Milwaukee’s mayor is making sure Wisconsin voters know how much their vote counts: ‘The swingiest of states’

Cavalier Johnson, the mayor of Milwaukee, is gearing up for another high-stakes election in which his state could be the deciding factor. 

Milwaukee is the largest city in Wisconsin and Milwaukee County is one of the Democratic strongholds in the state. Wisconsin is a key swing state this election cycle and proves to be a state that could be a tipping point for a victory for Vice President Kamala Harris or former President Donald Trump.

“That is rising in the consciousness here, that there’s only a handful of states that will decide the presidency, and chief among them is the state of Wisconsin. We’re the swingiest of swing states,” Johnson, a Democrat, told the Washington Examiner.

Wisconsin currently has a near-even split between voters registered as Democrats and Republicans. In 2020, President Joe Biden flipped the state blue by only 20,000 votes. In 2016, Trump flipped Wisconsin red for the first time since 1984 by a little more than 27,000 votes.

“Whether it’s Democrats or Republicans, Wisconsin, typically, is on the winning side of that equation, and whoever wins the state is, I believe, very likely to win the White House,” Johnson said.

Election integrity in Milwaukee County

In 2020, absentee ballots were a hot button issue in Milwaukee County and in other blue cities in swing states. 

“The unfortunate thing from 2020 is that there was a false narrative that things were happening here that just were not,” Johnson said. “Unfortunately, what you had was a candidate who lost an election fair and square, and ultimately did not accept the results of those elections.”

The state of Wisconsin requires absentee ballots to be counted on election night and Democrats by and large utilized absentee ballots more than their Republican counterparts at the time due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. 

Social media buzzed with conspiracy theories of large numbers of ballots being dumped in Milwaukee County, claiming voter fraud because so many ballots were counted in favor of Democrats that night. In reality, the sudden increase in ballots cast for Democrats were because the state requires all ballots to be counted on election night. In 2020, Milwaukee County reported 170,000 absentee ballots, most of which went to Biden.

Johnson was looking at a 2023 state bill, Assembly Bill 567, which would have allowed local municipalities to begin counting mail-in and early voting ballots before election day, in order to streamline the process and prevent these types of false claims. 

Johnson said the bill had the support of Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, a Republican. Gov. Tony Evers (D-WI) was prepared to sign such legislation. 

“Gov. Evers for years has proposed allowing county and municipal clerks to begin canvassing absentee ballots the day before an election and is glad to see this effort finally has bipartisan support,” a spokeswoman for the governor told WisPolitics. “If AB567 passes in its current form as amended by the committee and without any poison-pill additions, the governor will sign it.”

Despite bipartisan support in the Assembly, the bill failed in the state Senate, but Johnson said “if it had [passed], then there wouldn’t be a situation here where we would have to provide those numbers later in the evening on Election Day.” 

“I don’t want to see that. There are a number of reasonable Republicans who also don’t want to see that. But unfortunately, there just were not the votes in the state senate to combat that,” Johnson added

Still, Johnson is confident in the county’s and city’s election integrity.

“However, given that our processes in Milwaukee are always free, they’re always fair, they’re always transparent, and they will remain to be so in this election as well,” Johnson said.

Mobilizing voters in Milwaukee

After Biden exited the race, Harris’s first campaign stop was in Wisconsin, in West Allis a suburb of Milwaukee. Harris’s campaign kickoff further highlighted the importance of the Badger State ahead of November. 

“It was electric. Incredibly exciting for the people here in Milwaukee, meeting thousands of people, jam packed to see the Vice President as she officially kicked off her presidential campaign here in Wisconsin,” Johnson said.

“When you look in that gymnasium where her campaign rally was held. I mean, you saw a cross section of America … folks on the ground here are really, really excited to see her and to support her,” Johnson said, adding “folks were saying that they haven’t seen this sort of energy on the Democratic side since Barack Obama launched his initial campaign back in 2008.”

Johnson was born and raised in Milwaukee and went to college at the state’s flagship university, UW-Madison. He became acting mayor after Tom Barrett, Milwaukee’s longtime mayor for nearly two decades, was appointed to serve as the U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg.

In 2022, Johnson made history in a special election, becoming the first elected black mayor of the city. Now, he’s making sure fellow Milwaukee residents understand the importance of their vote.

“As I go out across the city, whether I’m going to festivals in Milwaukee or I go to a farmers market on Sunday, which I’ve been doing the past number of weeks, routinely, I run into somebody who is registering people to vote here in the city,” Johnson said.

“I’ve encouraged people to make sure that they interact with the people in their lives, who can vote, who should vote, but don’t vote in order to make sure that they know of the importance of the upcoming election,” Johnson continued. 

He said Milwaukee residents are increasingly becoming more aware of their electoral standing compared to other parts of the country. During the 2000 presidential election, there were around 14 swing states. In 2024, there are only about seven swing states, heightening the stakes of a campaign losing even one state.

“Folks are starting to understand that their votes really, really count to determine who’s going to sit in the Oval Office,” Johnson said. “Milwaukeans are starting to understand that their participation in the electoral process determines who the President of the United States is going to be — the most powerful person, not just in our country, but on planet Earth.

Hosting the RNC

Following the Republican National Convention, which took place in Milwaukee last month, Johnson was thrown into the national political spotlight as the convention descended upon his city. Johnson was one of the leading voices originally pushing for the convention to be held there during the city selection process.

“Whether they were delegates or members of the media, everybody had a positive impression of Milwaukee and and therefore of Wisconsin, because for many of the people who came here, it was their first time ever in this state,” Johnson said. 

Milwaukee doesn’t typically get the opportunity to host events that pique national interest like the Super Bowl or NCAA championships. In 2020, the Democratic National Convention was supposed to be held in Milwaukee, but was moved to a virtual format due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Johnson saw the RNC as a way to put Milwaukee on the map of cities capable of hosting large events. 

“I think it’s a wonderful thing for Milwaukee and a wonderful thing for the state of Wisconsin,” Johnson said. “The RNC is not the end — it’s the beginning. It’s the beginning for us to host large scale events, whether be they political, business, sports, entertainment, trade shows, and the like to come to Milwaukee.”

The day the Washington Examiner spoke with Johnson, he was with one-time Midwest mayor Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, formerly known as Mayor Pete. The pair were highlighting rail expansion in the state on Amtrak’s Borealis line. 

Johnson, like Buttigieg, seemingly has further ambitions in politics, but plans to stay in his home for now.

“I really value the opportunity to serve my community here in Milwaukee as mayor,” Johnson said. “When there’s an opportunity, when the time is right to run for governor, I certainly will take a look at that.”