Winning by ten points in Wisconsin’s special Supreme Court election, Judge Susan Crawford delivered a stunning rebuke to President Donald Trump and his centibillionaire sidekick Elon Musk, both of whom endorsed and supported her right-wing opponent Brad Schimel.

The decisive Wisconsin defeat was taken as a stark warning for next year’s Congressional midterm elections, with Musk himself bemoaning the prospect of a Democratic Congress. "Losing this judge race has good chance of causing Republicans to lose control of the House. If they lose control of the House, there will be non-stop impeachment hearings, there will be non-stop hearings and subpoenas, they're going to do everything to stop the [Trump] agenda,” he told Fox News before the results came in.

Crawford exulted in her victory speech that she had beaten “the world’s richest man,” plutocratic mastermind of Trump’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency and its chaotic, deeply unpopular crusade to wreck federal agencies. Athough he spent an estimated $25 million against her, turning the Wisconsin race into the most expensive judicial election in American history, she defeated him and Schimel by 55-45 percent.

The Tesla boss’s humiliation was underscored by a campaign trip to the Badger State two days before the election, when he handed out million-dollar checks and donned a “cheesehead” hat. Just hours before voters went to the polls, his auto company’s board asked him to step down as its chief executive.

While Republicans attributed the Wisconsin outcome to Democratic intensity and lower propensity to vote among the Trump base, the results also pointed to potential disenchantment among voters who went Republican last fall. High turnout in Democratic strongholds like Dane County and Milwaukee drove the liberal surge – but Crawford also appears to have flipped a few major counties that backed Trump in 2024

With over 95 percent of the vote counted, the Democratic-backed judge won Kenosha, Racine, Outagamie and Sauk counties, all of which went Republican last year. Her margin in Kenosha County, one of the state’s largest, was roughly five percent.

Trump himself tried to brush off Schimel’s defeat. On Truth Social he emphasized instead that Wisconsin voters approved an amendment to the Wisconsin state constitution requiring voters to display photo identification before casting a ballot. The state already requires voter ID by law, but the constitutional change will protect the law from being changed.