Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley defeated state Assembly Member Francesca Hong in a massive upset to win the Democratic primary for governor of Wisconsin on Tuesday night, a victory for the state party establishment, which feared Hong’s socialist views would make her a weak candidate in the general election.
Crowley’s narrow win came despite Hong’s commanding lead in recent polling, which prompted a ferocious push by the state party establishment to consolidate behind Crowley and defeat her. It ended a topsy-turvy primary that included two leading candidates dropping out amid scandal and the resurrection of Crowley’s campaign after he initially quit in July.
Kayla Wolf via Associated Press
On Wednesday morning, he led Hong by just 3,700 votes, equal to half of a percentage point. Both were just under 40% of the vote, with a number of other candidates ― including some who dropped out of the contest weeks ago ― splitting the remaining one-fifth.
Crowley, in his first appearance after his victory, downplayed the ideological splits within the Democratic Party and suggested voters would unite to defeat his opponent, GOP Rep. Tom Tiffany. Tiffany, a member of the House Freedom Caucus, won the Republican primary on Tuesday with the backing of President Donald Trump.
“Every one of us has something much bigger to unite around,” Crowley told reporters in Wisconsin. “And that is keeping MAGA extremism from bringing the chaos we see in Washington into our neighborhoods right here in the state of Wisconsin. From the very first day I announced this campaign, I said the real threat wasn’t any of my primary opponents. The real opponent has always been Tom Tiffany. That remains true today.”
Incumbent Gov. Tony Evers (D) campaigned relentlessly with Crowley in recent days, warning that Hong’s voluminous social media archive of controversial statements would make her a weak general election candidate, including her now-famous proclamation about hating Thanksgiving and past support for defunding the police.
“I am so proud of David — he’s the future of our Party, and I can’t wait for him to be our next governor,” Evers wrote in a 3 a.m. social media post. “For now, we polka. Tomorrow, we’re back at work to win.”
Crowley’s victory shows Democratic voters are still sensitive to warnings about electability even as their frustration with party leaders has empowered a series of major progressive victories this primary season.
Republicans clearly preferred to face Hong in the general election. The Republican Governors’ Association spent $3.6 million on ads “attacking” Hong that seemed designed to highlight left-leaning positions popular among Democratic primary voters, and Tiffany responded to Crowley’s victory with a statement comparing him to the woman he defeated.
“I’ve said all along that there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between these Democrat candidates, and David Crowley proved my point when he admitted there aren’t many policy differences between him and a socialist,” Tiffany said.
Crowley performed strongly in rural areas and in the majority-Black neighborhoods on the north side of Milwaukee. Hong did the same in college towns and in Milwaukee’s white neighborhoods. But she failed to develop a huge lead in her home county of Dane, the location of Madison and the University of Wisconsin — winning it just 44% to 36.7%, far short of the enormous margins expected of her.
While Crowley was considered the establishment candidate in the race, he bristled at the label. Considered a relatively progressive executive, Crowley came from humble origins: his parents battled drug addiction, his family was evicted three times before he was 18, and he initially dropped out of college, only to earn his degree in 2024 while serving as county executive.
“The frustration for me is because I have worked my entire life not to be labeled, not to be placed in a box,” he said in an interview last week on “Pod Save America.” “I didn’t get into this race to protect the establishment. I got into this race to protect the people, to let folks know that they deserve to have a seat at the table.”
Crowley campaigned on using an existing state budget surplus to fund education without raising local property taxes, expand child care offerings and to support rural hospitals in danger of closure.
Crowley has, however, declined to back Hong’s call for a moratorium on data center construction, an issue which powered her rise and helped draw in even GOP voters who oppose the projects. He has said he supports a “Beyonce” approach to data center construction, using the famous singer’s name as an acronym for “Bring Your Own New Clean Energy.”
Democrats, who were locked out of power by gerrymandered maps in 2011 following GOP Gov. Scott Walker’s victory, have spent 15 years trying to regain it. Holding the governor’s office and picking up a handful of seats in both the state Assembly and state Senate would give them a trifecta for the first time in a decade.
A Crowley victory in November would make him Wisconsin’s first Black governor and just the fourth Black person elected governor anywhere in the United States.