>> The following program is a PBS Wisconsin Original production.

>> The National Winds of Change meant a great night for Democrats in Wisconsin and very different political priorities to come in 2027.

>> Wisconsin.

This is a very good day.

This is a very good day.

>> I'm Frederica Freyberg tonight on here.

And now a recap of Tuesday's results.

And what a trifecta means for Democrats in the state capital.

Senator Tammy Baldwin shares her take on her party's newfound dominance in Congress.

And we speak with the last state leader to win with such a commanding lead.

Former Republican Governor Tommy Thompson.

It's "Here& Now" for November 6th.

>> Funding for Here and now is provided by the Focus Fund for journalism.

[MUSIC] Wisconsin.

>> The crashing blue wave hit Wisconsin in these midterm elections.

Much like the rest of the country.

It gave Democrats a trifecta at the state Capitol, with David Crowley winning the seat for governor and a majority for Democrats in both the state Senate and Assembly.

Attorney general Josh Kaul also won his third term here.

And now, senior political reporter Zac Schultz was in Milwaukee on Tuesday and brings us this report.

>> Milwaukee has made a lot of history in the last couple of weeks, with the Brewers winning the World Series and County Executive David Crowley becoming the first Black man to be elected governor in Wisconsin.

So perhaps it was fitting.

Crowley came out on stage using the walk up song that typically introduces World Series MVP William Contreras.

[MUSIC] >> Thank you, thank you, Wisconsin.

>> This election night party featured very little of the anxiety common to most campaigns.

Watching the results come in.

Instead, revelers who weren't watching Crowley's lead expand were focused on their dance moves.

And Wausau Tom Tiffany supporters realized the national wave would sweep away Republicans in Wisconsin.

>> Tonight was not the outcome we had hoped for.

>> This race was the most expensive in state history, with an estimated $200 million spent by both sides.

[MUSIC] victory is the largest in three decades, leaving no room for election conspiracies about voter fraud.

>> We're going to be magnanimous tonight.

>> Tiffany and Crowley were gracious and accepting the outcome.

>> Despite our differences.

I've never doubted that he loves the state that we both call home.

>> At age 40, Crowley is the youngest Wisconsin governor in the modern era.

>> But Wisconsin, this is a very good day.

This is a very good day because of you.

A boy who grew up facing eviction will now live in the governor's residence.

>> For months ago, Crowley wasn't even in the race, having dropped out in July.

But as the Democratic primary blew up, Crowley got back in with the support of incumbent Governor Tony Evers.

>> Governor, I am proud to call you my friend.

Honored to have had your support in my campaign, and I will build on what you have been doing.

>> And have done to keep moving the great state of Wisconsin for.

>> Unlike Governor Evers, governor elect Crowley can make good on his campaign pledges because he will have the support of the new Democratic controlled legislature.

The expected leaders, Representative Greta Neubauer and Senator Diane Hesselbein, were on hand Tuesday to announce their new majorities.

>> We will show that government can be a force for good in people's lives, and that things will be different when Democrats are in charge.

>> The new session doesn't start until January, but Democrats will start planning their agenda immediately.

>> We're going to have to caucus.

We're going to be caucusing next week and making sure that we're in alignment with the Assembly and the governor Crowley as well.

time Democrats had complete control, they lost it all in the very next election.

>> In a state like ours, the voters keep everybody honest.

And tonight, they told all of us in both parties, we are sending you to Madison to get something done.

Now go do it.

>> Well, the work starts immediately.

For one night at least, the party would go on.

>> We are one people, one Wisconsin.

And tonight we choose to move forward together.

Y'all.

>> Reporting from Milwaukee.

I'm Zac Schultz for "Here& Now".

>> Let's get to.

>> Work this week on Inside Wisconsin Politics.

election night.

Look at what the results mean going forward.

>> There are wave elections and there are wave elections.

And it just seems like this is about as big a one as any of us have experienced in the last well, in this century, let's say Ana, when you look at this election and specifically what happened here in Wisconsin, what stands out?

>> I think there are kind of two questions that, as we kind of look more into the results and talk more to voters, we'll get to parse a little bit more.

But essentially, was this an election for Democrats or was this a repudiation of Donald Trump?

And so I think Democrats also kind of need to figure that out for themselves, because Democrats here, you know, took the held the governorship, took the legislature.

They're going to govern for this pretty diverse state that is historically and still a purple state.

And so figuring out kind of exactly what they are being sent to Madison to do, I think is going to be really important if Democrats want to avoid sort of past patterns of getting in power for about five minutes and then losing it all again.

>> Zac, what about you?

>> I think that the extra cushion that the Democrats got in the legislature is the key thing here.

We were talking in past podcasts about what happens if it's 5049 in the Assembly and the fact that Democrats get to 53 seats.

