Primary preview: Two of the nation’s biggest states are nominating candidates on Tuesday

Posted on August 23, 2022 by Daily Kos Elections

Tuesday brings us our biggest election night until November as three states go to the polls to select their nominees for November, though only Florida is holding its first (and only) primary of the year.

Oklahoma voters already went to the polls on June 28, but the state is now hosting runoffs in primaries where no one took a majority of the vote. New York also held primaries that day for statewide races, the state Assembly, and local office, but because the courts redrew the maps for the U.S. House and state Senate, those nomination contests are only taking place now. The Empire State also will carry out special elections in the 19th and 23rd Congressional Districts.

Below you'll find our guide to all of the top contests, arranged chronologically by each state’s poll closing times. When it’s available, we'll tell you about any reliable polling that exists for each race, but if we don't mention any numbers, it means no recent surveys have been made public.

Note that the presidential results we include after each district reflect how the 2020 race would have gone under the new lines in place for this fall, except for the special elections in New York’s 19th and 23rd, which are being conducted using the existing boundaries. (The regularly scheduled primaries for both seats are taking place simultaneously, but under the new map.) And if you'd like to know how much of the population in each new district comes from each old district, please check out our redistribution tables.

Our live coverage will begin at 7 PM ET when polls close in most of Florida, a state that is typically one of the fastest to count votes. You can also follow us on Twitter for blow-by-blow updates, and you’ll want to bookmark our primary calendar, which includes the dates for the remaining primaries of the year.

Florida

Polls close at 7 PM ET in the portion of the state located in the Eastern time zone, where most Floridians live. Polls close an hour later in the remainder of the state.

● FL-Gov (D) (51-48 Trump): Rep. Charlie Crist and state Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried are the chief Democratic contenders to take on Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who will enter the general election with a massive $135 million war chest.

Crist, who was elected governor in 2006 as a Republican and narrowly lost the 2014 general election to reclaim his prior post following his party switch, has outspent Fried and earned endorsements from several prominent labor groups. Fried, though, has used the last weeks of the campaign to highlight her opponent’s political past, including Crist's appointment of an anti-abortion judge to the state’s highest court. Almost every poll, including a Fried internal from early August, has shown Crist ahead, though an independent survey from the final days put Fried up 47-43.

● FL-01 (R) (65-33 Trump): Rep. Matt Gaetz, the far-right icon who remains under federal investigation for sex trafficking of a minor and other alleged offenses, faces a challenge from self-funder Mark Lombardo. The other Republican candidate in the running is Greg Merk, who took 9% in Gaetz’s uncompetitive 2020 primary. This constituency in the Pensacola area barely changed under the new map.

Lombardo has used his personal wealth to run an ad blitz highlighting Gaetz’s travails; one ad during the final week even speculated, without evidence, that Gaetz might be the government informant who prompted the FBI's raid of Mar-a-Lago. The congressman, though, has outspent Lombardo, whom he’s accused of being a “liberal.”

● FL-04 (R) (53-46 Trump): Three Republicans are campaigning for an open seat that includes part of Jacksonville and its western suburbs, though state Senate President Pro Tempore Aaron Bean very much looks like the frontrunner.

Bean, who has the backing of Sen. Marco Rubio and Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry, posted a huge 59-16 lead over Navy veteran Erick Aguilar in an independent poll from early August, with underfunded rival Jon Chuba at 6%. That survey was taken weeks after Aguilar was thrown off the GOP fundraising platform WinRed for sending out deceptive appeals that appeared to be from better-known Republicans. Former state Sen. Tony Hill and businesswoman LaShonda Holloway are campaigning on the Democratic side, but both have struggled to bring in cash.

● FL-07 (R) (52-47 Trump): Democratic Rep. Stephanie Murphy announced her retirement months before Republicans transformed her suburban Orlando district from a 55-44 Biden constituency to one that supported Trump by 5 points, and eight Republicans are in the running to replace her. Four Democrats are also on the ballot, but none of them have raised much money.

The only sitting elected official in the race is state Rep. Anthony Sabatini, a far-right zealot who has a terrible relationship with his chamber's leadership. Sabatini has been on the receiving end of heavy spending from outside groups that fault him for voting against Gov. Ron DeSantis’ budget and for having once been a registered Democrat.

The other two candidates who have brought in serious sums are Army veteran Cory Mills and Navy veteran Brady Duke, who have each run ads implicitly threatening violence against liberals. The field also includes former DeBary City Commissioner Erika Benfield, who lost a competitive state House primary in 2020; former Orange County Commissioner Ted Edwards, who is campaigning as a moderate; former congressional staffer Rusty Roberts; and businessman Scott Sturgill, who lost the 2018 primary for the old 7th.

● FL-10 (D) (65-33 Biden): Ten Democrats are campaigning to succeed Rep. Val Demings, who is running for the Senate, in this safely blue Orlando constituency, including two former House members who jumped in just before filing closed in June.

One of them is former 9th District Rep. Alan Grayson, a bombastic frequent candidate who decided to end his little-noticed Senate bid to run here. The other relatively recent arrival is former 5th District Rep. Corrine Brown, whose launch came about a month after she accepted a deal with federal prosecutors that saw her plead guilty to tax fraud. Brown represented part of the Orlando area during her tenure from 1993 to 2017 even though her longtime Jacksonville base is located well to the north, but she’s raised little for her comeback campaign.

The top fundraiser by far is gun safety activist Maxwell Alejandro Frost, who has also benefited from about $1 million in support from the crypto-aligned Protect Our Future PAC. State Sen. Randolph Bracy, meanwhile, is the one current elected official in the race. The field also features pastor Terence Gray and five others. A last-minute poll from the Democratic firm Data for Progress found Frost leading Bracy 34-18, with Grayson at 14% and Brown at 6%; all others were in the low single digits and 15% were undecided.

● FL-11 (R) (55-44 Trump): Six-term Rep. Dan Webster faces Republican primary opposition from far-right activist Laura Loomer, a self-described "proud Islamophobe" who has been banned from numerous social media, rideshare, and payment services for spreading bigotry. One other little-known Republican is also competing here.

Webster only represents 35% of this new constituency in the western Orlando suburbs, which includes the gargantuan retirement community of The Villages. Still, he’s a far more familiar presence here than Loomer, who ran a high-profile but doomed 2020 bid against Democratic Rep. Lois Frankel in South Florida.

● FL-13 (R) (53-46 Trump): Five Republicans are competing to replace Democratic Rep. Charlie Crist in a St. Petersburg-based district the GOP aggressively gerrymandered. The winner will go up against former Department of Defense official Eric Lynn, who is the one Democrat in the running.

The early GOP frontrunner was 2020 nominee Anna Paulina Luna, who sports endorsements from Trump and the Club for Growth. Her two main opponents are Amanda Makki, a former lobbyist who Luna beat in last cycle’s primary, and attorney Kevin Hayslett. Hayslett and his allies have run an aggressive campaign against Luna, an effort that includes a clip of her saying “I always agreed with President Obama's immigration policies.” Luna and the Club in turn have gone after Hayslett for criticizing Trump in 2016. A recent independent poll shows Luna leading Hayslett 37-34, with Makki at 14%.

● FL-15 (R & D) (51-48 Trump): Each party has five candidates running for a brand-new seat in the Tampa suburbs, created because Florida won a new seat in reapportionment. On the GOP side, the two elected officials in the running are state Sen. Kelli Stargel, who is an ardent social conservative, and state Rep. Jackie Toledo, who has prevailed on competitive turf.

Another notable contender is former Secretary of State Laurel Lee, who recently resigned to run and was previously elected as a local judge before DeSantis chose her as Florida's top elections administration official. Rounding out the field are retired Navy Capt. Mac McGovern and Demetrius Grimes, a fellow Navy veteran who lost the 2018 Democratic primary for the old 26th District in South Florida. Outside groups promoting both Stargel and Lee have also been spending plenty of money here, with Stargel’s allies launching a late attack on Lee for not performing a “forensic audit of the 2020 election.”

For the Democrats, the most familiar name is probably Alan Cohn, a former local TV anchor who lost the 2020 general election to Republican Scott Franklin in the previous version of the 15th. (Franklin is seeking the new 18th.) Comedian Eddie Geller, though, has brought in more money for his campaign, while the other three contenders have barely raised anything.

● FL-20 (D) (76-23 Biden): Freshman Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick faces a Democratic primary rematch against former Broward County Commissioner Dale Holness, whom she beat by all of five votes in last year's crowded special election. State Rep. Anika Omphroy is also in, but she hasn’t reported raising anything. About three-quarters of this constituency, which is located in the inland Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach areas, is the same turf that Cherfilus-McCormick and Holness competed for last year.

Cherfilus-McCormick and Holness have attacked one another’s ethics, though they haven’t differed much on policy. The new incumbent has decisively outraised her main opponent, and the SEIU has endorsed her this time after pulling for Holness in the special.

● FL-23 (D) (56-43 Biden): Rep. Ted Deutch is retiring from a Fort Lauderdale-based seat that's very similar to the 22nd District he currently serves, and six fellow Democrats are on the ballot to succeed him.

