While the reelection of right wing Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker attracted most of the local and national media attention in the November 4 elections, there was also a bright spot for the left in Wisconsin. Angela Walker, an African-American bus driver and unionist running as an independent socialist candidate for Sheriff of Milwaukee County, received over 67,000 votes, representing 20.3% of the votes cast. This was a truly remarkable result given a hostile pro-business media which largely ignored her campaign, a limited budget, the lack of an organized political party behind her campaign, and the difficulty of third party and independent candidates to break the stranglehold of the corporation-backed Democratic and Republican parties.

Throughout her campaign, she denounced mass incarceration and police brutality in favor of a program of social justice that attacks the root of the social problems facing minority and working class people. Milwaukee is a city where racial segregation, police brutality, unemployment, and deep social inequality are particularly glaring…