I Fear an Unsubstantiated Whisper Campaign by Governor Evers Damaged Francesca Hong’s Candidacy
I Fear an Unsubstantiated Whisper Campaign by Governor Evers Damaged Francesca Hong’s Candidacy Weeks before Wisconsin’s Primary.
by Kirk Bangstad
Last week, I joined Flare USA’s October Surprise mass lobbying event in Washington D.C. and looked into many Republican congressional staffers’ eyes to ask them what their bosses would do if Trump caused a civil war by refusing to hand over power to congressional Democrats if they won a majority in the upcoming election. We then asked what they would do if Trump sent the FBI to steal voting machines and make it impossible to count ballots with any certainty that those ballots’ chain of custody wouldn’t been violated.
Most of these congressional staffers were kids fresh out of college with political science degrees, and I could see the anxiety in their eyes. Yes, some were diabolical little pricks that were mini-me’s of their actual bosses, but some were also bright-eyed, bushy-tailed doers who still believed they were serving their country.
While in one of these congressional buildings, I took a picture of a plaque that was dedicated to the officers who defended these very same Republican congressmen against a Trump-led insurrection on January 6th, 2021. I wondered whether any of those bright-eyed, bushy-tailed Republican staffers connected the dots that most of their bosses, whose lives were saved by capitol police that day, now disavowed the truth of what happened—even though we all saw it with our own eyes.
I was probably just as naive about politics as those young Republican staffers in 2020, when I hung a big Biden sign on my brewpub and was told I would be fined by my Republican county board if I didn’t take it down. I was less naive about politics over the next 5 years after constantly being attacked by that same county—losing my business permits and even being jailed— for simply exercising my 1st amendment right to free speech.
I love my country but hate the cheaters and schemers who have corrupted it. Up until Trump’s re-election in 2024, I thought those cheaters and schemers were limited to folks in the Republican party.
But since Trump’s election, I’ve seen too many of our so-called leaders in the Democratic party cheat and scheme instead of unify to form a strong opposition party. And while the Republican Party is existentially more dangerous, it has become fairly obvious that a salmon who swims upstream against either party in search of truth and good public policy is likely to get undercut by those who care more about wielding power than serving their constituencies.
Democratic Socialists Zohran Mamdani, Abdul El-Sayed, Angie Nixon, and Francesca Hong represent some of these salmon courageously swimming upstream. So do groups on the ground fighting to protect their brown-skinned neighbors in Minneapolis, Chicago, and New York while their congressmen and senators continue to fund ICE.
After repeatedly attempting to fix problems that Wisconsin’s top Democratic leaders refused to solve—like suing to remove Wisconsin’s Republican insurrectionists from the ballot using Article 3 of the 14th Amendment, suing to rid Wisconsin of it’s parasitic private school voucher system, and even briefly running for governor myself— I too felt like a salmon swimming upstream against institutional cowardice and organized opposition from the center left.
Within a month of me dropping out out of the governor’s race this summer, because too many of my nomination signatures were invalidated by the Wisconsin Elections Commission staff, my brewery was raided by the Wisconsin Department of Revenue for a measly $500 of excise taxes paid to the wrong state (IL). I couldn’t help but sense that my loud condemnation of Wisconsin’s cowardly Democratic establishment led to this heavy handed act of political retribution.
Fast forward to about three weeks before the Democratic primary. I already had endorsed Francesca Hong when I got a message from a high-ranking establishment Democrat telling me I should drop my support for her because a huge story was about to hit that would kill her candidacy.
That person went on to claim that most of Hong’s primary opponents, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and even Republican Tom Tiffany’s campaign, were sitting on a massive story alleging that Hong had an affair with fellow progressive Gubernatorial candidate Mandela Barnes while still married to her now ex-husband; got pregnant; and subsequently aborted the baby.
My source told me he heard the story secondhand from staffers on Hong’s campaign.
While I thought this rumor was explosive, I didn’t for a second think it would kill her candidacy. For those who haven’t read much of my writing over the years, I was Anthony Weiner’s deputy policy director during his campaign for Mayor in NYC, and lived through his enormous political sexting scandal. My first reaction to any potential negative story like this is to get ahead of it by telling the truth, so one’s opponents can’t shape the narrative.
I reached out to a trusted friend to tell the Hong campaign that this rumor was going around so she could get in front of it. There’s nothing wrong with having an abortion, no matter what the pro-life nut jobs might say, and if one is honest with one’s spouse—a marriage can be psychologically over long before the divorce papers are signed.
Over the next few weeks, the most powerful Democrat in the state—Governor Tony Evers—endorsed David Crowley, who had consistently polled 4th or 5th among Democratic primary candidates. Slowly but surely, almost every other influential Wisconsin Democrat also endorsed Crowley.
“Is Evers’ team sharing this rumor with all of these powerful dems to make them abandon Hong and embrace Crowley?” I asked myself.