The frontrunner from the beginning has been Broward County Commissioner Jared Moskowitz, a well-connected former state representative who later served in Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis' administration as director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management. Moskowitz, who has raised considerably more money than the rest of the field, has endorsements from several unions, and he’s also received help from two crypto-aligned PACs. His main rival appears to be Fort Lauderdale City Commissioner Ben Sorensen, who has tried to tie Moskowitz to the ultra-conservative governor.

● FL-27 (D) (50-49 Trump): Republican mapmakers did what they could to insulate freshman GOP Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar by shifting her Miami-area seat to the right, but two local Democratic elected officials are still betting she’s beatable. National Democrats, including the DCCC, have consolidated behind state Sen. Annette Taddeo, who dropped out of the governor's race in June to run here. Her main intraparty rival is Miami Commissioner Ken Russell, who abandoned his own long-shot Senate bid, while an underfunded activist named Angel Montalvo rounds out the field.

Oklahoma

Polls close at 8 PM ET/7 PM local time.

● OK-Sen-B (R) (65-32 Trump): Rep. Markwayne Mullin lapped former state House Speaker T.W. Shannon 44-18 in the first round of the special election primary to succeed Sen. Jim Inhofe, whose resignation takes effect at the end of this Congress, and he looks well-positioned for the runoff. Mullin earned Trump’s endorsement in July, while Gov. Kevin Stitt backed him in the final week of the contest. Recent polls have given Mullin double-digit leads.

● OK-02 (R) (76-22 Trump): State Rep. Avery Frix edged out former state Sen. Josh Brecheen 15-14 in an enormous 14-person primary to replace Markwayne Mullin in Eastern Oklahoma's 2nd District, and neither man has a clear edge going into the second round. A PAC affiliated with the Club for Growth has spent heavily to promote Brecheen, who is a former Club fellow, while Frix has support from his own allies. Brecheen also has the backing of four defeated primary candidates who notched a combined 30%.

New York

Polls close at 9 PM ET. Below we lead with New York's two special elections, followed by Tuesday's primaries.

● NY-19 (special) (50-48 Biden): This swing seat in the Hudson Valley unexpectedly became vacant in the spring when Gov. Kathy Hochul appointed Democratic Rep. Antonio Delgado as lieutenant governor, and each party has nominated a different county executive to run here.

The Democrats are fielding Pat Ryan, an Army veteran who was elected to lead Ulster County after losing the 2018 primary to Delgado, while Republicans are going with Marc Molinaro of Dutchess County, who was the GOP's 2018 candidate for governor. Though Molinaro lost that race to then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo in a 60-36 landslide, he carried the 19th by a wide 53-42. (Ulster, by the way, makes up a quarter of the old 19th, while Dutchess comprises 17% of the district.)

Ryan and his allies have made abortion rights the centerpiece of their campaign; the GOP, in contrast, has focused on tying him to the Biden administration and portraying Ryan as weak on public safety issues. National Republicans have spent far more money here than their Democratic counterparts, and even a recent DCCC internal found Molinaro ahead 46-43.

The two rivals could end up serving together in a few months, as Ryan is the frontrunner in the Democratic primary for the new 18th District while Molinaro faces no intraparty opposition in the redrawn 19th.

● NY-23 (special) (55-43 Trump): A special election is also taking place to succeed Republican Rep. Tom Reed, who resigned to join a lobbying firm a year after he was accused of sexual misconduct, but there it’s attracted little attention. The Republicans have picked Steuben County Party Chair Joe Sempolinski, who isn’t running for a full term anywhere. Democrats, meanwhile, have turned to Air Force veteran Max Della Pia, who is competing for a full term in the revamped 23rd District.

● NY-01 (R) (49.4-49.2 Biden): Three Republicans are facing off to succeed Rep. Lee Zeldin, who is the GOP’s nominee for governor, in an eastern Long Island constituency that moved a few points to the left under the new court-drawn congressional map. For months it looked like this would be an easy win for Nick LaLota, who serves as chief of staff of the Suffolk County Legislature and has the backing of the county’s Republican and conservative parties, but that’s no longer the case.

LaLota’s main adversary is cryptocurrency trader Michelle Bond, who has used her personal wealth to decisively outspend him. Bond has also gotten $1 million in outside help from several groups, including a PAC that just happens to be funded by her boyfriend, crypto notable Ryan Salame. LaLota has pushed back and run ads calling Bond as a “liberal D.C. lobbyist” who lives in a Beltway-area mansion. The third candidate is government relations firm executive Anthony Figliola, though he's attracted little money or attention.

The winner will go up against Suffolk County Legislator Bridget Fleming, who has the Democratic primary to herself.

● NY-03 (D) (53-45 Biden): Five fellow Democrats are competing in a pricey battle to succeed Rep. Tom Suozzi, who gave up this northern Nassau County seat to campaign in the primary against Gov. Kathy Hochul only to lose badly, both statewide and at home. The GOP is running 2020 nominee George Santos, whom Suozzi beat 56-43 last time as Biden was carrying the old 3rd 55-44.

Two contenders have considerably more resources than the rest of the field. Nassau County Legislator Josh Lafazan, who is campaigning as a moderate, has Suozzi’s endorsement, and he’s gotten some help from Protect Our Future PAC. The other well-funded candidate is DNC member Robert Zimmerman, a longtime party fundraiser who would be Long Island’s first gay member of Congress.

The field also includes two people who have lost past Democratic primaries to Suozzi. One is Jon Kaiman, a deputy Suffolk County executive who competed in the 2016 open-seat contest and has the support of the influential 32BJ SEIU building workers union. The other familiar name is Melanie D'Arrigo, who challenged the congressman from the left last cycle and lost 66-26. D'Arrigo has the backing of the Working Families Party, which has long been a force in New York progressive politics, but she’s struggled to bring in cash. The final candidate is marketing consultant Reema Rasool, who has raised very little.

● NY-04 (D) (57-42 Biden): Democratic Rep. Kathleen Rice unexpectedly decided to retire after four terms, and there’s a five-way Democratic primary to replace her in this southern Nassau County district. Team Blue’s nominee will go up against Hempstead Town Councilman Anthony D'Esposito, who is the only Republican running here.

Rice and 32BJ SEIU are backing Laura Gillen, who was elected as Hempstead's first Democratic supervisor in more than a century in 2017 but lost reelection two years later. The only other well-funded contender is Keith Corbett, who is arguing that his election as mayor of the small and traditionally Republican village of Malverne proves his bipartisan appeal; one of Corbett’s top allies is Jay Jacobs, the controversial head of the state and county parties. Nassau County Legislator Carrié Solages and two other candidates are also in, but none of them have raised much.

● NY-10 (D) (85-15 Biden): Democrats have an expensive and closely watched contest for the dramatically revamped 10th District based in Lower Manhattan and northwestern Brooklyn. Rep. Mondaire Jones, who currently represents the 17th District well to the north of the city in the Hudson Valley, decided to run here in order to avoid a primary against DCCC Chair Sean Patrick Maloney, but he faces a difficult battle nonetheless.

Among the many other major contenders here is former federal prosecutor Dan Goldman, who served as House Democrats' lead counsel during Donald Trump's first impeachment. Goldman, who is an heir to the Levi Strauss & Co. fortune, has pumped $4 million of his own money into his campaign, and he’s dominated the airwaves during the campaign; he also earned an endorsement in the final weeks from The New York Times, which is an influential presence in this district. But Jones, who is the only other candidate who has been able to advertise on TV, has hit his rival over an interview in which Goldman initially seemed open to curtailing abortion rights before reversing himself.

The field also includes New York City Councilwoman Carlina Rivera, who has several notable endorsements of her own. Rivera has the backing of 7th District Rep. Nydia Velazquez, who represents just under half of this new constituency, and the health care workers union 1199 SEIU, which is one of the most powerful labor organizations in city politics. Also in the running are Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou, who has the Working Families Party on her side; fellow Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon; and Elizabeth Holtzman, who is trying to return to the House after what would be a record 42-year gap.

There have been a number of polls of the race, but they've generally shown a very jumbled picture, with no candidate breaking out of the teens.

● NY-12 (D) (85-14 Biden): New York's new congressional boundaries have placed Manhattan’s Upper East Side and Upper West Side in the same district for the first time since World War I and resulted in a face-off between two 30-year incumbents, Carolyn Maloney and Jerry Nadler. The primary also includes attorney Suraj Patel, who challenged Maloney in 2018 and 2020, and one little-known contender.

Maloney's existing 12th District in the Upper East Side makes up about 60% of this new seat, while Nadler's 10th in the Upper West Side forms another 40%. However, while Nadler was safe at home before redistricting upended the map, Maloney only held off Patel 43-39 in their last bout.

The candidates haven’t differed on any major policy issues, but Maloney has argued that the end of Roe v. Wade makes it more important than ever to have a woman in office. Nadler, meanwhile, has highlighted how he’s New York’s only remaining Jewish representative, while Patel has campaigned as a generational change agent.

An early August poll for a pro-Patel group had Nadler edging out Maloney 29-27, with Patel at 20%. After that survey was taken, though, Nadler earned endorsements from both Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and The New York Times, which joined 1199 SEIU in his corner.