That means they've got a few people that they can lose.

And every time you have one of these waves, some people get into office who maybe didn't think they were going to get there, but then they think, I want to be here for a while.

So instead of thinking about what can we pass while we have power, they start thinking about, what do I have to do to get reelected?

So having that extra cushion in the assembly in 18 to 15 majority in the Senate makes a big difference when it comes to them starting to strategize how aggressive and how bold can we be when you don't have to worry about getting every single vote, every single time?

>> Rich, how about you?

>> It was just astonishing to see the margins.

Not in not just in Wisconsin, but nationwide.

And I think Zac and Anya have great points.

And I would agree.

I mean, Dems can think of this as a mandate that it was their policies that people wanted and they could theoretically, with a trifecta in Wisconsin, could just do every wish list thing that they wanted as fast as possible.

Lord knows, we saw something like that on the Republican side back in 2011, when a lot of bills moved very quickly.

So.

But I also talked to state senator who was reelected, Jeff Smith here in western Wisconsin, and he said he's been urging Democrats not to seek retribution.

He said, we've got busy, you know, a a big plate of things that we need to do.

We owe that to people.

We can't be playing games.

But I would imagine there's others within the caucuses in both chambers that wouldn't mind just giving the Republicans a taste of their own medicine.

>> You can see that full episode on our website.

In addition to sweeping the state House, Democrats also leveled up in Congress with the most surprising upset being in Wisconsin's first congressional district, where Republican incumbent Bryan Steil was unseated by Mitchell Berman, the first Democrat to hold the district in more than 30 years.

Another flip came with a contentious rematch in the third Congressional District between Republican incumbent Derrick Van Orden and Democratic challenger Rebecca Cook, bringing Wisconsin's congressional districts evenly split between the two parties.

>> I'm going to step out here.

I'm going to call Rebecca Cooke and congratulate her for winning.

That's what's going to happen.

You know why?

Because now she's going to represent me in Congress, and it's incumbent upon you to make sure that you understand that and that you support her.

That's who we are as Americans.

That's who we are as Republicans.

And that's what we're going to do.

So I wish Rebecca Cooke the absolute, very, very best.

And if she needs any help, my staff will be at her beck and call to make sure that we have a smooth transition, because this has never been about me.

It's always been about you.

>> I'm on a mission to make sure make our health care more affordable, to keep our family farms running, to fund our public schools, to bring down the damn price of gas.

This is a victory for all of us.

For anyone who is struggling to pay your rent or your mortgage, drowning in medical debt, worrying if you have to sell the farm.

Help is coming.

Yes.

>> The new and solid Democratic majorities in the U.S.

House and Senate herald a new day in Washington and across the country.

What will it mean for voters who made their voices heard this week?

We turn to Democratic U.S.

Senator Tammy Baldwin.

And thanks very much for being here.

>> It's a joy to join you.

>> So when you were watching the returns come in on Tuesday night, what was your reaction?

>> It was.

>> Incredible.

I had been spending the last many weeks campaigning in Wisconsin with Democrats running for state legislature and with David Crowley.

And I knew from what I was hearing, interacting with voters that something was something was afoot.

And boy, was it exciting to watch the returns come in not only across the state of Wisconsin, but to see from the East Coast all the way through to the West Coast.

I a real message being sent, you know, as I was campaigning, along with so many candidates universally, voters were talking about their struggles, their struggles to afford things, to make ends meet, their groceries, their gas, etc.

and they knew very clearly who was at fault.

They knew very clearly that the president and his Republican supporters support of the war, tariffs, trade wars, were driving up their costs, and they made it clear it was a repudiation of the Trump and Republican leadership of the Congress.

And now we have our work cut out for us to address those very issues that the voters talked about.

>> So Democratic consultant Joe Zepecki cautioned this was not, quote, an embrace of the Democratic Party, but a repudiation of Donald Trump and Maga, and that the Democrats, he said, need to govern like it.

Do you agree with that?

And how do lawmakers proceed?

>> Well, that's exactly how I just characterized my interaction with voters over the past many, many weeks.

They're struggling small businesses, farmers, families are struggling, and they're smart.

They know who's to blame.

So moving forward, there's a number of things we have to do.

We have to do oversight and accountability to make sure that the corruption that we have seen over the last year and, well, almost two years now, does, comes to an end.

You know, this president is enriching himself at the same time that others are just struggling to get by.

But we also need to address the high cost of things immediately.

And there's things we can do to bring down the cost of gas and diesel, and to bring down the costs of health care and prescription medication.

And there's things we can do to bring down the cost of child care, all the things that people are struggling with.

And I think we can do oversight and hold this administration to account.

At the same time that we're addressing the very central needs that voters have told us, not just in Wisconsin, but across the country.

