As the seemingly interminable recount for a Wisconsin Supreme Court seat drags on (as of May 9, incumbent Justice David Prosser's edge had declined slightly to 6,977 votes), attention continues to turn to the summer recall elections in the state Senate. Democrats have succeeded in obtaining the required number of signatures to challenge six Republican state senators. Republicans have gathered enough signatures to challenge three sitting Democrats. This means that almost every potentially competitive Senate seat will see a recall election this summer, and Republicans still have a few more days to turn in petitions for one final seat.

I had previously been skeptical that Democrats would be able to take over the state Senate this summer. I'm still skeptical, though less so than before. Two things have improved prospects slightly for the Democrats.

First, Wisconsin held three special elections in the General Assembly (the lower chamber of the Wisconsin legislature), all in Republican seats. Two were heavily Republican, and the Republicans held them easily. But a third was a bit of a swing district. The Democrats picked up this seat, located in the western portion of the state, by a 54-46 percent margin.

The following table shows the six Republican (red) districts and three Democratic (bright blue) districts that are now scheduled for recall elections. It shows Republican performance in the districts in the 2004 presidential race, the 2008 presidential race, the 2010 gubernatorial race, and the 2011 Supreme Court runoff. The districts are sorted by average Republican performance across these four races. Assembly District 94 -- the swing-ish district that Republicans lost, is shaded pale blue.

As we see, this alone isn’t a huge cause for celebration for Democrats. Although Republicans had held the 94th District for some time, it actually leans a few points toward the Democrats. Justice Prosser actually lost the district, suggesting that Governor Scott Walker’s agenda really is unpopular here.

More importantly, it is more Democratic than all but one of the Republican districts that are subject to recall elections. The Democrat ran three points ahead of the typical Democratic performance here; if that trend held across the six Republican seats, Democrats would pick up exactly three seats, and have a very tight race in one of their own.