2026-08-12T21:17:17.737Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/08/12/politics/david-crowley-wisconsin-governor-upset
大卫·克劳利在周二威斯康星州民主党州长初选中获胜，这一惊人转折发生在他暂停竞选活动一个月之后。
当这位密尔沃基县行政长官在退出竞选10天后重新参选时，民主社会主义州议员弗朗西斯卡·洪的参选势头似乎已不可阻挡。
但周三上午，率先呼吁本党选民搁置意识形态分歧、团结起来对抗“更重大威胁”的是克劳利，而非洪，他们将在秋季与共和党众议员汤姆·蒂法尼展开角逐。
这场令人意外的胜利，为中间派民主党建制派与进步派激进派之间的持续斗争翻开了关键新篇章——这一结果也凸显出，在这个总统关键摇摆州，选民对进一步左翼候选人的参选可行性存在犹豫。
深受欢迎的现任民主党州长托尼·埃弗斯上月劝说克劳利重返竞选，并在竞选最后阶段全程陪同他走访威斯康星州各地，毫不避讳地敦促选民慎重考量选择。
“我发自内心地认为，大卫·克劳利是我们击败汤姆·蒂法尼的最佳人选，”埃弗斯在最后一场竞选集会上说道，“很多人问：为什么是大卫？因为大卫这种人，说到就能做到。”
现年40岁的克劳利在地方政坛拥有长期履历。他曾是州议会议员，2020年当选密尔沃基县行政长官，并在四年后成功连任。这条从政路径与共和党前州长斯科特·沃克如出一辙：先在议会任职，再担任八年密尔沃基县行政长官——沃克是首位担任该职位的共和党人——随后于2010年当选州长。
克劳利还有机会创造历史。如果在11月的选举中获胜，他将成为威斯康星州首位黑人州长。
“我是土生土长的密尔沃基人，”他周三在重新自我介绍时说道，“本质上我是一名社区组织者，只是碰巧在过去六年里走进了州议会大厦，执掌了密尔沃基县政府。”
克劳利讲述了自己从童年“至暗时刻”一路走来的历程：当时他的家庭遭遇驱逐、面临心理健康问题、饱受成瘾困扰且住房不稳定，19岁时他从大学辍学，投身电气学徒行业，最终于2024年从威斯康星大学密尔沃基分校毕业，同时担任着县行政长官一职。
“我深知直面困境的滋味，因为我亲身经历过。我明白依靠公立学校、抓住机遇的意义，也相信只要有人肯投资你，你的未来就能改善，而且确实可以彻底改变，”他说道。
今年以来，民主社会主义者在华盛顿特区赢得市长初选，击败了纽约市和丹佛的众议院在任议员，还在费城和底特律的国会选举中击败了温和派候选人。
就在上周，进步派前公共卫生官员阿卜杜勒·埃尔赛义德在密歇根州联邦参议院初选中击败了建制派支持的温和派众议员黑利·史蒂文斯，尽管许多民主党人担忧埃尔赛义德的立场——包括他对以色列在加沙行动的尖锐批评、支持废除移民海关执法局以及倡导“全民医保”——可能会疏远温和派、无党派人士以及心怀不满的共和党人，而这些群体的选票正是他在11月大选获胜所必需的。
威斯康星州的这场初选并不具备上述几场选举的诸多典型特征。
佛蒙特州参议员伯尼·桑德斯、马萨诸塞州参议员伊丽莎白·沃伦以及纽约州众议员亚历山德里亚·奥卡西奥-科特兹等关键进步派人士都未介入此次初选——这一现实使得这场初选较少成为民主党整体发展方向的试金石。
7月期间，初选格局数次陷入混乱。克劳利首先退选，随后中间派的热门人选、副州长萨拉·罗德里格斯因竞选财务丑闻结束竞选。在埃弗斯的劝说下，克劳利重新参选。最终，埃弗斯的首届任期副州长曼德拉·巴恩斯也退出竞选。距离选举日仅几周之时，克劳利意外地成为了最后一位中间派候选人。
但在选举前几日，这位曾担任厨师和餐厅老板的洪（注：原文此处应为“洪”，指代弗朗西斯卡·洪）因一系列电视采访引发争议，让人质疑她是否有能力应对摇摆州大选中的严密审视。
在接受CNN采访时，当被问及2020年她倡导取消感恩节的推文时，她的回答含糊其辞。这段视频在网上疯传，许多民主党选民在采访中表示，这让他们对洪在11月的参选可行性产生了疑虑。
另一个复杂因素在于：许多威斯康星州选民提前投票，而当时初选格局仍在变动。今年，他们没有机会撤回已提交的选票并重新申领新选票。
截至周三下午，仍有最终选票待统计，但已有20%的选民——超过16.5万人——将票投给了克劳利和洪以外的候选人。另一位进步派候选人、州参议员凯尔达·罗伊斯获得了近6万张选票，其中包括洪的家乡麦迪逊所在的戴恩县的超过1.6万张选票。
