Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany says a recent Wisconsin visit by former Vice President Kamala Harris is a sign that Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Crowley is having trouble motivating voters.
Harris traveled to the battleground state on Monday to campaign with Crowley in Milwaukee, eight days before Election Day. Speaking to supporters at the city's Pfister Hotel, she acknowledged a mood of frustration among Democrats. "For the last year and a half, I know many of us have been going through a whole lot of emotion: anger, sadness, disappointment, destruction, depression, all kinds of emotions," she said.
Harris added that people have felt powerless and have wondered whether they can do anything about the situation. "I know how much pain people are in," she said, adding that she knows how it is creating fear among many communities.
Tiffany, speaking to Fox News Digital, said the appearance suggests Democrats are worried about turnout. "This is clearly a move that says that they're struggling to get their base to vote. David Crowley has not excited the base," he said. He described the campaign as dealing with a broader sense of national political fatigue driven by polarization and constant campaign messaging.
Critics and political opponents have accused Democratic leaders, including Gov. Tony Evers, of handpicking Crowley as a centrist alternative to more progressive candidates. One of them was state Rep. Francesca Hong, whom Crowley narrowly beat in the primary. The criticism echoes challenges Harris faced in her own presidential run.
"It was, once again, the Democrats that pulled somebody off the bench," Tiffany said. "They handpicked them rather than letting democracy work in their own party, and there's people very frustrated with that. They're trying to excite their base, and it's a problem for them."
Tiffany has presented himself as a commonsense candidate and has focused his attacks on Crowley's record as Milwaukee County executive, particularly on costs and taxes. "It's not in his DNA to reduce costs for people in Wisconsin or to reduce taxes," he said. "He is going to raise taxes. That's what he's done every single year when he's been county executive."
A spokesperson for the Crowley campaign rejected that characterization in a statement to Fox News Digital. The spokesperson said Crowley is traveling across the state to explain his plan to lower costs for working families who are struggling with bills because of what the statement called the "unaffordable MAGA agenda" of Tiffany and Donald Trump.
The spokesperson also defended Crowley's record, saying he has spent his career lowering costs, including balancing the budget and lowering the property tax rate every year as county executive. The statement accused Tiffany of going to Washington and selling out working Wisconsinites to give tax breaks to the same billionaires funding his campaign.
