What happened in Wisconsin last night?

Democrat Patty Schachtner, a county medical examiner, managed to defeat her Republican opponent Adam Jarchow in the race to replace a state senator who recently resigned after sixteen years to serve as Gov. Scott Walker’s agriculture secretary. Schachtner’s victory flipped the district from red to blue.

That surprising change is being analyzed as a Trump-era harbinger of electoral devastation for the GOP come November.

Walker himself chimed in before midnight to argue the results should amount to a “wake up call for Republicans in Wisconsin,” contending the GOP “can’t presume” voters are fully aware of how the party’s policies are benefitting them. Charlie Sykes, a staple of the state’s political media, said Schachtner’s win represented a “[g]enuinely stunning setback” for the Republican Party in Wisconsin. He reported that a “prominent” Republican in the state told him, “We are losing independent and educated women in droves.”

Christian Schneider, conservative columnist at USA Today and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, focused on the district’s conservative electorate, noting: “In a down year, even Romney won St. Croix County by 12. It’s basically wealthy suburban Republicans who have fled the Twin Cities, but it looks like the GOP may quickly be losing them.”

He continued: “In WI’s #SD10 race, the Republican (Jarchow) actually did well in the eastern, rural, working-class areas of the district – what we would consider to be ‘Trump country.’ But in the wealthy GOP areas bordering the Mississippi River, it was a bloodbath for the GOP.”

Schneider rightfully added that low-turnout special elections can make unreliable predictors, but posited that an “[e]nthusiasm gap, bad messaging and Trumpism are all suspects” in the loss for Republicans.

And, of course, it’s the low turnout itself those factors may have influenced.

On Tuesday, Republican Rick Gundrum also won a state assembly race in one of the solidly conservative districts within Schachtner’s senate district. Speaking to the Washington Examiner on Wednesday morning, Gundrum’s campaign manager Ethan Hollenberger explained, “Democrats outspent us wildly. Where they focused they won. This is a turnout issue.”

“We underperformed the primary by over 500 votes,” he added.

While much of Wisconsin’s economic landscape made it favorable territory for President Trump’s pitch to working-class voters, it’s well worth remembering he did not win the state’s GOP primary. If Wisconsin’s suburban conservatives, who dominate important pockets of the state such as Waukesha, Ozaukee, and St. Croix counties, are disillusioned with a president they supported with some reluctance, down-ballot candidates could suffer at the hands of an unforgiving enthusiasm gap in November. That gap could be exacerbated in the case that enough independents and Democrats in the historically blue state are motivated by Trump’s controversial leadership to vote against his party in those races.

It’s possible the loss also bears implications for Wisconsin’s competitive upcoming Republican primary in the race to defeat Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin. Reading the electorate, both candidates have sought to emphasize their support for the president, engaging in a proxy battle over Steve Bannon’s endorsement. Does a potential enthusiasm gap in a county with their target demographic change that? State Sen. Leah Vukmir, one of the two candidates running in the primary, campaigned for Jarchow.

Reacting to the results, Hollenberger wondered whether some Democratic ballots were cast by Republicans. “The question is why was there an enthusiasm gap and did we lose Trump voters to the Democrats?” he asked. “We most likely saw Democrats more encouraged to vote than Republicans.”

Mike Gousha, who hosts one of Wisconsin’s most prominent political talk shows, added an interesting observation. “Schachtner also ran on resentment toward Madison and MKE, ” he tweeted. “From her campaign announcement: ‘Whether it’s roads, schools or jobs, Madison politicians take money away from us and give it to Milwaukee.'”

Sound familiar?