La Crosse county voters more polarized than rest of Wisconsin

Is it any wonder we can’t agree? An analysis of the participation in Tuesday’s primary election shows that voters in La Crosse County are sharply divided politically. More so than in the rest of the state. Bernie Sanders carried Wisconsin over Hillary Clinton. But he whooped her in La Crosse County. Sanders took 62% of the votes in the democratic primary to Hillary Clinton’s 36%, doubling her vote total here. That is a much larger margin of victory than was seen statewide. In the republican presidential primary, Ted Cruz scored a victory over Donald Trump in Wisconsin. But not in La Crosse county. Trump actually won La Crosse County, capturing 41% of the vote to 37% for Ted Cruz. So La Crosse county voters are more extreme than voters elsewhere in Wisconsin. La Crosse county isn’t just red or blue. It is bright red, and bright blue. You could aruge that La Crosse county is more democrat than republican, based on the numbers from Tuesday’s election. Of the 44,000 votes cast, 54% were for democratic presidential candidates, while only 45% went to republican presidential candidates. Given the sharp divide among local voters, more marked here than elsewhere, it is little surprise that when it comes to politics, people in La Crosse are more polarized than elsewhere in Wisconsin.