Month: April 2021

GOP Divide Shows No Sign Of Letting Up As McCarthy Rips Cheney For Attacking Trump

Posted on by Becky Noble

The divide between the two wings of the Republican Party was as evident as ever at a party policy retreat held in Florida.

As House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy emphasizes the need for the GOP to be united, the division between McCarthy himself and GOP Chair Rep. Liz Cheney will not be an incentive for others with differing visions of the future of the party to come together for 2022.

According to a report from Politico, while former President Trump was not at the policy retreat, his presence was very much felt in the rift between the anti-Trump Cheney and McCarthy’s calls for unity.

RELATED: Schumer: Even With Manchin Opposing, ‘Reconciliation Is On The Table’ For Infrastructure Bill 

McCarthy’s Frustration Comes Through

In an interview with Politico, McCarthy was asked about bringing the party together while Cheney – the third-ranking Republican in the House – continues to attack an extremely popular Trump.

McCarthy said, “There’s a responsibility, if you’re gonna be in leadership, leaders eat last, and when leaders try to go out, and not work as one team, it creates difficulties.”

In a telling exchange, McCarthy said that he had spoken to Cheney about playing down some of her comments. When he was asked if he thought she had taken the advice is answer was, “You be the judge.”

That wasn’t all. At a later press conference, McCarthy demurred when asked if Cheney was fit to lead the GOP. 

GOP Rift Is Nothing New

The ink on the Articles of Impeachment were barely dry when Liz Cheney began to lay blame for the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol building on Donald Trump.

In a tweet on Jan. 6 following the violence at the Capitol, Cheney said, “There is no question that the President formed the mob, the President incited the mob. He lit the flame.”

Other GOP members of Congress also joined in on pinning the blame on Trump.

Over in the Senate, the same occurred. Those that many Trump supporters view as “RINOs” (Republican in name only) were also quick to blame Trump. Then Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) immediately following the violence in Washington D.C. stated that, 

“The mob was fed lies. They were provoked by the President and other powerful people. And they tried to use fear and violence to stop a specific proceeding of the first branch of the Federal Government which they did not like. But we pressed on,”

RELATED: Republicans Pressure John Kerry To Resign After NYT Leaked Iran Audio – What We Know So Far

GOP Facing Classic Clash Of Establishment Vs. Young Guns

What is happening within the Republican Party may be nothing more than a simple case of the Establishment Old Guard clashing with relatively younger, more often newly-elected young guns of the party.

These latter are tired of the establishment status quo and are not afraid to take on the Democrats. 

The young guns are equally not afraid to take on members of their own party. On Monday, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said that not inviting Trump to the retreat was “stupid.”

Greene argued, “Remember when Republicans lost the House in 2018 because a bunch of them distanced themselves from President Trump? Not inviting President Trump to the GOP retreat is the same stupid behavior. Funny how they don’t understand a record # of votes and support of any R President.”

Greene is among a handful of Republican lawmakers, including Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and Lauren Boebert (R-CO), who are not afraid to call out the senior members of the GOP.

Based on every known measure, Cheney is in the wrong as it regards Trump’s standing among GOP voters.

A February CNBC poll showed that 74% of Republicans want Donald Trump to stay politically active in some way, and 48% want him to remain the perceived head of the Republican Party. 

The Democrats have problems of their own in managing the AOC wing of their party, but a sizable GOP rift could bring them together quick.

The bottom line for Republicans is that Trump or no Trump, 2022 is fast approaching. 

 

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Morning Digest: Surprising census data shows Sun Belt states gaining fewer House seats than expected

Posted on by Daily Kos Elections

The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Carolyn Fiddler, and Matt Booker, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.

Leading Off

● Reapportionment: On Monday, the Census Bureau released long-awaited data from the 2020 census showing which states will gain seats in the House for the coming decade and which will see their congressional delegations shrink. In all, 13 states will feel the impact of population changes over the past 10 years, with six adding seats and seven losing representatives. These shifts are all reflected in the map above (with a larger version available here), but they contain several surprises compared to projections based on recent growth trends.

In a continuation of long-standing patterns, most of the increases in representation will be concentrated in Sun Belt states, with Texas once again leading the way in gaining two seats. However, while Florida looked likely to grow by two seats, it will only add one, and Arizona, which forecasts showed tacking on another seat, won't pick up any.

Conversely, losses will largely show up in states in the Midwest and Northeast, though New York avoided shedding two seats and came just 89 people away from standing pat. California, meanwhile, will experience its first decline in seats in state history. Montana, which lost a seat after the 1990 census, will once more send two members to Washington, D.C., though Rhode Island, which appeared to be on track to end up with just a single at-large district, will hang on to both of its seats.

Campaign Action

These shifts also affect the number of votes each state gets in the Electoral College, though they would not have altered the outcome of last year's presidential election and instead would have narrowed Joe Biden's 306-232 win slightly to 303-235. But the biggest impacts of the census won't be known until congressional redistricting is complete, a process that, thanks to delays in the production of necessary data, won't begin until August at the earliest and will likely last through a good part of next year.

We do know, however, that Republicans will once again dominate the redistricting process, just as they did following the 2010 census: As shown on this map, GOP lawmakers in the states will be able to draw new maps for anywhere from 38% to 46% of all districts while Democrats will control the process for just 16% of seats (the remainder will likely be drawn by nonpartisan entities or through bipartisan compromise). To stay on top of the mapmaking process as it unfolds, subscribe to our free weekly newsletter, the Voting Rights Roundup.

Senate

● AZ-Sen: Thiel Capital chief operating officer Blake Masters hasn't even publicly expressed interest in a Senate bid yet, but Politico reports that hasn't stopped his Republican mega donor boss, billionaire Peter Thiel, from dumping $10 million into a super PAC to support him. Thiel recently made a similar investment on behalf of venture capitalist J.D. Vance, a likely GOP Senate candidate in Ohio.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, meanwhile, has reportedly been attempting to convince Gov. Doug Ducey to change his mind and run against Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly after all, but Donald Trump is certainly not making McConnell's job any easier. The Daily Beast writes that Trump, who remains furious with the governor for not going along with his attempt to steal Arizona's electoral votes, has "told associates he would gladly and personally spoil any of Ducey's future political plans."

Trump even reportedly ranted that he'd go and campaign for Kelly if Ducey won the GOP nomination, a threat that, while few believe Trump would actually follow through on, shows just how much he despises his one-time ally. We may never find out just how far Trump would go, though, as the conservative Washington Examiner said last week that Ducey "continues to wave off the encouragement from fellow Republicans" to run.

