Journalists in Washington often sound like their first objective is to make sure Democrats are as electable as possible. In Wisconsin, socialist gubernatorial candidate Francesca Hong has a difficult job explaining a raft of bizarre and extreme tweets where she seems to hate a collection of American holidays, starting with Thanksgiving.
Politico "Playbook" reporter Irie Sentner labored mightily to help Hong prepare her appeal to a broader election after she wins the Democrat primary, as expected:
Hong, a state Assembly member and former restaurant owner, this week faced criticism from across the political spectrum about a slew of old social media posts espousing far-left views, from declarations to abolish the police to a call to “cancel Thanksgiving.” And El-Sayed’s knife-edge win right next door is reigniting concerns among some Democrats that a battleground may not be ready for such a lefty leader.
Hong appears to be moderating on — or at least adding context to — some of her more controversial positions. She has walked back her stance on police abolition while emphasizing the need to better tackle the underlying causes of crime. She told POLITICO many of her old posts were “jokes,” including the one about Thanksgiving, which she said is actually her favorite holiday.
It doesn't sound at all like a joke, insisting Thanksgiving should have been canceled in 1621: "If it takes a worldwide pandemic for us to realize we should stop celebrating colonialism and the original superspreader event [smallpox] that killed indigenous folx [sic] and women, so be it."
Does anyone make smallpox jokes? Hong claimed hey, she's just kind of a "curmudgeon" about holidays in general. This is true, since she's also slammed Halloween, the Fourth of July and "capitalist" Valentine's Day. Sentner just let her spin, with no apparent follow-up questions.
Saying that she'd cancel her alleged favorite holiday should at least provoke a follow up question. pic.twitter.com/01sfn4KNRf
— Andrew Follett (@AndrewCFollett) August 5, 2026
Sentner noted Hong wasn't giving up her "democratic socialist bona fides," but he can't define that as extreme. (Only Republicans do that.) He noted that Bernie Sanders and AOC have not endorsed her yet, but "Hong has notched endorsements from several national progressives, including Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who rallied alongside her and the progressive podcaster Hasan Piker last weekend."
Hasan Piker is merely a "progressive." All the leftist reporters are watering down Piker's violent and hateful extremism.
