Rebecca Cooke, the Democratic congressional candidate in Wisconsin's 3rd district.Cooke for Congress

Rebecca Cooke has spent many nights this year waiting tables during her race for Congress in a Wisconsin swing district. She is a 36-year-old service industry worker and nonprofit leader with a chance to secure an upset in a tight House race.

It’s not the typical profile for a future member of Congress. She has no personal fortune to self-fund her campaign or elected experience. But Cooke—running in a district that covers much of rural southwestern Wisconsin and includes the cities of Eau Claire and La Crosse—hopes a moderate version of Democratic populism can win back Trump voters.

“A big part of our identity and why I wanted to run for Congress is because I feel like there’s a lot of corporate monopolies that have really robbed us of our farming traditions, and that have really crippled a lot of our rural economy,” Cooke told me. She stressed the need for robust antitrust enforcement and supporting organized labor. “I like to tell people often that I’m progressive where it counts,” she said.

“After I endorsed Becca, he shoulder-checked me on the floor,” Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez said of Rep. Derrick Van Orden.

Cooke’s district leans Republican—but not by much. Trump carried the area by about 5 points. In 2022, Derrick Van Orden, a right-wing Republican and former Navy SEAL, won the seat after Ron Kind, the longtime moderate Democrat incumbent, announced his retirement. Cooke is now running to unseat Van Orden, who has quickly established a reputation for being one of Congress’ worst-behaved members.

Cooke is affiliated with the moderate Blue Dog wing of the party and has (literally) placed herself in the middle: In one ad, she stands in the center of a........

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