Out Sen. Tammy Baldwin to face anti-LGBTQ+, anti-choice GOPer Eric Hovde in November

Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin will face far-right Republican Eric Hovde, a wealthy banker endorsed by Donald Trump, in the November 5 election after both won their primaries Tuesday.

Baldwin, who has been a senator since 2013, was unopposed in the Democratic primary. She served in the U.S. House from 1999 to 2013 and was a Wisconsin state legislator before that. A lesbian, she was the first member of the LGBTQ+ community to be elected to either chamber of Congress while being out from the get-go; others, such as former U.S. Reps. Barney Frank and Jim Kolbe, came out while already in office.

Hovde won the Republican primary easily over Charles Barman, a construction manager, and Rejani Raveendran, a nurse and midwife. With 95 percent of the vote in, Hovde had 86.3 percent of the total to Barman’s 7.4 percent and Raveendran’s 6.3 percent.

Hovde had sought the Republican U.S. Senate nomination in 2012 but lost the primary to Tommy Thompson, a former Wisconsin governor and a Cabinet member under President George W. Bush. Thompson then lost to Baldwin in the general election.

Hovde is anti-LGBTQ+ and anti-abortion, and he has made comments disparaging single mothers and nursing home residents. In the 2018 U.S. Senate election in Wisconsin, he endorsed and contributed to Baldwin’s unsuccessful Republican challenger, Leah Vukmir, who supported a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage. He has said that being transgender is “insanity” and has opposed allowing trans youth access to gender-affirming health care and to the restrooms and sports that comport with their gender identity.

“We don’t allow our children to drive an automobile until they’re 16. … We don’t allow our young people to vote until 18. We don’t allow our young people to drink alcohol until 21. And yet we’re allowing children 11, 12, 13 … to be transgender. Do you realize the highest rate of suicide in our country today are young people that went through a transgender?” he said at an event this year, presumably meaning some sort of gender-affirming care, in response to a question from a leader of the anti-trans group Gays Against Groomers. The truth is, the suicide risk is high for young LGBTQ+ people who are not accepted by their families or who are sent to conversion therapy.

He has accused Baldwin of earmarking federal funds “for a transgender-affirming clinic that doesn’t even tell parents that they’re doing that, with their own kids.” In reality, the funds are for mental health services for young people experiencing homelessness.

He has said he wanted to see Roe v. Wade overturned and has claimed to oppose abortion in all circumstances, although this year he endorsed exceptions for pregnancies resulting from rape or incest or that threaten the life of the pregnant person.

He once said low-income people who can’t get food assistance are just “another sob story,” and he has said that children “born out of wedlock” are on “a direct path to a life of poverty.” This year, discussing supposed election fraud, he said that “almost nobody in a nursing home is at a point to vote.” He said he understands nursing homes because he is a lender to them. He is the founder of H Bancorp and is a real estate developer as well. He divides his time between California and Wisconsin.

“Eric Hovde is an arrogant opportunist looking to grab at power and influence wherever he can find it for the sake of his own ego,” said a statement from Jared Todd, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign’s Equality Votes PAC. “He has shown time after time that he’s completely out of touch with Wisconsin voters. Attacking transgender people, stripping Wisconsinites of their reproductive health care choices, and proposing nothing to make Wisconsinites better off is not a winning agenda. Wisconsinites, including the state’s 1 million Equality Voters, will reject Hovde’s bigoted elitism at the ballot box and reelect Tammy Baldwin, a champion for Wisconsin families who puts their needs first.”