Mike Bare
2023 - Present
2027
2
Mike Bare (Democratic Party) is a member of the Wisconsin State Assembly, representing District 80. He assumed office on January 3, 2023. His current term ends on January 4, 2027.
Bare (Democratic Party) ran for re-election to the Wisconsin State Assembly to represent District 80. He won in the general election on November 5, 2024.
Bare completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Mike Bare was born in Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Bare graduated from Manitowoc Lincoln High School in 2001. He earned a B.A. in political science in 2005 and an M.A. in political science in 2010, both from American University. His career experience includes working as a researcher and advocate at the Community Advocates Public Policy Institute, co-owner of the Biergarten at Olbrich Park, and managing director of the Virginia Sims Bare Family Foundation.[1] [2]He was elected to the Verona City Council in 2013.[1]
Bare has been affiliated with the following organizations:[1][2]
- New Leaders Council-Wisconsin
- Down Syndrome Association of Wisconsin
- Dane County Housing Authority
- Special Olympics of Wisconsin
- Verona Parks Commission
- Verona Plan Commission
- Wisconsin Public Health Association
Sponsored legislation
The following table lists bills this person sponsored as a legislator, according to BillTrack50 and sorted by action history. Bills are sorted by the date of their last action. The following list may not be comprehensive. To see all bills this legislator sponsored, click on the legislator's name in the title of the table.
Committee assignments
Note: This membership information was last updated in September 2023. Ballotpedia completes biannual updates of committee membership. If you would like to send us an update, email us at: editor@ballotpedia.org.
2023-2024
Bare was assigned to the following committees:
- Forestry, Parks, and Outdoor Recreation Committee
- Housing and Real Estate Committee
- Insurance Committee
- Rules Committee
Elections
2024
See also: Wisconsin State Assembly elections, 2024
General election
General election for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80
Incumbent Mike Bare defeated Robert Relph in the general election for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 on November 5, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Mike Bare (D) ![]() | 73.4 | 30,593 |
![]() | Robert Relph (R) | 26.5 | 11,038 | |
Other/Write-in votes | 0.1 | 36 |
Total votes: 41,667 | ||||
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Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80
Incumbent Mike Bare defeated Nasra Wehelie in the Democratic primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 on August 13, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Mike Bare ![]() | 78.3 | 12,169 |
![]() | Nasra Wehelie ![]() | 21.6 | 3,357 | |
Other/Write-in votes | 0.1 | 14 |
Total votes: 15,540 | ||||
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Republican primary election
Republican primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80
Robert Relph advanced from the Republican primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 on August 13, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Robert Relph | 99.3 | 2,509 |
Other/Write-in votes | 0.7 | 18 |
Total votes: 2,527 | ||||
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Campaign finance
Endorsements
To view Bare's endorsements as published by their campaign, click here. Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Bare in this election.
2022
State Assembly
See also: Wisconsin State Assembly elections, 2022
General election
General election for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80
Mike Bare defeated Jacob Luginbuhl in the general election for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Mike Bare (D) ![]() | 69.7 | 23,380 |
![]() | Jacob Luginbuhl (R) | 30.3 | 10,156 | |
Other/Write-in votes | 0.1 | 27 |
Total votes: 33,563 | ||||
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If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80
Mike Bare defeated Anna Halverson, Chad Kemp, Dale Yurs, and Doug Steinberg in the Democratic primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 on August 9, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Mike Bare ![]() | 47.7 | 4,921 |
![]() | Anna Halverson | 27.1 | 2,802 | |
Chad Kemp | 19.4 | 2,003 | ||
![]() | Dale Yurs ![]() | 4.5 | 460 | |
Doug Steinberg | 1.3 | 132 | ||
Other/Write-in votes | 0.0 | 3 |
Total votes: 10,321 | ||||
![]() | ||||
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Republican primary election
Republican primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80
Jacob Luginbuhl defeated Nathan Graewin in the Republican primary for Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 on August 9, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Jacob Luginbuhl | 55.5 | 1,935 |
Nathan Graewin | 43.8 | 1,526 | ||
Other/Write-in votes | 0.7 | 23 |
Total votes: 3,484 | ||||
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If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Campaign finance
Dane County Supervisors
See also: Municipal elections in Dane County, Wisconsin (2022)
General election
General election for Dane County Board of Supervisors District 32
Incumbent Mike Bare won election in the general election for Dane County Board of Supervisors District 32 on April 5, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Mike Bare (Nonpartisan) | 98.9 | 1,914 |
Other/Write-in votes | 1.1 | 21 |
Total votes: 1,935 (100.00% precincts reporting) | ||||
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If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Nonpartisan primary election
The primary election was canceled. Incumbent Mike Bare advanced from the primary for Dane County Board of Supervisors District 32.
2020
See also: Municipal elections in Dane County, Wisconsin (2020)
General election
General election for Dane County Board of Supervisors District 32
Mike Bare won election in the general election for Dane County Board of Supervisors District 32 on April 7, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
✔ | ![]() | Mike Bare (Nonpartisan) | 99.4 | 3,907 |
Other/Write-in votes | 0.6 | 25 |
Total votes: 3,932 | ||||
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If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Campaign themes
2024
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Mike Bare completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Bare's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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|From 2010 to 2022, Mike was an advocate for Wisconsin’s low-income population at the Community Advocates Public Policy Institute. Mike worked to solve Wisconsin’s housing crisis, expand health coverage and improve healthcare, advance economic security solutions, improve our criminal justice and corrections systems, and get Wisconsinites out of poverty through work-based solutions. In 2017, Mike started a community-focused and family-friendly business: The Biergarten at Olbrich Park. The Biergarten is enjoyed by tens of thousands of families every year, and it has raised a significant amount of money for Madison City parks and community causes.
