Prices as of August 27, 2026, 9:14 a.m. Eastern. Record compiled from 30 dated sources; see the sourced record file for every citation.
Who will win the Wisconsin governor race? Democrat David Crowley is the favorite. As of August 27, 2026, Kalshi prices a Democrat winning the November 3 election at 78-79 cents and Republican Tom Tiffany at 20-21; 79 cents means a 79% chance. The first post-primary Marquette poll has Crowley up 49-44 among likely voters and tied 44-44 among registered voters, so the market is more confident than the poll. Tiffany has out-raised Crowley by more than ten to one.
The first poll of the Wisconsin governor race since the primary handed both campaigns a number to like. The Marquette Law School Poll, released August 26 and taken August 12 to 20, has Democrat David Crowley ahead of Republican Tom Tiffany 49% to 44% among 738 likely voters, and tied at 44 apiece among all 891 registered voters, with 12% undecided. Poll director Charles Franklin put it to Wisconsin Public Radio plainly: "You could either come away with a modest Crowley advantage … or a dead tie."
The people with money on the outcome did not split the difference. On Kalshi, where a price in cents is a probability, the contract that pays $1 if a Democrat is sworn in as governor after the November 3, 2026 election was quoted at 9:14 a.m. Eastern on Thursday at 78 cents by buyers and 79 by sellers: about a 79% chance for Crowley. Tiffany's contract sat at 20 to 21. That is a wider gap than either version of the poll describes, in a state Donald Trump carried by 0.86 points in 2024 and Gov. Tony Evers held by 3.4 in 2022.
The reasons the market gives Crowley more room than the poll does are below: a primary where 792,009 people took a Democratic ballot to 490,819 Republican; independents who went 55 to 16 for Crowley among likely voters; and a Republican whose favorability is under water at 39 to 42. So is the reason it does not give him more. Tiffany raised $8.7 million in the first half of the year and $4.6 million more in July, against $776,000 for Crowley.
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The Board
As of August 27, 2026, 9:14 a.m. Eastern (Kalshi, cents = probability; the bid/ask is what buyers will pay and what sellers want):
| Outcome | Yes price (bid/ask) | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| David Crowley (D) | 78¢ / 79¢ | about 79% |
| Tom Tiffany (R) | 20¢ / 21¢ | about 21% |
Two rows is the whole board and they are mirror images: the asks add to 100 cents and the bids to 98. These are party contracts, paying $1 if "a representative of the Democratic party is inaugurated as the governor of Wisconsin pursuant to the 2026 election," and Kalshi can settle early on a consensus of media calls, so November 3 decides it. Before August 11 the Democratic contract tracked Francesca Hong, who led every primary poll, and fell to 38 cents; on primary night the Republican contract traded 109,717 contracts from 63 down to 18, and by August 12 the board read 77 to 24. Since then Crowley has closed between 72 (August 15) and 80 (August 23, and again on August 26, the day the Marquette poll landed), and open interest has grown to 211,910 contracts on his side and 213,022 on Tiffany's. The week's trading ran one way: from August 20 to 9:14 a.m. on August 27, 26,943 Crowley contracts traded, buyers took 84% of them, and his price went from 75 to 79. The biggest burst was 6,391 contracts bought in one second at 11:49 p.m. on August 20, at 75 to 76 cents, about $4,825. Tiffany's 15,885 contracts split almost evenly between buyers and sellers and his price still fell from 26 to 20; the biggest print on his side was a bet against him, 2,108 contracts sold at 24 cents at 12:55 p.m. on August 21. These are small sums: the largest burst all week was under $5,000. Kalshi's margin ladder says how close traders expect the count to be: "Democrats by 1 or more points" was 72 to 76 cents, "by 4 or more" 44 to 49, and "Republicans by 2 or more" 12 to 13. A Crowley win by something near four points, with a real tail both ways, is the race that ladder describes.
What the Models Think
We also put the question to our panel of forecasting programs, which we grade in public against real settlements, without showing them the price, only the sourced record below. Three of the panel's eight seats ran this board. Their middle answer put Crowley at 68%, 11 points under the 79-cent market. Two filed 68 and one filed 62, a spread of six points, and all three reasoned the same way: a midterm under a president Wisconsin voters disapprove of 59 to 40 in the Marquette poll, plus likely-voter leads of four and five points, set against Tiffany's cash and the state's habit of deciding elections by a point. One model: "Crowley leads 49-44 among likely voters in the gold-standard Marquette poll inside a strong Democratic midterm environment, offset by Tiffany's huge cash edge and Wisconsin's coin-flip history." The forecasters and the traders agree on the direction and disagree on how sure to be: two-in-three against four-in-five. The market has real money behind it. The panel has only the record. These are model estimates, not predictions of fact and not financial advice.
How 3,796 Votes and a Governor's Endorsement Built This Ballot
The primary that this page used to be about now fits in a paragraph. On August 11, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley beat state Rep. Francesca Hong, a democratic socialist who had led every public poll, 315,308 votes to 311,512, a margin of 3,796 votes or 0.48 points on the Wisconsin Elections Commission's count; this page had him at 5 cents on Kalshi that morning. Hong called Crowley after 2 a.m. and wrote on X, per the Cap Times, that "I fully support him (Crowley) and look forward to working with him to defeat Congressman Tiffany in November." The margin was inside Wisconsin's one-point recount window but outside the quarter-point line where the state pays, and she did not petition. The commission certified the results on August 25. Tiffany, the U.S. representative for northern Wisconsin's 7th District since 2020, took 95.32% of the Republican primary, 467,830 votes to Andy Manske's 22,553, and has carried President Trump's "Complete and Total Endorsement" since January 27, when Trump wrote on Truth Social, per WPR, that Tiffany "will fight to advance Common Sense Values, and put WISCONSIN, AND AMERICA, FIRST."
