and now. In this week's Inside Wisconsin politics
had more to say on the two leading candidates. I'm
joined by NPR's Shawn Johnson, Anya van
Wagtendonk and Rich Kremer. >> It seems like just a few
weeks ago on this show, we were all kind of wondering
where all these candidates in this big primary fit.
What were their political lanes?
>> Well, I think you have the context of the national
political mood for primary voters, which are Democrats
that are mainly angry at Donald Trump and his
administration there. If you look at it in that
frame, the establishment's the bad guy. The
establishment is national Democrats who haven't done
enough to stand up to Trump. So tapping into those
voters meant you couldn't be the establishment
because then you were on the side of inertia. So
Francesca Hong clearly moved to the left. She was
going to fight, fight, fight. And a lot of the
other Democrats in this race were trying to
outflank her, and they just could not.
has a particularly kind of interesting personal
really sort of impoverished, challenged background in
Milwaukee. And so up until, you know, he dropped out
the first time in this race, he was kind of described as
potentially not electable because statewide, there's
a there's sometimes, you know, negative feelings
about Milwaukee. There is, you know, always the racial
element of the fact that there's never been a Black
man elected to statewide office in Wisconsin. So
there were all these questions about him. Then
he comes back with the endorsement of Tony Evers,
and all of a sudden he's described as the
establishment. It's a needle of I'm a viable
candidate, but I will also stand up to the things that
you're angry about. >> Crowley raised more than
twice as much money during the month of July. He
raised $776,000 thereabout, and Hong brought in around
$339,000. So that is a big sign that, at least in
terms of money, Crowley's campaign is getting some
backing. And the other sign that caught my attention
was Governor Tony Evers, you know, who endorsed
Crowley's campaign, which is definitely being framed
as an alternative to Francesca Hong. He also
gave $20,000 from his from Evers campaign account to
Crowley's campaign account. That's not a lot of money,
but it could be a signal to Evers donors, Evers
supporters that I'm not just saying I support this.
I'm putting my money behind it.
>> Francesca Hong is running a really unique,
strange race. She has not raised as much money, but
it doesn't seem to matter. She's making sort of
headlines on her own, sort of organically rather than
through these paid ways. And then all these other
candidates are just trying to kind of trying to to
catch up. >> And she's not putting
herself on TV, but other people are. You've had
these Republican groups consistently putting her in
TV ads, calling her liberal ahead of this primary.
>> She has spent $0 on television, which is just
unheard of in any type of serious race. And she's not
running just a serious race. She's running the leading
race. She's doing some, you know, digital media and
things like this. But a lot of her campaign is very
grassroots, very kind of door to door. And so you're
right, when we see if you see her face on your TV or
on your your YouTube, it is because these Republican
groups are paying for ads trying to get her over the
finish line because they think she's beatable. But
meanwhile, she kind of says, you know, thanks for for
calling attention to my policies.
>> You can get the full episode of Inside Wisconsin
Politics wherever you get your podcasts. Earlier this
week, Madison police in week, Madison police in