Bonafide Badger or 'pure California'? Senate messages paint contrasting pictures of Eric Hovde

Republican Wisconsin Senate candidate Eric Hovde wants to tell you something: He lives here.

As he battles accusations of being an out-of-stater, the multimillionaire banking mogul is taking to the airwaves and social media in an attempt to dispel the charge from Democrats that he is a rich Californian seeking to buy a Wisconsin Senate seat.

On Tuesday, he launched a 60-second statewide television ad titled “Wisconsin Roots” detailing his history in the state. It came the same day Senate Democrats’ main campaign group released a 30-second ad of their own continuing their attacks. Their $2 million statewide ad buy highlights Hovde’s California banks and home and calls his lifestyle “pure California.”

The recent back-and-forth is a snapshot of a discourse that has consumed the race since Republicans signaled late last year that Hovde would challenge Baldwin. Democrats have carried the attacks into the first two official weeks of Hovde’s campaign, and the recent advertising investment signals a growing commitment to the effort — leaving Hovde to push back.

“I would like to tell you about the man I love, Eric, who is running for the U.S. Senate,” Hovde’s wife, Sharon, says in his Tuesday ad. She calls Hovde a fourth-generation Wisconsinite and notes he graduated from Madison East High School and the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The spot features a photo of Hovde at a Green Bay Packers game and standing in front of the Madison-based commercial and residential real estate company started by his grandfather. It mentions the Hovde Foundation, which aims to rescue children around the world from abuse and slavery.

It makes no mention, however, of the California-based businesses — H Bancorp and its primary subsidiary, Sunwest Bank — that have become the target of his opponents.

Democrats have focused on those businesses, as well as Hovde’s 2018 purchase of a hillside estate in Laguna Beach, to label him a Californian. Hovde has told WISN-AM (1130) that he spends about nine months out of the year living in his Wisconsin home.

But he also isn’t ignoring Democrats’ continued attempts to point out those ties. He’s posted videos of himself on social media swimming shirtless in a nearly frigid Lake Mendota addressing the claims.

“The Dems and Sen. Baldwin keep saying I’m not from Wisconsin, which is a complete joke,” he says in one video last week, half submerged in water and surrounded by ice. “Alright Sen. Baldwin, why don’t you get out here in this frozen lake, and we’ll really see who’s from Wisconsin.”

His campaign this week sought to dismiss Tuesday’s seven-figure ad buy from Democrats’ Senate Majority PAC. “This should tell you everything you need to know about how worried they are about Wisconsin flipping this fall,” the campaign’s general consultant wrote on X before the ad aired.

And Hovde on Tuesday morning said Baldwin “and her DC allies must be scared because they launched the first negative TV ads of the campaign today.”

The attacks aren’t a one-way road. Republicans have launched advertisements of their own hitting Baldwin, who is seeking her third term in Congress’ high chamber.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Senate GOP’s campaign arm, went after Baldwin in a 30-second digital ad the day Hovde formally announced his candidacy, accusing Baldwin of saying one thing and doing another. It pointed to Baldwin’s travel during the COVID-19 pandemic after encouraging people to stay home, as well as to her staff's lobbying connections.

In his new $700,000 ad, Sharon Hovde describes her husband as a family man who “loves our country and Wisconsin.” She says he is principled, honest and straightforward — “qualities I want in a U.S. senator to fight for Wisconsin.”

Still, Democrats’ own investment in the attacks means Wisconsinites will continue to hear a message similar to that hitting the airwaves this week:

“Multimillionaire California bank owner Eric Hovde on Wisconsin’s side?” the ad says. “Don’t bank on it.”

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Badger or California elite? Ads paint contrasting views of Eric Hovde