GOP group launches new ads seeking to turn out Trump voters for Schimel in Wisconsin race

A major Republican group is launching two new ads seeking to turn out Trump voters in an effort to elect conservative judicial candidate Brad Schimel in the high-stakes Wisconsin Supreme Court race.

The Republican State Leadership Committee's (RSLC) Judicial Fairness Initiative (JFI) rolled out the new advertising on Monday, which were first shared with The Hill.

The two ads are looking to encourage the same voters who cast ballots for President Trump last November to once again show up for an off-year spring election for Schimel, who is vying against liberal candidate Susan Crawford for an open seat on the high court.

Whoever wins the April 1 election will determine the partisan ideological balance on the court.

“What if you don’t vote on April 1st? It would be like Trump never won, with the far-left in control of our country,” says a narrator in part of the one 30-second ad, called “Needs Us.” “If we stayed home then, that could have been our reality, and if we don’t vote now against liberal Susan Crawford, it could be. Last year, we showed up for Trump, and he won.”

Text on the ad urges voters to “Vote for Trump ally, Brad Schimel, on April 1^st.”

In the second 30-second ad, called “Buzzkill,” different people situated at a bar discourage viewers from casting their ballot for Crawford.

“She’s not right for Wisconsin,” one woman says in the ad, while another woman says, “She’s the last thing that we need.”

The actors say they voted for Trump “To get men out of women’s sports,” “Criminals and illegal immigrants off our streets,” and “common sense.” One of the actors suggests Crawford “could roll it all back.”

The RSLC’s Judicial Fairness Initiative notes the ads are a part of a larger $2 million campaign in the Wisconsin race, which includes mailing statewide, TV ads and targeting on digital. The first ad in particular is notable for how overtly it seeks to tie Schimel to Trump.

"Wisconsinites have sent a clear message: they want commonsense restored in our politics. This starts with embracing the policy agenda of the Trump administration to put Wisconsin and our nation back on the right path," RSLC-JFI President Edith Jorge-Tuñón said in a statement.

"Should Susan Crawford be elected to the bench, she would align herself with the far left, consistently working to undermine both the Trump administration and state Republicans at every turn.”

Both sides are seeking to turn out their respective bases in the April election, as Republicans hope to see the same GOP voters engaged in the November election come out again next week. The RSLC’s Judicial Fairness Initiative is doing so by aligning Trump with Schimel, despite the fact that the race is technically nonpartisan.

Trump and Musk have both endorsed Schimel in the race.

Meanwhile, Crawford and Democrats are looking to harness voter backlash against Musk as a way to drive their voters to the polls.

Derrick Honeyman, a spokesman for the Crawford campaign, responded to the ads attacking Schimel for his handling of a rape test kit backlog when he was Wisconsin attorney general and for taking campaign contributions from a defendant’s attorney amid an ongoing case when he was serving as Waukesha County district attorney.

"Looks like an empty bar with just water on the table and not a beer in sight—Brad Schimel and Elon Musk's out-of-state allies really know nothing about Wisconsin,” Honeyman said in a statement.

“Schimel is too corrupt for Wisconsin, and voters should send him home on April 1, just like they did in 2018,” he added.

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