Category: MI-Sen

Morning Digest: Disgraced Republican who pushed aides to be surrogate mothers runs for his old seat

Posted on by Daily Kos Elections

The Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from the Daily Kos Elections team.

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Leading Off

● AZ-08: Former Republican Rep. Trent Franks stunned the Arizona political world Wednesday when he announced he'd run to regain the seat he resigned in 2017 following a shocking sexual harassment scandal in which he pushed a pair of aides to serve as surrogate mothers. Franks is campaigning to replace retiring Rep. Debbie Lesko, a fellow Republican who was elected to succeed him in a 2018 special election.

Franks first won a previous version of this conservative seat (then as now based in the western suburbs of Phoenix) in 2002, and he stood out as an ardent rightwinger even before he called President Barack Obama an "enemy of humanity" in 2009. He made his opposition to abortion rights one of his central causes: Franks would claim in 2010, "Half of all Black children are aborted," and insisted in 2013 that "the incidence of rape resulting in pregnancy are very low."

Early in the 2012 cycle, however, something mysteriously went awry. Franks had planned to seek a promotion to the Senate after fellow Republican Jon Kyl decided to retire, and his own consultant confirmed to reporter Dave Catanese the date and time of his April 2011 kickoff. But Franks shockingly pulled the plug without explanation just the day before that event, and we spent more than six years wondering why.

We unexpectedly got our answer in 2017, shortly after he said he'd resign. According to Arizona Republic columnist Laurie Roberts, Franks' "after-hours activities caught up to him," with one unnamed operative claiming there was a "file" on Franks that was shared with him to deter him from running. Another said that Franks "wrote creepy text messages a decade ago" to another politico.

The congressman's sins soon became public as the emerging #MeTooMovement unearthed ugly stories about countless powerful men. Franks, the Associated Press reported, had pushed one aide to carry his child and had offered her $5 million to do so. A separate story from Politico said that the women in Franks' office thought their boss "was asking to have sexual relations with them" because they were unsure whether he was "asking about impregnating [them] through sexual intercourse or in vitro fertilization."

One staffer said that Franks "tried to persuade a female aide that they were in love by having her read an article that described how a person knows they're in love with someone." Another said that her access to the congressman was cut off after she rebuffed his advances.

But Franks, who now claims he left Congress "to spare those I love from heavily sensationalized attacks in that unique and difficult time," apparently sees a chance for redemption with Lesko's departure. "Now that my family has matured and circumstances have developed as they have, I hope I can move forward," he said in a statement announcing his bid.

Franks joins an August GOP primary that already featured a trio of extremists. One of them is Blake Masters, who ran arguably the worst Senate campaign of 2022 in a cycle chock-full of terrible Republican candidates. Another rival is Abe Hamadeh, who has refused to accept his narrow loss last year in the race for attorney general.

Also in the running is state Sen. Anthony Kern, who was part of a slate of fake Trump electors in 2020; Attorney General Kris Mayes, who beat Hamadeh, is currently investigating that scheme. Lesko's choice, state House Speaker Ben Toma, has not yet announced, though he recently filed paperwork with the state. He may stand out in this crowded field, as Roberts last week described him as a conservative who nonetheless is "not a creature of the MAGA movement."

Trump carried the 8th District 56-43, and it would be difficult for Democrats to beat even one of these unsavory characters. Still, as we've noted before, Lesko only won her initial 2018 special 52-48, and she didn't have anything like the baggage that at least Franks, Hamadeh, Kern, and Masters are all lugging.

The Downballot

● Election Day is finally here! Joining us on "The Downballot" this week to preview all the key contests is Daily Kos Elections editor Jeff Singer, who has the goods on races big and small. Singer kicks us off by getting us up to speed on the battles for governor in Kentucky and Mississippi, two conservative Southern states where it's Republicans who are acting worried. Then it's on to major fights in Pennsylvania, where a vacant state Supreme Court seat is in play, and Ohio, where an amendment to enshrine abortion rights into the state constitution is on the ballot.

Singer also highlights a pair of bellwether legislative districts in Virginia, where both chambers are up for grabs, and then it's on to some lesser-known—but still exceedingly important—races further down the ballot. Several are also taking place in swingy Pennsylvania, including a critical contest that will determine who controls election administration in a major county in the Philadelphia suburbs. Democrats will also be hoping for a bounce-back in the county executive's race in Long Island's Suffolk County, an area that swung hard to Republicans last year.

Subscribe to "The Downballot" on Apple Podcasts to make sure you never miss a show—new episodes every Thursday! You'll find a transcript of this week's episode right here by noon Eastern time.

Senate

● MI-Sen: It's a bit of a game of telephone, but Politico reports that two anonymous sources who attended a lunch for Senate Republicans on Tuesday say that Indiana Rep. Todd Young told his caucus that he had "heard" (in the site's phrasing) that former Michigan Rep. Peter Meijer would launch a Senate bid within two days. Both Young and Meijer wouldn't comment when Politico reached out to them, but Meijer has been publicly contemplating a campaign for the upper chamber all year.

Governors

● MS-Gov: New disclosures for the month of October show Democrat Brandon Presley far outpacing Republican Gov. Tate Reeves on the financial front, with the challenger outraising the incumbent $3.4 million to $1.1 million ahead of next week's election.

For the entire campaign, Presley has brought in almost twice as much as Reeves, with a haul of $11.2 million versus the governor's $6.2 million take. Reeves does have an edge in cash remaining, as he's still sitting on $3 million, compared to $1.2 million for Presley. However, as Mississippi Today's Taylor Vance notes, $2 million of Reeves' stockpile comes from a "legacy" campaign account that's no longer permitted under state law.

A recent analysis from AdImpact found that Reeves has enjoyed a roughly $1 million edge in ad spending, shelling out $8.3 million on the airwaves to $7.3 million for his opponent. Those figures include reservations made as of last Thursday.

House

● CO-04: Rep. Ken Buck said Wednesday that he wouldn't run for a sixth term, an unsurprising decision that followed Buck's surprising emergence as an outspoken critic of his own party.

The Colorado Republican told MSNBC that his decision stemmed from his disappointment "that the Republican Party continues to rely on this lie that the 2020 election was stolen and rely on the Jan. 6 narrative and political prisoners from Jan. 6 and other things." Buck nonetheless voted to make election denier Mike Johnson House speaker last week, explaining his choice by saying, "I think people make mistakes and still could be really good speakers."

Buck, who remains a member of the Freedom Caucus, was a hard-right ally during most of his time in national politics, and hardcore conservatives are in a strong position to retain his seat. The 4th District, which includes dark-red eastern Colorado and GOP-leaning suburbs of Denver in Douglas County, supported Donald Trump 58-39.

State Rep. Richard Holtorf, who embodies the type of combative far-right politics that Buck was once known for, already had the congressman in his sights: He formed an exploratory committee in September after Buck spoke out against his party's drive to impeach Joe Biden. Other names, however, will likely surface for the June GOP primary now that Buck, who previously showed interest in leaving office to take an on-air cable news job, has announced he won't be on the ballot.