目前克劳利与洪的差距不足4000票，上述任何一个因素都可能影响选举结果。
“我们或许不会在每项政策上都达成一致，或许不会使用相同的标签，但我们都希望拥有安全的社区、优质的学校、负担得起的医疗保健、高薪工作，以及为我们所有孩子创造更光明的未来。我们所有人都有更重大的目标可以团结在一起，那就是阻止MAGA极端主义将我们在华盛顿看到的混乱带入威斯康星州的社区，”克劳利周三上午在密尔沃基的胜选演讲中说道。
建制派势力向克劳利的集中支持，也为他的竞选复活起到了关键作用。
埃弗斯与克劳利在选举日前最后冲刺阶段共同开展竞选活动，而威斯康星州民主党人正试图抓住今年秋季难得的翻盘机会。
民主党近年来在威斯康星州势头渐盛，近年来赢得了两个关键的最高法院席位，在共和党执政多年后，终于有望拿下州议会多数席位。
“威斯康星州的民众，我们付出了太多努力，等待了太久，绝不能让这一切付诸东流。我们所建立的一切、所奋斗的一切，都岌岌可危，”埃弗斯在周日的一场竞选活动中说道。
这番话直指像麦迪逊的凯利·沃尔特斯这样的未决选民，她对混乱的初选感到沮丧，不确定该支持谁。
“我真的很喜欢埃弗斯州长，也很感激他在这场候选人众多的竞选中给予支持，”沃尔特斯在 Covenant Presbyterian 教堂投票后说道，“到最后都不知道该支持谁，这确实帮我做出了决定。”
凯伦·内夫参加了克劳利最后一场竞选活动之一，她对民主党初选期间的诸多波折明显感到沮丧，多位候选人退选，未能更早地围绕一位替代人选达成共识。
“我真的很失望，我们最终陷入了洪和克劳利二选一的僵局，”内夫说道，她表示自己欣赏洪，但担心她的参选可行性，“作为一名民主社会主义者，她的立场过于强硬。我并不反对民主社会主义，但她的态度太过强硬，我认为这会吓到其他人。”
74岁的埃弗斯绝非全美州长中最张扬的一位。但威斯康星州的几位民主党顾问表示，他与选民之间有着异乎深厚的信任基础，他在竞选后期的背书至关重要。
“如果没有州长的鼎力相助，克劳利不可能获胜，”一位资深政党顾问告诉CNN，“他的时机选择和支持都起到了关键作用。”
在竞选最后阶段的每一场活动中，埃弗斯都会在舞台上与克劳利亲切拥抱，清晰地传递出他对克劳利的支持和认可。尽管克劳利得到了党内建制派的大部分支持，但他对“自己是建制派一部分”的说法表示不满。
“我或许属于既得利益群体，”克劳利告诉CNN，“但我绝非建制派。”
如今，克劳利必须团结党内分裂的派系——大部分选民都将票投给了他的对手——并扩大自己的选民基础，为迎战蒂法尼的大选做准备。
周三，他在密尔沃基的一个社区中心发表演讲，称赞洪的竞选活动“提醒威斯康星州各地的人们，只要相信更美好的未来、为每个家庭争取更多机会，就没有所谓的必败之局”。
“这种热情强化了我们的民主，我期待着在未来携手共进的过程中，赢得他们以及所有参与此次竞选的人的支持，”他说道。
克劳利还预告了他对蒂法尼的攻击策略，抨击这位共和党众议员支持唐纳德·特朗普总统关于2020年总统选举存在大规模舞弊的说法，并投票削减食品券等项目的资金。
未来几天，他承诺将把注意力转向“团结民主党人、无党派人士、共和党人，以及那些害怕MAGA极端分子占据州长职位的人”。
洪也试图迅速弥合党内裂痕，周三一早致电克劳利承认败选，并同意出席团结活动。
她在周二晚间的演讲中表示，无论谁赢得初选，民主党人都将“继续为彼此而战”。
“因为所有参与此次竞选的人都知道，我们能够让未来变得更美好——而且我们必须让未来变得更美好，”她在麦迪逊对支持者说道。
Inside the Wisconsin upset that shook the progressive left for a change
2026-08-12T21:17:17.737Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/08/12/politics/david-crowley-wisconsin-governor-upset
One month after he suspended his campaign, David Crowley’s victory in Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor on Tuesday marked an astonishing turn around.
