Mandela Barnes launches Wisconsin governor campaign as Democratic frontrunner

Former Wisconsin Governor. Mandela BarnesHe is a far-left Democrat who almost ousted the Republican senator. Ron Johnson In 2022, she launched a campaign for governor on Tuesday.

Barnes enters the race to replace retiring Gov. Tony Evers, D-Wis., as the front-runner in the crowded Democratic primary. But unlike his lesser-known rivals, Barnes carries with him the baggage of a multimillion-dollar national Senate race that exposed years of extreme positions and a record that Republicans have already used to define him at the state level.

Rep. Tom Tiffany, R-Wis., the most high-profile Republican in the upcoming gubernatorial contest, on Tuesday took a “trip down memory lane about why left-wing extremist Mandela Barnes is wrong for Wisconsin.”

“Mandela Barnes is a left-wing extremist,” Tiffany said in a statement. “The fact that he is the Democratic front-runner shows how extreme and out of touch the party is. The people of Wisconsin rejected him in 2022, and they will do so again in 2026.”

Mandela Barnes announces his candidacy for governor of Wisconsin after narrowly losing the Senate in 2022

Then-Senate candidate Mandela Barnes is seen leaving a canvas launch party on November 7, 2022, in Glendale, Wisconsin. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Fox News Digital reported extensively on Barnes during 2022 midterm elections Before losing by one percentage point to Johnson in a race that revealed weaknesses that are likely to affect his next run for governor.

Mandela Barnes has a long history with the group that seeks to ban gang databases and make Wisconsin a sanctuary state

From ties to groups that have called for defunding the police and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to crafting legislation to ban hollow-point bullets and assault rifles, here’s a look back at the storylines that dominated Barnes’ Senate campaign.

Fox News Digital reported In October 2022, Barnes had a long history with a liberal nonprofit group aimed at defunding the police, eliminating law enforcement gang databases, treating 24-year-old felons as juveniles and making Wisconsin a sanctuary state.

Barnes served on the board of Citizen Action of Wisconsin (CAW) from 2014 to 2018 and was its secretary in 2017 and 2018. The group supported Barnes campaign In June 2022, he said he was “proud” to have her support.

“We’ve worked together for a long time now, and I’m excited about the idea that we can finally take down Ron Johnson together,” Barnes said on a CAW podcast. Battlefield Wisconsin“, in June 2022.

Former Wisconsin Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes attends a US Senate campaign rally in Madison, Wisconsin on November 2, 2022. (Scott Olson/Getty)

“You’re someone who’s been part of our movement and part of citizen action for a number of years,” the podcast host responded. “Your agenda aligns with ours.”

CAW describes itself on its website as a social justice group that works to “improve the lives and life prospects of all working-class Wisconsinites, but at the same time disproportionately benefits communities of color because they are the most marginalized and economically poor.”

Fox News Digital reported In September 2022, Barnes repeatedly called for cutting the state’s prison population in half, and eliminating cash bail and other bail. Progressive criminal justice reforms.

Before taking public office, Barnes previously served as an organizer for the Milwaukee Inner-City Alliance for Hope, a Milwaukee-based social justice group, when he teamed up with another organization, Wisdom, to launch a 2012 initiative aimed at cutting… Wisconsin prison population In half.

Gov. Tony Evers shakes hands on stage with former Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes during a rally in Milwaukee on Oct. 29, 2022, as both Democrats campaign in competitive midterm races. (Scott Olson/Getty)

The initiative was called 11×15 campaignBarnes told local media at the time that the government sought to reduce the state’s prison population to 11,000 inmates by 2015.

later that monthFox News Digital also reported that Barnes has been endorsed by an anti-police extremist group that has called for defunding and disbanding Law enforcementas well as abolishing ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP).

On its website, Color change PAC He celebrated Barnes’ experience as a former field organizer and state representative, as well as the state’s current lieutenant governor, while calling on voters to make him the first Black senator from Wisconsin.

The group is described as “the nation’s largest online racial justice organization,” and has engaged in harsh rhetoric aimed at law enforcement, as well as police policies and institutions that it claims are “racist.”

In August 2022, Fox News Digital reported that Barnes headed A Government Task Force on Climate Change Which recommended anti-racist education.

The so-called Climate Change Task Force — which Evers created and appointed Barnes to lead in October 2019 — is designed to develop strategies for dealing with climate change. State government To continue the fight against climate change. Barnes and other task force members submitted a final report more than a year later in December 2020, which laid out 55 solutions to combat global warming and promote “environmental justice.”

Mandela Barnes announced his campaign for governor of Wisconsin on Tuesday, December 2, 2025. (Scott Olson/Getty)

“In order to address this crisis and the environmental injustice associated with it, we must take urgent action, and we must ensure that these actions are fair and inclusive — anything less will continue the long pattern of environmental racism we have seen in this country,” Barnes said in a statement after the report was published.

Barnes has a long list of policy goals on his website for his newly launched gubernatorial campaign, which include commitments to ban assault weapons, make Roe v. Wade the law of the land and combat President Donald Trump’s “tariff debacle.”

When launching his campaign, Barnes said he was running because “this moment calls for bold leadership for the state of Wisconsin.”

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When reached for comment, Barnes told Fox News Digital that as lieutenant governor, “I had a strong record of supporting and providing resources to give law enforcement the tools and training they need to keep our communities safe and keep violent criminals off our streets, so I obviously don’t agree with any group that calls for defunding the police.”

“As someone who has lost many close friends to gun violence, I believe deeply and personally that every person has the right to feel safe in their community, and as Governor, I will work closely with law enforcement to protect the people of Wisconsin. Meanwhile, Donald Trump pardoned a prominent drug trafficker just this week.” Barnes said referring to Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez.

His campaign also emphasized Barnes’ “strong record of supporting law enforcement funding to keep Wisconsin communities safe.”

Fox News Digital’s Jessica Chasmar, Brandon Gillespie and Thomas Catenacci contributed to this report.