Buck was elected Weld County district attorney in 2004 and emerged on the national scene when he challenged Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet in 2010, following Bennet's appointment by then-Gov. Bill Ritter. But Buck first had to get through a tough primary against former Lt. Gov. Jane Norton, another extremely conservative politician. Both sides tried to argue that they were the true candidate of the burgeoning tea party movement, but it was the district attorney who proved more adept at consolidating support from anti-establishment figures.

Late in his battle with Norton, Buck made news when he remarked, "I don't wear high heels … I have cowboy boots, they have real bullshit on them," a line Norton argued was sexist.

"My opponent has said a number of times on the campaign trail that people should vote for her because she wears high heels, because she wears a skirt, because she's a woman," Buck said in his defense. "She ran a commercial that said Ken Buck should be man enough to do X, Y, and Z. ... I made a statement, it was a lighthearted statement that I'm man enough, I don't wear high heels and I have cowboy boots on." Buck won 52-48 four days after the NRSC quietly donated $42,000 to Norton.

Bennet, who had just triumphed in his own competitive primary against former state House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, wasted no time portraying the Republican nominee as too far to the right for what was then still a swing state.

Buck made the senator's task easier on a "Meet the Press" appearance late in the campaign when he said he stood by his 2005 declaration that he had refused to prosecute an alleged rape because "a jury could very well conclude that this is a case of buyer's remorse." He also argued that being gay was a choice. "I think birth has an influence over it," he said, "like alcoholism and some other things, but I think that basically you have a choice."

Bennet prevailed 48-46 during an otherwise horrible year for his party. His fellow Republicans quickly cited him, along with Delaware's Christine O'Donnell and Nevada's Sharron Angle, as a cautionary example of what happens when the party chooses extremist nominees in tossup Senate races. (It's unclear, though, whether Norton, who had for instance blasted Social Security as a "Ponzi scheme," would have actually been a better choice.)

But unlike those fellow travelers, Buck remained in office, even winning another term as district attorney in 2012 before planning a 2014 campaign for Colorado's other Senate seat. Yet even though polls showed Democratic Sen. Mark Udall was vulnerable, Buck and the entire field struggled to raise money and gain traction. But an otherwise stagnant race was completely transformed in February of 2014 when the Denver Post broke the news that Rep. Cory Gardner would make a late bid.

Buck quickly announced that he'd switch course and seek instead to replace Gardner, who ended up endorsing the district attorney as his successor. The two denied that there was any pre-planned switcheroo, but Buck handily dispatched state Sen. Scott Renfroe 44-24 in the primary, and he went on to prevail easily in November. Gardner, meanwhile, accomplished what Buck could not four years earlier and managed to narrowly unseat Udall amid the GOP's second midterm wave election in a row.

Yet while Buck had indeed made it to Congress, he soon signaled he was unhappy in the House long before he ended up retiring. In the summer of 2017, he expressed interest in campaigning to succeed Attorney General Cynthia Coffman in the event that she were to run for governor, though he stayed put even after she launched what turned out to be a disastrous campaign. Buck was elected state party chair two years later, and while he said he'd remain in the House, Inside Elections' Nathan Gonzales reported that he'd told people he was considering retiring that cycle.

The congressman again sought reelection even as some party members groused about him trying to do both his jobs at once. Buck's tenure as party chair was defined by infighting amid Colorado's transformation into a reliably blue state. That shift culminated with Biden's double-digit win in 2020 as well as Gardner's decisive loss to former Gov. John Hickenlooper that same year.

Buck, who was the rare Freedom Caucus member to recognize Biden's win, initially showed some interest in another campaign against Bennet in 2022, but he ended up running for what would be his final term in the House.

● MD-03: Democratic state Sen. Clarence Lam tells the Baltimore Sun that he's considering a bid for Maryland's 3rd Congressional District, which recently became open after Rep. John Sarbanes announced his retirement. Lam's legislative seat is located entirely within the House district he's eyeing, making up about 17% of it, according to calculations from Daily Kos Elections.

● MT-02: State Auditor Troy Downing has kicked off his campaign for the GOP nomination in this safely red district in eastern Montana, though it's still unclear whether GOP Rep. Matt Rosendale will join the Senate race that he's been flirting with for months or if he'll run for a third House term here. Downing was first elected auditor in 2020 after taking third place for the GOP nomination for Senate in 2018, a primary that Rosendale won before he narrowly lost to Democratic Sen. Jon Tester that fall.

Downing said back in August when he set up an exploratory committee that he wouldn't challenge Rosendale if the incumbent runs again, but Rosendale keeps pushing back his timeline for announcing his decision on a Senate bid and recently said he may not decide until the March 11 filing deadline. Consequently, Downing and any other prospective GOP candidates might not have any idea whether they'll be running against the incumbent until it's too late to switch to another race if Rosendale seeks reelection.

● NY-03: Indicted Rep. George Santos remains in office after a majority of his colleagues voted against an expulsion resolution that needed the support of two-thirds of the chamber. The House voted 213-179 against expulsion on Wednesday evening, one day after the House Ethics Committee declared it would "announce its next course of action" against the Republican by Nov. 17.

A total of 31 Democrats joined 182 Republicans in voting "no," with Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin saying afterward, "Santos has not been criminally convicted yet of the offenses cited in the Resolution nor has he been found guilty of ethics offenses in the House internal process. This would be a terrible precedent to set, expelling people who have not been convicted of a crime and without internal due process." On the other side were 155 Democrats and 24 Republicans.

● OR-03: Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal on Wednesday became the first major candidate to launch a bid to succeed retiring Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer in the safely blue 3rd District around Portland. Local law required Jayapal, who is the older sister of Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, to resign her post to run for Congress, which she did just before entering the race.

Both Jayapal siblings were born in India and emigrated as teenagers, though the congresswoman began her political career a few years earlier by winning a state Senate seat in the Seattle area in 2014 before earning a promotion to Washington, D.C., two years later. Susheela Jayapal, by contrast, worked as general counsel to Adidas America and for nonprofits before successfully running for the county commission in 2018. That initial victory made her the first Indian American to hold an elected county post in Oregon, and she'd likewise be the first Indian American to serve the state in Congress.

The sisters sat down for a joint interview with HuffPost this week, with the now-former commissioner declaring, "I cannot imagine being on this path without Pramila and I can't wait to work with her―and we're gonna irritate each other along the way." They'd be only the second set of sisters to serve together in Congress, following in the footsteps of a pair of California Democrats, Reps. Loretta and Linda Sánchez. Loretta Sánchez left the House to wage an unsuccessful 2016 Senate bid against none other than Kamala Harris, while Linda Sánchez continues to represent part of the Los Angeles area.

The Jayapals, however, would together make history as the first two sisters to serve in Congress simultaneously while representing different states. Several sets of brothers have done so in the past, most notably Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy and New York Sen. Robert Kennedy, from 1965 until the latter's assassination in 1968.

