Mandela Barnes ended his campaign for governor, abruptly clearing the path in Wisconsin’s Democratic primary just weeks before the August 11 election. Barnes, 39, said it had become clear who the party’s nominee would be, then added that his goal from the start was to take on and defeat Tom Tiffany and help Democrats win up and down the ticket.
The move came as Barnes was already the best-known Democrat in the field and had raised $1.4 million for the full campaign, including $841,358 in the first half of this year. He still had $204,208 on hand at the end of June, a sign that the decision was not about money alone so much as a race that had shifted under his feet this week.
He launched his campaign in December after serving two terms in the state Assembly and later becoming the Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor in 2018. Barnes and Tony Evers defeated Scott Walker and Rebecca Kleefisch that November, and Barnes went on to become the first African-American to serve as Wisconsin’s lieutenant governor and the second African-American to hold statewide office in Wisconsin. He later passed on reelection in 2022 and ran against Ron Johnson, losing by about 27,000 votes, or one percentage point.
This time, the Democratic field had already been unstable before Barnes stepped aside. Francesca Hong entered the race in September and had pulled into a wide lead in new statewide polling released the same week Barnes quit. The race’s only televised debate also took place that same week, giving voters their clearest direct look at the contenders just as the front-runner disappeared from the ballot.
Barnes’ exit followed reporting by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel about a 2025 state Democratic Party review into allegations that he was using his role in the party to have sexual encounters with young adult women. The Journal Sentinel said it was continuing to report the story. That detail matters because Barnes had not simply been a candidate with weak momentum; he was the presumed front-runner until the ground started moving beneath him.
There was also a sharper contradiction in the final days of the campaign. Barnes said the race’s purpose was defeating Tom Tiffany, yet as recently as Wednesday night he was casting doubt on whether Francesca Hong could beat him. He pledged to support the Democratic nominee, but his withdrawal leaves the party with a race that has already seen Sara Rodriguez drop out last month and David Crowley rejoin after being persuaded back by Barnes, Evers and others. The next hard deadline is the August 11 primary, and now the unanswered question is no longer whether Barnes could win it, but how much of the field is left for voters to sort out without him.
