Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and brash celebrity billionaire Donald Trump won Vernon County’s Democratic and Republican presidential primaries, respectively, April 5.
Sanders, an independent socialist running as a Democrat, defeated Hillary Clinton, the Democratic front-runner, in the county, 3,476-1,934. He also won the statewide vote.
GOP front-runner Trump received 2,437 votes. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who won the statewide vote, finished second with 1,878 votes, while Ohio Gov. John Kasich placed a distant third with 635.
Also receiving votes were former candidates Jeb Bush, Ben Carson, Chris Christie, Carly Fiorina, Mike Huckabee, Rand Paul and Rick Santorum. All dropped out of the race after the presidential ballot was finalized Jan. 26, and could not be removed from it by state law.
In the City of Hillsboro, Sanders received 111 votes to 89 for Clinton in the Democratic primary.
Trump received 119 votes to take the city’s Republican primary. Cruz finished second with 80 votes, while Kasich finished second with 26.
In the statewide Supreme Court race, Appeals Court Judge JoAnne Kloppenburg defeated incumbent Justice Rebecca Bradley, 5,401-4,795, in Vernon County despite losing to Bradley statewide.
Bradley retained the seat Gov. Scott Walker appointed her to last fall following the death of Justice Patrick Crooks, who had announced only days before that he would not run for another 10-year term on the high court.
In Hillsboro, Kloppenburg also defeated Bradley, 221-206.
In the lone citywide contest for two open School Board seats, incumbent Board President Jennifer Hynek received the most votes of the four candidates, with 605.
She won the four surrounding townships–Forest, Greenwood, Hillsboro and Union–and lost in the City of Hillsboro to Jill Stekel.
Stacy Sosinsky won the second seat, also on the strength of votes from the outlying townships. She finished with 561.
Stekel finished a close third with 544 votes.
City Council member Randy Seeley placed last in the voting in the City and the townships, finishing with 303 votes.
Hynek and Sosinsky were sworn into office April 11 during the Hillsboro School Board’s regular monthly meeting.
Hynek administered the oath to Sosinsky, then was sworn into her seat by Board Vice President Brian Hora.
Incumbent Hillsboro Mayor Greg Kubarski and the four City Council members standing for election–Rick Hanke, Garth Hitselberger, Mark Lankey, and Elizabeth Parish–all ran unopposed and were returned to their posts.
In the Vernon County Board race, incumbents Al Skemp in District 26, John Mitchell in District 27, and Shawn Redington in District 29 also ran unopposed and retained their seats. In District 28, where no candidate was running, Bobbi Richardson received 43 write-in votes to win the seat.
In the only contested Board election, Mary Bringe defeated John Audetat, 193-125, in District 7. All other Board candidates ran unopposed and remain in office.