When the Milwaukee County executive re-entered the race 10 days after he exited it, democratic socialist state lawmaker Francesca Hong’s momentum seemed near insurmountable.
But on Wednesday morning, it was Crowley, not Hong, who was urging his party’s voters to set aside their ideological differences and unite against “something much bigger” in this fall’s race against Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany.
The stunning win opens a critical new chapter in the ongoing battle between the center-left Democratic establishment and its progressive insurgency — one that revealed voters’ hesitancy around the electability of further-left candidates in a presidential battleground.
Tony Evers, the popular outgoing Democratic governor, recruited Crowley back into the race last month and campaigned at his side as they traveled together across Wisconsin in the closing stretch of the race, mincing few words as he implored voters to weigh their choices carefully.
“In my heart of hearts, I know David Crowley is the best chance we have of beating Tom Tiffany,” Evers said at one of his final rallies. “A lot of people have asked: Why David? David is the kind of guy who gets shit done.”
The 40-year-old has a long record in local politics. A former member of the state Assembly, Crowley was elected Milwaukee County executive in 2020 and won a second term four years later. It’s the same path that GOP former Gov. Scott Walker followed: serving in the legislature, then as Milwaukee County’s executive for eight years — where he was the first Republican to hold the role — prior to being elected governor in 2010.
Crowley also has the chance to make history. If elected in November, he would be the state’s first Black governor.
“I’m a son of Milwaukee,” he said Wednesday, seeking to introduce himself anew. “I’m a community organizer by heart who has just happened to find himself in the halls of the state capitol building and at the head of Milwaukee County government for the last six years.”
Crowley described his climb from the “very dark days” of his childhood, which included eviction, mental health struggles, addiction and housing uncertainty, to dropping out of college at 19 to pursue an electrical apprenticeship, and ultimately graduating from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in 2024 while serving as county executive.
“I know what it means to face hardship because I’ve lived it. I know what it’s like to rely on public schools, to depend on opportunity, and to believe that if that if people invest in you, your future can improve and it absolutely can change,” he said.
Democratic socialists this year have won the mayoral primary in Washington, DC, ousted House incumbents in New York City and Denver and defeated moderate contenders in congressional contests in Philadelphia and Detroit.
Just last week, progressive former public health official Abdul El-Sayed bested the establishment pick, moderate Rep. Haley Stevens, in Michigan’s Senate primary, despite many Democrats’ worries that El-Sayed’s positions — including his strident criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, his support for abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement and his advocacy for Medicare for All — might alienate the moderates, independents and disaffected Republicans whose votes he will need to win November’s general election.
Wisconsin lacked many of the hallmarks of those races.
Key progressive figures like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stayed out of the primary — a reality that made the race less of a litmus test on the party’s broader direction.
The primary field was jumbled several times in July. First, Crowley dropped out. Then a top center-left choice, Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez, ended her own campaign amid a campaign finance scandal. At Evers’ urging, Crowley jumped back into the race. Finally, Evers’ first-term lieutenant governor, Mandela Barnes, exited. Just weeks from Election Day, Crowley was improbably the last moderate contender left standing.
But in the days leading up to the election, the former chef and restaurant owner set off alarm bells herself with a series of television interviews that raised questions about whether she was prepared to handle the intense scrutiny of a general election in a battleground state.
In an interview with CNN, she gave a meandering answer when asked about a 2020 tweet in which she advocated for canceling Thanksgiving. The moment went viral, and many Democratic voters said in interviews that it gave them pause about Hong’s viability in November.