● NY-16 (D) (71-28 Biden): Rep. Jamaal Bowman was elected to represent southern Westchester County two years ago after unseating longtime Rep. Elliot Engel in the primary, and he now faces two members of the county legislature who hope to do the same thing to him.

Bowman’s main adversary looks like Vedat Gashi, who is presenting himself as a more moderate alternative to the progressive incumbent. Gashi has the backing of Engel, who represented 75% of the new iteration of the 16th at the time Bowman beat him, and he’s brought in a notable amount of money for his bid. Gashi’s colleague, Catherine Parker, launched her own bid in late May, but she’s struggled with fundraising. Rounding out the field is Mark Jaffe, who fared badly in a 2020 primary for the Assembly.

● NY-17 (D) (54-44 Biden): Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, who heads the DCCC, is locked in a primary duel against state Sen. Alessandra Biaggi, who is trying to run to his left. Maloney represents only about a quarter of this new constituency in the lower Hudson Valley, and Biaggi has taken him to task for running here rather than defending the more competitive 18th District that’s home to most of his current constituents.

Biaggi, though, currently serves none of this seat, and she doesn’t have anything approaching the incumbent’s resources. Maloney has the endorsement of Bill Clinton, who lives in the new 17th, while 14th District Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the Working Families Party are pulling for the challenger. The winner will likely go up against Assemblyman Mike Lawler, who appears to be the leading candidate in the GOP primary.

● NY-19 (D) (51-47 Biden): Two Democrats are campaigning to face Republican Marc Molinaro, who is competing in the aforementioned special election for the old 19th District. A bit under half of the new version of this constituency, which is based in southeastern upstate New York, overlaps with the seat Molinaro is running for on Tuesday. One of the Democratic contenders is attorney Josh Riley, who had been running for the 22nd District in the Syracuse area until May. His opponent is businesswoman Jamie Cheney, who has run ads discussing how she had an abortion a decade ago.

● NY-22 (D & R) (53-45 Biden): Both parties have contested primaries to succeed Republican Rep. John Katko in a seat that contains the Syracuse and Utica areas. The only Democrat who has raised a serious amount of money is Navy veteran Francis Conole, who lost the 2020 primary to take on Katko in the old 24th District. Protect Our Future has also deployed over $500,000 to support Conole, while there has been no outside spending for any of his rivals, who include Air Force veteran Sarah Klee Hood, Syracuse Common Councilor Chol Majok, and former Assemblyman Sam Roberts.

The GOP side pits businessman Steve Wells, who lost the 2016 primary to now-Rep. Claudia Tenney in the old 22nd, against Navy veteran Brandon Williams. National Republicans are very much rooting for the self-funding Wells, as the Congressional Leadership Fund is running commercials to support him.

● NY-23 (R) (58-40 Trump): Freshman GOP Rep. Chris Jacobs abruptly decided to retire in June after coming out in favor of gun safety measures following the mass shooting in Buffalo, and two prominent Republicans are facing off to replace him. The early frontrunner was developer Carl Paladino, the proto-Trump who served as the 2010 Republican nominee for governor and has a long and ongoing history of bigoted outbursts. Paladino’s opponent is Nick Langworthy, who has retained his position as state party chair during the campaign.

Paladino has used his wealth to massively outspend Langworthy, and he released an internal in mid-July that showed him winning by a lopsided 54-24 margin. An independent survey conducted by veteran pollster Barry Zeplowitz weeks later, though, put Langworthy ahead 39-37. Paladino characteristically trashed Zeplowitz for donating $99 to his rival and claimed he had “no credibility,” but he didn’t respond with contrary numbers. The winner will face Democrat Max Della Pia, who as noted above is also running in Tuesday's special election for the old 23rd. (Neither Jacobs nor Paladino sought the GOP nod for the special.)

Tuesday Primary Preview: Trump’s Big Lie slate aims to go three for three in key Arizona races

Posted on August 2, 2022 (Updated August 2, 2022) by Jeff Singer

Primary season is back in full force on Tuesday with major contests taking place in Arizona, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, and Washington. Ohio voters will also go back to the polls for primaries for their state legislature, which were delayed because of redistricting litigation (primaries for the Buckeye State’s other offices took place as planned in early May).

Note that the presidential results we include after each district reflect how the 2020 race would have gone under the new lines in place for this fall. And if you'd like to know how much of the population in each new district comes from each old district, please check out our redistribution tables.

Our live coverage will begin at 8 PM ET at Daily Kos Elections when polls close in Missouri as well as most of Kansas and Michigan. You can also follow us on Twitter for blow-by-blow updates, and you’ll want to bookmark our primary calendar, which includes the dates for primaries in all 50 states. Lastly, you can track the outcomes of each of these key races with our cheat sheet, which we’ll keep continuously updated throughout election night.

Ohio

Polls close at 7:30 PM ET.

Kansas

Polls close at 8 PM ET / 7 PM local time in the portion of the state located in the Central time zone, where virtually all Kansans live, and an hour later in four sparsely populated counties along the state's western border with Colorado. Individual counties have the option to keep their polls open an extra hour.

• KS Ballot (56-41 Trump): The Kansas Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that the state constitution protects abortion rights, but the Republican-dominated legislature has placed a proposed constitutional amendment on the primary ballot to change that. If a majority votes “yes” on Tuesday, then the legislature would have the power to end abortion in the state. A win for the “no” side, however, would keep the status quo intact. The only poll that’s been released was a mid-July survey from a Republican pollster on its own behalf that showed “yes” ahead 47-43.

Other Kansas races to watch: KS-AG (R)

Michigan

Polls close at 8 PM ET in the portion of the state located in the Eastern time zone, where almost all Michiganders live, and an hour later in four small counties in the Upper Peninsula along the state's western border with Wisconsin.

• MI-Gov (R) (51-48 Biden): The Republican contest to face Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer transformed dramatically in late May when a massive signature fraud scandal prevented former Detroit Police Chief James Craig, who had been the frontrunner, and four other candidates from appearing on the primary ballot. One of the five remaining contenders, conservative radio host Tudor Dixon, soon earned the backing of former Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos and other members of her influential family, plus a last-second endorsement from Donald Trump. She’s posted leads in most recent polls, and national Democrats seem convinced that Dixon will advance as well, as they recently launched ads against her.

Self-funding businessman Kevin Rinke, who most surveys have had in second, has used his wealth to decisively outspend his rivals; Rinke has aired commercials faulting Dixon for accepting the help of DeVos, who resigned from Trump’s cabinet a day after the Jan. 6 attack. Another candidate, real estate agent Ryan Kelley, attracted national attention in June when the FBI arrested him on misdemeanor charges related to his role in the riot, but he’s struggled to turn that notoriety into votes. Chiropractor Garrett Soldano and pastor Ralph Rebandt are also running, while Craig is using his limited remaining funds in a long-shot effort to win the nomination through a write-in campaign.

• MI-03 (R) (53-45 Biden): Freshman Rep. Peter Meijer, who was one of the 10 House Republicans to vote to impeach Trump, faces primary opposition from a Trump-backed challenger, conservative commentator John Gibbs. The winner will go up against 2020 Democratic nominee Hillary Scholten, who faces no intra-party opposition for her second bid, in a Grand Rapids-based seat that Michigan's new independent redistricting commissions transformed from a 51-47 Trump seat to one Biden would have decisively carried.

Meijer and his allies have massively outspent Gibbs’ side, though the challenger got a late boost from Democrats who believe he’d be easier to beat in November. The DCCC launched an ad campaign in the final week declaring that Gibbs was "[h]andpicked by Trump to run for Congress" and saying he supports a "hardline against immigrants at the border and so-called 'patriotic education' in our schools." A pro-Meijer PAC quickly responded by running its own commercial arguing that Gibbs is actually the “handpicked candidate” of Nancy Pelosi.

• MI-08 (R) (50-48 Biden): Democratic Rep. Dan Kildee is defending a seat in the Flint and Saginaw areas that’s a little more competitive than his current 5th District, and three Republicans are campaigning to face him.

The frontrunner is former Trump administration official Paul Junge, who lost to Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin 51-47 in the old 8th District in 2020. (The old and new 8th Districts do not, however, overlap.) Former Grosse Pointe Shores Councilman Matthew Seely, like Junge, has self-funded almost all of his campaign, though Junge has spent far more. The third candidate, businesswoman Candice Miller, shares her name with a former congresswoman who used to represent a neighboring seat, but she’s reported raising nothing.

• MI-10 (D) (50-49 Trump): Five Democrats are competing to take on Army veteran John James, who was Team Red's Senate nominee in 2018 and 2020, in a redrawn seat in Detroit's northeastern suburbs that's open because of the incumbent-vs.-incumbent matchup in the 11th (see just below).

The most prominent contender is probably former Macomb County Judge Carl Marlinga, who was the county’s longtime prosecutor. The best-funded candidate, though, is attorney Huwaida Arraf, while Warren Council member Angela Rogensues also has brought in more money than Marlinga. Sterling Heights City Council member Henry Yanez and former Macomb County Health Department head Rhonda Powell are also in, but they’ve each struggled with fundraising. James himself faces only minor opposition in his own primary.

