‘Whatcha see is whatcha get’

Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway says consistent leadership won her a second term

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Though storms in Madison held off until after polls closed April 4 at 8 p.m., Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway might have liked some slightly smoother sailing as results came in on election night. After posting the largest vote share in a Madison mayoral primary in decades in February with 60% of the vote, Rhodes-Conway’s lead slipped in the general election. She nevertheless defeated her opponent Gloria Reyes by a comfortable 11-point margin, 55%-44%.

The day saw historically high turnout for a spring election as a nationally watched state Supreme Court race topped the ballot, improving on already high primary turnout. In Madison, 59% of registered voters turned out to vote in the mayor’s race, an increase from about 36% turnout in the primary. The many voters who participated in the general election but not the primary seemed to break toward Reyes, a former Madison police officer and president of the Madison school board, who significantly improved her vote share from the primary, when she won 28% of votes citywide.

Supporters waiting for Rhodes-Conway to arrive at her election night party at Turn Key celebrated almost as loudly when the Associated Press called the state Supreme Court election for liberal Janet Protasiewicz unexpectedly early as they did when the victorious mayor arrived shortly after. Greeted by applause and hugs, Rhodes-Conway noticed that Protasiewicz was giving her victory speech on a muted TV and waited until she had finished her remarks before hopping up on the seat of a leather booth to address the crowd. She was more than OK with her race getting second billing on the night.

“Tonight was a great night for Wisconsin,” said Rhodes-Conway. “The Bucks won, the Brewers won, and Janet won.

“There’s a lot of work to be done still, to face the challenges of our growing city, and the opportunities that abound in Madison. And I’m so excited to do this work in a new political climate,” added Rhodes-Conway. “We’re going to continue to prioritize public safety, housing, fighting the climate crisis, equitable economic development, and investing in our young people.”

Those priorities have not changed much in Rhodes-Conway’s four years; she listed affordable housing, racial equity, climate change, and a rapid transit system as priorities in a 2019 interview with Isthmus ahead of the general election. She says her consistency has been key to her success.

“Whatcha see is whatcha get,” Rhodes-Conway tells Isthmus with an aw-shucks shrug. “What I heard on the campaign trail and what tonight confirms is that all the work that we've been doing over the past four years is on the right track. We’ve been working on the right issues. We’ve been working on the issues people care about, and we do need to continue doing that.”

While the outcome was expected, a night of unprecedented turnout in a spring election produced eye-popping vote totals. Reyes’s roughly 50,000 votes were more than Rhodes-Conway received in her victorious 2019 campaign against former Mayor Paul Soglin. But with almost 50% more voters participating this year, Rhodes-Conway’s 63,000 votes still left her with a comfortable cushion.

In some wards, turnout approached rates normally only seen during elections with national races. In one near-west side ward just north of Monroe Street, more than 80% of registered voters turned out. And Madisonians were not only going to the ballot box to vote for the Supreme Court race: More than 99% of those in Madison who voted for a Supreme Court candidate also voted for a candidate in the mayor’s race.

Rhodes-Conway again dominated wards on the isthmus and downtown, netting 40-point margins in some. Reyes, who only won two wards outright in the primary, did best in the outlying areas of the city, posting her biggest margins of victory in north-side wards and far-east side wards near I-90/94, some of which she won by 20 points.

Reyes’s significant improvement from the primary to the general might not surprise some. In her 2018 race for school board, Reyes upset an incumbent to take the seat, and this year made her underdog status a core theme of her campaign. A candidate who at times struggled to be taken as a serious challenger, Reyes found and rallied around pockets of discontent in the city over such policies as the Metro Transit system redesign and changes to single-family zoning, ultimately becoming a credible conduit for those dissatisfied with the incumbent mayor.

“I’ve been an underdog my entire life,” said Reyes in her election night remarks at the Caspian Grill on Madison’s far west side. “Although I will not serve as your next mayor, there's a young Black kid or a Latino student who was watching on TV right now, maybe talked about it in school in their classrooms. This will open up the doors of possibilities for them. I might not have won this election but I will continue to work tirelessly to make a positive impact.”

Reyes was an underdog when it came to money as well, with Rhodes-Conway’s campaign outspending Reyes’ campaign 2-to-1 since Jan. 1. 

Reyes raised about $24,000 in the most recent reporting period, from Feb. 7- March 20, while Rhodes-Conway raised about $76,000. More than $20,000 of the mayor’s total came from political action committees, including issue PACs supporting gun safety and abortion rights. Several labor union PACs, which bundle political contributions made by members, also contributed heavily to Rhodes-Conway.

Reyes says her campaign focused on reaching and turning out new and infrequent voters as it looked toward the general election post-primary.

“Kennedy Heights was an area that I grew up in, that was the first place that I was when my parents moved here,” Reyes tells Isthmus. “I hit those doors, even though they didn't have a history of voting, because I feel strongly that people who don't vote don't have a reason to vote. You have to give them a reason to vote, and we shouldn't ignore them.”

The strategy seems to have paid dividends. “I got a message today from someone who said ‘my mom walked from Kennedy Heights to Mendota Elementary School to vote for you,’” says Reyes. “That's what I'm talking about. Those are the voters I really reached. And those are the voters that I really care about. I care about those silent voices that we don't hear from, that are significantly impacted by the decisions that we make.”

For her part, Rhodes-Conway says the two weeks between this election and the start of her next term as mayor won’t be as frantic as the same period four years ago. Reflecting on her 2019 win, Rhodes-Conway says, “I was a lot more nervous, and I think I was oddly more nervous after I won. Like, ‘What do I do now?’” She says she credits former mayor Paul Soglin with helping her manage the short transition period.

This year Rhodes-Conway won’t have to scramble to hire staff and make appointments as she did ahead of her first term. She plans to get away with her partner over the weekend to recover from the campaign a bit — then, she says, “I’m excited to get back to work.”