Hijacking Campaign 2024 | Independent Expenditures | Issue Ads | Candidates | Offices | Campaign 2024
Posted: September 25, 2024
Updated: October 6, 2025
The Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC) uses this state-registered committee to make independent expenditures in support of Republicans running for Wisconsin state offices. The RSLC also runs similar operations in other states. All the state committee's income in 2024 came from the national RSLC in Washington, D.C.
The organization spent over $6.9 million between 2010 and 2023 on independent expenditures and phony issue ads in Wisconsin legislative and statewide races, making it one of the top interest group spenders on Badger State elections.
According to reports filed with the Wisconsin State Ethics Commission, the state body that regulates campaign finances, RSLC started its 2024 legislative independent spending campaign the day after the August 13th primaries and had already spent nearly $450,000 by the end of the month. The money went towards mailers and online advertising in three senate races, the 8th, the 14th and the 30th. The first two seats featured Republican incumbents, Duey Stroebel in the 8th and Joan Ballweg in the 14th. Stroebel was running in new district after he was displaced from his old seat in the 20th Senate by new legislative maps passed in 2024. As for Ballweg, the general consensus held that her district was more favorable to Democrats after passage of those maps. There was no incumbent running in the 30th as its GOP incumbent was running in the 2nd Senate after the new maps placed him there.
By mid-September, RSLC expanded its activities to include online advertising and mail campaigns in three assembly contests, the 21st, the 26th and the 61st, all incumbent GOP legislators but with caveats. The incumbent in the 21st had represented that district since 2013, but the other two incumbents, both first-term legislators, Amy Binsfeld in the 26th and Bob Donovan in the 61st were running in new districts but had represented, respectively, the 27th and the 84th before 2024's new legislative maps.
The first available RSLC online ad targeted Democratic candidate David Marstellar in the 21st Assembly. The ad attacked Marstellar for opposing school choice and calling parents' rights movements "stupid."
Four weeks before the election, the committee began an ad campaign attacking Democratic candidates in the aforementioned districts for supporting higher taxes. Here is an example from the 61st Assembly.
In total, the RSLC spent over $841,000 for mailers and online advertising in six districts with wins in two races, the 21st and 61st Assembly districts, and losses in four, the 26th Assembly and the 8th, 14th and 30th State Senate.
Last active election: 2023
This organization is registered with the Wisconsin Ethics Commission as an independent expenditure committee following the January 2010 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. FEC.