Third-party candidates dispute Hovde's claims that Democrats set them up to steal votes

 

WISCONSIN (CBS 58) -- Eric Hovde is accusing Democrats of organizing and funding a fake third-party candidate to steal votes that would have otherwise gone to him.

"It's one thing to lie to voters through TV ads, like I'm a Californian or that I want to ban abortion or ban beer. It's another to fund and organize a false candidate to manipulate voters," Hovde said on X Tuesday.

Hovde also accused Democrats of "propping up" another third-party candidate.

We spoke with both of those candidates about Hovde's claims.

Hovde says one's a plant, the other a propped-up Libertarian, and that if either candidate had been out of the race, the outcome would've been different.

"He had every chance and opportunity to earn the votes of the people that voted for me," said Thomas Leager, America First, U.S. Senate candidate.

On election night, and still today, Hovde is blaming the election outcome on dirty politics.

"It's unfortunate, if the Democrats wouldn't have put a plant, this probably would've been called some time ago, but you know what, it is what it is and we just have to wait through the final end of it," said Hovde on election night.

"I wanted to get on the ballot, that was my main objective. I wanted to run in the race. That's not a plant," said Leager.

Leager, a grocery store manager and gun rights activist, allowed the Patriots Run Project to help him get on the ballot, and says he let them handle the campaign contributions.

"I did my research on them when I started this race. Everything that I saw was a legitimate, right-leaning, conservative organization," said Leager.

They raised $23,700. Leager says when the reports went out, he learned a Democrat had been part of it.

"At that point, I had a choice to make, and I said, you know, there's other guys that feel that they got duped. I've legitimately done the work for this state, and I feel like I'm the best option for the state," said Leager.

Hovde has also pointed a finger at Libertarian Phil Anderson, who has also run for office in past elections, including those in 2014, 2016, 2018 and 2020. Anderson maintains there's value in third parties.

"The fact is that not everyone is represented by Democrats or Republicans," said Anderson.

Anderson says he can see why Republicans and Democrats might vote for him, especially when ads like these were out there.

"It highlighted some positions of mine that are true, but that might be appealing to Hovde voters as a way to pry voters away from him and towards me," said Anderson.

Bottom line, both Anderson and Leager say they wanted the job, and that they were not recruited to run.