Donald Trump won the White House in 2016 by tearing down the famous electoral “blue wall”, taking the states of Michigan and Wisconsin, along with Pennsylvania, from the Democrats. He lost the White House four years later when the same states went to Joe Biden.
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Both parties have already reached out to the Midwest ahead of next year's presidential election, each choosing to hold their national conventions in the region. The Republicans will hold their event in July 2024 in Milwaukee, the largest city in the state of Wisconsin. Democrats announced Tuesday that they will hold theirs next month in Chicago, just 90 miles away in blue Illinois.
By choosing Chicago over fellow finalists New York and Atlanta, the Democratic National Committee said, the party is “returning to the Midwest, a critical Democratic stronghold,” and called Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan and Minnesota part of ” blue walls' critical for Biden. A 2020 victory, as well as his party's success in last fall's midterm elections.
That overlooked Trump's success in the Midwest four years ago, but the DNC also noted that Chicago embodied the “formidable coalition” of voters that will be vital to Biden in his expected 2024 re-election campaign.
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“We see the importance of these states and the recognition by the Democratic Party that we have to win them,” said Democratic Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, who has been a leading supporter of Chicago's bid.
The Midwest wasn't the only part of the country that boosted Biden in 2020. He flipped two Sun Belt states, Arizona and Georgia, and carried Pennsylvania, which is often considered part of the “blue wall” but isn't in the Midwest. Still, the selection by both parties of Midwestern convention sites shows the region's enduring political importance — even if it's no guarantee of support.
“The Midwest is the place to be,” said Cam Savage, a Republican strategist who has worked with top GOP elected officials across the region. “You see Pennsylvania to Wisconsin — and pretty much everything in between — as key battleground states in any national election these days.”
It was the second straight election cycle that Democrats looked to the Midwest for their convention. In 2020, the party chose Milwaukee to host, but ended up essentially holding it due to the coronavirus pandemic.
This year, it was up to Biden to choose a site, and he said Chicago would be a “showcase” for his administration's oversight of post-pandemic economic growth and unemployment reduction.
Kiichiro Sato / AP
The nation's third-largest city, Chicago is also heavily pro-union, demonstrating Biden's commitment to organized labor, which was instrumental in helping him win the 2020 Democratic primary and presidency.
“Atlanta could also have been strategic. But it doesn't allow the party to really demonstrate all the principles it's supposed to stand for, and they can do that in Chicago,” said Sarah Nelson, president of the Airline Attendants Union. He signed a letter to the DNC from leading labor groups and union workers urging them to choose Chicago.
Pritzker pointed to his state's strong defense of abortion rights as an important factor. Other Democrats were concerned about Georgia's Republican-controlled Legislature and the state's lax gun laws. That's despite Chicago being plagued by gun violence, potentially exposing Democrats to GOP attacks on rising crime rates in cities across the country.
Lisa Hernandez, the chairwoman of the Illinois Democratic Party, said the bid went beyond Chicago and her state, calling the convention site the “gateway to the blue bastion of the Midwest.” Her party noted that Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota have voted Democratic in all but 2016 presidential elections over the past 30 years, and that each state re-elected its Democratic governor last fall.
Organizers of the Chicago bid also argued from the start to White House officials that it represented the Midwest as a whole. However, this has not always been positive for Democrats.
Few places better illustrate the ever-changing electoral allegiances of the Midwest than Wisconsin, where both Democratic Gov. Tony Evers and Republican Sen. Ron Johnson won re-election in last fall's midterm elections.
Democrats, meanwhile, are still celebrating Judge Janet Protasiewicz's victory last week in the race for the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which gave liberal justices control of the court for the first time in 15 years. They will likely have the chance to challenge an 1849 statewide abortion ban prompted by the U.S. Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade, as well as congressional district maps that had favored Republicans.
That same night, however, Republican Dan Knodl won an open Wisconsin state Senate seat, giving the GOP a supermajority in the chamber.
“Wisconsin is always going to be 50/50, right down the line,” said Democratic strategist Pete Giangreco, who worked on Barack Obama's presidential campaigns and is advising 2024 U.S. Senate candidates in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. “But you have to have the blue wall first, or Georgia and Arizona don't matter.”
Giangreco, who was also involved in Protasiewicz's winning campaign, noted that progressive Brandon Johnson's victory over a moderate Democratic challenger in Chicago's recent mayoral race may have boosted the city's congressional bid.
Johnson, a former Chicago Teachers Union organizer, has been endorsed by progressive leaders including Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. The 47-year-old, who is black, won by building a multiracial coalition that included youth and labor unions, and he brings a new sense of optimism to the city — a combination of factors that Democrats need to recreate in 2024, Giangreco said.
“It's very clear that Brandon brought younger people into activism, into the electorate,” Giangreco said. “It certainly didn't hurt our chances at all that you have a mayor of the city who is dynamic and young and part of a movement that is an important part of our party.”
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Weissert reported from Washington.
