Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Republican challenger Eric Hovde squared off on a debate stage Friday evening in Madison in a fiery exchange of attacks that showed how intense this race has become after largely flying under the radar for months.
Hovde wasn’t as highly touted a Senate Republican candidate as some others trying to knock off Democratic incumbents, but the race in Wisconsin has become extremely tight in recent weeks, mirroring the small margin of difference between Vice President Harris and former President Trump in recent state-wide polls.
Friday was the only debate between Baldwin, a two-term incumbent, and Hovde, a multimillionaire real-estate mogul and banker, and Republicans have criticized Baldwin for not agreeing to more stage encounters. She participated in three debates in 2018.
Baldwin is a skilled politician with a record in Washington as a leader on women’s health issues, who served 14 years in the House.
Her re-election race was initially seen as less competitive than the reelection bids by Sens. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), and Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) but some Republican strategists now view Baldwin as the next most vulnerable Democratic incumbent after Tester and Brown.