Wisconsin Democrats Were 30 Points From Nominating a Socialist for Governor. They Missed by 3,211 Votes.
- 2:34 a.m., Aug. 12 when the Associated Press finally called Wisconsin's Democratic primary for governor, after a Milwaukee flash-drive error delayed the count for hours — Fox News; Wisconsin Public Radio, Aug. 12, 2026
- 39.8% to 39.4% the final margin — Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley over DSA-backed state Rep. Francesca Hong, roughly 3,211 votes, under Wisconsin's 1-point automatic-recount threshold — Fox News, Aug. 12, 2026
- 20-30 Points how far ahead Hong was polling as recently as early August, before Crowley's late comeback — NPR, Aug. 12, 2026
- 28,000 Ballots Milwaukee absentee ballots uploaded to the wrong flash drive on election night, the error that delayed the final tally — Wisconsin Public Radio, Aug. 12, 2026
- July 8 → July 18 the ten days Crowley suspended his campaign before re-entering with Gov. Tony Evers's endorsement, after which his fundraising roughly tripled — The Hill, Aug. 12, 2026
At 2:34 a.m. on August 12, 2026, the Associated Press finally called Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor: Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley (D-WI) over state Rep. Francesca Hong (D-WI), the Madison lawmaker backed by the Democratic Socialists of America. It reads like a routine headline — the establishment candidate beat the insurgent — and that framing buries the number underneath it. Crowley finished at 39.8 percent to Hong’s 39.4 percent, a margin of roughly 3,211 votes, well under the one-point threshold that would have triggered an automatic recount.
A month earlier, that outcome looked out of reach. Hong had led primary polling by 20 to 30 points through most of July, on track to become the first self-described socialist elected governor of any state in American history. Crowley had suspended his own campaign on July 8 for lack of traction. He re-entered ten days later with an endorsement from outgoing Gov. Tony Evers (D-WI), who is not term-limited but chose not to seek a third term — an endorsement that roughly tripled Crowley’s fundraising and helped him close a 30-point gap to a coin flip in three and a half weeks.
The count itself nearly missed its own deadline: 28,000 Milwaukee absentee ballots were uploaded to the wrong flash drive on election night, delaying the final tally for hours while the county sorted out the error. By the time AP called it, Republicans already had their nominee locked in — Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-WI), endorsed by President Trump in January, who spent the summer building a general-election argument aimed squarely at the socialist he expected to face in November. He may now have to retool it.
Wisconsin’s recount rules explain why the margin mattered so much. A margin of one percentage point or less triggers an automatic, candidate-requested recount; Crowley’s 0.4-point edge sat just outside that window, meaning the result was effectively final the moment AP called it. It was not fast getting there. Milwaukee — the state’s largest county and Crowley’s home base — was also where the count bottlenecked: election officials uploaded roughly 28,000 absentee ballots to the wrong flash drive, an error that had to be caught and corrected before results could be finalized, according to Wisconsin Public Radio’s reporting on the delayed call.
Behind Crowley and Hong, state Sen. Kelda Roys (D-WI) finished a distant third at roughly 10.6 percent, and former Evers administration secretary Joel Brennan took about 3 percent. Neither came close to disrupting the two-way race the primary had effectively become by election night.
The attack that dogged Hong hardest in the campaign’s final stretch wasn’t about her legislative record. It was her old social media. Fox News resurfaced a January 20, 2022 post in which Hong wrote that she wanted the country “to stop being an abundance of suffering but a wealth of opportunity,” adding that the country could get there by electing “more Black and Brown folks who won’t be racist obstructionists.” Also recirculated: a deleted post calling Thanksgiving “the original superspreader event,” and a 2021 post responding to the decision not to charge the officer who shot Jacob Blake.
“I want this country to stop being an abundance of suffering but a wealth of opportunity. We can do this by providing equal rights to Black and Brown folks. Elect more Black and Brown folks who won't be racist obstructionists.”