● GA-Sen, GA-Gov: Former Republican Rep. Doug Collins said Monday that he wouldn't run for anything in 2022. Collins, who gave up his seat in the House last year to unsuccessfully run for the Senate, had previously talked about campaigning against Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock or waging a primary bid against Gov. Brian Kemp.

● OH-Sen, OH-13: It's really happened: Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan has launched a campaign for Ohio's open U.S. Senate seat. Ryan, who is close to labor and had $1 million in the bank at the end of March, is the first major candidate to announce a bid for Team Blue, and he'll likely be the frontrunner in a primary. He'd face a tough general election battle, though, in a former swing state that supported Donald Trump by a wide 53-45 margin last year.

Still, the congressman and his allies are hoping that Ryan, who has represented the Youngstown area in Congress since 2003, will be able to win back the type of working class voters who backed the Democratic ticket until the Trump era. He very much seemed to be aiming his opening message at this demographic, declaring, "Ohioans are working harder than ever, they're doing everything right, and they're still falling behind."

Ryan himself has also managed to decisively hold the 13th Congressional District, which backed Barack Obama 63-35 in 2012 but only supported Joe Biden 51-48, despite its ugly trend to the right. Still, his 52-45 showing last cycle was by far the narrowest victory in his 10 House campaigns.

Ryan has, until now, explored running for statewide office numerous times only to stay in the House, but his congressional district may not exist for much longer. Ryan made his announcement hours before the Census confirmed that Ohio would be losing a seat. Ohio Republicans also will more or less have free rein to draw the new congressional maps as they please despite the passage in 2018 of a supposedly reform-minded constitutional amendment, and they very well could leave Ryan's would-be Democratic successors without a friendly constituency to campaign for.

● PA-Sen, PA-Gov: The Philadelphia Inquirer's Jonathan Tamari relays that Republican Rep. Mike Kelly or his team have told at least two of his colleagues that he'll seek re-election rather than run for Senate or for governor.

Governors

● FL-Gov: Democratic Rep. Charlie Crist recently created a political committee that allows him to raise money for a potential bid for governor.

● NV-Gov: North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee didn't rule out a run for governor earlier this month just before he left the Democratic Party to join the Republicans, and political columnist Jim Hartman writes that he's indeed considering taking on Democratic incumbent Steve Sisolak. Hartman also adds that 2018 nominee Adam Laxalt has turned his attention to a possible campaign against Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto and doesn't appear interested in another campaign against Sisolak.

● SC-Gov, SC-01: Former Rep. Joe Cunningham announced Monday that he would seek the Democratic nomination to take on Republican Gov. Henry McMaster rather than try to regain his old House seat along the South Carolina coast, which Republicans are poised to redraw in redistricting and could make much redder.

Cunningham lost his bid for a second term by a narrow 51-49 to Republican Nancy Mace last year as Donald Trump was taking the 1st District 52-46, and he'll face a decidedly uphill climb in a state that Trump won by a much-larger 55-43 spread. Still, Democrats are hoping that two uninterrupted decades of GOP governors, as well as a potentially competitive Republican primary, could give them an opening to score their first statewide win since 2006.

Cunningham is McMaster's only notable opponent from either party so far, but a few Republicans have shown some interest in taking on the governor. The most vocal member of this group is businessman John Warren, who lost the 2018 runoff to McMaster 54-46 and didn't rule out a rematch back in January.

● VA-Gov: The Virginia Republican Party will be choosing its statewide nominees at its May 8 convention, but the Washington Post's Laura Vozzella says it will likely take "several days" to learn the winners. The party's State Central Committee voted Sunday to begin a hand-count of the ballots starting the day after the gathering, a lengthy process that involves instant-runoff tabulations; Vozzella adds, "Votes will be weighted based on each locality's performance in past GOP contests."

House

● LA-02: The all-Democratic special election runoff for Louisiana's vacant 2nd Congressional District saw state Sen. Troy Carter defeat fellow state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson 55-45 on Saturday. Carter will succeed Cedric Richmond, who resigned from this New Orleans-area district in January to take a post in the Biden White House.

Many national observers saw the contest between Carter and Peterson (who are not related) as a battle between moderates and progressives. Both New Orleans-based legislators campaigned as ardent Democrats, but Peterson, who would have been the first Black woman to represent Louisiana in Congress, argued she was the more liberal of the two. Notably, while Peterson emphatically backed the Green New Deal, Carter would only call it "a good blueprint" and said he didn't support the plan. Carter, in turn, insisted he'd have an easier time working with Republicans in Congress than Peterson.

Carter did in fact earn the support of some prominent Republicans, including Jefferson Parish President Cynthia Lee Sheng, but he also had endorsements from Richmond himself and Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, the highest-ranking Black member of the House. Peterson, for her part, enjoyed the backing of Gary Chambers, a vocal progressive who took a strong third place in the first round of voting in March, as well as New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and she also benefited from $1.2 million in runoff spending from EMILY's List.

However, other factors at work complicate the narrative that Carter's victory was a win for the establishment over progressive outsiders. To begin with, both Carter and Peterson have served in elected office since the 1990s, and Peterson even chaired the state Democratic Party from 2012 until just last year.

In a marker of their political longevity, both candidates also competed against one another for a previous version of this seat 15 years ago. Carter took a distant fifth in the all-party primary, while Peterson went on to lose a runoff to then-Rep. Bill Jefferson; Carter would unsuccessfully run again two years later.

Stephanie Grace of the New Orleans Advocate also notes that Carter had the support of very influential liberal politicians in New Orleans, an area that made up just over half the vote in Saturday's election. Among those in Carter's corner were Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams, a progressive reformer who won his seat last year by beating a Peterson-backed opponent, as well as City Council President Helena Moreno. And while both candidates supported LGBTQ rights, Grace notes that Carter's "longtime advocacy made him the favorite for much of that community."

Local New Orleans political divides also likely played a big role in the end result. Peterson is a leader in the Black Organization for Leadership Development (BOLD), a longtime power-player in the Crescent City that has often clashed with Richmond and his allies. Both sides ran up some major wins and losses in the 2019 legislative elections, and if anything, Saturday's runoff was a continuation of that long-running battle—one in which the Richmond-Carter bloc came out decisively on top.

Peterson had needed a good showing in Orleans Parish, which is coterminous with the city of New Orleans, to make up for her losses in the rest of the district, but Carter instead carried it 53-47.

● NJ-11: The New Jersey Globe mentions former Monmouth County Commissioner Christine Myers as a possible Republican opponent for Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill, though there's no word on her interest. Myers' name came up here in 2018 and 2020, but she opted to remain at the Small Business Administration during both cycles. Myers, though, was one of the many Trump appointees who recently lost their post in the federal government.