Crowley's path was stranger. He suspended his campaign on July 8, saying he would "not be the Democratic nominee for Governor." Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez quit on July 17 over campaign-finance discrepancies, per PBS Wisconsin, and Crowley restarted the next day with Evers behind him: "I'm all-in on David Crowley - and I'm urging Wisconsinites to join me in supporting him," per Spectrum News.
Two things from that primary carry into November. Democratic ballots outnumbered Republican ballots 792,009 to 490,819, though Tiffany's side had nothing to turn out for. And the last two statewide temperatures ran liberal: Susan Crawford won the April 2025 Supreme Court seat 55 to 45, and Chris Taylor won the April 7, 2026 seat 60 to 40. Against those sit Evers by 3.4 in 2022 and Trump by 0.86 in 2024, which is why Ballotpedia lists the forecasters' ratings as "Toss-up" or "Lean Democratic." Every other governor's race on the exchange is on our 2026 governor races board; the backdrop, a Republican White House in a midterm year, runs through the 2026 midterm boards; the other open seat the panel scored this month is Georgia's.
Data Center David, the Legislative Terrorists Ad and Tiffany's Money
The general opened with two seven-figure statewide ad buys in the same week. Tiffany's campaign spot, "Geez, That's Crazy," per Urban Milwaukee on August 14: "David Crowley spent recklessly, botched health insurance for thousands, raised property and sales taxes," and "Even David Crowley says there's no real difference between him and socialists." The Democratic Governors Association answered with "Pander": "Tiffany's agenda is so radical that even Republicans say he's part of a group of legislative terrorists in Congress," and cited January 6. The record there: on January 7, 2021, Tiffany voted to object to the Arizona and Pennsylvania electors, objections the House rejected 121-303 and 128-282, after condemning the previous day's violence at the Capitol.
Tiffany's second ad brands his opponent "data center David Crowley" over a clip of Crowley calling Wisconsin a possible "AI and a data hub not only for the entire country, but for the entire globe." WPR reported on August 18 that the ad quotes Crowley's July 24 answer opposing an automatic rollback of data-center tax incentives but leaves out his call for "a more rigorous review" of them, and that Tiffany himself voted for the federal spending bill that carried a ten-year moratorium on state AI regulation before the Senate removed it. Crowley's campaign said Tiffany was "lying about" his record because he "can't defend his own extreme record of backing Trump's cost-raising agenda." The issue is live: Marquette found 67% of voters favor a one-year ban on new data-center construction, and both men spent August 24 talking about it on the road, per FOX 11.
Then the money, the one column Tiffany wins outright. WBAY's read of the mid-year reports had Tiffany raising $8.7 million from January through June with just under $3 million on hand; WPR's read of the July reports had him raising more than $4.6 million from July 1 to 27, most of it from the state Republican Party per WSAW, against Crowley's $776,000 raised and $463,000 on hand. Republican strategist Keith Gilkes, on the Badger Battleground Poll that had Crowley 48 to 44 on August 12 and 13: "Tom Tiffany is starting slightly down, but a four-point deficit in August is hardly insurmountable." The other side of that ledger, per the Milwaukee Courier, is that 76% of Marquette's voters called Tiffany conservative or very conservative and 5% moderate, while 23% called Crowley moderate.
Crowley carries an ethics complaint of his own. The Cap Times reported that Cheryl Brattlie of Verona, who described herself as "a private citizen," filed with the Wisconsin Ethics Commission; the allegations are that he moved more than $142,000 from his county-executive account to his governor account, part of it from lobbyists not yet permitted to give. No ruling is on the record, and two weeks of attack ads have not moved the price toward the side buying most of them: Tiffany's contract closed at 27 cents on August 14, the day the spots began, and trades at 20 to 21 now.
More on this: 2026 Governor Races: Every Kalshi Board We Track · California Governor Race 2026: Who Paid for the Close Poll · Who Will Win the House in 2026? Where the Big Money Went · SAVE Act: What Stands Between the Bill and Trump's Desk · Florida Governor Odds 2026: Donalds vs. Jolly
What Moves The Price From Here
- September 2026: the next Marquette poll and the next money reports. Marquette has not announced its next release date; the August one moved Crowley to an 80-cent close for a day. A tie among likely voters, not just registered ones, would be the first real test of 79. Tiffany's cash on hand after July is not yet public.
- October 8 and 9, 2026: the debates, if they happen. TMJ4's town hall at UW-Milwaukee on October 8 and the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association's one-hour debate on October 9, moderated by Jill Geisler, are proposed; as of August 18, per the Journal Sentinel, neither campaign had committed. Early in-person voting opens October 20.
- November 3, 2026. Election Day. Kalshi can settle on a consensus of media calls that night; the January 2027 inauguration is the formal close. Either way, this one is decided on November 3, 2026.
Hero illustration: OddsShopper, in the house collage style. David Crowley photo by LaShawnda Jones, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; Tom Tiffany photo by US House of Representatives, licensed Public domain; photos cropped, toned, and composited.
Prices quoted are live Kalshi market prices as of August 27, 2026, 9:14 a.m. Eastern, and will keep moving until this market settles after the November 3, 2026 vote. OddsShopper covers prediction markets as an independent analyst: any model or panel figures referenced are model estimates, not predictions of fact and not financial advice. This article does not advocate for or against any candidate or party. Trading involves risk; contracts can go to zero.
