California banker Eric Hovde concedes Wisconsin Senate election after 12 days

California businessman Eric Hovde has conceded Wisconsin’s U.S. Senate race, nearly two weeks after he lost to Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D).

Hovde made his concession via a video posted to the X social media platform on Monday morning.

Thank you for your support. It’s time to move on. pic.twitter.com/XiO4XVVcaP

— Eric Hovde (@EricHovde) November 18, 2024

In the video, Hovde continued to make baseless claims about the race, where he lost to Baldwin by 29,116 votes. A slew of absentee ballots from Milwaukee that were reported in the early hours on Nov. 6 pulled Baldwin ahead of her opponent, which Hovde has falsely labeled as evidence of fraud. Officials routinely said before Election Day that Milwaukee’s absentee ballots wouldn’t be counted until late into election night or early the next day.

Hovde said he refused to call for a recount because according to him, officials would be counting the same ballots “regardless of their integrity.” Hovde also provided no evidence for his claim that “Democratic operatives” placed third-party candidates on the ballot to “siphon votes” from his campaign (American First candidate Thomas Leager received around 400 fewer votes than the margin between Baldwin and Hovde.)

A spokesperson for Baldwin’s office told Heartland Signal that Hovde has not called Senator Baldwin to officially concede the election or congratulate her. Despite repeatedly bashing Baldwin and her partner’s personal lives, Hovde says his supporters think he conducted his campaign with integrity and morality.

Most news organizations, including the Associated Press and ABC News, called the race during the afternoon of Nov. 6. But Hovde had used those baseless claims to delay conceding. Even when he admitted that he lost last Tuesday, he said he would consider a recount before conceding.

In her victory speech from Nov. 7, Baldwin did not mention Hovde but called for politics with less division and fewer lies.

Since jumping into the Senate race in February, Hovde has downplayed the fact that he operates a bank headquartered in Utah and owns a mansion in California worth $7 million. When reports of foreign governments depositing money in his bank, Hovde’s eventual response was “who cares?” Hovde repeatedly called for Baldwin to release her partner’s financial records despite no requirement to do so.

The former candidate also made a series of disparaging statements against groups like the elderly, women and overweight people.