● NY-24: The Conservative Party in Onondaga County, which makes up most of New York's 24th Congressional District, says it won't endorse Republican Rep. John Katko next year, putting the congressman at risk of losing a ballot line that's played a key role in sustaining his political career. Katko had previously lost the support of Conservatives in the other three counties in the district—Oswego, Cayuga, and Wayne—though the ultimate decision will fall to state party chair Jerry Kassar, who previously said Katko is "in trouble" and reportedly plans to defer to local leaders.

Katko has received a great deal of attention—and, from Donald Trump loyalists, scorn—for his vote to impeach Trump in January, but that's not the only issue putting him at odds with the Conservative Party. Die-hards are also pissed that he backed the Equality Act, which would protect LGBTQ rights, and that he voted to boot Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene from her committee assignments due to her violent rhetoric. However, Katko also voted for the Equality Act in 2019 and still retained the Conservative Party's support the next year, so there may be time to repair the relationship.

Katko will certainly hope so: In 2018, he defeated Democrat Dana Balter by 13,694 votes—fewer than the 16,972 he received on the Conservative line. While his victory wasn't dependent on that line in his 2020 rematch with Balter, Katko might not be so lucky next year, especially if Democrats target him in redistricting.

Onondaga Conservatives say they'll ask Kassar to either leave the party's line blank or endorse someone else in 2022. The latter option could prove particularly self-defeating, but it's a tack not unfamiliar to right-wing extremists in New York: Republicans lost a special election in 2009 in what was then the 23rd Congressional District after the GOP and the Conservative Party nominated different candidates, allowing Democrat Bill Owens to flip a seat that had been red since the 19th century.

● OH-01: Franklin Mayor Brent Centers recently filed paperwork with the FEC, but the Republican isn't ready to launch a bid for Congress yet. Centers recently told the National Journal's Kirk Bado that he wasn't making any decisions until he sees Ohio's new congressional map, though he added that he wanted to run for the seat in the Cincinnati suburbs.

The mayor also said of Republican Rep. Steve Chabot, who appears to be his most likely opponent, "After 25 years, we need new energy. I would hope he retires." Chabot, however, has insisted time after time that he's not going anywhere.

● OH-15: Gov. Mike DeWine on Monday announced the dates of the special election to succeed Rep. Steve Stivers, a fellow Republican who will resign May 16 in order to lead the state Chamber of Commerce. The filing deadline will be the following day, May 17. The primary and general will be Aug. 3 and Nov. 2, respectively, the same as the dates for the special for the 11th District.

● TX-06: Republican activist Susan Wright picked up an endorsement Monday from Donald Trump less than a week ahead of the May 1 all-party primary to succeed her late husband, Rep. Ron Wright.

Trump made his not-tweet days after his camp publicly called out former wrestler Dan Rodimer for claiming, "Our campaign is the only one that has ever been endorsed by President Trump in this race." Trump did indeed back Rodimer last year when he was the GOP nominee for Congress―in Nevada.

Legislative

● Special Elections: There was a special election on Saturday in Louisiana and there is also one on tap for Tuesday in Connecticut. First up is our recap:

LA-HD-82: Republican Laurie Schlegel defeated fellow party member Eddie Connick 52-48 in a runoff election to win this suburban New Orleans district. Schlegel was able to reverse her fortunes from the first round of voting, which Connick led 40-36.

This chamber is now at full strength with Republicans in control 68-35 (there are two independent members).

CT-HD-145: This is a Democratic district in Stamford that became vacant when former Rep. Patricia Miller was elected to the state Senate in a special election in March. Democrat Corey Paris is taking on Republican J.D. Ospina, and both candidates have run for office before; Paris waged a bid for a state House seat in the Bridgeport area in 2018 but failed to make the ballot, while Ospina ran for this seat in 2020, losing to Miller 77-23.  

This is a strongly Democratic district that backed Hillary Clinton 80-17 in 2016. Democrats currently control this chamber 96-54, with just this seat vacant.

Mayors

● New York City, NY Mayor: Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams unveiled an endorsement Monday from Ruben Diaz Jr., his counterpart in the Bronx, for the June instant-runoff Democratic primary. Diaz, who is one of the more prominent Latinos in city politics, surprised almost all political observers last year when he decided not to wage his own campaign for mayor.

Other Races

● CA-AG: Sacramento County District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert on Monday announced a campaign against Democratic incumbent Rob Bonta, who was confirmed to this post just last week. Schubert, a former Republican who became an independent in 2018, attracted national attention for her role in apprehending the Golden State Killer in 2016, and she would be the first gay person elected to this post.

Schubert presented herself as a counter to two prominent California criminal justice reformers who recently won district attorney races, Los Angeles County's George Gascón and San Francisco's Chesa Boudin. She joins a top-two primary that includes Republican Nathan Hochman, a former federal prosecutor who is running on similar themes.  

● VA-LG: On Monday, Del. Hala Ayala picked up an endorsement from Gov. Ralph Northam ahead of the June 8 Democratic primary. Ayala, whose 2017 win made her one of the first Latinas to serve in the state House, would be the first woman of color elected statewide in Virginia. She faces five rivals for the nomination, including three with significantly more cash-on-hand than her.

Anti-Trump Republican Liz Cheney Refuses To Rule Out Running For President

Posted on by Rusty Weiss

Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney refused to rule out a future run for President of the United States when asked by the New York Post.

“I’m not ruling anything in or out — ever is a long time,” she is quoted as saying.

Her coy remarks may not be referencing 2024 though, as she believes the GOP already has a number of solid contenders in the next presidential election cycle.

“I think we have a huge number of interesting candidates, but I think that we’re going to be in a good position to be able to take the White House,” Cheney said.

RELATED: Liz Cheney ‘Would Not’ Support Trump In 2024 — We Can’t ‘Embrace Insurrection’

Cheney Blasts Fellow Republicans Planning To Run For President

Cheney, the lead Republican of 10 in the House who joined Democrats in the impeachment of Donald Trump following the Capitol protests in January, continued her fixation on that singular event.

Cheney said any of her colleagues who participated in questioning certification of the electoral college results should not be eligible to run.

“I do think that some of our candidates who led the charge, particularly the senators who led the unconstitutional charge, not to certify the election, you know, in my view that’s disqualifying,” she told the New York Post.

Senators Ted Cruz (TX) and Josh Hawley (MO) both took part in objecting to the certification of the 2020 election results for President, something Liz Cheney and the media have claimed led to an “insurrection.”

