# 2025 Wisconsin Supreme Court Election The **April 1, 2025** election for an open seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court was the most expensive judicial race in U.S. history, at more than **$100 million**, double the previous record set in 2023. It was also the first real test of [[Elon Musk]]'s political money after he joined the second Trump administration. Musk-affiliated groups spent more than **$25 million** backing the conservative candidate, and Musk revived the [[America PAC $1 Million Petition Sweepstakes]] for the race. The conservative lost by ten points. ## The race | | Susan Crawford | Brad Schimel | |---|---|---| | Alignment | Liberal | Conservative | | Background | Dane County circuit judge (2018–) | Waukesha County circuit judge (2019–); state attorney general 2015–2019 | | Result | **1,301,137 (55.02%)** | 1,062,330 (44.92%) | The seat was open because liberal Justice Ann Walsh Bradley retired after 30 years. Crawford's win kept the court's **4–3 liberal majority**, likely through at least August 2028. Turnout was comparable to a midterm and far above any previous Wisconsin Supreme Court race. ## Musk's role Musk treated the race as national. At his Green Bay rally he told voters it was "a vote for which party controls the House of Representatives," a reference to the court's power over congressional maps. [[America PAC]] and a second Musk-aligned group, Building America's Future, put nearly $20 million behind Schimel by the final weekend. Total Musk-affiliated spending on ads and field work ended above $25 million. **The giveaway.** America PAC offered **$100 to voters who signed a petition "in opposition to activist judges,"** and named a $1 million winner. Then Musk posted that he would personally hand out two $1 million checks at a rally. His first post framed the checks as thanks to voters "for taking the time to vote." Hours later he revised it to tie them to the petition, with recipients as petition spokespeople. - **March 28:** Attorney General [[Josh Kaul]] sued to block the payments under the state law against "offering or promising to give anything of value to an elector in order to induce the elector to go to the polls." - **March 29:** A state appeals court denied Kaul's emergency motion. - **March 30:** The Wisconsin Supreme Court declined to take the case. It also declined Musk's request that two justices who had campaigned for Crawford recuse themselves. That evening in Green Bay, Musk handed $1 million checks to two people, one of them the chair of the Wisconsin College Republicans. - **April 1:** Crawford won by 10.1 points. ## The enforcement aftermath - **July 10, 2026.** The [[Wisconsin Elections Commission]], which has three Democratic and three Republican members, voted **5–1** in closed session that there was **probable cause** Musk violated the state's election-bribery law "by making a social media post offering one million dollars to individuals who voted … in order to induce them to vote in that election." It referred two voter complaints, from Milwaukee and Green Bay, to the Brown County district attorney. - **August 2026.** The Brown County DA asked for a special prosecutor, citing a conflict. La Crosse County DA **Tim Gruenke** took the case. - **August 25, 2026.** Gruenke declined to charge. He said no jury would likely convict "after considering the intent, the second post, and the fact nothing of value was ever given to anyone for voting." He called the original post "a poorly worded statement that was corrected and brought into compliance with the law." - **Pending:** a civil suit by the **Wisconsin Democracy Campaign** in Brown County Circuit Court. ## Why it matters **The money lost.** In a statewide race where Musk personally made himself the issue, his record spending and cash giveaways coincided with a double-digit loss. It was the first electoral signal that his political brand, weeks into his [[DOGE]] tenure, was a liability in a swing state. **The legal template held.** A bipartisan elections commission found probable cause, and the case still ended without charges. Two things protected Musk: rewriting the offer within hours, and paying petition "spokespeople" rather than voters. Together with the Philadelphia ruling in 2024, the result is that swing-state cash offers routed through a petition have now survived both a lottery challenge and a bribery referral. ## See Also - [[America PAC $1 Million Petition Sweepstakes]] — the 2024 original - [[America PAC Timeline]] - [[America PAC]] · [[Elon Musk]] · [[Josh Kaul]] · [[Wisconsin Elections Commission]]