After trailing in the polls, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., is increasing his rhetoric toward his Democratic rival, Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes.
According to a Trafalgar poll, conducted from Aug. 22 to 25, if the election for a senator were held "today," 47.1% of respondents would vote for Johnson, compared to 49.4% who would vote for Barnes.
Speaking about his political opponent at the 53rd Chicken Burn event, Johnson said, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, that Barnes is "hiding from the press, he's hiding from Wisconsin."
"He wants to run basically a Joe Biden campaign. If he could get away with it, he'd hide in his basement," Johnson added.
So far, Barnes has received support from five organizations that call for defunding the police, a position that Barnes has denied having himself.
"I don't support defunding the police," Barnes told The Wall Street Journal in January.
Johnson was also critical of Barnes' comments from a year ago about the United States' founding and the role that slavery played in it.
"Things were terrible. The founding of this nation? Awful," Barnes said at the time. "You know, but we are here now and we should commit ourselves to doing everything we can do to repair the harm because it still exists today."
"Where did he develop these grievances?" Johnson replied. "This radical leftism, this radical Marxism, this radical socialism, where do you develop this? I don't understand that."
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