The University of Minnesota's Eric Ostermeier also tells us that a trio of brothers served together in the House while representing three different states from 1855 to 1861: Cadwallader Washburn of Wisconsin, Israel Washburn of Maine, and Elihu Washburn of Illinois, who would become one of the most prominent Republicans in Congress during the Civil War and Reconstruction. A fourth brother, William Drew Washburn, later won a House seat in Minnesota in 1878, though none of his siblings were still in office by that point.

However, Susheela Jayapal will need to get through a competitive primary before she can join her sister in the nation's capital. Gresham City Councilor Eddy Morales​ announced his own campaign late Wednesday, a development we'll be discussing in our next Digest​.

State Rep. Travis Nelson also told Willamette Week​, "We need more representation from the nursing profession in Congress, and to my knowledge, a male nurse has never been sent to Congress. Furthermore, we need more LGBTQ+ representation, and a Black LGBTQ+ man has never been elected to Congress outside of the state of New York​." Nelson​ added, "I plan to arrive at my decision this week​."​ Former Multnomah County Board of Commissioners Chair Deborah Kafoury additionally hasn't ruled out getting in herself.

Susheela Jayapal will also be seeking office under a different election system than her sister did in 2016, when she ran to succeed another longtime Democratic member, Jim McDermott, in a dark blue seat. Pramila Jayapal, who is the younger sibling by three years, faced off against eight other candidates in that year's top-two primary, taking 42% to 21% for state Rep. Brady Walkinshaw, a fellow Democrat. She went on to defeat Walkinshaw 56-44 in the general election a few months later. In Oregon, however, only a simple plurality is needed to win a party's nomination, and whoever secures the nod in May's primary will have no trouble in the general election for a seat that favored Joe Biden 73-25.

● TX-12: Republican Rep. Kay Granger, who chairs the influential House Appropriations Committee, confirmed Wednesday that she would not seek a 15th term in Congress, following reporting late Tuesday night from the Fort Worth Report that she would retire.

Texas' 12th Congressional District, which is based in the Fort Worth area, favored Donald Trump 58-40 in 2020, so whoever wins the GOP nod should have little trouble in the fall. The primary is set for March 5, though a May 28 runoff would take place if no one wins a majority of the vote in the first round.

Granger's announcement came only a little more than a month before the Dec. 11 filing deadline, though one person was already running against the congresswoman. Businessman John O'Shea attracted little attention when he launched his campaign in April, however, and he finished September with a mere $20,000 in the bank. O'Shea, though, has the backing of Attorney General Ken Paxton, a far-right favorite who has survived numerous scandals and a high-profile impeachment.

State House Majority Leader Craig Goldman, meanwhile, has been talked about as a possible Granger successor for a while, and the Texas Tribune notes that an unknown party reserved several domain names relevant to Goldman in the days before Granger announced her departure. Goldman said Wednesday​, "As far as my political plans go, I’m honored and humbled by all who have reached out and will have a decision made very soon​."

Wealthy businessman Chris Putnam, who lost to Granger 58-42 in the 2020 primary, also tells the Fort Worth Report and KERA News​ he's mulling another run, while Tarrant County Commissioner Manny Ramirez said he'd make his own decision "soon."

State Rep. Nate Schatzline,​ meanwhile, said, "Anything is possible in the future​." Fellow state Rep. Brian Byrd​ played down his own interests but doesn't appear to have said no either; the Fort Worth Star-Telegram writes he​ "said he isn’t looking at a bid for the congressional seat at this point."​ However, Tarrant County Judge Tim O'Hare, who is the county's top executive official, and Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker were both quick noes.

Granger, who founded an insurance agency, got her start in public life in the early 1980s when she joined the Fort Worth Zoning Commission. She first assumed elected office in 1989 when she won a seat on the City Council, a body whose nonpartisan nature kept her from having to publicly identify with a party. (Texas Democrats were still a force at the time, though not for much longer.)

That state of affairs continued two years later when she won a promotion to mayor, a similarly nonpartisan post. Longtime political observer Bud Kennedy would recount to the Daily Beast in 2013, "She was carefully centrist in the way she led the city."

That led both Democrats and Republicans to see Granger as a prize recruit in 1996, when Democratic Rep. Charlie Geren, a conservative who had been elected to succeed none other than former Democratic Speaker Jim Wright, decided to retire from a previous version of the 12th. Granger settled on the GOP, though, and she beat her nearest opponent 69-20 in her first-ever Republican primary.

In a sign of just how different things were three decades ago, Granger campaigned as a supporter of abortion rights. She had little trouble in the general election against Democrat Hugh Parmer, a former Fort Worth mayor who had badly lost a 1990 race to unseat Republican Sen. Phil Graham. Granger beat Parmer 58-41 even as, according to analyst Kiernan Park-Egan, Bill Clinton narrowly beat Republican Bob Dole by 46.3-45.5 in the 12th. (Independent Ross Perot, who hailed from neighboring Dallas, took 8%.)

Granger's win made her the second Republican woman to represent Texas in Congress after Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and the first to serve in the House; there would not be another until Beth Van Duyne won the neighboring 24th District in 2020. Granger, who is tied with Maine Sen. Susan Collins as the longest-serving Republican woman in congressional history, owed her longevity in part to the fact that she only faced one serious reelection challenge during her long career.

That expensive primary battle took place in 2020, when Putnam tried to portray Granger as insufficiently pro-Trump even though she had Trump's endorsement. Putnam, who had the Club for Growth on his side, also tried to tie the incumbent to long-running problems at an expensive local development project called Panther Island that used to be led by the congresswoman's son.

But Granger and her backers at the Congressional Leadership Fund fought back by reminding voters that she was Trump's candidate, and she defeated her opponent by 16 points ahead of another easy general election. While Putnam initially announced he'd seek a rematch the following cycle, his decision not to file left her Granger on a glide path to yet another term.

Granger became chair of the Appropriations Committee after her party retook the House in 2022. From that powerful perch, she was one of the most prominent Republicans to vote against making Jim Jordan speaker. She described that stance as "a vote of conscience," adding, "Intimidation and threats will not change my position." But the chairwoman, like the rest of her caucus, embraced far-right Rep. Mike Johnson a short time later, saying she'd work with him "to advance our conservative agenda."

Franks first won a previous version of this conservative seat (then as now based in the western suburbs of Phoenix) in 2002, and he stood out as an ardent rightwinger even before he called President Barack Obama an "enemy of humanity" in 2009. He made his opposition to abortion rights one of his central causes: Franks would claim in 2010, "Half of all Black children are aborted," and insisted in 2013 that "the incidence of rape resulting in pregnancy are very low."

Early in the 2012 cycle, however, something mysteriously went awry. Franks had planned to seek a promotion to the Senate after fellow Republican Jon Kyl decided to retire, and his own consultant confirmed to reporter Dave Catanese the date and time of his April 2011 kickoff. But Franks shockingly pulled the plug without explanation just the day before that event, and we spent more than six years wondering why.

