Mainstream Democrats are heaving a sigh of relief.
The upset loss by Francesca Hong, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, in the Wisconsin Democratic primary for governor shows that the party’s left-wing insurgency may only go so far.
Polls heading into Tuesday’s primary showed Ms. Hong, a state assembly member, comfortably ahead of her top opponent, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley. But a large chunk of voters remained undecided until late in the campaign, and negative publicity over old tweets by Ms. Hong – including one calling for the cancellation of Thanksgiving – may well have swung the race.
Why We Wrote This
Despite a messy gubernatorial primary in which multiple candidates dropped out, polling front-runner and democratic socialist Francesca Hong was edged out by center-left candidate David Crowley.
After last week’s victory by progressive Abdul El-Sayed in the Michigan primary for U.S. Senate, establishment Democrats worried that left-wing momentum could damage the party’s prospects nationally in the Nov. 3 midterm elections.
In Wisconsin, a battleground state in presidential races, the center-left Mr. Crowley staged an extraordinary comeback with a late surge in fundraising and the backing of outgoing Gov. Tony Evers. Just three weeks ago, Mr. Crowley had dropped out of the race, but Governor Evers encouraged him to get back in after another Democrat dropped out. He also won the support of major labor unions.
Ms. Hong had disavowed controversial old statements, including calls to defund the police and abolish prisons, and insisted to reporters that she “loves” Thanksgiving. But the damage may already have been done.
Mr. Crowley’s narrow victory also points to challenges in polling during primaries, when voter turnout is low and can be hard to predict, especially during the summer. In last week’s Michigan primary, Mr. El-Sayed barely won after polls showed him far ahead.
In nearby Minnesota, progressive Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan beat the more-centrist Rep. Angie Craig in the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate on Tuesday, showing that the liberal wing of the party is hardly in retreat.
If Mr. Crowley wins in November, he will be the state’s first Black governor. U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany easily won the Republican primary, setting up a showdown for leadership in a state that President Donald Trump won in 2024 by fewer than 30,000 votes.
Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio/AP
Progressive Democrats expressed frustration that their preferred candidate failed to win the Wisconsin nomination, and that Congress’s most prominent democratic socialists – Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York – did not endorse Ms. Hong.
“We cannot build progressive power while gatekeeping our own movement through the eyes of the establishment,” the progressive group Our Revolution said in a statement late Tuesday on X.
Both Mr. Crowley and Ms. Hong focused on economic issues in their campaigns. But Ms. Hong’s now-deleted social media post from November 2020 denouncing Thanksgiving as “celebrating colonialism” may have been her undoing.
And even in backing away from past statements, Ms. Hong did not completely disavow them. As a chef, she told CNN on Aug. 3, she enjoys “bringing folks around the table.” But, she added, “Thanksgiving is also a time that’s incredibly painful for many people in our communities.”