RELATED: Trump ‘Very Seriously’ Considering A 2024 Run, Says He Misses Helping People

Keeping Focus On The Capitol Riot

Just weeks ago, Cheney again attacked former President Donald Trump, whom she voted to impeach because he allegedly incited the Capitol protests in January.

“I think that it was the gravest violation of an oath of office by any president in American history,” the establishment Republican declared in an interview with Fox News’ Neil Cavuto.

“For us as a party, we have to be the party of hope and aspirations, and we cannot embrace insurrection and can’t minimize what happened January 6.”

The Wyoming Republican has said she would not support Donald Trump if he were to run in 2024.

Meanwhile, in an interview with Fox News personality Sean Hannity, the former President insisted he is “very seriously” considering a run for the White House in 2024.

Liz Cheney running for president will be difficult, but she has enough trouble on the horizon in her next primary.

Cheney is already facing a primary challenge and has faced multiple calls to resign following her vote to impeach Trump.

The former President’s son, Donald Trump Jr., joked that Cheney’s presidential aspirations must involve “a primary challenge to Joe Biden for the Dem nomination because God knows she’d be lucky to break 5% running in the 2024 Republican primary.”

Former Clinton campaign adviser and political pundit Dick Morris predicted Cheney will lose her re-election campaign in 2022 due to her decision to impeach Trump.

“She has a snowball’s chance in hell of getting reelected,” he told Newsmax.

 

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Morning Digest: Far-right ex-cop wages intraparty bid against pro-impeachment GOP congressman

Posted on by Daily Kos Elections

The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Carolyn Fiddler, and Matt Booker, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.

Leading Off

● WA-04: Far-right ex-cop Loren Culp announced Thursday that he would challenge Washington Rep. Dan Newhouse, who is one of the 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump in January. Culp, who was the GOP’s 2020 nominee for governor, made it very clear he’d be making his campaign all about that vote: After accusing the incumbent of having a “spine made of jelly,” Culp, without offering any evidence, accused Newhouse of making “some kind of deal” with Democrats.

Newhouse was already facing intraparty challenges on his right from state Rep. Brad Klippert and businessman Jerrod Sessler in next year’s top-two primary, and more could still join. It’s possible that a crowded field of opponents could split the anti-Newhouse GOP vote in the 4th District and allow the congressman to advance to a general election with a Democrat, but that’s far from assured. This 58-40 Trump seat is red enough that Newhouse went up against a fellow Republican in both 2014 and 2016, and this eastern Washington seat will almost certainly remain very conservative turf after redistricting.

Campaign Action

Culp may also be prominent enough to emerge as Newhouse’s main foe, especially since Klippert did not report raising any money in the time between his January launch and the end of March. (Sessler entered the race in early April.) Culp himself served as mayor of the small community of Republic, which is located in the neighboring 5th District, in 2018 when he made news by announcing he wouldn't enforce a statewide gun safety ballot measure that had just passed 59-41.

Culp's stance drew a very favorable response from far-right rocker Ted Nugent, who posted a typo-ridden "Chief Loren Culp is an Anerican freedom warrior. Godbless the freedom warriors" message to his Facebook page.

Culp soon decided to challenge Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee, and he quickly made it clear he would continue to obsessively cultivate the Trump base rather than appeal to a broader group of voters in this blue state. That tactic helped Culp advance through the top-two primary, an occasion he celebrated by reaffirming his opposition to Inslee's measures to stop the pandemic, including mask mandates.

Inslee ended up winning by a wide 57-43, but Culp responded by saying he’d “never concede.” Instead, he filed a lawsuit against Secretary of State Kim Wyman, a fellow Republican, that made baseless allegations of “intolerable voting anomalies” for a contest “that was at all times fraudulent.”

The state GOP did not welcome Culp’s refusal to leave the stage, though. Some Republicans also openly shared their complaints about Culp’s campaign spending, including what the Seattle Times’ Jim Brunner described as “large, unexplained payments to a Marysville data firm while spending a relatively meager sum on traditional voter contact.”

Culp also gave himself a total of $48,000 for lost wages and mileage reimbursement, a sum that Brunner said “appears to be the largest-ever for a candidate in Washington state.” Republicans also griped that Culp had spent only about a fifth of his $3.3 million budget on advertising, a far smaller amount than what serious candidates normally expend.

Culp’s attorney ultimately withdrew the suit after being threatened with sanction for making “factually baseless” claims. Culp himself responded to the news by saying that, while the cost of continuing the legal battle would have been prohibitive, “It doesn’t mean that the war’s over … It just means that we’re not going to engage in this particular battle through the courts.”

Newhouse, for his part, responded to Culp’s new campaign by reaffirming that he’ll be running for a fifth term next year. Newhouse brought in $288,000 during the first quarter for his campaign, and he ended March with $528,000 to defend himself.

Senate

● AK-Sen: West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, the most conservative Democrat in the chamber, endorsed Republican incumbent Lisa Murkowski. Manchin previously crossed party lines by backing Maine Sen. Susan Collins last cycle; neither Murkowski nor Collins supported Manchin during his 2018 reelection bid.

● FL-Sen, FL-Gov: Democratic Rep. Val Demings on Thursday reiterated her interest in running for Senate or governor, adding, "It's next year, right, and so I'd need to make that decision soon for sure by mid-year. And we're almost there now." Demings did not indicate if she was leaning towards one statewide race over the other.

● IA-Sen, IA-Gov: Democratic state Auditor Rob Sand recently told Iowa Press that he was thinking about running for the Senate, governor, or for reelection in 2022, and that he didn't have a timeline to decide. Sand won this post in 2018 by unseating a Republican incumbent 51-46 even as GOP Gov. Kim Reynolds was prevailing 50-48.

● MO-Sen: The Kansas City Star recently asked former NASCAR driver Carl Edwards if he was interested in seeking the Republican nomination for this open seat, and he did not rule out the idea. Edwards said, "I don't have an active campaign going on," before he talked about his belief "in the founding principles and individual freedom and liberty and sustainability of our way of life." He added, "There might be a day when I'm able to help with that."

Governors

● CA-Gov: Former reality TV star Caitlyn Jenner announced Friday that she would compete as a Republican in this year's likely recall election against Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom. In addition to Jenner, the GOP field includes former Rep. Doug Ose, 2018 nominee John Cox, and former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, and it could still expand further.

Jenner, who would be the first transgender person elected statewide anywhere, has not sought office before, though she's not completely new to politics. She was a vocal Donald Trump supporter in 2016, although Politico recently reported that she didn't cast a ballot at all that year; Jenner also did not vote in 2018 when Newsom was elected governor.