• MI-11 (D) (59-39 Biden): The Democratic primary in the new 11th is a duel between a pair of sophomore House members, Haley Stevens and Andy Levin. Stevens' existing 11th District makes up 45% of this revamped seat in Detroit’s northern suburbs, while Levin’s 9th is home to another 25%. Retiring Rep. Brenda Lawrence represents the balance of this district, and she’s backing Stevens.

Stevens and Levin have largely voted the same way while in Congress, though while Levin has emphasized his support for Medicare for all and the Green New Deal, Stevens has portrayed herself as more pragmatic. The congresswoman has enjoyed a huge financial advantage over her colleague; outside groups, led by the hawkish pro-Israel organization AIPAC, have also outspent Levin’s allies by a lopsided margin. A recent independent poll showed Stevens ahead 58-31.

• MI-12 (D) (74-25 Biden): Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who is one of the most vocal progressives in the House, faces a prominent intra-party challenge from Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey. Two other candidates, former state Rep. Shanelle Jackson and Lathrup Village Mayor Kelly Garrett, are also running, but they haven’t attracted much attention. The three challengers, like a large portion of the electorate in this Detroit-based seat, are Black, while Tlaib is the daughter of Palestinian immigrants.

Tlaib, whose existing 13th District makes up 53% of the new 12th, has far outspent Winfrey, who has faulted Tlaib for casting a vote from the left against the Biden administration's infrastructure bill. However, a newly established group called Urban Empowerment Action PAC has gotten involved to help Winfrey, and it’s responsible for most of the more than $600,000 that’s been spent on her side.

• MI-13 (D) (74-25 Biden): A total of nine Democrats are competing in an extremely expensive contest to succeed retiring Rep. Brenda Lawrence, who is Michigan's only Black member of Congress, in a seat that includes part of Detroit and its southern suburbs. The top spender by far is state Rep. Shri Thanedar, who unsuccessfully sought Team Blue’s nomination for governor in 2018 before winning his current office two years later; Thanedar, who is originally from India, is the only candidate who isn’t Black.

State Sen. Adam Hollier, meanwhile, has benefited from over $6 million in outside spending promoting him and attacking Thanedar. Most of this has come from AIPAC, but VoteVets and the crypto-aligned Protect Our Future have also expended considerable sums. Lawrence, for her part, is supporting Michigan Civil Rights Commissioner Portia Roberson.

A recent independent poll showed Thanedar leading Roberson 22-17, with Hollier at 16. The field also includes hedge fund manager John Conyers III, who is the son and namesake of the late former congressman, and former Detroit General Counsel Sharon McPhail, who each clocked in with 7%, as well as Detroit School Board member Sherry Gay-Dagnogo and Teach for America official Michael Griffie.

Missouri

Polls close at 8 PM ET / 7 PM local time.

• MO-Sen (R) (57-41 Trump): Republicans have a crowded contest to succeed retiring Sen. Roy Blunt in this conservative state, though only three―former Gov. Eric Greitens, Attorney General Eric Schmitt, and Rep. Vicky Hartzler―appear to have a shot at the nomination. The field also includes Rep. Billy Long, state Senate President Pro Tem Dave Schatz, and wealthy attorney Mark McCloskey, but none of them have registered much support in the polls.

Early surveys gave the lead to Greitens, who resigned from the governorship in 2018 in the face of multiple scandals. The candidate, though, has been on the receiving end of millions of dollars worth of ads from a super PAC that, among other things, has highlighted his ex-wife's accusations that Greitens physically abused both her and their children in 2018.

Hartzler, for her part, has the backing of Missouri’s other senator, Josh Hawley, but her efforts to get the biggest endorsement in GOP politics went badly: In early July, Trump publicly announced that he “will NOT BE ENDORSING HER FOR THE SENATE.” Instead, the day before the primary, Trump announced "that ERIC has my Complete and Total Endorsement!" Both Greitens and Schmitt thirstily lapped up the statement as a bona fide expression of support, ignoring the fact that Trump pointedly did not choose between the two.

Unlike the lightning-rod Greitens, Schmitt has managed to avoid any toxic headlines throught the race, though his opponents have tried to portray him as being too close to China. Schmitt has also benefited from more outside spending than anyone else, and recent polls have shown the attorney general in the lead.

The Democrats have a primary battle of their own between Marine veteran Lucas Kunce and businesswoman Trudy Busch Valentine, though the winner will be a longshot, even if they get to face someone as tainted as Greitens. A onetime Republican, former U.S. Attorney John Wood, is also campaigning as an independent.

• MO-01 (D) (78-20 Biden): Freshman Rep. Cori Bush pulled off a major upset two years ago when she unseated veteran Rep. Lacy Clay in the Democratic primary, and the high-profile progressive now faces four intra-party opponents in a St. Louis seat that only experienced small changes under the new map.

Bush’s main foe is state Sen. Steve Roberts, who has gone after Bush for casting a vote from the left against the Biden administration's infrastructure bill and has Clay’s backing. Bush's team, meanwhile, has highlighted accusations of sexual assault against Roberts by two different women in 2015 and 2017, though he was never charged in either case. A July poll showed the incumbent ahead 40-20.

• MO-04 (R) (69-29 Trump): Seven Republicans are competing to replace Rep. Vicky Hartzler in what remains a safely red constituency in the western part of the state, and there’s no obvious frontrunner.

Cattle farmer Kalena Bruce has the backing of Gov. Mike Parson and the influential Missouri Farm Bureau, while state Sen. Rick Brattin has the prominent anti-abortion group Missouri Right to Life in his corner. Former Boone County Clerk Taylor Burks is the only other candidate who has held elected office, while former Kansas City TV anchor Mark Alford enjoys some local name recognition. Retired Navy SEAL Bill Irwin is the final candidate who has spent a notable amount of money.

Outside groups have almost completely focused on helping or hindering only two of the contenders. School Freedom Fund, which is an affiliate of the anti-tax Club for Growth, has spent over $1 million to support Brattin or attack Alford; two other organizations, the crypto-aligned American Dream Federal Action and Conservative Americans PAC have deployed a comparable sum to help Alford and weaken Brattin.

• MO-07 (R) (70-28 Trump): The GOP has a similarly crowded eight-way race in southwestern Missouri to replace another Senate candidate, Rep. Billy Long, and no one has an obvious advantage here either. The field includes a trio of state senators, Eric Burlison, Mike Moon, and Jay Wasson, while another name to watch is Alex Bryant, a pastor who would be the first African American Republican to represent Missouri in Congress. The final candidate who has spent a notable amount is physician Sam Alexander.

Wasson, who is self-funding, has far outspent his competition, but Burlison’s allies at the Club for Growth have also dropped $1 million to stop him. The Club and the nihilistic House Freedom Caucus, likewise, have deployed almost $600,000 to promote Burlison. A third group, Conservative Americans PAC, has spent close to $700,000 to beat Burlison and a bit less than half of that to hit Moon.

Arizona

Polls close at 10 PM ET / 7 PM local time.

• AZ-Sen (R) (49.2-48.9 Biden): Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly will be a top GOP target following his close win in 2020 for the final two years of the late John McCain's term, and five Republicans are competing to face him. Most polls show that the frontrunner is former Thiel Capital chief operating officer Blake Masters, who picked up Trump’s endorsement in June. Masters’ old boss, conservative mega donor Peter Thiel, has poured $15 million into a super PAC to support him, while the anti-tax Club for Growth is also spending on his behalf.

Masters’ main intra-party rival appears to be wealthy businessman Jim Lamon, who posted a lead in one recent survey. Lamon has tried to portray Masters as a phony conservative who only recently relocated to the state from California, and he’s also run a commercial using recent footage of his rival calling the Unabomber “a "subversive thinker that's underrated."

Attorney General Mark Brnovich, meanwhile, began the race looking like the frontrunner, but Trump loathes him for insufficiently advancing the Big Lie and he’s faded in recent months. State Corporation Commissioner Justin Olson and retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Michael McGuire round out the field.

• AZ-Gov (R & D) (49.2-48.9 Biden): The Republican primary has turned into an expensive proxy battle between Trump and termed-out Gov. Doug Ducey, a one-time Trump ally who wound up in the MAGA doghouse after he refused to go along with Trump’s efforts to steal the 2020 election.

Trump is all in for Kari Lake, a former local TV anchor turned far-right conspiracy theorist. Ducey, meanwhile, is supporting Board of Regents member Karrin Taylor Robson, who has used her wealth to massively outspent Lake. Former Rep. Matt Salmon, who was the 2002 nominee, is also on the ballot along with two others, though he ended his campaign in June and endorsed Robson. Most polls show Lake ahead, though a Robson internal had the race tied.

Robson and her allies are trying to pull off an upset by highlighting Lake’s past as a supporter of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, and they got some help in June from an unexpected source. After Lake targeted drag performances as "grooming" and "child abuse," a prominent Phoenix drag queen named Richard Stevens responded by posting images of the two together during their now-severed friendship and revealing that he’d performed for her multiple times. The story wound up in an anti-Lake ad in which another drag queen said that the candidate is “not just a fake, she's a phony'.”

The Democratic side has been a far more low-key affair, though there’s been little recent polling. Secretary of State Katie Hobbs has been the frontrunner from the start, and she’s enjoyed a big financial advantage over former Homeland Security official Marco López.

