Donald Trump may be getting all the headlines, but partisan struggles in state capitals across the country may do far more to change America than the drama surrounding the first ex-president to be charged with a crime.
Clashes between Democrats and Republicans over issues like abortion and guns, which could also shape future voting laws and electoral maps, foreshadow the great debates to come in the 2024 presidential campaign. These simmering conflicts also reflect a nation divided over its cultural and political identity and show how sometimes small shifts in the balance of power can have momentous consequences.
In Wisconsin – one of the most competitive swing states in recent presidential elections – a liberal judge won a race for a state Supreme Court seat Tuesday in a victory that could restore abortion rights in the state and lead to the redrawing of maps that the GOP had shaped to their advantage. The magnitude of her victory – by around 200,000 votes – will ring alarm bells for the GOP.
In North Carolina, Republicans were celebrating after a Democratic state representative, who was elected by a nearly 20-point margin a few months ago, flipped to the GOP this week, giving the party veto-proof majorities in both state legislative chambers as they seek new curbs on abortion and more restrictive election laws.
America’s tortured divide on firearms is driving an extraordinary showdown in Tennessee. Instead of working to combat mass shootings after last week’s massacre at a Nashville school, Republican state legislators want to kick out three Democrats who joined a gun control protest.
National Democrats are, meanwhile, looking at Chicago, where Bernie Sanders-backed progressive Brandon Johnson won Tuesday’s mayoral runoff. He beat a moderate with a tough-on-crime message by making a more nuanced pitch than his previous support for calls to…
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