Wisconsin's 8 congressional district races up for grabs in 2024 election
All of Wisconsin's eight U.S. House congressional district seats are up for grabs on Election Day, with all but one race featuring an incumbent candidate.
Only two of those districts are rated by Cook Political Report as being competitive, with the 3rd District race tagged as "leans Republican" and the 1st District race being categorized as "likely Republican."
In the state Legislature, Democrats hope that new district maps will help them chip away at the lopsided majorities Republicans have enjoyed in both chambers for more than a decade.
Almost half of Wisconsin's 33 state Senate seats and all 99 state Assembly seats are up for election this year.
In the state Assembly, Democrats have their most competitive campaign cycle in years, thanks in large part to the newly redrawn districts and the retirements they helped bring about.
Wisconsin was one of three "blue wall" states (Michigan and Pennsylvania are the others) that went narrowly for Trump in 2016 after almost 30 years of voting for Democratic presidential candidates. Four years later, Democrat Joe Biden won all three states back for Democrats with a margin in Wisconsin of about 20,000 votes out of nearly 3.3 million votes cast.
Congressional District 1
- Bryan Steil (Incumbent) - Republican Party
- Peter Barca - Democratic Party
- Chester Todd Jr. - Green Party
Congressional District 2
- Mark Pocan (Incumbent) - Democratic Party
- Erik Olsen - Republican Party
Congressional District 3
- Derrick Van Orden (Incumbent) - Republican Party
- Rebecca Cooke - Democratic Party
Congressional District 4
- Gwen Moore (Incumbent) - Democratic Party
- Tim Rogers - Republican Party
- Robert Raymond - Independent
Congressional District 5
- Scott Fitzgerald (Incumbent) - Republican Party
- Ben Steinhoff - Democratic Party
Congressional District 6
- Glenn Grothman (Incumbent) - Republican Party
- John Zarbano - Democratic Party
Congressional District 7
- Tom Tiffany (Incumbent) - Republican Party
- Kyle Kilbourn - Democratic Party
Congressional District 8
- Kristin Lyerly - Democratic Party
- Tony Wied - Republican Party
Decision notes on Wisconsin's overall results
In Wisconsin, the first vote results reported on election night tend to be a mix of ballots cast on Election Day and in advance. In the April presidential primaries, more than a third of counties reported most or all of their vote results in their first vote report of the night — including in-person Election Day votes as well as mail-in and early votes.
But larger counties, including the Democratic strongholds of Milwaukee and Dane, took much longer. Their first vote update of the night included only a small share of the total votes cast. In a close race, that likely means waiting for final results in both places to know who has won the state.
In 2016, Democrat Hillary Clinton lost to Trump despite winning Milwaukee County with 66% of the vote; Dane County, the home of Madison, with 70%; and LaCrosse County with 51%. Four years later, Biden won Milwaukee with 69% of the vote, Dane with 76% and LaCrosse with 56%, eking out a narrow statewide victory.
Trump carried Brown County, the home of Green Bay, in 2016 and 2020 with about 52% of the vote, but Biden improved upon Clinton's showing there by about 4 percentage points on his way to a win.
Along with support in the more rural parts of the state, Trump will likely need to post big numbers in the "WOW" counties of Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington in suburban Milwaukee to counter the heavy Democratic support Harris will likely claim in Milwaukee and Dane.