I am one of the many Wisconsin expats that has abandoned the state until it gets its shit back together. The thing you have to understand about the Wisconsin electorate, is that, in the aggregate, it's fucking dumb, mean, entitled, and will never reconsider its beliefs. The tea party movement really thoroughly fucked the state for the foreseeable future.
That lines up pretty well with my experience. I lived in Wisconsin for about 2-1/2 years. It's not a state that has nothing going for it. The structure is absolutely there for it to be a successful and enjoyable place that residents could have right to be proud of. With what I encountered though the phrase Wississippi was very apt. And yeah, it's because too many people there choose for it to be that way.
WI used to be heavily pro-labor, relatively progressive, and on a positive track, although it certainly was struggling to come to terms with its historical blemishes that persisted into deep systemic issues (racism and segregation have always been a massive issue in the state, but have only worsened in the last couple decades). When the right overtook almost the entirety of governor for a long stretch, it utterly broke the state though. The upside is that WI and MN were functionally identical until one went hard right and the other soft left and the result makes a wonderful case study for how vapid and destructive the entirety of the US right and Republicans are.
Will forever laugh at the "Biden or busters" and Anarcho-Bidenists saying swapping to Kamala would be a bad idea electorally. Biden was really unpopular.
I think him "voluntarily" stepping aside helped. If he were primaried, that might not have gone as well as it would look like he got kicked out, and that generally doesn't have a great result for the incumbent party