The mayor of Waukesha, Wisconsin, a prominent Republican suburb of Milwaukee, will vote for Vice President Kamala Harris this election.
Mayor Shawn Reilly, a former Republican, said he voted third party in 2016 and voted for President Joe Biden in 2020, but did not make those decisions public. In 2024, he is going public with his support for the Democratic ticket.
“It is a vote against Trump,” Reilly told Fox6 in Milwaukee. “I am terrified of Donald Trump becoming our next president for all the reasons I have indicated: he’s already been impeached twice. He’s been convicted of felonies, and this is not what the United States needs.”
Reilly said he left the Republican Party on Jan. 6, 2021, when supporters of the former president attacked the U.S. Capitol. He said he is prepared for “repercussions” when going public with his support of Harris.
“There’s going to be a lot of people who are not happy with what I say, and there will be a lot of people who are happy with what I have to say. But when you’re in this job, that’s your daily life, anyways,” Reilly said.
Waukesha is the state’s most populous solidly Republican county. Waukesha county and other suburban counties, Ozaukee and Washington, surrounding Milwaukee county have historically been Republican strongholds. From 1996 through 2020, no Democratic candidate won even a single municipality, town, or city in these three counties.
Signs indicate the counties may be leaning more Democratic since the rise of former President Donald Trump. Trump won the city of Waukesha in both 2016 and 2020. In 2016, he won by an 11-point lead, but in 2020 his lead shrunk to 5.5 points.
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Both Trump and Harris have spent time in this area in recent weeks as Trump looks to hold onto his support here while Harris tries to peel back Republicans who are not fans of Trump.
“It’s kind of a political joke amongst pundits that it all comes down to Waukesha County, Wisconsin,” Mike Wagner, a professor who focuses on political communication and public opinion at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, previously told the Washington Examiner. “There is some truth to that — the turnout is really important for Republicans there. It’s really a place that they need.”