David Crowley Wants Unity With Francesca Hong and Embraces Her Plan to Defund the Police

Milwaukee just got a preview of what "unity" means in today's Democratic Party, and it's not moderation meeting the middle. David Crowley eked out a primary win over Francesca Hong, a candidate who ran on abolishing the U.S. Senate and gutting Milwaukee's school choice program. You'd think a narrow victory would prompt a pivot toward the center. Instead Crowley turned around and said his agenda lines up closely with hers.

That's the tell here. This isn't a case of a winner making a courtesy call to a primary rival for optics. Crowley is telling Wisconsin voters, in plain language, that the socialist platform he supposedly beat isn't something he's distancing himself from. It's something he's absorbing. Ending school choice in a city where thousands of low-income families depend on it isn't a fringe position you tolerate to keep the coalition happy. It's a policy that changes real kids' lives, and Crowley just signaled he's fine carrying that water.

Then there's the tax pitch, pushing Wisconsin toward the highest rate in the country, at a moment when families are already stretched thin from grocery bills to gas prices. Pair that with rhetoric friendly to defunding police in a state that has watched Milwaukee struggle with violent crime, and you have a platform built for press releases, not for people who actually live there.

Wisconsin voters deserve a governor who tells them the truth before an election, not after one. Crowley just did the opposite. He ran as the reasonable Democrat and is now governing, or at least campaigning, as the socialist alternative he claimed to beat.