We unexpectedly got our answer in 2017, shortly after he said he'd resign. According to Arizona Republic columnist Laurie Roberts, Franks' "after-hours activities caught up to him," with one unnamed operative claiming there was a "file" on Franks that was shared with him to deter him from running. Another said that Franks "wrote creepy text messages a decade ago" to another politico.

The congressman's sins soon became public as the emerging #MeTooMovement unearthed ugly stories about countless powerful men. Franks, the Associated Press reported, had pushed one aide to carry his child and had offered her $5 million to do so. A separate story from Politico said that the women in Franks' office thought their boss "was asking to have sexual relations with them" because they were unsure whether he was "asking about impregnating [them] through sexual intercourse or in vitro fertilization."

One staffer said that Franks "tried to persuade a female aide that they were in love by having her read an article that described how a person knows they're in love with someone." Another said that her access to the congressman was cut off after she rebuffed his advances.

But Franks, who now claims he left Congress "to spare those I love from heavily sensationalized attacks in that unique and difficult time," apparently sees a chance for redemption with Lesko's departure. "Now that my family has matured and circumstances have developed as they have, I hope I can move forward," he said in a statement announcing his bid.

Franks joins an August GOP primary that already featured a trio of extremists. One of them is Blake Masters, who ran arguably the worst Senate campaign of 2022 in a cycle chock-full of terrible Republican candidates. Another rival is Abe Hamadeh, who has refused to accept his narrow loss last year in the race for attorney general.

Also in the running is state Sen. Anthony Kern, who was part of a slate of fake Trump electors in 2020; Attorney General Kris Mayes, who beat Hamadeh, is currently investigating that scheme. Lesko's choice, state House Speaker Ben Toma, has not yet announced, though he recently filed paperwork with the state. He may stand out in this crowded field, as Roberts last week described him as a conservative who nonetheless is "not a creature of the MAGA movement."

Trump carried the 8th District 56-43, and it would be difficult for Democrats to beat even one of these unsavory characters. Still, as we've noted before, Lesko only won her initial 2018 special 52-48, and she didn't have anything like the baggage that at least Franks, Hamadeh, Kern, and Masters are all lugging.

The Downballot

● Election Day is finally here! Joining us on "The Downballot" this week to preview all the key contests is Daily Kos Elections editor Jeff Singer, who has the goods on races big and small. Singer kicks us off by getting us up to speed on the battles for governor in Kentucky and Mississippi, two conservative Southern states where it's Republicans who are acting worried. Then it's on to major fights in Pennsylvania, where a vacant state Supreme Court seat is in play, and Ohio, where an amendment to enshrine abortion rights into the state constitution is on the ballot.

Singer also highlights a pair of bellwether legislative districts in Virginia, where both chambers are up for grabs, and then it's on to some lesser-known—but still exceedingly important—races further down the ballot. Several are also taking place in swingy Pennsylvania, including a critical contest that will determine who controls election administration in a major county in the Philadelphia suburbs. Democrats will also be hoping for a bounce-back in the county executive's race in Long Island's Suffolk County, an area that swung hard to Republicans last year.

Subscribe to "The Downballot" on Apple Podcasts to make sure you never miss a show—new episodes every Thursday! You'll find a transcript of this week's episode right here by noon Eastern time.

Senate

● MI-Sen: It's a bit of a game of telephone, but Politico reports that two anonymous sources who attended a lunch for Senate Republicans on Tuesday say that Indiana Rep. Todd Young told his caucus that he had "heard" (in the site's phrasing) that former Michigan Rep. Peter Meijer would launch a Senate bid within two days. Both Young and Meijer wouldn't comment when Politico reached out to them, but Meijer has been publicly contemplating a campaign for the upper chamber all year.

Governors

● MS-Gov: New disclosures for the month of October show Democrat Brandon Presley far outpacing Republican Gov. Tate Reeves on the financial front, with the challenger outraising the incumbent $3.4 million to $1.1 million ahead of next week's election.

For the entire campaign, Presley has brought in almost twice as much as Reeves, with a haul of $11.2 million versus the governor's $6.2 million take. Reeves does have an edge in cash remaining, as he's still sitting on $3 million, compared to $1.2 million for Presley. However, as Mississippi Today's Taylor Vance notes, $2 million of Reeves' stockpile comes from a "legacy" campaign account that's no longer permitted under state law.

A recent analysis from AdImpact found that Reeves has enjoyed a roughly $1 million edge in ad spending, shelling out $8.3 million on the airwaves to $7.3 million for his opponent. Those figures include reservations made as of last Thursday.

House

● CO-04: Rep. Ken Buck said Wednesday that he wouldn't run for a sixth term, an unsurprising decision that followed Buck's surprising emergence as an outspoken critic of his own party.

The Colorado Republican told MSNBC that his decision stemmed from his disappointment "that the Republican Party continues to rely on this lie that the 2020 election was stolen and rely on the Jan. 6 narrative and political prisoners from Jan. 6 and other things." Buck nonetheless voted to make election denier Mike Johnson House speaker last week, explaining his choice by saying, "I think people make mistakes and still could be really good speakers."

Buck, who remains a member of the Freedom Caucus, was a hard-right ally during most of his time in national politics, and hardcore conservatives are in a strong position to retain his seat. The 4th District, which includes dark-red eastern Colorado and GOP-leaning suburbs of Denver in Douglas County, supported Donald Trump 58-39.

State Rep. Richard Holtorf, who embodies the type of combative far-right politics that Buck was once known for, already had the congressman in his sights: He formed an exploratory committee in September after Buck spoke out against his party's drive to impeach Joe Biden. Other names, however, will likely surface for the June GOP primary now that Buck, who previously showed interest in leaving office to take an on-air cable news job, has announced he won't be on the ballot.

Buck was elected Weld County district attorney in 2004 and emerged on the national scene when he challenged Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet in 2010, following Bennet's appointment by then-Gov. Bill Ritter. But Buck first had to get through a tough primary against former Lt. Gov. Jane Norton, another extremely conservative politician. Both sides tried to argue that they were the true candidate of the burgeoning tea party movement, but it was the district attorney who proved more adept at consolidating support from anti-establishment figures.

Late in his battle with Norton, Buck made news when he remarked, "I don't wear high heels … I have cowboy boots, they have real bullshit on them," a line Norton argued was sexist.

"My opponent has said a number of times on the campaign trail that people should vote for her because she wears high heels, because she wears a skirt, because she's a woman," Buck said in his defense. "She ran a commercial that said Ken Buck should be man enough to do X, Y, and Z. ... I made a statement, it was a lighthearted statement that I'm man enough, I don't wear high heels and I have cowboy boots on." Buck won 52-48 four days after the NRSC quietly donated $42,000 to Norton.

Bennet, who had just triumphed in his own competitive primary against former state House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, wasted no time portraying the Republican nominee as too far to the right for what was then still a swing state.

Buck made the senator's task easier on a "Meet the Press" appearance late in the campaign when he said he stood by his 2005 declaration that he had refused to prosecute an alleged rape because "a jury could very well conclude that this is a case of buyer's remorse." He also argued that being gay was a choice. "I think birth has an influence over it," he said, "like alcoholism and some other things, but I think that basically you have a choice."

