Last month when I announced that I’d be taking the summer off to develop a new book project, YSDA readers — and the YSDA adjacent — rejoiced. Dark clouds would not be making a daily appearance in their inbox. The summer would be all sea shells and balloons. But some failed to read the fine print. And the fine print said that, with a Democratic gubernatorial primary in August, I might feel the need to comment now and then on that contest. Such is the case today. Don’t worry, it’s just an occasional thing. The sun will come out tomorrow. Tomorrow there’ll be sun.
We’ve reached another milestone in the 2026 gubernatorial race — the state party conventions are over. The Republicans met last month someplace, nothing was said and nobody cared. Tom Tiffany, who likes a brandy old fashioned and has a mother who knits, will be their candidate.
But the Democrats just wrapped up their convention in the wonderful, amazing, lovely and fantastic city of Madison and they held a straw poll. Here’s how many straws each candidate got:
Sara Rodriguez: 164
Francesca Hong 138
Kelda Roys: 114
David Crowley 78
Joel Brennan: 52
Mandela Barnes: 41
Missy Hughes: 10
I’ve also been in receipt of some polling data from one of the campaigns. It too finds Rodriguez with a lead (take a wild guess on which campaign leaked the data), but it also found Hong and fellow hard-left candidate Barnes with just under half the vote if you combine their shares. And if you add Barnes’ straw votes to Hong’s, she would have come out on top. So that’s consistent — and concerning.
Put all that together and here are some observations.
I have thought from the start that Rodriguez would likely get the nomination, but her campaign has been slow out of the blocks. I was starting to doubt her. But these latest numbers restore some measure of my confidence.
I had thought that Brennan might challenge her. But that was based on the idea that his brother-in-law, Exact Sciences founder Kevin Conroy, would pump millions into his campaign through an officially (but not really) unaffiliated organization. It’s getting late and that hasn’t happened, at least not yet.
Brennan is running a word-of-mouth campaign. Even I’ve been getting some pitches lately to support the Milwaukee guy. And if you’re pitching me it means you’re either very thorough or very desperate. The pitch is that he can win because he’s the most qualified person to be governor.
Yikes. That’s their argument? That he’s qualified? There are three fallacies behind that argument.
First, having been Department of Administration secretary (while never having held any actual elected public office) doesn’t make him better qualified than Rodriguez, who was a long-time health industry exec, a state legislator and now lieutenant governor, or Crowley, who was also a legislator and now county executive of the largest county in the state, or Hughes, who was in the C suite at Organic Valley and then led the state’s economic development agency.
Second, that kind of experience isn’t necessarily predictive of success. Tommy Thompson served for 14 years and was widely (sometimes grudgingly) regarded as an extremely effective governor. And before he got the job he never ran anything bigger than an Assembly office.
And third, if you’ve been paying attention for any, say, three-day period over the last decade you may have noticed that what were once thought of as “qualifications” are now actually a liability. Voters are in a mood to elect the unqualified. See Trump, Donald. See also, Platner, Graham. And also see Hong, Francesca. No, sorry, being a failed restauranteur and showing facility with use of the word “fuck” does not count as actual qualifications.
I had thought that Brennan would challenge Rodriguez for the moderate mantel, but unless Conroy comes through, I think he’s probably done. (This could make for an uncomfortable Thanksgiving dinner, but that’s not our concern.)
Mandela Barnes is being Mandela Barnes. He’s long had the reputation for being more hat than cattle. It takes some organization and effort to win a straw poll. These have never been thought of as his strong suits. Yet, he may save the party. As long as he stays in, it’s less likely that the Democratic socialist (which translates to “unelectable in November”) Hong will win the nomination. If he drops out, look out.
Roys did okay, but she’s from Madison where the convention was held and she has the teachers union endorsement, which should have produced a better result for her.
Crowley joins Brennan in the disappointing category. He led the pack in fundraising in the first report and he’s long been just generally well-regarded. He should have done better.
Missy Hughes might well make both a solid general election candidate and a good governor, but this is just more evidence that her campaign is not catching on.
Meanwhile, Tiffany just sails through the summer. Democrats need to beware because it’s shaping up like Tammy Baldwin versus Tommy Thompson in the 2012 U.S. Senate race. Tommy had a crowded and competitive primary and came out of it without a dime. Meanwhile, Tammy was unopposed for the nomination and so was able to come out well-funded and swinging, defining Tommy from the get-go as “not for us anymore.”
Tiffany will have been able to spend the summer defining himself as a down-to-earth Wisconsin guy and then, come August, he’ll define whoever wins the Democratic nomination as, well, Francesca Hong, whether or not it’s actually Francesca Hong who gets the nod.
The bottom line as of post-convention time: Rodriguez may have reestablished herself as the frontrunner, but don’t count out Hong. And in November do not count out Tiffany.
Now let’s all get back to our summer.
Yellow Stripes & Dead Armadillos 