>> President Trump has said that he would work with Democrats.

Where do you see the most play in reality?

>> You know, I think that we are all.

Focused right now on the affordability aspect of things.

We need to rein in this presence, lawlessness.

I mean, let me just remind folks that the war in Iran is illegal.

It has never been sanctioned by Congress in any way.

And so we need to bring that to an end.

I hope he understands that this election was in large part about that lawless act of his.

I hope we can work with him on a number of pieces of legislation focused on child care, focused on bringing down the cost of health care.

And we just need to be very clear that the voters gave us marching orders, and we are beholden to the voters who have placed trust in us and our leadership.

And we've got to go out and fight for them.

And we're going to do everything we can with every lever we can to get this president on board or, or work around him when we need to.

>> Why do you think voters punished Republicans all the way down the line for their repudiation of Donald Trump?

>> You know, there were hardly any Republicans who were willing to stand up to Donald Trump.

I think about folks who were horrified by his illegal war in Iran, but vote after vote because we kept bringing war powers resolutions to the floor.

They stood, you know, in lockstep with him, shoulder to shoulder with him, unwilling to say the very obvious truth that this is an illegal war of choice that Donald Trump brought us into.

And we saw that over and over again on numerous measures, including the huge tax breaks in what he called the big, beautiful bill we call the big ugly bill, huge tax cuts for the very richest, for the well-heeled corporations.

At the same time, he was ending Medicaid for hundreds of thousands of folks across the United States, including 270,000 here in Wisconsin.

We saw, you know, this this big ugly bill with tax breaks for the wealthiest.

At the same time, they were attacking the most vulnerable and their stability.

People saw that people voted and, you know, we we now have a situation where people saw it wasn't just Trump.

He had enablers.

He had enablers in the House.

He had enablers in the Senate, and a number of them aren't returning to the Congress of the United States.

>> This election is being called the beginning of the end of the Trump era.

If that's true in your mind, what era follows?

>> Well, certainly we are seeing underscored the end of the Trump era just by the several announcements just two days after the election of people departing the administration, whether that's a cabinet secretary or I suspect there'll be more or high ranking officials in various departments.

So you're going to see his leverage decline dramatically.

He's a lame duck president, but he is also one without the power in Congress to do his bidding.

And I think that, you know, hopefully this sets the stage.

If we deliver what the voters have demanded of us, they placed their trust in us.

The next era is going to be building towards a new Democratic president to succeed this administration.

>> Senator Tammy Baldwin, thanks very much for joining us.

>> Thank you for having me.

>> Milwaukee's central count operation is often under heavy scrutiny and used as a scapegoat for voter fraud.

On Tuesday, election workers and observers were on high alert.

A few kinks in the process still arose, including a mechanical issue with two large tabulators, a missing piece of security tape, and a couple hundred ballots missing unique ID numbers, all of which were quickly resolved.

Officials like Milwaukee election chief Paulina Gutierrez emphasize caution when criticizing an operation of Milwaukee's size, and says to keep issues like these in perspective.

>> We have issues with machines every election, and we have technicians.

If you saw they came right away, they handled the situation.

Our poll workers dealt with it.

We have contingencies in place, but I was grateful to our technicians that we didn't have to move wards.

They were able to stay at the machines.

And so despite the some of the machine issues we have, I mean, they processed thousands and thousands of ballots and we were able to catch up and we're moving along.

>> David Crowley is also moving along to the work of being governor elect.

Asked about his transition team, he said it will represent the whole of Wisconsin.

>> Right now, I'm focusing on making sure that this cabinet, this transition team and all the workers that we're going to be employing is representative of the state of Wisconsin.

I'm not looking to just bring Milwaukee and Madison to Madison.

I want to make sure this is representative of the entire state of Wisconsin.

But it's not just folks who are who have an expertise in their field.

It's about how they care for these communities, how they're able to build relationships across the state of Wisconsin, because we have to work together in order to do this.

And it's not just working with state government and the legislators and the workers there.

It's about working with local municipalities, our cities, our villages, our towns and our counties to make sure that we are rowing in the right direction so we can all get ahead.

You know, we we have to bring some balance when it comes down to the state legislature as well as our local municipalities, because we have seen under Republican control that they're willing to take everything from our local municipalities and local units of government in order to make themselves look good.

And so I'm focusing on building this transition to where we're going to be able to be able to build the necessary relationships possible to where we can put politics aside and really focus on moving the state forward.

>> By the numbers, Democratic governor elect David Crowley beat Republican Tom Tiffany by 8.2 points.

That's the largest winning margin since 1998, when four term Republican Governor Tommy Thompson won by 21 points.

Here to talk about this year's election, the Republican rout.

And what's next is Tommy Thompson.

And governor, thanks very much for being here.