Jenner insisted in 2017 that, while Trump has "made some mistakes" on LGBTQ issues, she didn't regret backing him, but she finally acknowledged the following year that she'd been wrong. That public break, however, didn't stop Jenner from hiring multiple high-level Trump campaign personnel for her bid or accepting help from former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale.

● NH-Gov: 2020 Democratic nominee Dan Feltes told the Concord Monitor that he had "no intention right now of putting my name on the ballot in 2022," though he didn't rule out a second bid for governor.

Feltes, who was state Senate majority leader at the time, raised a credible $1.7 million last time for his bid against Republican Gov. Chris Sununu, but the popular incumbent defeated him in a 65-33 landslide. Sununu has yet to announce if he'll run for a fourth two-year term or challenge Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan instead.

House

● FL-20: Palm Beach County Commissioner Mack Bernard said Thursday that he would not compete in the still-unscheduled special election for this safely blue seat.

● KS-03: 2020 Republican nominee Amanda Adkins earned an endorsement Friday from 4th District Rep. Ron Estes for her second campaign against Democratic incumbent Sharice Davids.

● ME-02: The Bangor Daily News takes a look at the potential Republican field to take on Rep. Jared Golden in this 52-45 Trump seat, a northern Maine constituency that is the reddest Democratic-held House district in America. So far, though, the only notable politician who appears to have publicly expressed interest is state Rep. Mike Perkins, who said Thursday he was forming an exploratory committee.

2020 nominee Dale Crafts, meanwhile, said he wasn't ruling out a second try. Crafts, who is a former state representative, was decisively outraised by Golden last time, and major outside groups on both sides dramatically cut their ad buys in the final weeks of the race in what Politico characterized at the time as "a sign of no confidence" in the Republican. Golden ended up prevailing 53-47, which was far closer than what almost any publicly released poll showed.

State Sen. Lisa Keim and former state Rep. Alex Willette said they wouldn't run, but the Bangor Daily News writes that former Rep. Bruce Poliquin, who lost this seat to Golden in 2018, did not respond to questions about his plans. Poliquin spent much of 2019 talking about seeking a rematch against Golden, but he ultimately announced that, while he was "itching to run again," he had to skip that race to care for his elderly parents.

While Democrats control the governorship and both houses of the legislature, redistricting isn't likely to alter Maine's congressional boundaries all that much. The state requires two-thirds of each chamber to pass a new map, and there are more than enough Republicans to block any districts they view as unfavorable. If the legislature deadlocks, the state Supreme Court would take charge of redistricting.

● NV-04: 2020 candidate Sam Peters has announced that he'll once again compete for the Republican nomination to take on Democratic Rep. Steven Horsford. Peters, who is an Air Force veteran and businessman, lost last year's primary 35-28 to former Assemblyman Jim Marchant. Horsford went on to beat Marchant 51-46 as Joe Biden was carrying this northern Las Vegas area seat by a similar 51-47 spread.

● OH-01: Franklin Mayor Brent Centers filed FEC paperwork Thursday for a potential campaign for the Cincinnati-area seat currently held by his fellow Republican, Rep. Steve Chabot. Centers previously said he planned to enter the race in early May.

● TX-06: The progressive firm Data for Progress has released a survey of the May 1 all-party primary that shows Republican party activist Susan Wright, the wife of the late Rep. Ron Wright, in first with 22%.

2018 Democratic nominee Jana Lynne Sanchez leads Republican state Rep. Jake Ellzey by a small 16-13 margin in the contest for the second spot in an all-but-assured runoff, with a few other candidates from each party also in striking distance. Former Trump administration official Brian Harrison and Democrat Shawn Lassiter, who works as an education advocate, are both at 10%, while 2020 Democratic state House nominee Lydia Bean is at 9%.

The only other poll we've seen all month was a Meeting Street Research survey for the conservative blog the Washington Free Beacon from mid-April that showed a very tight four-way race. Those numbers had Sanchez and Wright at 16% and 15%, respectively, with Ellzey at 14% and Harrison taking 12%.

Data for Progress also polled a hypothetical runoff between Wright and Sanchez and found the Republican up 53-43. This seat, which includes part of Arlington and rural areas south of Dallas, supported Trump only 51-48 in 2020 after backing him 54-42 four years before, but Republicans have done better downballot.

● TX-15: 2020 GOP nominee Monica De La Cruz-Hernandez's second campaign picked up an endorsement Friday from Sen. Ted Cruz. De La Cruz-Hernandez, who held Democratic incumbent Vicente Gonzalez to a shockingly close 51-48 win last year, is the only notable Republican currently in the race for this Rio Grande Valley seat, which backed Joe Biden only 50-49 after supporting Hillary Clinton by a wide 57-40.

Mayors

● New York City, NY Mayor: The city Campaign Finance Board on Thursday approved former White House Office of Management and Budget Director Shaun Donovan for matching funds.

The board said the previous week that it was "deferring its decision" as it sought "further information" about a super PAC that has received at least $3 million from the candidate's father, but it cleared Donovan for public financing following its review. With this development, all of the notable Democrats competing in the June primary have received matching funds except former Citigroup executive Raymond McGuire, who is not taking part in the program.

Meanwhile, attorney Maya Wiley received an endorsement on Friday from EMILY's List. The field also includes two other pro-choice women, former city Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia and nonprofit executive Dianne Morales.

Prosecutors

● Manhattan, NY District Attorney: Former State Chief Deputy Attorney General Alvin Bragg recently picked up endorsements from two prominent labor groups ahead of the crowded June Democratic primary: the healthcare workers union 1199 SEIU and 32BJ, which represents building and airport employees.

Other Races

● CA-AG: The state legislature on Thursday overwhelmingly voted to confirm Democratic Assemblyman Rob Bonta to replace Xavier Becerra, who resigned last month to become U.S. secretary of health and human services, as California attorney general. Bonta, who has made a name for himself as a criminal justice reformer, is also the first Filipino American to hold this post.

Bonta already faces a challenge from Republican Nathan Hochman, a former federal prosecutor, in his 2022 campaign for a full four-year term. The bigger threat in this very blue state, though, could come from Sacramento District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert, a Republican-turned-independent who is publicly considering a bid.

Politico writes that Schubert, who attracted plenty of attention in 2016 after the Golden State Killer was apprehended, has also "hammered California's unemployment fraud failures and has excoriated [criminal justice] reformers." Schubert, though, would need to get through the top-two primary before she could focus on Bonta, and it's far from guaranteed that she'd be able to advance if Hochman or a different Republican emerges as Team Red's frontrunner.