• AZ-01 (R & D) (50-49 Biden): Republican Rep. David Schweikert is seeking re-election in a reconfigured seat in the eastern Phoenix area that’s more competitive than his existing 6th District, but he needs to get through an expensive and ugly primary before he can worry about that. Businessman Elijah Norton has enjoyed a huge spending advantage thanks to his personal wealth, and he’s aired ads attacking Schweikert over a major scandal that resulted in the incumbent admitting to 11 different violations of congressional rules and campaign finance laws in 2020.

Schweikert, for his part, has focused on Norton's turbulent departure from his insurance company. The congressman has also circulated mailers showing his challenger and a male friend with the caption, “Elijah Norton isn't being straight with you.” Norton quickly fired back with a defamation lawsuit accusing Schweikert of falsely insinuating that he’s gay. The field also includes Josh Barnett, who badly lost a 2020 race against Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego but could cost Norton some much-needed anti-incumbent votes.

The Democratic contest between Jevin Hodge, who lost a tight 2020 race for the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, and former Phoenix Suns employee Adam Metzendorf has been far less incendiary. Hodge, who would be Arizona’s first Black congressman, has far outspent his rival, and the DCCC backed him in June.

• AZ-02 (R) (53-45 Trump): Democratic Rep. Tom O'Halleran is defending a seat in northern and eastern rural Arizona that’s considerably more conservative than the 1st District he holds now, and seven Republicans are competing to face him. One of them, Navy SEAL veteran Eli Crane, picked up Donald Trump’s endorsement in the final weeks of the race, a decision that earned Trump loud boos at his rally a few hours later (possibly because of a coordinated effort by opponents who've criticized him for not living in the district).

Crane himself released a survey before he earned Trump’s nod showing him in the lead with 19% while state Rep. Walt Blackman and businessman Mark DeLuzio tied 12-12 for second. Outside groups have spent $1 million to either promote Crane or attack Blackman, a fellow Big Lie promoter who would be the state’s first Black member of Congress. The field also includes Ron Watkins, the reputed founder of the QAnon conspiracy cult, though he’s raised little.

• AZ-04 (R) (54-44 Biden): Democratic Rep. Greg Stanton faces six Republicans in a seat based in the southern Phoenix suburbs that is considerably more competitive than the 9th District he now serves. The GOP establishment has consolidated behind Tanya Wheeless, a former president of the Arizona Bankers Association. Her best-funded rival is restaurant owner Kelly Cooper, who has financed most of his campaign himself, while Chandler City Councilman Rene Lopez is also in. Outside groups have deployed over $1 million to support Wheeless and bash Cooper.

• AZ-06 (D & R) (49.3-49.2 Biden): Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick announced her retirement last year before Arizona's Independent Redistricting Commission drew up a new Tucson-based seat that’s well to the right of her current 2nd District, and both parties have contested primaries to succeed her.

The Democratic side pits former state Rep. Daniel Hernández, who as an intern helped save then-Rep. Gabby Giffords after she was shot in 2011, against state Sen. Kirsten Engel; a third candidate, engineer Avery Anderson, hasn't earned much attention. Both candidates have brought in a comparable amount of money, and major outside groups haven’t been involved here.

Until recently, the Republican primary looked like it would be an easy win for Juan Ciscomani, a former senior advisor to Gov. Doug Ducey who has far outraised his five intra-party foes. But things got more interesting in the final days when the House GOP’s main super PAC, the Congressional Leadership Fund, spent over $1 million to support Ciscomani, whose decision to campaign as a unifier may not be resonating with the primary electorate.

Ciscomani’s main rival appears to be former mortgage banker Kathleen Winn, who has thrown far more red meat to the base. Winn has spread conspiracy theories insinuating that American leaders are “being paid off” by China and Russia, so naturally she has the backing of notorious far-right figures including Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar and Kari Lake, Trump’s candidate for governor.

• AZ-AG (R) & AZ-SoS (R & D) (49.2-48.9 Biden): Both the offices of attorney general and secretary of state, which along with the governor are involved in certifying election results in the Grand Canyon State, are open, and Trump is backing an election conspiracy theorist for each.

Trump’s man in the six-way contest for attorney general is former prosecutor Abe Hamadeh, who has denied that Biden won the state. Hamadeh's intra-party foes are Tiffany Shedd, who lost a close general election last cycle in the 1st Congressional District against Rep. Tom O'Halleran; Rodney Glassman, a former Democrat who now sports an endorsement from far-right Rep. Paul Gosar; former prosecutor Lacy Cooper; former Arizona Supreme Court Justice Andrew Gould; and manufacturing executive Dawn Grove. The winner will go up against former Arizona Corporation Commission Chair Kris Mayes, who has no opposition in the Democratic primary.

Over in the four-way contest for secretary of state, Trump is backing state Rep. Mark Finchem, a QAnon supporter who led the failed effort to overturn Biden's victory and attended the Jan. 6 rally just ahead of the attack on the Capitol. Finchem faces two fellow legislators, state Rep. Shawnna Bolick and state Sen. Michelle Ugenti-Rita, who have both promoted voter suppression measures. The final candidate is advertising executive Beau Lane, who has Gov. Doug Ducey’s endorsement and is the one candidate who acknowledges Biden’s win.

The Democratic contest for secretary of state pits state House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding against Adrian Fontes, who narrowly lost re-election in 2020 as Maricopa County clerk. A recent poll for an unnamed super PAC put Fontes ahead 44-29, but a pro-Bolding group gave their candidate a 35-30 advantage.

Other Arizona races to watch: Maricopa County, AZ Attorney

Washington

Polls close at 11 PM ET / 8 PM local time.

Washington’s top-two primary requires all candidates to compete on one ballot rather than in separate party primaries. The two contenders with the most votes, regardless of party, advance to the Nov. 8 general election. Candidates cannot win outright in August by taking a majority of the vote.

• WA-03 (51-46 Trump): Republican Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler earned herself a prominent place on Trump's shitlist after she voted for impeachment, and she now faces four fellow Republicans, two Democrats, and two unaffiliated candidates in this southwest Washington constituency that's very similar to her previous district. Trump himself is pulling for Joe Kent, an Army veteran who has defended Putin's invasion of Ukraine and has ties to far-right extremists.

An outside group called Conservatives for A Stronger America, though, has spent over $1 million to attack Kent and elevate a third Republican, evangelical author Heidi St. John. Kent has argued that this organization is trying to “prop up a spoiler candidate and split the vote” in order to help Herrera Beutler advance to the general election, though he’s trying something similar on a smaller scale. His campaign has sent out mail pieces highlighting how the only serious Democratic candidate, auto repair shop owner Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, is the one "pro-choice candidate for Congress,” a move aimed at costing Herrera Beutler Democratic votes. The field also includes GOP state Rep. Vicki Kraft, though she’s earned little notice.

• WA-04 (57-40 Trump): Republican Rep. Dan Newhouse, who also voted for impeachment, faces six intra-party opponents in this largely unchanged eastern Washington constituency, while businessman Doug White is the one Democrat in the running. Trump has thrown his support behind 2020 gubernatorial nominee Loren Culp, an ex-cop who has refused to recognize his decisive loss to Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee, but he’s badly struggled with fundraising.

Defending Main Street, which is aligned with the GOP leadership, has spent over $1 million praising Newhouse and attacking Culp, while the challenger has received no major outside help. Team Red’s field also includes self-funding businessman Jerrod Sessler and state Rep. Brad Klippert.

• WA-08 (52-45 Biden): Three notable Republicans are challenging Democratic Rep. Kim Schrier in what remains a competitive seat in suburban Seattle.

Schrier's most familiar foe is 2020 nominee Jesse Jensen, who unexpectedly held her to a 52-48 win last time despite bringing in little money and is proving to be a considerably stronger fundraiser this time. Another well-established Republican is King County Councilmember Reagan Dunn, who was the 2012 nominee for attorney general; Dunn is the son of the late Rep. Jennifer Dunn, who represented previous versions of this constituency from 1993 to 2005. Team Red's field also includes another failed candidate for attorney general, 2020 nominee Matt Larkin.

Jensen has outspent his intra-party rivals, and he’s also benefited from over $300,000 in support from a super PAC set up to help him. The group’s efforts include ads against Dunn, including mailers highlighting his past struggles with alcoholism.

Other Washington races to watch: WA-SoS

GOP panic over two major Pennsylvania races headlines huge primary night nationwide

Posted on May 17, 2022 (Updated May 17, 2022) by Jeff Singer

Tuesday brings us the biggest primary night of the 2022 cycle so far―in fact, one of the biggest we can expect all year―as voters in five different states across the country head to the polls. We have tons of must-watch and extremely expensive elections in store as each side selects its nominees in crucial contests for Senate and governor, as well as in numerous House races.

Below you'll find our guide to all of the top primaries, arranged chronologically by each state’s poll closing times. When it’s available, we'll tell you about any reliable polling that exists for each race, but if we don't mention any numbers, it means no recent surveys have been made public.

And of course, because this is a redistricting year, every state on the docket has a brand-new congressional map. To help you follow along, you can find interactive maps from Dave's Redistricting App for Idaho, Kentucky, North Carolina, Oregon, and Pennsylvania. Note that the presidential results we include after each district reflect how the 2020 race would have gone under the new lines in place for this fall. And if you'd like to know how much of the population in each new district comes from each old district, please check out our redistribution tables.

