What tight Democratic primaries reveal about midterm voters

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
This message comes from NPR sponsor, Carvana. Carvana believes selling your car should be easy. Get a real offer down to the penny, picked up from your driveway. You may keep waiting for a catch, there isn't one. Sell today at carvana.com. Pickup fees may apply.

**Robin Young** (0:17)
WBUR podcasts, Boston.

**SPEAKER_3** (0:24)
Today I stand before the people of Wisconsin after we rose from the ashes.

**Kalyani Saxena** (0:31)
What does the tug of war between the Democratic Party's establishment and progressive wing signal for midterms?
It's Wednesday, August 12th, and this is Here & Now Anytime from NPR and WBUR Boston. I'm Kalyani Saxena. Today on the show, we'll get an update on the condition of former Marine Robert Gilman. He was freed from a Russian prison this week.

**Kieran Ramsey** (1:05)
So he's improved a little, but he is still in very, very frail health.

**Kalyani Saxena** (1:10)
Also we'll hear about a new category for heat waves. Yes, that's a real thing.

**Kate Yoder** (1:16)
It's a period of unusually warm weather, usually in the spring or the early summer, where the temperatures stay above freezing both day and night.

**Kalyani Saxena** (1:26)
But first, let's debrief on last night's whirlwind of primaries. Voters cast their ballots in Alabama, Connecticut, Minnesota, South Carolina, Vermont, and Wisconsin, to choose the candidates they'd like to advance to the general election in November. Of particular importance, the Democratic primary for governor in Wisconsin. Progressives were hoping to see Francesca Hong take the nomination, which would have been another win for that wing of the party.
Ahead of the election, she was leading the polls. But it was moderate David Crowley who eked out a victory.
What does all this mean for the direction of the Democratic Party? Especially after much had been made of the progressive wins in New York and Michigan. Well, Indira Laxmanan spoke with Katrina Gamble, CEO of Sejourne Strategies, a progressive consulting firm, about the primary and what might motivate voters ahead of the midterm election.

**Robin Young** (2:25)
Democrats are divided over whether the party should be moving left or appealing to centrists. Last night's mixed primary results underscore that. In Minnesota's US. Senate primary, progressive Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan condemned the Trump administration's harsh immigration tactics that killed two US citizens on Minneapolis' streets. She was endorsed by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, and she won her race handily despite being outspent 4-1 by a moderate opponent with major outside funding. Here she is celebrating last night.

**Peggy Flanagan** (2:58)
We need to rip ICE apart and stop them from terrorizing our communities.

**Robin Young** (3:07)
In contrast, in neighboring Wisconsin, Democratic socialist Francesca Hong was far ahead in the polls, but she lost her race to a moderate. For more on the mixed signals coming from Democratic voters, we're joined here in the studio in Washington by Katrina Gamble. She's founder and CEO of Sojourn Strategies, a progressive consulting firm. Katrina, thanks for coming in.

**Katrina Gamble** (3:27)
Thanks for having me.

**Robin Young** (3:28)
So in Wisconsin, Francesca Hong had a double-digit lead in the polls, but she narrowly lost to David Crowley, an African American moderate who had left the race and then just recently jumped back in. How did Crowley manage this dramatic comeback?

**Katrina Gamble** (3:44)
Well, first, I think there are some questions about the accuracy of the polls, and so we have to investigate that to understand, was the lead as large as folks thought it was going into election day? Second, I think Hong struggled in a lot of ways on some of the issues that came up about whether or not we should cancel Thanksgiving and some of her language around abolishing ICE. So in this moment where a lot of voters are really frustrated and they're looking for options, I think there was an opportunity there for Hong, but she kind of got in her own way.
And Crowley had some strong endorsements from very key leaders like Representative Gwen Moore and obviously the current governor in Wisconsin with Evers. And ultimately, I think this idea of electability versus the progressive wing in this instance, folks leaned more towards the electability front.

**Robin Young** (4:35)
Well, you're teasing at something that I'm curious about, which is that unlike in neighboring Minnesota, where this progressive Peggy Flanagan won so easily, Hong did not get endorsements from Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren. Was she considered too radical for national progressive leaders?

**Katrina Gamble** (4:54)
It's unclear if people thought that she was too radical.
And in all of their public statements, many of them were saying that they were really only focused on federal elections. And so that's why they didn't get involved in the Wisconsin governor's race. And so I'm not sure if that is what was the case in Wisconsin. But one of the things that is clear is that Peggy Flanagan is a long time candidate and elected official. So she was a strong candidate in Minnesota compared to some of the, I think, the missteps that happened late in the campaign with Hong.