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: The first 100 days look pretty good, but the global pandemic rages on

Posted on (Updated by Greg Dworkin

David Lauter/LA Times:

In his first 100 days, ‘Uncle Joe’ Biden combines progressive goals and a reassuring manner

As his presidency nears its 100th day, the blank spots are filling in. The resulting image is one most observers did not expect based on Biden’s largely centrist, four-decade record.

“A couple of months before the election ... did I think he would be a transformational president? I would have laughed at that idea,” said Democratic strategist Cornell Belcher.

“I would have been mistaken.”

“I don't have to think about what Joe Biden is doing every day,” said a North Carolina man who voted for Biden. “The best thing about Joe Biden is I don't have to think about Joe Biden.” https://t.co/NWtezHRMj1

— Monica Alba (@albamonica) April 25, 2021

NY Times:

How Covid Upended a Century of Patterns in U.S. Deaths

COVID trolls went nuts over this graphic. it spoiled their narrative.

The U.S. death rate in 2020 was the highest above normal since the early 1900s — even surpassing the calamity of the 1918 flu pandemic.

🇺🇸🇮🇳🌎🦠 Unbelievable that NIH head Francis Collins & former FDA chief Scott Gottlieb were not asked a single question about the Covid catastrophe that is unfolding in India & elsewhere & how the U.S. could help on political Sunday shows Meet the Press & Face the Nation.

— Michael Knigge (@kniggem) April 25, 2021

LA Times:

Michigan’s outbreak has scientists worried COVID skeptics will keep pandemic rolling

When Kathryn Watkins goes shopping these days, she doesn’t bring her three young children. There are just too many people not wearing masks in her southern Michigan town of Hillsdale.

At some stores, “not even the employees are wearing them anymore,” said Watkins, who estimates about 30% of shoppers wear masks, down from around 70% earlier in the pandemic. “There’s a complete disregard for the very real fact that they could wind up infecting someone.”

Her state tops the nation by far in the rate of new COVID-19 cases, a sharp upward trajectory that has more than two dozen hospitals in the state nearing 90% capacity.

The nation is watching.

Post-ABC poll shows a record divide between the parties in views of Biden ahead of the 100-day mark - 90% of Democrats approve vs. 13% of Republicans. Full story w/@danbalz @EmGusk https://t.co/YmhHRI2IHE

— Scott Clement (@sfcpoll) April 25, 2021

The insurrectionist party has not accepted defeat.

Frank Bruni/NY Times:

So Anthony Fauci Isn’t Perfect. He’s Closer Than Most of Us.

We owe him gratitude, not grief.

The phrases “public servant” and “public service” are exhausted to the point of meaninglessness. They’re tics. They roll off politicians’ tongues as readily as requests for money, suggesting that adulation and power aren’t the more potent draws to elected office. They’re invoked in regard to other government workers, as if decent paychecks and generous pensions weren’t a significant lure.

But if anyone ever deserved to be described in those terms, it’s Anthony Fauci. That was true before the coronavirus. It’s truer now — despite the times when he has revised his message on how to deal with it, despite assessments of the pandemic that didn’t bear out and despite Republicans’ efforts to use all of that to turn him into some bespectacled Beelzebub.

Shocker of shockers: Fauci isn’t perfect. But he has been perfectly sincere, perfectly patient, a professional standing resolutely outside so many of the worst currents of American life. More than that, he has been essential. We owe him an immeasurable debt of gratitude, not the mind-boggling magnitude of grief that he gets.

If anything, that grief has grown more intense of late. It was on garish display during a House hearing just over a week ago, when Representative Jim Jordan, doing a fan dance for Fox News, tore into Fauci as a doomsday addict less intent on saving people’s lives than on scrapping people’s liberties.

.@KFF’s excellent polling shows that the hardest “will never get” group is ~ 13-15%, and has been pretty stable across survey waves https://t.co/CqSbMhBV3U pic.twitter.com/BS5X93rLGc

— Kevin Collins (@kwcollins) April 25, 2021

Economist:

India is struggling with a catastrophic second wave

A return of the virus was inevitable. The government’s failures were not

A month is a long time, in pandemics as in politics. Until March, India was recording barely 13,000 new covid-19 cases a day, fewer than Germany or France and a drop in the ocean for a nation of 1.4bn. The caseload then began to tick gently upwards, until suddenly, late in March, it was rocketing. On April 21st India clocked 315,000 new positive covid-19 tests, above even the biggest daily rise recorded in America, the only other country to record such highs. In contrast to America, however, the pandemic’s trajectory in India is near-vertical (see chart 1). Its vaccination effort, albeit impressive in scale and organisation, is simply too late to change the course of the virus any time soon. “They said flatten the curve and we did,” laments a wry recent tweet. “We just put it on the wrong axis.”

This is such a bad look for us. Our own vaccination effort is tapering off...it's clearly time to help our friends in their hour of need. https://t.co/JwZ39s7bci

— Noah "Bunny Hugger" Smith 🐇 (@Noahpinion) April 24, 2021

Guardian:

Israel and Chile both led on Covid jabs, so why is one back in lockdown?

Analysis: contrasting national outcomes highlight how easily UK could blow its chances

What is happening in Chile?

Chile is in the enviable position of having vaccinated faster than any other country in the Americas. More than a third of the country’s 18 million people have received at least one shot of either Pfizer/BioNTech or China’s Sinovac Biotech vaccine. However, cases have soared to the point of overwhelming the health system and strict lockdown measures are back in place.

What went wrong?

The speedy vaccination programme appears to have instilled a false sense of security that led the country to ease restrictions too soon without people appreciating the ongoing risks. The country reopened its borders in November and in January introduced permits for Chileans to go on summer holiday. Without strict controls on people entering the country, and the lack of an efficient contact-tracing system, travellers may have brought infections back into the country that were not picked up.

The virus would have had more chance to spread when the schools reopened along with restaurants, shopping malls, casinos, gyms and churches. With transmission rates now so high in the country, a far greater proportion of the population will need to be vaccinated to get on top of the epidemic.

We finally have our Biden Voters in Diners story.

— John Armbruster (@john_armbruster) April 25, 2021

Business Insider:

This millennial GOP congressman voted to impeach Trump. Now he's trying to save his party from going off a cliff.

These are surreal times to be [Peter] Meijer. At 33, he is the eighth-youngest member of Congress and quick with references to the classic "Oregon Trail" video game. About a week before we met, Michigan Republican Party Chairman Ron Weiser suggested assassination as a way to remove Meijer.

"Ma'am, other than assassination, I have no other way ... other than voting out," Weiser told a woman at a North Oakland Republican Club inquiring about how to defeat the "witches in our own party." "OK? You people have to go out there and support their opponents."