Bennet prevailed 48-46 during an otherwise horrible year for his party. His fellow Republicans quickly cited him, along with Delaware's Christine O'Donnell and Nevada's Sharron Angle, as a cautionary example of what happens when the party chooses extremist nominees in tossup Senate races. (It's unclear, though, whether Norton, who had for instance blasted Social Security as a "Ponzi scheme," would have actually been a better choice.)

But unlike those fellow travelers, Buck remained in office, even winning another term as district attorney in 2012 before planning a 2014 campaign for Colorado's other Senate seat. Yet even though polls showed Democratic Sen. Mark Udall was vulnerable, Buck and the entire field struggled to raise money and gain traction. But an otherwise stagnant race was completely transformed in February of 2014 when the Denver Post broke the news that Rep. Cory Gardner would make a late bid.

Buck quickly announced that he'd switch course and seek instead to replace Gardner, who ended up endorsing the district attorney as his successor. The two denied that there was any pre-planned switcheroo, but Buck handily dispatched state Sen. Scott Renfroe 44-24 in the primary, and he went on to prevail easily in November. Gardner, meanwhile, accomplished what Buck could not four years earlier and managed to narrowly unseat Udall amid the GOP's second midterm wave election in a row.

Yet while Buck had indeed made it to Congress, he soon signaled he was unhappy in the House long before he ended up retiring. In the summer of 2017, he expressed interest in campaigning to succeed Attorney General Cynthia Coffman in the event that she were to run for governor, though he stayed put even after she launched what turned out to be a disastrous campaign. Buck was elected state party chair two years later, and while he said he'd remain in the House, Inside Elections' Nathan Gonzales reported that he'd told people he was considering retiring that cycle.

The congressman again sought reelection even as some party members groused about him trying to do both his jobs at once. Buck's tenure as party chair was defined by infighting amid Colorado's transformation into a reliably blue state. That shift culminated with Biden's double-digit win in 2020 as well as Gardner's decisive loss to former Gov. John Hickenlooper that same year.

Buck, who was the rare Freedom Caucus member to recognize Biden's win, initially showed some interest in another campaign against Bennet in 2022, but he ended up running for what would be his final term in the House.

● MD-03: Democratic state Sen. Clarence Lam tells the Baltimore Sun that he's considering a bid for Maryland's 3rd Congressional District, which recently became open after Rep. John Sarbanes announced his retirement. Lam's legislative seat is located entirely within the House district he's eyeing, making up about 17% of it, according to calculations from Daily Kos Elections.

● MT-02: State Auditor Troy Downing has kicked off his campaign for the GOP nomination in this safely red district in eastern Montana, though it's still unclear whether GOP Rep. Matt Rosendale will join the Senate race that he's been flirting with for months or if he'll run for a third House term here. Downing was first elected auditor in 2020 after taking third place for the GOP nomination for Senate in 2018, a primary that Rosendale won before he narrowly lost to Democratic Sen. Jon Tester that fall.

Downing said back in August when he set up an exploratory committee that he wouldn't challenge Rosendale if the incumbent runs again, but Rosendale keeps pushing back his timeline for announcing his decision on a Senate bid and recently said he may not decide until the March 11 filing deadline. Consequently, Downing and any other prospective GOP candidates might not have any idea whether they'll be running against the incumbent until it's too late to switch to another race if Rosendale seeks reelection.

● NY-03: Indicted Rep. George Santos remains in office after a majority of his colleagues voted against an expulsion resolution that needed the support of two-thirds of the chamber. The House voted 213-179 against expulsion on Wednesday evening, one day after the House Ethics Committee declared it would "announce its next course of action" against the Republican by Nov. 17.

A total of 31 Democrats joined 182 Republicans in voting "no," with Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin saying afterward, "Santos has not been criminally convicted yet of the offenses cited in the Resolution nor has he been found guilty of ethics offenses in the House internal process. This would be a terrible precedent to set, expelling people who have not been convicted of a crime and without internal due process." On the other side were 155 Democrats and 24 Republicans.

● OR-03: Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal on Wednesday became the first major candidate to launch a bid to succeed retiring Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer in the safely blue 3rd District around Portland. Local law required Jayapal, who is the older sister of Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, to resign her post to run for Congress, which she did just before entering the race.

Both Jayapal siblings were born in India and emigrated as teenagers, though the congresswoman began her political career a few years earlier by winning a state Senate seat in the Seattle area in 2014 before earning a promotion to Washington, D.C., two years later. Susheela Jayapal, by contrast, worked as general counsel to Adidas America and for nonprofits before successfully running for the county commission in 2018. That initial victory made her the first Indian American to hold an elected county post in Oregon, and she'd likewise be the first Indian American to serve the state in Congress.

The sisters sat down for a joint interview with HuffPost this week, with the now-former commissioner declaring, "I cannot imagine being on this path without Pramila and I can't wait to work with her―and we're gonna irritate each other along the way." They'd be only the second set of sisters to serve together in Congress, following in the footsteps of a pair of California Democrats, Reps. Loretta and Linda Sánchez. Loretta Sánchez left the House to wage an unsuccessful 2016 Senate bid against none other than Kamala Harris, while Linda Sánchez continues to represent part of the Los Angeles area.

The Jayapals, however, would together make history as the first two sisters to serve in Congress simultaneously while representing different states. Several sets of brothers have done so in the past, most notably Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy and New York Sen. Robert Kennedy, from 1965 until the latter's assassination in 1968.

The University of Minnesota's Eric Ostermeier also tells us that a trio of brothers served together in the House while representing three different states from 1855 to 1861: Cadwallader Washburn of Wisconsin, Israel Washburn of Maine, and Elihu Washburn of Illinois, who would become one of the most prominent Republicans in Congress during the Civil War and Reconstruction. A fourth brother, William Drew Washburn, later won a House seat in Minnesota in 1878, though none of his siblings were still in office by that point.

However, Susheela Jayapal will need to get through a competitive primary before she can join her sister in the nation's capital. Gresham City Councilor Eddy Morales​ announced his own campaign late Wednesday, a development we'll be discussing in our next Digest​.

State Rep. Travis Nelson also told Willamette Week​, "We need more representation from the nursing profession in Congress, and to my knowledge, a male nurse has never been sent to Congress. Furthermore, we need more LGBTQ+ representation, and a Black LGBTQ+ man has never been elected to Congress outside of the state of New York​." Nelson​ added, "I plan to arrive at my decision this week​."​ Former Multnomah County Board of Commissioners Chair Deborah Kafoury additionally hasn't ruled out getting in herself.

Susheela Jayapal will also be seeking office under a different election system than her sister did in 2016, when she ran to succeed another longtime Democratic member, Jim McDermott, in a dark blue seat. Pramila Jayapal, who is the younger sibling by three years, faced off against eight other candidates in that year's top-two primary, taking 42% to 21% for state Rep. Brady Walkinshaw, a fellow Democrat. She went on to defeat Walkinshaw 56-44 in the general election a few months later. In Oregon, however, only a simple plurality is needed to win a party's nomination, and whoever secures the nod in May's primary will have no trouble in the general election for a seat that favored Joe Biden 73-25.

