| Dianne Hesselbein | |
| Office: | Minority Leader of the |
| Term Start: | December 1, 2023 |
| Predecessor: | Melissa Agard |
| State Senate1: | Wisconsin |
| District1: | 27th |
| Term Start1: | January 3, 2023 |
| Predecessor1: | Jon Erpenbach |
| State Assembly2: | Wisconsin |
| District2: | 79th |
| Term Start2: | January 7, 2013 |
| Term End2: | January 2, 2023 |
| Predecessor2: | Sondy Pope-Roberts |
| Successor2: | Alex Joers |
| Birth Date: | 10 March 1971 |
| Birth Place: | Madison, Wisconsin, U.S. |
| Party: | Democratic |
| Spouse: | Robert Hesselbein |
| Children: | 3 |
| Education: | University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh (BS) Edgewood College (MA) |
| Website: | |
Dianne H. Hesselbein ( Conway; born March 10, 1971) is an American Democratic politician from Middleton, Wisconsin. She is the minority leader of the Wisconsin Senate since December 2023; she has been a member of the Senate since January 2023, representing Wisconsin's 27th Senate district. She previously served ten years in the Wisconsin State Assembly, representing the 79th Assembly district from 2013 through 2023.
Dianne Hesselbein was born Dianne Conway in Madison, Wisconsin, in March 1971. She graduated from La Follette High School in 1989 and went on to attend the University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh, where she earned her bachelor's degree in 1993. She then obtained her master's in religious studies from Edgewood College in 1996.[1] [2]
She subsequently moved to Middleton, Wisconsin, just west of Madison, where she was elected to the Dane County board of supervisors. In November 2012, she was elected to the Wisconsin State Assembly without opposition, running on the Democratic Party ticket.[3] [4] She was subsequently re-elected in 2014, 2016, 2018, and 2020,[1] and rose within the caucus to become assistant minority leader from 2017 through 2022.[5]
In December 2021, long-time incumbent state senator Jon Erpenbach announced he would not run for a seventh term in 2022.[6] A week later, Hesselbein announced she would run for the open Senate seat.[7] She faced no opposition in the Democratic primary, and went on to defeat Republican candidate Robert Relph with 68% of the vote in the November general election.[8]
She was sworn in as state senator in January 2023. In December 2023, she was elected minority leader of the Wisconsin Senate following the resignation of Melissa Agard.[9]
Dianne Hesselbein's first husband was Scott Edmundson, during that marriage she was known as Dianne Edmundson. They were married in 1995[10] and had two children together before divorcing in 2000.[11]
She took the name Dianne Hesselbein when she married airline pilot Robert Hesselbein, with whom she had one more child. She now resides in Middleton with her husband, who is now retired.[2]
| Year | Election | Date | Elected | Defeated | Total | Plurality | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | Primary[12] | Democratic | 3,590 | 65.52% | Dem. | 1,885 | 34.40% | 5,479 | 1,705 | ||||
| General[13] | Democratic | 24,683 | 98.75% | 24,995 | 24,371 | ||||||||
| 2014 | General[14] | Democratic | 18,843 | 62.24% | Rep. | 11,406 | 37.67% | 30,275 | 7,437 | ||||
| 2016 | General[15] | Democratic | 23,211 | 63.84% | Rep. | 13,105 | 36.04% | 36,360 | 10,106 | ||||
| 2018 | General[16] | Democratic | 28,079 | 97.58% | 28,776 | 27,382 | |||||||
| 2020 | General[17] | Democratic | 29,719 | 67.14% | Rep. | 14,507 | 32.77% | 44,267 | 15,212 | ||||
| colspan="6" style="text-align:center;background-color: #e9e9e9;"| General Election, November 8, 2022[8]
|-|-