PEWAUKEE, Wis. — President-elect Donald Trump won Wisconsin's 10 electoral votes, reclaiming the Republican battleground state he lost to President Biden in 2020 by just 0.4 percentage points.
As of 2:30 a.m. Wednesday, Mr. Trump, 78, had a 4-point lead over Vice President Kamala Harris, 60, in Wisconsin, 51.3% to 47.3, according to the Associated Press. %.
This is Trump's biggest victory to date in the dairy state, which he won by less than 1 percentage point in 2016.
In the week before the election, the former president rallied voters in Green Bay and Milwaukee in closing campaigns focused on the economy and immigration, promising better days ahead and linking Vice President Kamala Harris to Biden's policies. Ta.
Trump visited several Democratic cities, including his home base of Milwaukee, which he hailed as “home of the first and oldest school choice program.”
He declared that education is “the civil rights issue of our time,” as Republicans seek to make school choice an election issue in many states.
The former president also held rallies in dark-blue Dane County in the final month, trying to narrow the traditionally large Democratic lead in the high-turnout county.
Vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance and his surrogates also urged supporters to vote early in the weeks leading up to the election, despite Trump's previous objections.
Several Republican-aligned third-party groups, including Turning Point Action and Americans for Prosperity WI, waged a ground campaign to get the vote out.
The strategy paid off, as support from the Republican base and a surge in independent voters in the last few weeks helped push the former president over the finish line.
Trump won Wisconsin by 1 point in 2016, but the state gave the green light to Biden by 0.8 percentage points in 2020 — despite multiple recounts and legal challenges from Republicans. Despite that.
Both candidates campaigned hard here, each visiting red and blue strongholds in an effort to win over undecided voters and close the gap in crucial battleground states.
Polls show that Wisconsin is in a heated state with presidential candidates, with Trump at +0.2 in the RealClearPolling average of candidates heading into voting day.