The Daily Kos Elections Team talks about how the MAGA civil war might be hurting the GOP in races across the country on The Downballot podcast

Embedded Content

Our live coverage will begin at 7:30 PM ET at Daily Kos Elections when polls close in North Carolina. You can also follow us on Twitter for blow-by-blow updates, and you’ll want to bookmark our primary calendar, which includes the dates for primaries in all 50 states.

KENTUCKY

Polls close in the portion of the state located in the Eastern Time Zone, which includes the entire 3rd Congressional District, at 6 PM ET. They close in the rest of the state an hour later.

● KY-03 (D) (60-38 Biden): Rep. John Yarmuth, who's spent a decade as Kentucky’s only Democratic member of Congress, is retiring from a Louisville seat that only underwent minor changes in redistricting, and two candidates are running for the nod to replace him: state Senate Minority Leader Morgan McGarvey, who has Yarmuth’s endorsement, and state Rep. Attica Scott, who would be the state’s first Black member of Congress.

McGarvey, who has enjoyed a massive fundraising lead over Scott, has also received $1 million in support from Protect Our Future PAC, a group funded by cryptocurrency billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried. Scott, who kicked off a campaign for this seat before Yarmuth announced his departure, has not benefited from any serious outside spending.

NORTH CAROLINA

Polls close statewide at 7:30 PM ET. Candidates must take at least 30% of the vote to avert a July 26 runoff, though the second-place finisher must officially request a runoff for one to occur.

● NC-Sen (R) (50-49 Trump): A total of 14 Republicans are competing to succeed retiring GOP Sen. Richard Burr, but most of the attention has centered around Rep. Ted Budd and former Gov. Pat McCrory. Budd has the backing of Donald Trump and the well-funded Club for Growth, which along with its allies has spent $14.3 million on the congressman's behalf.

While Budd's campaign appeared to be in rough shape as recently as late January, every recent survey has shown him far ahead and well above the threshold for avoiding a runoff. Former Rep. Mark Walker and businesswoman Marjorie Eastman are also running, but they’re unlikely to matter unless the polls are wrong and Budd struggles to win outright. The winner will face former state Supreme Court Chief Justice Cheri Beasley, who doesn’t have any serious opposition in the Democratic primary.

● NC-01 (D & R) (53-45 Biden): Rep. G.K. Butterfield is retiring from this northeastern North Carolina seat that became slightly redder under the new congressional map imposed by the state courts after finding the GOP's districts were illegal partisan gerrymanders. Four fellow Democrats are running to replace the departing congressman. The two main contenders are state Sen. Don Davis, a prominent moderate whom Butterfield is supporting, and former state Sen. Erica Smith, who badly lost the 2020 primary for the U.S. Senate.

Smith has gone after her opponent for supporting anti-abortion legislation, but she’s been heavily outspent by Davis and his allies. The senator has benefited from $2.9 million in spending from United Democracy Project, a super PAC funded by the hawkish pro-Israel group AIPAC, while the Working Families Party has deployed a considerably smaller $600,000 to promote Smith. A recent Davis internal, to which Smith did not respond, showed him up 44-31.

Things got unexpectedly nasty in the final week of the GOP's eight-way primary when the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC close to party leadership, launched an ad campaign aiming to torpedo accountant Sandy Smith, who is running again after losing to Butterfield 54-46 in 2020. Smith’s most prominent intra-party foe appears to be Rocky Mount Mayor Sandy Roberson, who is the only elected official in the contest and has self-funded most of his bid. Other contenders to watch are attorney Billy Strickland, who failed to beat an incumbent state senator in a 2020 primary, and another self-funder, businessman Brad Murphy.

● NC-04 (D) (67-32 Biden): Veteran Rep. David Price is retiring from a safely blue seat that remains anchored by the college towns of Durham and Chapel Hill, and eight fellow Democrats are competing to take his place. The contest includes two elected officials: Durham County Commissioner Nida Allam, who in 2020 became the first Muslim woman to win elective office in North Carolina, and state Sen. Valerie Foushee, who would be the first Black woman to represent this area in Congress. Also in the running is Clay Aiken, the former "American Idol" star who unsuccessfully ran against Republican Rep. Renee Ellmers several maps ago in 2014 and would be the state’s first gay representative.

Outside spending has very much favored Foushee, with AIPAC and Protect Our Future, the crypto-aligned PAC, representing most of the $3.5 million that has been deployed on her behalf; by contrast, Allam has received about $330,000 in support from the Working Families Party and other groups, while there have been no independent expenditures for Aiken. A late April internal from Foushee’s allies at EMILY’s List showed her defeating Allam 35-16.

● NC-11 (R) (54-44 Trump): Far-right freshman Rep. Madison Cawthorn pissed off lots of folks in western North Carolina when he tried to leave them behind to run for an even more conservative district in the Charlotte area that he had almost no ties to—a self-serving plan to boost his own profile that got derailed when the state's new court-drawn map replaced that Charlotte seat with a solidly blue district.

Cawthorn now faces seven challengers in a constituency that’s virtually the same as the one he wanted to abandon, several of whom launched campaigns during the brief period that the congressman was trying to hop districts. Sen. Thom Tillis has thrown his support behind state Sen. Chuck Edwards, who has pitched himself as an ardent conservative alternative to the shameless, attention-seeking incumbent. A super PAC close to Tillis has spent $1.6 million on ads attacking Cawthorn and his litany of embarrassing behaviors while also promoting Edwards.

The incumbent, though, retains Trump’s endorsement, and he could benefit if the other six candidates, including local GOP official Michele Woodhouse, split the anti-Cawthorn vote. Indeed, a late April survey from GOPAC, which isn’t backing anyone, showed that Cawthorn still led Edwards 38-21. The eventual winner will likely go up against Buncombe County Commissioner Jasmine Beach-Ferrara, who is the Democratic frontrunner.

● NC-13 (D & R) (50-48 Biden): Redistricting created a new swing seat in Raleigh's southern suburbs, and both parties have competitive primaries here. The Democratic side includes five candidates, with state Sen. Wiley Nickel and former state Sen. Sam Searcy the frontrunners. Nickel has enjoyed a spending advantage over Searcy in a contest where major outside groups haven’t gotten involved.

Things are far busier on the Republican side, where eight contenders are squaring off. Both Donald Trump and the Club for Growth are supporting Bo Hines, a 26-year-old former North Carolina State University football player who has minimal ties to the area and. The Club, the nihilistic House Freedom Caucus, and assorted other groups have together spent over $2.3 million promoting Hines and attacking one of his many opponents, wealthy attorney Kelly Daughtry, while a PAC called Old North has dropped over $1 million to boost Daughtry and bash Hines.

The other six candidates haven’t attracted as much attention. The field includes former Rep. Renee Ellmers, who represented part of the greater Raleigh area in the House from 2011 to 2017 in a brief career that was defined by some very wild swings of fortune; party activist DeVan Barbour; Army veteran Kent Keirsey; and pastor Chad Slotta.

PENNSYLVANIA

Polls close statewide at 8 PM ET.

● PA-Sen (R & D) (50-49 Biden): Both parties have hosted expensive primaries to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Pat Toomey in this key swing state, though the GOP contest has been a far more volatile affair. Until the final week, the main contenders were TV personality Mehmet Oz, who has Trump’s backing, and wealthy former hedge fund manager David McCormick. The two candidates and their allies have dumped millions on attack ads for months, which appears to have provided an unexpected opening for author Kathy Barnette, an election denier who badly lost to Democratic Rep. Madeleine Dean last cycle in the 4th District.

A survey taken for Fox News late in the race showed Oz with a 22-20 edge over McCormick, with Barnette just behind at 19%. The Club for Growth soon followed up with a $2 million infusion for Barnette, who has scarcely aired any ads on her own. Many GOP insiders are worried that she’d jeopardize the party’s general election prospects, and even Trump tried to knock her down Thursday. Also in the running are Jeff Bartos, who was Team Red's nominee for lieutenant governor; former Ambassador to Denmark Carla Sands; and attorney George Bochetto, but they haven’t demonstrated any Barnette-like late surge.

On the Democratic side, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman has from day one enjoyed huge polling leads over his two main intra-party rivals, Rep. Conor Lamb and state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta. The race never descended into anything like the bloody affair on the Republican side, though it did turn negative last month. A pro-Lamb super PAC tried to weaken Fetterman using an erroneous and since-corrected news report to falsely claim Fetterman is a "self-described socialist” (the spot was pulled off the air and an edited version had to be substituted), but there’s no indication this attack had its desired effect. Fetterman announced Sunday that he’d suffered a stroke two days before but was “well on my way to a full recovery” and would continue his campaign.

● PA-Gov (R) (50-49 Biden): Republicans have to sort out a crowded, bitter primary before they can focus on trying to replace termed-out Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, a contest Team Blue has taken a deep interest in. State Sen. Doug Mastriano, a QAnon ally and Big Lie proponent whom many Republicans fret would be a toxic nominee, posted a 29-17 advantage over former Rep. Lou Barletta in a mid-May Fox News poll despite spending little money. Democratic Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who has no intra-party opposition, even ran commercials ostensibly attacking Mastriano that are actually designed to help him appeal to Trump fans; Trump himself also delivered a late endorsement to Mastriano on Saturday.