● TX-12: Republican Rep. Kay Granger, who chairs the influential House Appropriations Committee, confirmed Wednesday that she would not seek a 15th term in Congress, following reporting late Tuesday night from the Fort Worth Report that she would retire.

Texas' 12th Congressional District, which is based in the Fort Worth area, favored Donald Trump 58-40 in 2020, so whoever wins the GOP nod should have little trouble in the fall. The primary is set for March 5, though a May 28 runoff would take place if no one wins a majority of the vote in the first round.

Granger's announcement came only a little more than a month before the Dec. 11 filing deadline, though one person was already running against the congresswoman. Businessman John O'Shea attracted little attention when he launched his campaign in April, however, and he finished September with a mere $20,000 in the bank. O'Shea, though, has the backing of Attorney General Ken Paxton, a far-right favorite who has survived numerous scandals and a high-profile impeachment.

State House Majority Leader Craig Goldman, meanwhile, has been talked about as a possible Granger successor for a while, and the Texas Tribune notes that an unknown party reserved several domain names relevant to Goldman in the days before Granger announced her departure. Goldman said Wednesday​, "As far as my political plans go, I’m honored and humbled by all who have reached out and will have a decision made very soon​."

Wealthy businessman Chris Putnam, who lost to Granger 58-42 in the 2020 primary, also tells the Fort Worth Report and KERA News​ he's mulling another run, while Tarrant County Commissioner Manny Ramirez said he'd make his own decision "soon."

State Rep. Nate Schatzline,​ meanwhile, said, "Anything is possible in the future​." Fellow state Rep. Brian Byrd​ played down his own interests but doesn't appear to have said no either; the Fort Worth Star-Telegram writes he​ "said he isn’t looking at a bid for the congressional seat at this point."​ However, Tarrant County Judge Tim O'Hare, who is the county's top executive official, and Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker were both quick noes.

Granger, who founded an insurance agency, got her start in public life in the early 1980s when she joined the Fort Worth Zoning Commission. She first assumed elected office in 1989 when she won a seat on the City Council, a body whose nonpartisan nature kept her from having to publicly identify with a party. (Texas Democrats were still a force at the time, though not for much longer.)

That state of affairs continued two years later when she won a promotion to mayor, a similarly nonpartisan post. Longtime political observer Bud Kennedy would recount to the Daily Beast in 2013, "She was carefully centrist in the way she led the city."

That led both Democrats and Republicans to see Granger as a prize recruit in 1996, when Democratic Rep. Charlie Geren, a conservative who had been elected to succeed none other than former Democratic Speaker Jim Wright, decided to retire from a previous version of the 12th. Granger settled on the GOP, though, and she beat her nearest opponent 69-20 in her first-ever Republican primary.

In a sign of just how different things were three decades ago, Granger campaigned as a supporter of abortion rights. She had little trouble in the general election against Democrat Hugh Parmer, a former Fort Worth mayor who had badly lost a 1990 race to unseat Republican Sen. Phil Graham. Granger beat Parmer 58-41 even as, according to analyst Kiernan Park-Egan, Bill Clinton narrowly beat Republican Bob Dole by 46.3-45.5 in the 12th. (Independent Ross Perot, who hailed from neighboring Dallas, took 8%.)

Granger's win made her the second Republican woman to represent Texas in Congress after Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and the first to serve in the House; there would not be another until Beth Van Duyne won the neighboring 24th District in 2020. Granger, who is tied with Maine Sen. Susan Collins as the longest-serving Republican woman in congressional history, owed her longevity in part to the fact that she only faced one serious reelection challenge during her long career.

That expensive primary battle took place in 2020, when Putnam tried to portray Granger as insufficiently pro-Trump even though she had Trump's endorsement. Putnam, who had the Club for Growth on his side, also tried to tie the incumbent to long-running problems at an expensive local development project called Panther Island that used to be led by the congresswoman's son.

But Granger and her backers at the Congressional Leadership Fund fought back by reminding voters that she was Trump's candidate, and she defeated her opponent by 16 points ahead of another easy general election. While Putnam initially announced he'd seek a rematch the following cycle, his decision not to file left her Granger on a glide path to yet another term.

Granger became chair of the Appropriations Committee after her party retook the House in 2022. From that powerful perch, she was one of the most prominent Republicans to vote against making Jim Jordan speaker. She described that stance as "a vote of conscience," adding, "Intimidation and threats will not change my position." But the chairwoman, like the rest of her caucus, embraced far-right Rep. Mike Johnson a short time later, saying she'd work with him "to advance our conservative agenda."

Michigan Republican who got booted from the 2022 ballot launches Senate bid

Posted on by Jeff Singer

Former Detroit Police Chief James Craig confirmed Tuesday that he would seek the Republican nomination to succeed retiring Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a declaration that comes the year after he was ejected from the 2022 primary ballot for governor of Michigan over fraudulent signatures. "I'm not doing it for ego," said Craig, whose last campaign experience would have humbled almost anyone else.

Protestors disrupted his 2021 kickoff rally for his quest to take on Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and that was just the start of his troubles. Craig's campaign would experience several major shakeups, including the departure of two different campaign managers in less than four months, and it would also draw unfavorable press coverage for heavy spending.

The former chief also lost a high-profile endorsement from Rep. Jack Bergman, a northern Michigan Republican who griped that his former choice ignored his region "in favor of a self proclaimed Detroit-centric approach." Still, polls showed Craig well ahead in the primary as he sought to become the Wolverine State's first Black governor.

Everything changed in May, though, when election authorities disqualified Craig and four other contenders from the ballot after they fell victim to a huge fraudulent signature scandal and failed to turn in enough valid petitions. The former frontrunner decided to forge ahead with a write-in campaign to win the GOP nod, blustering, "I'm going to win." However, Craig instead became an afterthought even before far-right radio commentator Tudor Dixon emerged as the new frontrunner, and he ended up taking all of 2% of the vote.

Craig went on to endorse U.S. Taxpayers Party nominee Donna Brandenburg, who had also been ejected from the Republican primary, saying that Dixon's extreme opposition to abortion rights went too far even for him. (James himself was recorded the previous year responding in the affirmative when asked if he'd stop Democrats "from undoing the law that makes abortion illegal in Michigan.") Whitmer soon won 54-44, with Brandenburg in fourth with just 0.4%.

The former chief launched his new effort weeks after former Rep. Mike Rogers joined the nomination fight, and Craig has already worked to position himself as the Trumpiest candidate. The new contender published a pro-Trump op-ed last month in the far-right Daily Caller, and the GOP's supreme master responded by sharing it on social media.

