Francesca Hong campaigns for governor on support for working class
Democratic governor candidate Francesca Hong, a democratic socialist, campaigns at DanDan in Milwaukee on April 26.
SOUTH MILWAUKEE — Francesca Hong, a democratic socialist who is cementing her frontrunner status in the Democratic primary for governor, walked into her Sunday afternoon rally Aug. 2 wearing her signature blue pantsuit and grooving to Wisconsin anthem “Jump Around.”
At the podium, Hong could barely get any words out over the cheers of attendees. “That’s my governor!” one shouted, with 10 days to go before the Aug. 11 primary that will decide which Democrat will challenge Republican Tom Tiffany in November.
Throughout the two-hour event, Hong and other speakers sought to challenge the question looming over her campaign: Can Hong translate her grassroots fervor into beating Tiffany?
“When people want to fight for something together, when they see something they believe in, and they start to believe in one another, I think the Dems are going to have to write a new playbook here,” Hong said.
“Regardless of where your political home may be or how you identify, this is the moment where we must convey and win power for the majority, and that’s working-class people,” she said.
Hong’s on-stage guests included U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar from Minnesota, who endorsed Hong in April, and left-wing commentator Hasan Piker, who has divided Democrats for previous comments that critics call antisemitic and anti-American.
But the crowd was fired up for Piker, with some attendees seated in chairs rising for a standing ovation. He alluded to the state’s sewer socialist history, saying Wisconsin is where the American socialist movement began “long before Zohran [Mamdani] and Bernie Sanders.”
“The good people of Wisconsin always knew that this wasn’t about scary ideas, and it was just about a working-class movement that wanted to help out one another,” Piker said. “A Republican will never be elected in this state ever again, once our movement is done.”
Hong joined Piker in his Los Angeles studio in June to appear on his Twitch stream. She raised around $60,000 from that event. Piker indicated at the time that he could travel to Wisconsin to campaign for Hong; Piker said Aug. 2 he campaigned for U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan the day prior.
Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, who is now running in second place behind Hong, was the first Democrat in the race to say he would not appear with Piker, calling Piker’s comments “beyond the pale.”
Hong, asked by reporters after the event if campaigning with Omar and Piker was a risk, said the risk is instead “not building the broadest coalition possible.”
“Francesca Hong choosing to campaign with individuals who said America ‘deserved 9/11,’ called communism the ‘honorable end goal,’ and believe capitalists should be killed is certainly a choice,” Tiffany said in a statement.
Tiffany previously tied Omar’s endorsement to his…
Read More: Francesca Hong rallies with Ilhan Omar, Hasan Piker ahead of election