GOP leaders who aren’t Trump have hoped that they could consolidate behind one non-Mastriano candidate, prompting state Senate leader Jake Corman and former Rep. Melissa Hart to drop out just days before the primary and endorse Barletta, an anti-immigration zealot who is anything but a moderate. However, former U.S. Attorney Bill McSwain, self-funding businessman Dave White, and several contenders even further behind in the polls have stayed put. McSwain himself has spent heavily, but he got the worst news possible last month when Trump attacked him for not doing enough to advance the Big Lie and urged Republicans not to vote for him.

● PA-12 (D) (59-39 Biden): Five Democrats are campaigning to succeed retiring Rep. Mike Doyle in a Pittsburgh-based seat that looks very much like the 18th District he currently serves.

Doyle and Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald are both backing Steve Irwin, a former chief of the Pennsylvania Securities Commission. The other major contender is state Rep. Summer Lee, a progressive who would be the first Black woman to represent the Keystone State in Congress. In Lee’s corner are Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey and the influential SEIU Pennsylvania State Council. There's also law professor Jerry Dickinson, who challenged Doyle in the 2020 primary and lost 67-33. Dickinson, like Lee, is a Black progressive, and it's possible the two will be competing for the same sorts of voters.

A late March poll for Lee’s supporters at EMILY’s List showed her beating Irwin 38-13, but Irwin’s allies have ramped up their spending since then. A total of $3.1 million in outside spending has gone towards promoting Irwin or attacking Lee, with the bulk of it coming from AIPAC. The Working Families Party and Justice Democrats, meanwhile, are responsible for most of the $1.7 million that’s aided Lee.

● PA-17 (D & R) (52-46 Biden): Two Democrats and three Republicans are campaigning to succeed Senate candidate Conor Lamb in a suburban Pittsburgh seat that’s very similar to the old 17th District. On the Democratic side, Navy veteran Chris Deluzio has outspent party operative Sean Meloy in a race where outside groups haven’t gotten involved. Deluzio has the Allegheny-Fayette Central Labor Council on his side, while Meloy, who would be the state’s first LGBTQ member, has the support of neighboring Rep. Mike Doyle.

The GOP race is a battle between former Ross Township Commissioner Jeremy Shaffer and Jason Killmeyer, a national security analyst who often appears in conservative media. Shaffer has spent the most money, though Killmeyer has made sure to highlight the fact that Shaffer unseated an incumbent state senator in the 2018 primary only to narrowly lose the general election and cost the GOP a crucial seat. The third Republican, business owner Kathleen Coder, has little money.

IDAHO

Polls close in the portion of the state located in the Mountain Time Zone at 10 PM ET/8 PM local time. Polls close in the rest of the state an hour later.

● ID-Gov (R) (64-33 Trump): Gov. Brad Little faces seven fellow Republicans in this overwhelmingly red state, but the most prominent of the bunch is Trump-endorsed Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin, who is also an ally of far-right conspiracist groups. Little, however, has enjoyed a massive financial lead, and he posted a huge 60-29 lead over McGeachin in an independent poll conducted in mid-April.

● ID-02 (R) (60-37 Trump): Longtime Republican Rep. Mike Simpson faces a primary rematch against attorney Bryan Smith, whom he beat 62-38 in 2014, in an eastern Idaho constituency that barely changed following redistricting; three little-known contenders are also on the ballot.

Just as he did eight years ago, Smith is arguing that the congressman is insufficiently conservative, though this time he’s also attacking Simpson for the doubts he expressed about Trump in 2016. The incumbent, for his part, is once again portraying the challenger as a greedy lawyer. Pro-Simpson groups have spent $1.7 million here, while Smith’s allies have dropped $680,000.

● ID-AG (R) (64-33 Trump): Five-term Attorney General Lawrence Wasden faces an intra-party challenge from former Rep. Raúl Labrador, who spent his four terms in the House as one of the most prominent tea party shit-talkers before losing his 2018 bid for governor in the GOP primary. Conservative activist Art Macomber is also in the mix. The Club for Growth has run commercials attacking Wasden for refusing to join other GOP attorneys general in suing to overturn Biden’s win, and Labrador has also taken him to task for not working with hardline conservatives in the legislature. A trio of polls, including a Club internal, have found Labrador in the lead.

OREGON

Polls close in most of Oregon at 11 PM ET/8 PM local time; they close an hour earlier in the small portion of the state in the Mountain Time Zone, but few if any votes will be reported before 11 ET.

● OR-Gov (D & R) (56-40 Biden): Democratic Gov. Kate Brown is termed-out of an office her party has held since the 1986 elections, and both sides have competitive races to succeed her. The two candidates who emerge Tuesday will be in for an expensive general election that will also feature former state Sen. Betsy Johnson, a conservative Democrat-turned-independent who's been a strong fundraiser.

There are 15 different Democrats in the running, but the only two serious contenders are state Treasurer Tobias Read and former state House Speaker Tina Kotek, who would be the first lesbian elected governor anywhere in the country. Kotek’s ads have emphasized her role in passing progressive policies, while the more moderate Read has argued that he represents a “new approach” for the state. A mid-April Reed internal had Kotek ahead 25-20.

The 19-person GOP field is similarly crowded but more in flux. The only recent poll we’ve seen was an independent survey from early May that showed former state House Minority Leader Christine Drazan leading former state Rep. Bob Tiernan, who has been self-funding, 19-14, with 2016 nominee Bud Pierce at 10%. The field also includes 1998 nominee Bill Sizemore; consultant Bridget Barton; businesswoman Jessica Gomez; Baker City Mayor Kerry McQuisten; and Sandy Mayor Stan Pulliam.

● OR-04 (D) (55-42 Biden): Veteran Rep. Peter DeFazio is retiring from a district along the state’s south coast that Democrats in the legislature made several points bluer, and eight fellow Democrats are running to replace him.

The top fundraiser is state Labor Commissioner Val Hoyle, who has endorsements from DeFazio and Sen. Jeff Merkley. Around $580,000 in outside spending has gone to supporting Hoyle, with most of that coming from the crypto-aligned Web3 Forward. Also in the race are former Airbnb executive Andrew Kalloch; Corvallis school board chair Sami Al-Abdrabbuh; and Doyle Canning, who badly lost the 2020 primary to DeFazio. The winner will go up against 2020 GOP nominee Alek Skarlatos, a National Guard veteran whose 52-46 loss last cycle represented the closest re-election contest of DeFazio's career.

● OR-05 (D & R) (53-44 Biden): Rep. Kurt Schrader, who has long been one of the most visible moderates in the Democratic caucus, faces a challenge from the left in a central Oregon seat that he currently represents just under half of. Schrader’s sole intra-party foe is Jamie McLeod-Skinner, who would be Oregon's first LGBTQ member of Congress and has attacked the incumbent for his ties to special interests.

McLeod-Skinner has raised a serious amount of money, but Schrader has still massively outspent her. The congressman has also received $2.1 million in outside support, with most of it coming from super PACs dedicated to electing centrist Democrats, while the Working Families Party has deployed about $340,000 for the challenger. Biden has also endorsed Schrader.

Five Republicans are facing off as well. The two serious contenders are former Happy Valley Mayor Lori Chavez-DeRemer, who lost two competitive races for the state House in 2016 and 2018, and businessman Jimmy Crumpacker, who took fourth place in the 2020 primary for the old 2nd District.

● OR-06 (D & R) (55-42 Biden): Democrats have experienced a massively expensive nine-way race for this brand-new seat in the mid-Willamette Valley that the state earned in reapportionment, though the bulk of the outside spending has benefited just one of them. That candidate is economic development adviser Carrick Flynn, who's been backed by a staggering $11.4 million from cryptocurrency billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried's super PAC, Protect Our Future. House Majority PAC, a decade-old group that exists to help Democrats in general elections, has also spent $940,000 to support Flynn, an unprecedented departure condemned by Sen. Jeff Merkley. A third super PAC called Justice Unites Us is running ads for Flynn as well.

The Congressional Hispanic Caucus, a heavy donor to HMP that was furious about the PAC's intervention, has spent around $1.5 million to support state Rep. Andrea Salinas, who would be Oregon’s first Latina member of Congress. The field also includes state Rep. Teresa Alonso León; self-funding perennial candidate Cody Reynolds; Oregon Medical Board member Kathleen Harder; former Multnomah County Commissioner Loretta Smith; and cryptocurrency developer Matt West, though none of them have received any outside support. An early May Salinas internal poll showed her edging out Flynn 18-14, with everyone else in single digits.

The seven-person Republican primary is similarly crowded but far cheaper. The field includes three candidates who have histories in older versions of the 5th District, from which the new 6th draws the bulk of its DNA: former Rep. Jim Bunn, who was elected to his only term in the 1994 Gingrich revolution; Mike Erickson, who was the GOP's unsuccessful 2006 and 2008 nominee for the next incarnation of the 5th; and former Keizer city councilor Amy Ryan Courser, who lost to Democratic Rep. Kurt Schrader in 2020. Also in the running are Army veteran Nate Sandvig, state Rep. Ron Noble, Dundee Mayor David Russ, and Air Force veteran Angela Plowhead.

