Wisconsin’s 8th State Senate District is one of the most competitive races this year, experts say. Using their fundraising edge, state Democrats are sending huge sums to their candidate there.

By Maggie Zale, THE BADGER PROJECT

A state senator in Wisconsin makes a little more than $57,000 per year. But the contenders for the 8th Senate District have each raised well over ten times that in their attempt to win the seat.

Approaching a total of $2 million with weeks still remaining before the election, Republican state Sen. Duey Stroebel and his Democratic opponent Jodi Habush Sinykin have raised the most of any state Legislature race in 2024. They are running for the hyper-competitive 8th Senate District, which includes the northern Milwaukee suburbs of Grafton, Menomonee Falls and Whitefish Bay.

Stroebel has reported raising more than $700,000 through late September, including a $200,000 donation to himself, according to his latest mandatory reports to the state. But Habush Sinykin, an attorney from Whitefish Bay, has reported raising nearly $1.2 million in 2024 through late September. The Democrat also raised and spent nearly $1.5 million last year in her unsuccessful bid to win the seat in a special election.

More than $700,000 of Habush Sinykin’s 2024 campaign cash has come from the state Democratic Party, a striking example of the organization’s huge fundraising advantage over the state GOP. By comparison, the Republican Party of Wisconsin has given Stroebel a paltry $83,000.

And those figures don’t include spending by political groups independent of the campaigns, which will undoubtedly push the total cost of the race even higher.

Thanks to a loophole in state campaign finance law created by a 2014 U.S. Supreme Court case and left open by the Republican-controlled Legislature, political parties can receive unlimited donations from individuals, and can donate unlimited amounts to candidates.

Stroebel was first elected to the state Senate in a special election in 2015 after serving two terms in the Assembly. But he currently serves in the neighboring 20th Senate District. His home was moved into the 8th in the redistricting earlier this year, so he will need to win in the new district to remain in the state Senate.

That may be a tougher climb than he’s used to. The district became friendlier to Democrats when it changed, said Ryan Weichelt, a UW-Eau Claire geography professor who focuses on redistricting.

“It will most likely be the closest state Senate race, in my opinion,” he said.

The Democratic candidate is a partner at Habush Habush & Rottier, the prominent personal injury law firm in Milwaukee. She has served on the Wisconsin Groundwater Advisory Committee and the Wisconsin Legislative Council’s Special Committee on the Great Lakes Compact as a policy expert in freshwater stewardship. She was also appointed to the Wisconsin DNR’s Wolf Management Plan Committee in 2021, according to her campaign website.

Stroebel sits on several high-profile committees, including as the vice-chair of the Legislature’s powerful, budget-writing Joint Committee on Finance. He also serves as chair of the Committee of Government Operations.

While political parties are not limited by state campaign finance laws, individuals, political candidates and political action committees are. A candidate for state Senate can take no more than $2,000 per election from any of them.

Stroebel has received the maximum $2,000 from more than 70 contributors, including from the PACs of Microsoft, Walmart, the Wisconsin Insurance Alliance, the Wisconsin Builders Association and the Bell Ambulance Inc. Employees PAC, according to his most recent campaign finance reports. 

But along with political parties, no caps exist on the amount political candidates in Wisconsin can donate to themselves, per state law. This has allowed Stroebel to donate $200,000 to his own campaign.

Habush Sinykin has received the maximum $2,000 donation from more than 50 contributors in 2024, including many unions, such as the Wisconsin Laborers District Council and Wisconsin State Council of Carpenters, according to Follow the Money. She also received the maximum donation from Lynde Uihlein, a top political donor to Democrats in Wisconsin and cousin of Republican megadonors Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, and Robert Habush, her father. 

Habush Sinykin also received a total of $12,000 from several members of the Lubar family of the Lubar & Co. private investment firm in Milwaukee.

All that political cash translates into waves of political advertising, on the airwaves, online and in mailboxes in the hyper-competitive 8th.

Even before the state’s legislative districts were redrawn earlier this year, the district had a history of close elections. In the 2020 presidential election, 49.5% of the district voted for Biden there, while 48.9% voted for Trump, Weichelt said.  

Then the district got a little more left-leaning in the most recent redistricting, as “the inclusion of the areas near Whitefish Bay add more Democratic voters,” Weichelt said.

The top donors to Stroebel in the 2024 election cycle (so far)

Top donors to Habush Sinykin in the 2024 election cycle (so far)

This story was produced with support from INN’s Rural News Network and Microsoft’s Democracy Forward program.

The Badger Project is a nonpartisan, citizen-supported journalism nonprofit in Wisconsin.