In case one progressive-versus-moderate swing-state showdown wasn’t enough, Wisconsin is running it back this week with its Democratic gubernatorial primary.
Democratic Socialist state legislator Francesca Hong has led the pack for much of the race, but the leading non-socialist alternative has shifted as candidates have dropped out and one even got back in. In the final stretch, that alternative has been Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, who dropped out on July 8 and reentered the race just 10 days later.
Hong has attracted plenty of attention for radical statements she has made over the years, and Wisconsin’s Democratic establishment is working to prevent her from advancing to the general election against Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany. So far, every poll has shown Hong leading, but given the recent chaos in the primary and last week’s polling miss in Michigan, a significant polling error doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibility.
To make sense of the race, I’m joined by two of Wisconsin’s leading political observers: Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette Law Poll, and Craig Gilbert, a Lubar Center fellow at Marquette Law School and a longtime Milwaukee Journal Sentinel journalist.
We examine the reliability of the primary polling, Hong’s rise, the Democratic Party’s ideological evolution and the electability arguments shaping the race. We also explore the broader political mood in the country’s quintessential swing state and what Marquette’s state and national polling reveals about the road to November.
