For Wisconsin Dems, a 2024 win in the battleground state is years in the making

MADISON, Wis. — Democrats in the state believe they have been laying the groundwork for winning the 2024 presidential election for roughly seven years. 

Wisconsin Democrats Chair Ben Wikler told Fox News Digital in an interview that their “everything, everywhere, all at once” and neighbor-to-neighbor organizing has been building the infrastructure for Democrat nominee Vice President Harris to win the critical battleground state. 

He said Democrats in Wisconsin have been “building teams of neighbors to take responsibility for talking to folks in their surrounding area” continuously “for the last seven years.”

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Harris and Trump are neck and neck in Wisconsin. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

The Harris campaign is then building off the groundwork they have spent years laying for Democrats, he said. 

Wikler attributed recent statewide electoral wins for Democrats in the last six years to this organizing strategy. 

“What we know is that a trusted messenger matters almost as much as the message,” Wikler said. “And there are Democrats in rural areas talking to other rural voters, in suburbs talking to other suburban voters, in cities talking to other city-dwellers about their votes.”

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Milwaukee City Hall (AP Photo/Morry Gash)

“We think that the messages that Harris and Walz are carrying, they can resonate with everybody,” he said. “And having a messenger who can actually start that conversation and have it not at the talking-point level but at ‘what’s actually happening in our lives and communities’ level makes all the difference. “

Wikler noted that “Wisconsin is the perennial tipping-point state,” referencing its past electoral shifts from going for former President Trump in 2016 to President Biden in 2020.

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A woman dons a cheese hat with an American flag on it in Wisconsin. (Reuters)

“On the Democratic side, we have a real ground organizing volunteer operation, and we have 16,000 people who’ve done their first volunteer shift with Democrats” since Harris became the nominee late in the campaign. 

He hit Republicans and allied organizations for using “paid canvassers, people who are hired to go knock on doors but don’t necessarily have a connection to the community where they’re having those conversations.”

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Donald Trump and Kamala Harris (Fox News)

“I think we’ll see at the end of the day which of these strategies has a bigger effect,” Wikler added. 

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This week, Fox News Power Rankings rated Wisconsin as a “Toss Up” going into the presidential election. 

On the ground, Republicans and Democrats alike are expecting the state to come down to just tens of thousands of votes, as it did in 2016 and 2020.

Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.