Martin Rakacolli
However the presidential election goes, Dane County did its part for former Vice President Joe Biden. The Democratic enclave delivered 42,000 more votes for Biden than it did for Hillary Clinton in 2016 — nearly a 20 percent increase.
Biden won Wisconsin by a razor-close margin — just over 20,000. That’s a little less than the .77 percent victory that put the state in the Trump column in 2016.
Clinton received 70.4 percent of the vote four years ago. Biden won the county with 75.5 percent. Trump also received 7,500 more votes in Dane County than he did in 2016. Even so, the margin of victory for Democrats in 2020 was 35,000 more votes than four years earlier. Only the town of Dane and the city of Edgerton (which is only partially in the county) went for Trump in Dane County. Third-party candidates garnered more than 20,000 votes in 2016. That dropped to 5,800 this year.
Voter turnout was massive and at record levels: 89.2 percent in Dane County and 84.7 percent in the city of Madison. Biden won 220 of Dane County’s 228 voting wards. And that’s including five wards with fewer than five voters. The Democratic nominee won every polling place in Madison and received 84 percent of the vote. The polling places at O’Keeffe Middle School and Wil-Mar Center on Madison’s isthmus had the most lop-sided victories. Both wards went for Biden with 96 percent of the vote.
On Election Day, Trump was ahead in Wisconsin. But as absentee ballots started coming in from the cities of Milwaukee, Kenosha and Green Bay in the early hours of Nov. 4, Biden pulled ahead. Dane County was done with its unofficial tally of all ballots by around 12:30 a.m. Why was Dane able to count a record number of absentee ballots so much quicker?
“Awesomeness,” Dane County Clerk Scott McDonell tells Isthmus, offering no other explanation.
Martin Rakacolli
Results by county for the 2016 presidential election.
Polling, as in 2016, severely underestimated Trump’s support in Wisconsin. In the final week of October, Siena College/The New York Times Upshot found an 11-point edge for Biden. ABC News/The Washington Post had Biden up by 17. The Marquette Law School poll had Biden ahead in the state by four or five points since July.
The Trump campaign announced Nov. 4 it intends to request a recount in Wisconsin. Even though the margin is slim, the last time the state performed a recount it did not change the outcome.
In 2016, Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein requested (and paid for) a statewide recount. That netted Trump an increase of just over 100 votes. Even former Republican Gov. Scott Walker is skeptical about the prospects of a recount tipping Wisconsin to Trump, tweeting Nov. 4, “20,000 [votes] is a high hurdle.”
“After recount in 2011 race for WI Supreme Court, there was a swing of 300 votes,” Walker posted. “After recount in 2016 Presidential race in WI, @realDonaldTrump numbers went up by 131.”
According to the latest unofficial tally, Milwaukee County gave Biden 69.4 percent of the vote, netting Democrats 20,000 more votes than in 2016. Biden made gains in Brown and Winnebago counties — home to Green Bay and Oshkosh — though majorities in both counties still put Trump on top. In 2016, the president received nearly 14,000 more votes than Clinton in Brown and around 6,400 in Winnebago. Biden narrowed that to 10,300 and 3,700 respectively. The Democrats also did better in the GOP strongholds of Waukesha and Ozaukee counties.
In western Wisconsin and the Northwoods, Trump maintained the swing to the right seen in 2016. The president increased his percentage of victory in Trempealeau County by four points; three points in Jackson County; nearly five points in Richland County; and three points in Dunn County. In 2016, Trump won 23 more counties than Obama won in 2008 and 2012. Biden narrowed that to 21 counties by flipping Door and Sauk.
With Trump falsely declaring victory and threatening to challenge election results in the U.S. Supreme Court, Madison is set to hit the streets today. Protests are planned downtown for Wednesday afternoon and night.
The Associated Press has not called a winner in Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania. It might take until at least Friday to know the unofficial totals in Pennsylvania. If Biden holds on to leads in Nevada, he’ll reach exactly the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency.
Editor's note: This story was updated to reflect the Associated Press calling Wisconsin and Michigan for Joe Biden.