Then right before the primary, Mandela Barnes dropped out of the race. “Did someone just force him out of the race to keep this wild rumor out of the news?” I wondered.
When Crowley beat Hong against all odds, I was angry like the rest of Wisconsin’s progressives because Governor Evers put his foot on the scale at the last minute. I also understood how the rumor I heard could have truly damaged Hong in the general election, so I decided not to let my anger get the best of me. It’s possible that Hong simply wouldn’t have had enough time to redefine herself if this story got out, and we’d end up with a Trump sycophant and MAGA election denier as our governor.
But then weeks and months went by, and this story never came out. I couldn’t fathom how, if all the competing campaigns had heard this rumor as well as the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, this story hadn’t already made front page news.
Fast forward to last week. After I had written my Sunday essay explaining that I was going to DC to protest later in the week, I heard from a reliable source that Governor Evers and the establishment Democrats were telling candidates in state races not to accept money from Francesca’s campaign coffers to help them win. This seemed a) ridiculously self-defeating, b) like they were punishing political candidates for associating with Democratic Socialists, and c) insulting to the large progressive base of voters who Francesca energized more than any other Democrat on the campaign trail.
The “cheating and scheming” aspect that I hate so much about American politics was now seemingly working against a Democratic Socialist that shared my values, and I got mad again. I started wondering if that whole rumor about Francesca and Mandela was simply that—a rumor to trick influential Democrats to abandon her. So I picked up the phone and texted Francesca last week.
I texted her directly and got no response. Then I texted progressive Congressman Mark Pocan and one of his staffers to see if they had heard this story and if it was true. Again, no response.
Then I went to D.C. to protest with countless progressives who told me stories about how the Democratic establishment in our nation’s capitol was sidelining groups who wanted to mobilize there to protect our elections. The parallels between establishment interference in grassroots progressive organizing and energy-building in DC and Wisconsin were so striking that my paranoia about what happened in Wisconsin’s Democratic primary grew. Could it be possible Evers’ team made this rumor up out of whole cloth to knock Francesca out of the race?
So I decided to text Mandela Barnes.
His response to me, as pictured in the screen shots above, was cryptic but still an obvious denial.
So now, at least one of the two main characters in this explosive rumor denied its veracity. Again, I don’t need to know the truth of whether or not Hong had an affair with Barnes, because I simply don’t care. That being said, I think we all deserve to know whether this unsubstantiated rumor was used by Wisconsin’s Democratic establishment to convince influential Democrats to abandon Francesca and throw their support behind a back-bencher with no energy behind his campaign.
If true, then THAT is the true scandal out of all of this.
I think the public deserves a statement from Governor Tony Evers about whether his campaign spread this rumor to convince influential Democrats to abandon Francesca and endorse Crowley, especially if they didn’t know it was true. I also think the public deserves a statement from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel as to why, if they had this story, they didn’t publish it. Was there a deal made between the newspaper, Governor Evers, and establishment Democrats to not publish this story as long as Francesca lost the primary?
Might all this potential cheating and scheming by establishment Democrats be rationalized in order to keep Tom Tiffany—one of the most soulless Trump rubber-stamping election deniers in the country, from becoming Wisconsin’s next Governor?
I don’t think so.
I think any Democrat can beat Tiffany, given how unpopular the Trump regime currently is. What I can’t stomach is when any party elites—Republican or Democrat—cheat and scheme the American public out of electing folks who might actually be honest enough to pass laws that would help working people.
After getting reinvigorated by protesting with wonderful Americans last week, I will once again work with my lawyers tomorrow to figure out ways to protect my brewery from Governor Evers’ Department of Revenue—instead of devoting my full energy to mobilize with other activists to protect our elections.
I think back to the plaque I saw in that congressional office building that honored capitol police for saving the lives of so many Congressmen on January 6th, 2021, and have a deeper understanding of how they probably felt after being stabbed in the back by those very same Congressmen who they fought to protect.
Had Governor Evers fought as hard against Republicans as he’s fought against the left flank of his own party, Wisconsinites would be much better off today.
Once we take back power, we must completely rebuild our electoral system so that the most cowardly among us never end up holding the most power again.
Thanks for reading, and thanks for sticking with the Minocqua Brewing Company.
Together, we must link arms with the courageous and get our state and country back, one beer at a time.
Kirk Bangstad
Owner, Minocqua Brewing Company
Publisher, Minocqua Brewing Company Times
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Discussion about this post
https://minocquabrewingcompanytimes.substack.com/p/i-fear-an-unsubstantiated-whisper
fuck the DNC, support David Hogg's Leaders We Deserve and/or your progressive candidates. it sucks that we might have to again hold our noses to vote for corporate Dems but once we get rid of MAGA we can still work to get rid of corporate Dems.
These corporate Dems just play games. If they haven’t picked the candidate, they can’t win. I’ve had enough of these shoot your foot Dems. If you can’t stand success get the hell out, we’re fighting fascism here. I just know they are going to screw this election up.