Rogers, by contrast, has had a bumpier relationship with Trump. While the former congressman briefly served on Trump's 2016 transition team, he told the Washington Post last year that "Trump's time has passed." Rogers, who considered waging his own presidential bid, also said of the Jan. 6 riot, "There is never a time in American democracy when violence accomplishes what you want … It is giving up on our Constitution when you storm the Capitol to try to change an election."

But Rogers, whom multiple outlets say the NRSC recruited to run for the Senate, now seems to have realized that Trump's time very much has not passed for the primary voters who will be determining his fate next year. The former congressman echoed the far-right voices in his party last week in a video proclaiming, "[W]hat we are seeing right now is a politically motivated DOJ waging war against the leading Republican presidential candidate on behalf of President [Joe] Biden." "This is not the mike Rogers i knew," tweeted former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who was one of the 10 House Republicans who voted for impeachment after Jan. 6. "How did you fall so far mike?"

The GOP field also includes state Board of Education member Nikki Snyder, who struggled to raise money during the first half of the year, and it may swell still further. Former Rep. Peter Meijer, who lost renomination last year after voting for impeachment, formed an exploratory committee just before Labor Day. Wealthy businessman Perry Johnson, who got thrown off the 2022 gubernatorial ballot along with James, also said last week he was considering abandoning his doomed presidential bid to run for the Senate; the Detroit News also reported in August that another rich guy, 2018 primary loser Sandy Pensler, is thinking about another try, and the paper wrote Tuesday that he was still mulling it over.

On the Democratic side, Rep. Elissa Slotkin is the frontrunner in a field that includes actor Hill Harper, who launched his campaign in early July. Observers are waiting to learn if Harper or any of the other contenders raised a credible amount of money during the third quarter of the year or if Slotkin ended September as the only Democrat with enough money to run a serious operation.

Click here to stop Republicans from snatching the Senate!

Morning Digest: Kevin McCarthy has two months to decide if he’ll seek reelection to the House

Posted on by Daily Kos Elections

The Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from the Daily Kos Elections team.

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Leading Off

● CA-20: Kevin McCarthy's colleagues ousted him as speaker of the House on Tuesday, and if you're like us you have just one question: What's next for California's 20th District?

Ok, even the most hardcore among us may have a few other things on our minds right now, but California's early filing deadline means that McCarthy will have only a little more than two months to decide if he wants to seek a 10th term to the chamber where he was just humiliated. The congressman himself did nothing to dispel speculation that he might retire or resign when he responded to a question about whether he’d stay in office by answering, “I’ll look at that.” 

Candidates have until Dec. 8 to turn in paperwork if they want to compete in the Golden State's March 5 top-two primary, and, because hopefuls can pay a fee rather than submit signatures, major contenders can decide whether they'll run on the final day of qualifying. The state automatically extends the deadline to five days in contests where the incumbent chooses not to file for reelection, so the field might only take shape late if McCarthy doesn't end up running.

The current version of the 20th District, which includes parts of the Bakersfield and Fresno areas, supported Donald Trump 61-36, which makes this the most conservative of any of California's 52 congressional districts. The GOP likewise has a large bench of prospective candidates, and, because this area is so red, it's possible that two Republicans could advance to the general election. McCarthy has always easily prevailed in this area going back to his initial election in 2006, and it remains to be seen if any strong opponents would take him on even in his diminished state.

3Q Fundraising

  • OH-Sen: Bernie Moreno (R): $1 million raised, additional $3 million self-funded, $5 million cash on hand
  • CA-49: Margarita Wilkinson (R): $1 million raised (campaign did not respond to inquiry if this includes self-funding)
  • TX-18: Isaiah Martin (D): $307,000 raised (in 25 days)
  • TX-32: Julie Johnson (D): $300,000 raised

Senate

● CA-Sen: Democratic Sen. Laphonza Butler was sworn in Tuesday to replace the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein, but she says she's unsure if she wants to enter the top-two primary for a full six-year term. "I have no idea. I genuinely don't know," she told the Los Angeles Times the previous day.

California's filing deadline is Dec. 8, but Inside Elections' Jacob Rubashkin notes that another important date will pass next week. Democratic candidates have until Oct. 13 to say that they want to compete for the party endorsement at the November convention, and no major candidate will want to pass up the opportunity to be listed by name in a special section of the voter guide that each county sends to all voters. As we've written before, this is a bit like having someone else pay for a mailer to every voter in the state, a real boon in an expensive contest like this one.

Meanwhile, Data Viewpoint finished a poll just before Butler's appointment was announced Sunday that did not include her as an option. It found Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff and Katie Porter both advancing past the top-two primary with 19% each as Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee and Republican Eric Early took 6% apiece.

● FL-Sen: The Messenger's Marc Caputo reports that businessman Stanley Campbell is interested in seeking the Democratic nomination to take on GOP incumbent Rick Scott even though former Rep. Debbie Mucarsel Powell has emerged as the party's frontrunner. Campbell, who is the brother of 2 Live Crew's Luther Campbell, has not said anything publicly, though he quietly filed FEC paperwork last week.

Caputo writes that Campbell served in the Navy and went on to form multiple companies, including an artificial intelligence firm whose work helped lead to the 2005 apprehension of serial killer Dennis Rader. Campbell went on to become one of the few African Americans to own a golf course in 2021 when he purchased Martin Downs Golf Club in southeastern Florida's Treasure Coast region.

● MI-Sen: Former Detroit Police Chief James Craig confirmed Tuesday that he would seek the Republican nomination to succeed retiring Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a declaration that comes the year after he was ejected from the 2022 primary ballot for governor of Michigan over fraudulent signatures. "I'm not doing it for ego," said Craig, whose last campaign experience would have humbled almost anyone else.

Protestors disrupted his 2021 kickoff rally for his quest to take on Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and that was just the start of his troubles. Craig's campaign would experience several major shakeups, including the departure of two different campaign managers in less than four months, and it would also draw unfavorable press coverage for heavy spending.

The former chief also lost a high-profile endorsement from Rep. Jack Bergman, a northern Michigan Republican who griped that his former choice ignored his region "in favor of a self proclaimed Detroit-centric approach." Still, polls showed Craig well ahead in the primary as he sought to become the Wolverine State's first Black governor.

Everything changed in May, though, when election authorities disqualified Craig and four other contenders from the ballot after they fell victim to a huge fraudulent signature scandal and failed to turn in enough valid petitions. The former frontrunner decided to forge ahead with a write-in campaign to win the GOP nod, blustering, "I'm going to win." However, Craig instead became an afterthought even before far-right radio commentator Tudor Dixon emerged as the new frontrunner, and he ended up taking all of 2% of the vote.

Craig went on to endorse U.S. Taxpayers Party nominee Donna Brandenburg, who had also been ejected from the Republican primary, saying that Dixon's extreme opposition to abortion rights went too far even for him. (James himself was recorded the previous year responding in the affirmative when asked if he'd stop Democrats "from undoing the law that makes abortion illegal in Michigan.") Whitmer soon won 54-44, with Brandenburg in fourth with just 0.4%.