Trump has no idea who is actually in Ohio’s primary, but we do. Here’s what to watch on Tuesday

Posted on May 3, 2022 by Jeff Singer

After a two-month break, the 2022 primary season picks back up Tuesday in Ohio and Indiana, and we have plenty to watch. The main event is Ohio’s massively expensive Republican primary for the state's open Senate seat, where venture capitalist J.D. Vance is hoping that a late endorsement from Donald Trump will put him over the top (even if Trump himself hasn’t bothered to remember Vance’s name), but it’s far from the only primary on tap.

Below you'll find our guide to the key primaries to watch in both states. When it’s available, we'll tell you about any reliable polling that exists for each race, but if we don't mention any numbers, it means no recent surveys have been made public. And of course, because this is a redistricting year, both states on the docket have brand-new congressional maps. To help you follow along, you can find interactive maps from Dave's Redistricting App for both Indiana and Ohio.

Polls close at 6 PM ET in the portion of Indiana located in the Eastern Time Zone, while the rest of the state follows an hour later. Voting concludes in Ohio at 7:30 PM ET, and our live coverage will begin then at Daily Kos Elections. You can also follow us on Twitter for blow-by-blow updates, and you’ll want to bookmark our primary calendar, which includes the dates for primaries in all 50 states.

● OH-Sen (R & D) (53-45 Trump): Republican Sen. Rob Portman’s retirement set off a crowded and extremely expensive GOP primary that features five serious contenders, though only one earned Donald Trump’s coveted endorsement in the final weeks of the contest. That candidate is venture capitalist J.D. Vance, the Hillbilly Elegy author and one-time vociferous Trump critic who has reinvented himself as a MAGA diehard. (Trump excused his old disloyalty at a recent rally, saying that while Vance “said some bad shit about me,” each of his rivals “did also.”) A super PAC largely funded by conservative megadonor Peter Thiel has also spent heavily to support Vance and has run ads touting Trump's seal of approval.

The other hopefuls and their allies, though, are still hoping that voters won’t be so forgiving of Vance’s past impieties. Former state Treasurer Josh Mandel, who lost the 2012 Senate race to Democrat Sherrod Brown, and his backers at the Club for Growth have continued airing ads highlighting Vance’s old anti-Trump comments. Wealthy businessman Mike Gibbons, who took second in the 2018 Senate primary, has also spent heavily on his own commercials, though he’s continued to focus on bashing Mandel.

Listen to a breakdown of the May primaries on Daily Kos Elections’ The Downballot podcast with David Nir and David Beard

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Another candidate to watch is Portman’s choice, former State Party Chair Jane Timken, though her decision to stop airing ads on broadcast TV late in the race is an ominous sign for her chances. Finally, there’s state Sen. Matt Dolan, who co-owns Cleveland's Major League Baseball team. Dolan, who is the one major candidate to condemn the Big Lie, has used his personal resources to run commercials touting himself as a more traditional conservative. Trump, meanwhile, has repeatedly attacked him for changing his team's name to the Guardians last year, a decision the state senator says he wasn’t involved in.

We’ve seen a few polls since Vance won Trump’s endorsement, and they indicate he still doesn’t have the nod locked up. A Fox News survey found Vance leading Mandel by a small 23-18 margin, though Vance’s super PAC allies see him defeating the former treasurer 31-19. The Democratic firm Blueprint Polling, meanwhile, shows Dolan edging out Vance 18-17, with Gibbons and Mandel at 13% and 12%, respectively.

Things are far less chaotic on the Democratic side, where Rep. Tim Ryan enjoys a huge financial edge over Morgan Harper, a former adviser to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau who unsuccessfully challenged Rep. Joyce Beatty for renomination in 2020, as well as two little-known candidates.

The previews that follow are ordered by poll closing times and then race, with statewide contests first.

● IN-01 (R) (53-45 Biden): Seven Republicans are competing to take on freshman Democratic Rep. Frank Mrvan in this constituency in the northwestern corner of the state that changed minimally in redistricting, though the only two who have spent serious sums are former LaPorte Mayor Blair Milo and Air Force veteran Jennifer-Ruth Green. Milo, who went on to serve in Gov. Eric Holcomb’s administration, entered the primary as the frontrunner, but Green has aired ads arguing that the former mayor is a "Never Trump liberal" who refused to back Trump in 2016.

● IN-09 (R) (63-35 Trump): Nine Republicans are running to succeed GOP Rep. Trey Hollingsworth, who unexpectedly announced in January that he would retire after just three terms, in this south-central Indiana seat that shifted eastward but remains a conservative bastion. Of the four most notable contenders, perhaps the most familiar name is former Rep. Mike Sodrel, who lost his bid for a second term in a far-more competitive version of the 9th in 2006 and waged failed campaigns to reclaim it over the following two cycles. Sodrel has mostly been self-funding his latest comeback bid, which has allowed him to outspend his many rivals.

Former state Sen. Erin Houchin, who took second to Hollingsworth in 2016, is also trying again, and she’s benefited from almost $500,000 in aid from the cryptocurrency-aligned PAC American Dream Federal Action. Another name to watch is Army veteran Stu Barnes-Israel, who has also received over $900,000 in support from a group called Hoosier Values. (This post has been updated to reflect that PAC’s spending.) Rounding out the field is state Rep. J. Michael Davisson, who was appointed to the legislature last fall to succeed his late father, but he’s spent almost nothing.

● OH-Gov (R & D) (53-45 Trump): Republican Gov. Mike DeWine faces three intra-party foes, with former Rep. Jim Renacci looking like the most serious of the bunch—but that might be giving the ex-congressman too much credit. Renacci, who lost the 2018 Senate race to Democratic incumbent Sherrod Brown, has spent his time trashing DeWine's handling of the pandemic, and he’s used his personal resources to self-fund most of his race. (“Why waste time trying to raise money when you’re running against an incumbent?” the former congressman recently mused.) However, DeWine and his allies have still enjoyed a massive financial edge.

The contest also includes farmer Joe Blystone and former state Rep. Ron Hood, who badly lost last year's special election primary for the 15th Congressional District, and a recent poll indicates that they’re costing Renacci some vital anti-incumbent votes. A Fox News survey released in the final week of the primary gave DeWine a 43-24 advantage over the former congressman, with Blystone at 19%.

The Democratic primary is a duel between two former mayors who each left office at the start of the year: Cincinnati's John Cranley and Dayton's Nan Whaley. Cranley has enjoyed a modest spending edge, while Whaley has the support of Brown, who is Ohio’s most prominent Democrat. Cranley went negative about two weeks ahead of Election Day with an attention-grabbing ad in which he compared the performance of Cincinnati with Dayton's during the two ex-mayors' time in office.

● OH-09 (R) (51-48 Trump): GOP mapmakers sought to weaken 20-term Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur, who has served in the House longer than any woman in history, by gerrymandering her Toledo-area seat, which under the old lines voted 59-40 for Biden. Two Republican state legislators are now running to take her on. State Sen. Theresa Gavarone enjoys the support of 5th District Rep. Bob Latta, who currently represents just over half the new 9th. State Rep. Craig Riedel, meanwhile, is backed by the infamous Jim Jordan, and he’s run ads pledging to join Jordan’s Freedom Caucus.

Riedel has dominated the airwaves, with AdImpact reporting that he’d outspent Gavarone $290,000 to $43,000 on commercials going into the final week. J.R. Majewski, a conservative activist who has links to the QAnon conspiracy cult, has also generated some attention, but he has significantly fewer resources than either of his two rivals.

● OH-11 (D) (78-21 Biden): Rep. Shontel Brown faces a Democratic primary rematch against former state Sen. Nina Turner, a prominent Bernie Sanders supporter whom she defeated in last year's special election in a 50-45 upset. Turner is hoping that she’ll gain ground now that the district has been redrawn to include all of her old base in Cleveland, but this time, she’s at a huge financial disadvantage as she goes up against the incumbent. Democratic Majority for Israel PAC, AIPAC, and the crypto industry-aligned Protect Our Future PAC have been airing ads in support of Brown, while Turner hasn’t benefited from any major outside spending. The congresswoman also earned an endorsement on Friday from President Biden.

● OH-13 (R) (51-48 Biden): This seat in the southern suburbs of Akron and Cleveland, which is a radically reconfigured mashup of five old districts, is open thanks to some unusual circumstances: Two incumbents might've sought reelection here, but one, Democrat Tim Ryan, is running for Senate while another, Republican Anthony Gonzalez, opted to retire after voting to impeach Trump.

That's left us with a seven-way GOP primary, though Trump-endorsed attorney Madison Gesiotto Gilbert has decisively outspent her intraparty rivals. The field also includes former congressional aide Shay Hawkins, who lost a close 2020 race for the state House and whom The New York Times says is the one contender to air any TV ads. The winner will take on state Rep. Emilia Sykes, who faces no opposition in the Democratic primary.

Tuesday will be an exciting night, so we hope you’ll join us for our liveblog at Daily Kos Elections!