Tony Evers sat next to David Crowley on television this weekend and said, with the calm certainty of a man who has never been right about anything important, “She’s a Democrat, of course we’ll be helpful, but that’s not going to happen.” The “she” is Francesca Hong. The “that” is her winning the Democratic nomination for governor of Wisconsin. And the tone was every inch the patronizing head-pat that the party machine reserves for candidates who didn’t wait for permission.
Let’s be clear about what the Wisconsin Democratic establishment has done here. They cycled through candidates like a bad fantasy football draft. First Sara Rodriguez, who collapsed under a campaign finance scandal. Then Mandela Barnes, who exited amid a sex scandal. Then Crowley, the Milwaukee County executive who had already dropped out once before. This is the crew that presumes to lecture primary voters about “electability.” They couldn’t even run a stable recruitment process, and now they want you to believe they alone can read the political weather.
Hong went from dishwasher to executive chef. She owned a restaurant in Madison. She is a single mother and a DSA member who won her assembly seat and has run unopposed since. Her platform is not radical in any sense that matters to working people: expanded health care, universal paid leave, a serious boost in education funding, and a stance against the data centers that communities across Wisconsin increasingly view as a blight. She is hitting a dozen-plus cities on a get-out-the-vote tour while Crowley does television hits beside the governor.
Tony Evers (BY) via wikimediaThe establishment’s electability argument has always been a power play dressed up as pragmatism. It is defined, as Alex Pareene put it in the Prospect, only in terms of opposition to things people want but are told they can’t have. The same consultants who anointed Hillary Clinton in 2016 are now whispering that a democratic socialist can’t win a purple state. Abdul El-Sayed just proved them wrong in Michigan, where he beat Haley Stevens by a point despite $70 million in outside spending against him. Organization and grassroots enthusiasm carried the day. Nine dollars per vote beat ninety-five.
And here is the tell that should settle every argument: National Review is openly rooting for Hong to win the nomination. Their columnist wrote, in a piece titled for a “Carnival of Fools” segment, that every Republican is “quietly rooting for her” because they believe her progressive record makes her unelectable statewide. They dredge up her old social media posts, mock her Madison progressivism, and sneer at her demographics. This is the same playbook they run against every candidate who threatens the corporate donor ecosystem. If the right is telling you who they want to face, listen.
Crowley himself seems to know the ground is shifting. He told UpFront that after Michigan, “we have to pause a little bit because all these polls have not necessarily been telling the truth.” He bristled at the “establishment” label while sitting next to the governor who endorsed him. State Senator Kelda Roys reported a “huge surge of support” for Hong after the primary debate. Joel Brennan saw the same. This race is late-breaking, and the momentum is not with the machine’s pick.
HarvestLife (CC BY-SA 4.0) via Wikimedia CommonsWhat we are watching in Wisconsin is not a fringe insurgency. It is a movement of people who have been told for decades to accept less, to vote for the lesser evil, to trust the process that keeps producing losers. Hong’s campaign is built on the premise that Wisconsinites deserve a candidate who actually wants to deliver the party’s stated agenda. Health care. Paid leave. Schools. These are not radical demands. They are the floor.
The establishment’s job now is not to manage decline. It is to get out of the way. Evers said he’d be “helpful” if Hong wins, then immediately added it won’t happen. That conditional solidarity is worthless. Either you support the nominee or you don’t. Either you trust voters or you don’t. Wisconsin Democrats have a chance to nominate someone who went from the kitchen line to the state legislature and never stopped organizing. The question is whether the party’s gatekeepers will spend the general election helping her or hedging their own reputations.
Every door knocked, every vote earned, every city on that GOTV tour is the answer to a political class that keeps picking the safe candidate and losing. Hong is not the risk. The risk is letting the same people who fumbled the recruitment keep calling the shots.