Francesca Hong · post to X, Jan. 20, 2022 · resurfaced by Fox News Digital, Aug. 2026
Hong’s defense leaned on the calendar. “I had some hot takes, some bad takes on Twitter,” she said when asked about the posts. “But I’ve evolved, I’ve learned.” On policing specifically, she narrowed her position considerably as the primary closed in: “I’m not defunding the police, not abolishing police. I am serious about public safety.”
“I had some hot takes, some bad takes on Twitter... But I've evolved, I've learned.”
Francesca Hong · on her resurfaced posts · Fox News Digital, Aug. 2026
The “I was young” framing runs into a complication: several of the posts, including the 2021 line calling to “defund then abolish” police, were written after Hong was already a sitting state representative, not before she entered public life, according to Fox News’s reporting. The “evolved” account also sits awkwardly next to a January 2026 endorsement from a group called Wisconsin Electoral Socialists, which backed Hong specifically for her “commitment to police and prison abolition” — seven months, not years, before she began describing those same views as an old hot take.
Tiffany didn’t wait for Wisconsin Democrats to decide. Through the summer, while Hong led primary polling, the Republican built his entire general-election pitch around the premise that he’d be facing her. “Is the heartland going to be the firewall that stops this movement of socialism coming from, especially the East Coast?” he said. “I think Wisconsin will be… We’ll be the place that stops socialism.”
His campaign paired the rhetoric with a checklist, walking through what it characterized as Hong’s actual positions against her public claim that she didn’t agree with the entire Democratic Socialists of America platform.
“Last night, socialist Francesca Hong claimed she doesn't agree with the entire DSA platform. So we checked her record: Abolish the Senate? Yes. Abolish ICE, prisons, and the police? Yes. Mass amnesty? Yes. Transition Wisconsin away from defense manufacturing? Yes.”
Rep. Tom Tiffany's (R-WI) campaign messaging, as characterized in Fox News Digital's reporting ahead of the Aug. 11 primary
Then the voters he was warning about didn’t nominate her. Crowley — a moderate who ran on his Milwaukee record, not DSA membership — won the primary Tiffany had spent months campaigning against. If there was a firewall against socialism in Wisconsin this summer, Democratic primary voters arguably built a smaller one of their own first, by a margin of 3,211 votes.
Crowley’s biography is, on its own, notable. He grew up in Milwaukee’s 53206 ZIP code — among the most heavily policed and most incarcerated in the country — and has said his family was evicted multiple times when he was a child. If elected in November, he would be Wisconsin’s first Black governor. Hong, for her part, remains Wisconsin’s first Asian American state legislator and a former chef and restaurant owner; her defeat ends, for now, a campaign that would have made her the first self-described socialist ever elected governor of a U.S. state. Neither Sen. Bernie Sanders nor Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez endorsed her.
Tiffany cleared his own primary easily over Andy Manske, carrying what President Trump called on Truth Social a “Complete and Total Endorsement,” posted January 28, 2026.
The general election is set for November 3, 2026: Crowley (D) against Tiffany (R), with Evers not seeking a third term. Tiffany spent the summer rehearsing an argument against a democratic-socialist nominee. He will face a Milwaukee County executive instead — one whose own party nearly didn’t give him the chance to run against anyone at all.
Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley (D-WI) narrowly defeated DSA-backed state Rep. Francesca Hong (D-WI) in Wisconsin’s Democratic gubernatorial primary, 39.8 percent to 39.4 percent — a roughly 3,211-vote margin the Associated Press didn’t call until 2:34 a.m. on August 12, 2026, after 28,000 Milwaukee absentee ballots were uploaded to the wrong flash drive. Hong had led polling by 20 to 30 points weeks earlier; Crowley closed the gap only after suspending his campaign on July 8 and re-entering July 18 with Gov. Tony Evers’s endorsement. Hong’s resurfaced 2021-2022 social-media posts — including a line calling America “an abundance of suffering” and another to “defund then abolish” police — became a late flashpoint she answered by calling them old “hot takes.” Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-WI), Trump-endorsed and the GOP nominee, spent the summer building his campaign around facing Hong specifically. He will face Crowley instead on November 3.