Another complicating factor: Many Wisconsin voters cast their ballots early and while the primary field was still in flux. This year, they were not given the opportunity to scrap the ballots they’d already submitted and ask for new ones.
Twenty percent of the electorate — more than 165,000 voters as of Wednesday afternoon, with the final ballots still being counted — had voted for candidates other than Crowley and Hong. Another progressive, state Sen. Kelda Roys, had claimed nearly 60,000 votes — including more than 16,000 in Dane County, which covers Hong’s hometown of Madison.
With Crowley and Hong separated by less than 4,000 votes, any of those factors could be the difference in the race’s outcome.
“We may not agree on every policy. We may not use the same labels. But we all want safe communities, strong schools, affordable health care, good-paying jobs, and a brighter future for all of our children. And every one of us has something much bigger to unite around, and that is keeping MAGA extremism from bringing the chaos we see in Washington into our neighborhoods right here in the state of Wisconsin,” Crowley said in a victory speech Wednesday morning in Milwaukee.
The consolidation of establishment support around Crowley also played a key role in reviving his campaign.
Evers and Crowley hit the road together on a final sprint to Election Day, as Wisconsin Democrats looked to salvage a rare opening this fall.
Democrats have been on the rise in Wisconsin, winning two key Supreme Court seats in recent years, with a statehouse majority finally within grasp after years of Republican rule.
“Wisconsinites, we have worked too damn hard and we have waited too damn long to have this all squandered now. Everything we built and everything we worked for is on the line,” Evers said at a campaign stop Sunday.
It was a message aimed squarely at undecided voters like Kelly Walters of Madison, who was frustrated by the chaotic primary and unsure of who to support.
“I really like Gov. Evers and I appreciate his support in a race where there’s a lot of candidates,” Walters said as she left her polling place at the Covenant Presbyterian Church. “Not knowing at the end who to support, that definitely helped me in my decision.”
Karen Neff, who came to see Crowley at one of his final campaign stops, was visibly frustrated with all of the wild twists and turns in the Democratic primary, with candidates dropping out of the race and failing to coalesce around one alternative sooner.
“I’m really disappointed that we find ourselves in this mess between Hong and Crowley,” said Neff, who said she liked Hong, but worried about her electability. “She has been fairly abrasive in her stance as a democratic socialist. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being a democratic socialist, but she’s come out so strong that I think she’s going to scare people.”
Evers, 74, is hardly the flashiest of the nation’s governors. But several Democratic advisers in Wisconsin said he has an unusually deep reservoir of trust with voters and his late endorsement in the race was critical.
“Without the governor’s helping hand, Crowley couldn’t have won,” a longtime party adviser told CNN. “His timing and his backing were critical.”
At each stop in the closing days of the race, Evers literally embraced Crowley on stage, sending an unmistakable signal of his support and seal of approval. But while Crowley had the backing of much of the party establishment, he bristled at the notion that he was an entrenched part of it.
“I may be established,” Crowley told CNN, “but I’m not the establishment.”
Now, Crowley must unite the divided factions of the party, a majority of which voted for his opponents, and expand his base as he looks ahead to the general election against Tiffany.
He started on Wednesday with a speech at a community center in Milwaukee where he praised Hong for running a campaign that he said “reminded people across Wisconsin that there are no longshots when it comes to believing in a better future and fighting to expand opportunities to every family.”
“That kind of passion strengthens our democracy, and I look forward to earning their support and everyone who participated in this campaign as we move forward together,” he said.
Crowley also previewed his lines of attack against Tiffany, blasting the GOP congressman for siding with President Donald Trump’s claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential election and for voting to slash funding for programs like food stamps.
In the coming days, he vowed to turn his focus to “coalescing Democrats, independents, Republicans, and those who are afraid of having a MAGA extremists occupying our governorship.”
Hong also looked to quickly mend the party’s rifts, calling Crowley to concede early Wednesday morning and agreeing to appear at a unity event.
She said in a speech on Tuesday night that no matter who wins the primary, Democrats are going to “continue to fight for each other.”
“Because everyone who’s running in this race, they know that we can make better possible — and we must make better possible,” she told supporters in Madison.