Mike and his wife met while interning together for U.S. Senator Russ Feingold, and now have two young sons and happily reside in the City of Verona. Mike enjoys tending his moderately successful vegetable garden, loves to coach the boys’ baseball teams, and to cook.- We must protect our democracy, restore our rights, and invest in our communities. Republicans have been far too successful in degrading voters’ confidence in our democracy. I advocate for pro-democracy policies like ballot drop boxes, automatic voter registration, voting by mail, and public financing of campaigns.
- Too many of our rights—voting, collective bargaining, reproductive health choice, LGBTQ+ rights, and our freedom to assemble free from fear of gun violence—have been taken away or eroded in recent years.
- We must make investments in our communities, including strong public schools and higher education, housing for everyone, transit options, childcare, Medicaid expansion, and environmental protections. I am a leader in the State Assembly on legislation to help working people. I introduced bills to expand the Earned Income Tax Credit (AB471) that puts more money in workers’ pockets, expand the Homestead Credit (AB458) that helps people pay rent or the mortgage, and create WISEARNS, a state-facilitated retirement savings program for workers whose employers don’t provide it. We have a state budget surplus that could fund these priorities and more.
For the past year I served on the State Affairs Committee where Republicans send some of the bills most important to them.
I also enjoyed serving on the Parks, Forestry, and Outdoor Recreation Committee. It is one of the committees with an environmental protection mission, which is of interest to me.
I also served on the Insurance Committee, which was relatively inactive.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
2022
State Assembly
Mike Bare completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Bare's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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|- Mike strives for progress on our challenges guided by progressive values: Empathy for Others, Fairness in Processes, Equity in Outcomes, Service to Community, and Devotion to Family
- The Wisconsin we have today is a result of purposeful choices, and I will be part of making better choices happen. We don’t have to make it difficult to vote, or cause people to be uninsured or homeless.
- Republicans in the Legislature have been attacking and undermining our democracy and the fabric of what holds us together as a state. I’m ready to fight for the right to vote, to end partisan gerrymandering, and to stop the purposeful spread of disinformation.
Republicans in the Legislature have been attacking and undermining our democracy and the fabric of what holds us together as a state.
Protect Our Basic Rights:
Public Education
A strong public education in good schools with well-paid educators is the bedrock of our state. Mike's Mom was a public school teacher. Mike will be a champion for educators and students in the State Assembly and actively work to protect and improve our schools.
Healthcare
Everyone has the right to affordable and high-quality healthcare, but not every Wisconsinite has access to it. This is especially true in the rural areas of the 80th District.
Women
Women’s rights, especially the right to choose, get Mike's full and unconditional support.
Housing
Far too many of our neighbors and school children struggle with housing insecurity and bouts of homelessness. Mike is an expert on housing policy and wants Wisconsin to transform how we guarantee everyone has access to affordable, quality, and stable shelter.
Broadband
Every Wisconsinite has a right to access information and virtual tools that are vital to wellbeing, school, business, and social and family connection.
Environment
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
Dane County Supervisors
Mike Bare did not complete Ballotpedia's 2022 Candidate Connection survey.
2020
Mike Bare did not complete Ballotpedia's 2020 Candidate Connection survey.
Campaign finance summary
Note: The finance data shown here comes from the disclosures required of candidates and parties. Depending on the election or state, this may represent only a portion of all the funds spent on their behalf. Satellite spending groups may or may not have expended funds related to the candidate or politician on whose page you are reading this disclaimer. Campaign finance data from elections may be incomplete. For elections to federal offices, complete data can be found at the FEC website. Click here for more on federal campaign finance law and here for more on state campaign finance law.
Scorecards
A scorecard evaluates a legislator’s voting record. Its purpose is to inform voters about the legislator’s political positions. Because scorecards have varying purposes and methodologies, each report should be considered on its own merits. For example, an advocacy group’s scorecard may assess a legislator’s voting record on one issue while a state newspaper’s scorecard may evaluate the voting record in its entirety.
Ballotpedia is in the process of developing an encyclopedic list of published scorecards. Some states have a limited number of available scorecards or scorecards produced only by select groups. It is Ballotpedia’s goal to incorporate all available scorecards regardless of ideology or number.
Click here for an overview of legislative scorecards in all 50 states. To contribute to the list of Wisconsin scorecards, email suggestions to editor@ballotpedia.org.
2024
To view all the scorecards we found for this legislator in 2024, click [show]. |
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In 2024, the Wisconsin State Legislature was in session from January 16 to March 12.
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2023
To view all the scorecards we found for this legislator in 2023, click [show]. |
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In 2023, the Wisconsin State Legislature was in session from January 3 to December 31.
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See also
2024 Elections
External links
Candidate Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 |
Officeholder Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 |
Personal |
Footnotes
Political offices | ||
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Preceded by Sondy Pope (D) |
Wisconsin State Assembly District 80 2023-Present |
Succeeded by - |
Preceded by Jason Knoll |
Dane County Board of Supervisors District 32 2020-2023 |
Succeeded by - |