Maryland To Review Dr. David Fowler’s Work After Testimony In Derek Chauvin Trial – WCCO | CBS Minnesota https://t.co/i9jwv6cePo

— Skeptical Scalpel (@Skepticscalpel) April 25, 2021

Bloomberg:

U.S. Says It’ll Send India Vaccine Materials, Boost Aid Finance

Earlier, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser said the U.S. will consider sending India stockpiled doses of AstraZeneca Plc’s vaccine currently unapproved for use in the U.S.

“I think that’s going to be something that is up for active consideration,” Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” while cautioning that he didn’t “want to be speaking for policy right now.”

Indian colleagues have recommended to me these fundraisers to buy oxygen, food for those in need, & support for people isolating/quarantining:https://t.co/MwCZy8RQgRhttps://t.co/wre55XntzFhttps://t.co/IxSR5DE5G6https://t.co/aV2eC0RcGhhttps://t.co/TDokBQsjbz

— Prof. Gavin Yamey MD MPH (@GYamey) April 25, 2021

Alex Padilla replaced Kamala Harris in the Senate. Now, he’s pushing for an immigration overhaul.

Posted on by By Eugene Daniels, Krystal Campos and Michael Cadenhead

When Kamala Harris resigned from the Senate, California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s vote was the only one that mattered and it went to Alex Padilla, the California Secretary of State. When he was sworn in, Padilla became the first Latino senator from the Golden State.

His appointment was met with both excitement and criticism because without Harris, there are no Black women in the U.S. Senate. “I say, I hear you. I agree with you. Personally, I'll do my best to be the best senator I can for all Californians,” Padilla said. “But how can I do my part to also uplift the voices of the Black community, Balck women especially.”

His first three months were an insurrection, impeachment, an inauguration, voting on Covid relief and Democrats like Padilla pushing to get rid of the filibuster, which forces a 60-vote threshold.

“We've got to walk and chew gum at the same time. Look, you want to work on a bipartisan basis. I'm not against that. That's the ideal scenario. Those of us who already agree we need to get rid of the filibuster continue to be vocal about it, keep it a public priority,” Padilla said.

A huge focus for Padilla is immigration reform. California has the highest concentration of immigrants of any state in the U.S. and he’s the son of Mexican immigrants. Despite the lack of movement on comprehensive immigration reform for decades, Padilla is “optimistic.”

“And there's probably different ways to achieve the reforms,” said Padilla. “For starters, we have a president in the White House who’s willing.”

Posted in Uncategorized

Michigan GOP congressman: ‘I would say my goal is to not be a hypocrite’

Posted on (Updated by By David Cohen

Three months after voting to impeach President Donald Trump, freshman Rep. Peter Meijer sees plenty to be critical of on both sides of the aisle in Washington.

Speaking Sunday on CNN's "Inside Politics With Abby Phillip," Meijer (R-Mich.) expressed disappointment both with Republican persistence in challenging the integrity of the 2020 election and the inability of Democrats to act in a bipartisan manner.

Meijer was one of 10 Republicans to vote for impeachment in January, something that made him stand out in the GOP very soon after being sworn in — and a target of scorn within the party. He's already drawn a primary challenge for 2022 from Tom Norton, a veteran of the war in Afghanistan and strong supporter of Trump.

"I would say my goal is to not be a hypocrite," Meijer told Phillip. "To be able to call balls and strikes fairly and have a voice that is credible even if somebody might not have the same beliefs or agree on the political side."

He said Republicans need to stop living in "a perpetual state of denial" about the way they lost power in 2020.

"We lost the presidency in 2020. We lost the Senate in 2021. So we need to get back to a point where we could be offering some solutions, and earning the trust of the voter and get that rare privilege of governing on behalf of the American people," he said.

The Michigan Republican also said that Washington's Democrats have missed an opportunity to advance the cause of good government.

"If you're a progressive, you've seen a lot of just wild sums of taxpayer dollars thrown toward — or just thrown vaguely in the direction of things that you like," he said. "If you were hoping to see some bipartisan consensus, if you're hoping to see governance from the middle, I think you've been sorely disappointed."

Addressing one of the nation's hottest issues, Meijer said that much of the rhetoric surrounding election reform measures is overheated.

"I think one of the biggest challenges is that election integrity is important to everybody. But how you hear it depends very much on where you sit. The idea that Republicans are out to broadly disenfranchise folks is false. The idea that all of these elections were stolen is also false," he said.

Posted in Uncategorized

Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Vaccine hesitancy and how to reach the subgroups most hesitant

Posted on (Updated by Greg Dworkin

PRRI:

Religious Identities and the Race Against the Virus: Engaging Faith Communities on COVID-19 Vaccination

Faith-based approaches are influential among vaccine hesitant communities. More than one in four (26%) Americans who are hesitant to get a COVID-19 vaccine, and even 8% of those who are resistant to getting a vaccine, report that at least one of six faith-based approaches supporting vaccinations would make them more likely to get vaccinated...

These faith-based approaches include: A religious leader encouraging vaccine acceptance, a religious leader getting a vaccine, religious communities holding information forums, learning that a fellow religious community member received a vaccine, a nearby religious congregation serving as a vaccination site, and religious communities providing vaccine appointment assistance.

The Senate just unanimously confirmed Deanne Criswell to be FEMA Administrator. She's led NYC’s emergency management office for years and ​will be instrumental in helping this country respond to COVID and tackle the climate crisis. And she's the first woman to lead the agency!

— Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) April 22, 2021

David Leonhardt/Upshot:

What Do You Do When the Kids Are Still Unvaccinated?

There will be more than one reasonable way to approach the risks of family activities.

What should those families do this summer and next fall, as they consider sending children to day care, seeing relatives, socializing with friends, eating in restaurants or traveling on airplanes?

The answers will not be easy. Families will make different decisions based on their own preferences. There will be more than one reasonable approach.

https://t.co/gvn5qviC8e

— Paul Musgrave (@profmusgrave) April 22, 2021

Zeynep Tufecki/Whitney R. Robinson, PhD, MSPH/Substack:

How One Epidemiologist Decided Whether to Send Her Children to Group Childcare

How to reason when information is incomplete, uncertain and emotionally-fraught

I’ve written on Twitter about my decision in March 2020 to keep my two young children (1 year old and 5 years old) in group childcare.  I feel lucky that I had the option.  But keeping them in daycare was a pretty out-of-step decision in my social circle at the time.  One day my toddler was the only child in his classroom. It was just him and his two teachers.  I’ve talked about my decision publicly over the past year, on Twitter and on my podcast, but I’m not trying to convince anyone else to make the same choices.  If I’d been in different circumstances, such as having older relatives living in my household or in a job where I couldn’t risk a two-week daycare quarantine, I might have made a different decision. I’ve talked about my decisions because I was talking about my research life publicly.  I couldn’t do that in good conscience without acknowledging the support I was getting through paid childcare.  So many families, especially mothers of young children, have dealt with huge levels of gaslighting and burnout over the past year.  I didn’t want to ignore the impossible trade-offs many families with young children faced because of the lack of a social safety net. I also wanted it to be clear what trade-offs I was making to reduce the risk for myself and the other members of the daycare community (e.g., no podding, no indoor activities with anyone outside our immediate family, purely outdoor meetups).