>> Well, thank you, Frederica, and it's always a pleasure to be on your program.

And it's always a pleasure for me to get a chance to see you again.

>> What was it like for you to see Republicans go down in such spectacular fashion?

>> It hurts.

You know, I've been a Republican my whole life.

I liken it to 1970, when I was a at that time, a sophomore Republican legislator from Elroy, Wisconsin.

And we went down from 58 to 36 in the Assembly.

It was a smashing defeat.

And it had shades of that.

When I was looking at the election on on Tuesday night, the third.

It just you know, it just hurts when your party gets decimated like the Republican Party is, was a complete rejection across the country.

>> And.

>> No state really was saved by it.

It was a Democrat purple wave.

And I keep telling people, Wisconsin is a Democratic state.

And the sooner or later people are going to come to the realization.

That's correct.

>> So you say that about Wisconsin being a Democratic state, and yet the notion of it being purple was just propped up by maps.

And arguably, you know what Senator Baldwin put it as Republicans enabling Donald Trump.

>> That that is not true.

I mean, the maps have been changed.

There's no question about it.

And now they are.

And it's a Democrat state and it's a blue state.

And and Madison is growing.

Dane County is growing.

And those are Democratic voters.

So for the for the foreseeable future, until the Republican Party reorganize and recognizes that they need like what I did when back when I ran for governor.

Get into Dane County.

Madison, the universities, Milwaukee and start building up a Republican flavor of Republican Party in those areas.

We're going to continue to lose the only solution for Republicans is to reach out and start realizing that they've got to have a better message, and they got to go in and talk to Democrat voters.

>> What's that message?

>> That message is, is less government, more decision making by the individuals, less taxes.

But at the same time, taking care of people, coming up with initiatives to build housing for the homeless, be able to come up with initiatives to make sure that everybody, like I did with BadgerCare.

You know, the Democrats now take credit for it, but it was me that started BadgerCare, and all the Democrats were opposed to it.

All of those kind of issues that people want.

You got to come up with a Republican initiative in those areas.

If you ever are going to come back and be the majority party.

>> Do you continue to support President Trump, even given what just happened?

>> President Trump was not helpful in this election.

And the people certainly repudiated President Trump.

His popularity is at 31% across the country.

That's it.

That tells me that that is a rejection.

And the Republican Party has allowed Donald Trump, the president, to be able to make all the decisions as to what direction Maga is going.

That's not right.

The House, the Senate and state legislatures, state governors have got to get in if they want to change this party and become a majority party again, they got to start taking some control and start making their own decisions.

And not just let's the president of the United States make the decisions.

That's the issue.

>> Didn't any Maga alignment on your part go against kind of your more pragmatic approach to working across the aisle?

>> Yes.

You know, I always have told people this, Democrats and Republicans alike, and I'll tell the same thing to the current Democrat governor, David Crowley.

You run as a Democrat and you come up with Democrat ideas in the campaign, and you run as a Republican.

But once you get elected, then you should become the governing party.

You should become Democrats for governing, Republicans for governing.

Join together and come up with great ideas.

The truth of the matter is Frederica is Democrats have got some good ideas.

Not many, but they've got a lot of ideas that are good.

Republicans have a lot of ideas that are good.

Wouldn't it be a better society if we came together and meld those ideas and really come up with great initiatives to solve the homeless problem, to solve economic development, to solve the health care problem?

>> What about at the state level with Democratic trifecta governor in both houses?

Do you see David Crowley and the other new majority leaders moving quickly to undo all of the Republican policy?

>> Absolutely.

They're going to move with warp speed.

And I think that's wrong.

But that's what they're going to do.

You know, when you win, you want to be able to say, I won.

And this is elections have consequences.

As the old saying goes.

And it does.

Elections have consequences.

All of these issues, some of my favorite issues are going to go by the wayside.

And I'm sorry about that, because there are good issues and good.

It's done a good job, but that's.

But that's politics.

You got to recognize it.

All I'm telling is David, the new governor, to be able to be cautious and start reaching out to the Republicans and bring them in.

He will be a stronger governor and a better governor if he does that, if he is able to come and become more bipartisan, instead of saying, now I'm just going to smash the Republicans because we won.

I think that's the wrong attitude.

And I'm hopeful he's going to be more of a bipartisan, more centrist governor.

I don't think he's going to be.

But I hope he is.

And I'm going to caution him and advise him if he ever talks to me.

>> All right.

Governor Tommy Thompson, thanks very much.

>> Rubi for more on this and other issues facing Wisconsin, visit our website at PBS wisconsin.org and click on the news tab.

That's our program for tonight.

I'm Frederica Freyberg.

Have a great weekend.

>> Funding for Here and Now is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and friends of PBS Wisconsin.