Because this was a tangible decision that I made early in the pandemic, when research was limited, I thought it was a good example for Zeynep’s meta-epistemiology series.  When almost everyone else was keeping their kids home, how did I decide to send mine to daycare?  In the spirit of Zeynep’s previous posts, I will answer that question using 3 principles.

Greta Thunberg looking disappointed in world leaders, a photo essay. pic.twitter.com/LB7uB50sJy

— Seth Masket (@smotus) April 22, 2021

NY Times:

Biden’s Intelligence Director Vows to Put Climate at ‘Center’ of Foreign Policy

A pair of recent intelligence reports have presented a grim picture of climate change. The annual worldwide threat assessment, which looks at short-term challenges, said extreme weather caused by climate change would increase the potential for surges in migration and cause instability around the globe.

The changes will “exacerbate political instability and humanitarian crises,” the annual threat report said.

#India just reported almost 315k #COVID19 cases marking the highest single-day increase anywhere in the world. The situation's so dire hospitals are on the verge of collapse running out of beds, oxygen & meds. I speak w/ @BDUTT who says deaths are likely higher than reported pic.twitter.com/JGtpZo0kM4

— Rosemary Church (@rosemaryCNN) April 22, 2021

Sarah Longwell/Bulwark:

Did We Forget Our Democracy Is Still Under Threat?

Complacency is an inherent weakness of democracy.

Old joke: An old fish and a young fish pass each other. The old fish says, “Fine water today, isn’t it?” The young fish replies, “What’s water?”

This, I have learned in hundreds of hours of focus groups, is how many Americans think about democracy—or more accurately, don’t think about it. Democracy is the system we have, and have inherited, but most of our experiences with any of the alternatives are so remote that we view democracy as the default state. As something that just is.

That isn’t to say that Americans don’t think about politics. Oh, do we. Probably more than is helpful. We have, as a people, some pretty out-there opinions and preferences and expectations about politics.

Wow, significant and alarming gap here: Just half of moms with children at home say they have been or plan to get vaccinated; that's 17 points lower than women without kids at home, and 18 points lower than dads with kids at home. https://t.co/4ULXf5CNH6 pic.twitter.com/Dx5pHvqIlP

— Ruth Graham (@publicroad) April 22, 2021

AP:

US drop in vaccine demand has some places turning down doses

Barbara Gennaro, a stay-at-home mother of two small children in Yazoo City, Mississippi, said everybody in her homeschooling community is against getting the vaccine. Gennaro said she generally avoids vaccinations for her family in general, and the coronavirus vaccine is no different.

“All of the strong Christians that I associate with are against it,” she said. “Fear is what drives people to get the vaccine — plain and simple. The stronger someone’s trust is in the Lord, the least likely they are to want the vaccine or feel that it’s necessary.”

Another challenge for vaccinations in a rural state like Mississippi is that in many cases, doses are being shipped in large packages with one vial containing at least 10 doses.

Biden is the first Democratic president since Jimmy Carter who didn’t put Larry Summers in charge of big economic policy decisions. A consequential move: If he’s running the show there’s probably no $1.9 trillion stimulus law and no $2.25 trillion infrastructure & jobs plan. https://t.co/MsOJs7WaXX

— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) April 22, 2021

Robert Draper/NY Times magazine:

Liz Cheney vs. MAGA

The Wyoming congresswoman challenged Republicans to turn away from Trump after Jan. 6. Instead, they turned on her.

Others argued that her announcement a day before the impeachment vote had given the Democrats a talking point to use against the rest of the Republican conference. (“Good for her for honoring her oath of office,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi pointedly remarked when told of Cheney’s intentions.) Likening the situation to a football game, Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania lamented, “You look up into the stands and see your girlfriend on the opposition’s side — that’s one hell of a tough thing to swallow.”

“She’s not your girlfriend!” a female colleague yelled out. Kelly’s remark was immediately disseminated among Republican women in professional Washington, according to Barbara Comstock, who served as a Republican congresswoman from Virginia until 2019. “We emailed that around, just horrified, commenting in real time,” she told me.

President Biden's climate summit is highlighting a White House approach that blends diplomacy, executive power, salesmanship and a few threats too. Here are a few pillars of the emerging Biden climate doctrine. https://t.co/fs7nPjy6yC

— Axios (@axios) April 23, 2021

William Saletan/Slate:

Republicans Still Sympathize With the Insurrection

They identify with the people who stormed the Capitol.

These sentiments don’t seem to have waned. Since January, the share of Republicans who insist that President Joe Biden did not “legitimately win the election,” nearly 80 percent of the GOP, has hardly budged. Nearly two-thirds of Republicans say Trump won the election, and nearly 30 percent say they’ll “never accept” Biden as president. Two weeks ago, by a two-to-one ratio, Republicans reaffirmed their view that the election was “stolen” from Trump. Last week, 70 percent said there had been enough fraud to change the election’s outcome.

This faith in the myth of the stolen election is driving an enduring sense of affinity with the Capitol invaders. In a Harvard-Harris poll taken in late February, two-thirds of Republicans refused to call the clash an “armed insurrection,” insisting it was just a “protest” that had somehow turned violent. In March, when a Monmouth survey asked about the “anger over the presidential election” that had “led to” the attack, 40 percent of Republicans said the anger was at least partially justified. Two weeks ago, in an Ipsos poll, most Republicans said that the people who “gathered at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6” were largely “peaceful, law-abiding Americans.”

Cuomo impeachment investigators contact 70 witnesses, receive 200-plus tips: reports

Posted on by Dom Calicchio
An investigation to determine whether New York state lawmakers should attempt to impeach Gov. Andrew Cuomo is underway, with about 70 witnesses contacted, according to reports.

McAuliffe donor registers as foreign agent to represent Ukrainian oligarch accused of bribery

Posted on by Caitlin McFall
Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe has received donations from Lanny Davis, attorney for Ukrainian billionaire Dmytro Firtash, a key figure in Donald Trump’s first impeachment, government filings show.