The former chief launched his new effort weeks after former Rep. Mike Rogers joined the nomination fight, and Craig has already worked to position himself as the Trumpiest candidate. The new contender published a pro-Trump op-ed last month in the far-right Daily Caller, and the GOP's supreme master responded by sharing it on social media.

Rogers, by contrast, has had a bumpier relationship with Trump. While the former congressman briefly served on Trump's 2016 transition team, he told the Washington Post last year that "Trump's time has passed." Rogers, who considered waging his own presidential bid, also said of the Jan. 6 riot, "There is never a time in American democracy when violence accomplishes what you want … It is giving up on our Constitution when you storm the Capitol to try to change an election."

But Rogers, whom multiple outlets say the NRSC recruited to run for the Senate, now seems to have realized that Trump's time very much has not passed for the primary voters who will be determining his fate next year. The former congressman echoed the far-right voices in his party last week in a video proclaiming, "[W]hat we are seeing right now is a politically motivated DOJ waging war against the leading Republican presidential candidate on behalf of President [Joe] Biden." "This is not the mike Rogers i knew," tweeted former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who was one of the 10 House Republicans who voted for impeachment after Jan. 6. "How did you fall so far mike?"

The GOP field also includes state Board of Education member Nikki Snyder, who struggled to raise money during the first half of the year, and it may swell still further. Former Rep. Peter Meijer, who lost renomination last year after voting for impeachment, formed an exploratory committee just before Labor Day. Wealthy businessman Perry Johnson, who got thrown off the 2022 gubernatorial ballot along with James, also said last week he was considering abandoning his doomed presidential bid to run for the Senate; the Detroit News also reported in August that another rich guy, 2018 primary loser Sandy Pensler, is thinking about another try, and the paper wrote Tuesday that he was still mulling it over.

On the Democratic side, Rep. Elissa Slotkin is the frontrunner in a field that includes actor Hill Harper, who launched his campaign in early July. Observers are waiting to learn if Harper or any of the other contenders raised a credible amount of money during the third quarter of the year or if Slotkin ended September as the only Democrat with enough money to run a serious operation.

● UT-Sen: Republican Rep. John Curtis declared that he'd remain in the House rather than run for the Senate in a Deseret News op-ed that was published days after the congressman sounded very likely to seek a promotion. KSL NewsRadio asked him Thursday to rate his likelihood on a scale of one to 10, to which Curtis responded, "It's up there in the nine-plus region."

House

● AL-02: Democratic state Rep. Juandalynn Givan told CBS 42 on Monday that she'd decide within the next two weeks if she'd run for the new 2nd District.

● IL-04: Chicago Alderman Raymond Lopez, who the Chicago Sun-Times calls "one of the police union's staunchest City Council supporters," announced Tuesday that he'd challenge Rep. Chuy Garcia in the March Democratic primary for this safely blue constituency. Lopez, who the paper adds has a history of "anemic fundraising," previously entered the 2018 race for a previous version of this seat and this year's contest for mayor of Chicago, but he dropped out well before each primary.

Lopez ended up backing wealthy perennial candidate Willie Wilson for mayor over Garcia, incumbent Lori Lightfoot, Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson, and several other contenders. Neither Garcia nor Lightfoot ended up advancing past the nonpartisan primary, though, and Lopez supported former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas in the general election against Johnson. Garcia, for his part, endorsed fellow progressive Johnson, who went on to pull off a tight win.

● PA-08: Businessman Rob Bresnahan, a Republican who Politico says is capable of self-funding, has filed FEC paperwork for a bid against Democratic Rep. Matt Cartwright.

● WI-03: State Rep. Katrina Shankland declared Tuesday that she was joining the Democratic primary to face GOP Rep. Derrick Van Orden, who made national news in July when he reportedly screamed at teenage Senate pages.

Shankland, who was first elected to the legislature in 2012, won reelection in 2020 56-44 as Joe Biden was taking her seat by a smaller 53-45, and she touted herself as a candidate with "a proven track record of not only winning elections but outperforming the top of the ticket in those elections." Van Orden's southwestern Wisconsin constituency is significantly redder turf, though, as Donald Trump took it 51-47.

Shankland joins a nomination contest that includes businesswoman Rebecca Cooke and former La Crosse County Board chair Tara Johnson. Cooke, who took second in last year's primary, announced Tuesday that she'd raised $400,000 during the opening quarter of her new effort.

Legislatures

● NH State House: State Rep. Maria Perez announced Monday she was leaving the Democratic Party to become an independent, a move that once again changes the math ahead of a series of upcoming special elections for this closely divided chamber.

Republicans currently hold a 198-196 edge in a 400-member body that includes Perez and two other nonaligned members. The final three seats are vacant, but while Joe Biden carried two of them by double digits, the final one favored Donald Trump 53-45: Voters go to the polls Nov. 7 to fill the bluest of these three constituencies, while the other two specials have not yet been scheduled. However, given how much volatility we've seen in the state House this year, it's anyone's guess what the membership rolls will look like by the time all three of these seats are occupied.

Mayors and County Leaders

● Baltimore, MD Mayor: Goucher College's new poll with The Baltimore Banner shows former Mayor Sheila Dixon beating incumbent Brandon Scott 39-27 in the first survey we've seen of the May Democratic primary, with another 23% opting for "some other candidate." That latter group said they preferred Scott over his rival 36-33, though that would be far from enough to make up the deficit. The school also finds Dixon, who resigned in 2010 after she was convicted of stealing gift cards that were supposed to help needy families, with a narrow 47-45 favorable rating, which is far better than the 37-53 score that respondents give Scott.

Prosecutors and Sheriffs

● Maricopa County, AZ Sheriff: Democratic Sheriff Paul Penzone announced Monday that, not only would he not run again in 2024, he would resign in January as the top lawman in America's fourth-largest county. Penzone implied he was quitting because another opportunity had presented itself, saying he wanted to avoid "distractions" during what would have been his final year in office.

State law requires the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to select another Democrat to succeed Penzone even though Republicans enjoy a 4-1 majority on the body. Supervisor Steve Gallardo, who is the only Democrat, tells the Arizona Republic he wants the new sheriff to be an "effective candidate" for next year's race.

Penzone first ran for this post in 2012 against Republican incumbent Joe Arpaio, who had spent decades as one of America's most venal and abusive law enforcement officials, but he lost 51-45. Their rematch four years later went very differently, though, and the department's racial profiling policies against Latinos finally caught up to the sheriff.

That October, just a month before his re-election campaign, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that it would charge Arpaio with criminal contempt of court for violating a judge's orders to curtail his department's unconstitutional profiling practices. Penzone ended up winning by a lopsided 56-44 even as Donald Trump, who would pardon Arpaio soon after the election, carried the county 48-45.

Penzone went on to secure reelection by that same 56-44 spread against Jerry Sheridan, a former Arpaio chief deputy who had just beaten his old boss in the primary, but the department still has a long way to go to excise Arpaio's legacy. Raul Piña, who serves on the court-appointed Community Advisory Board, told the Republic on Monday that "institutional racism in the Sheriff's Office" persists. Piña, while acknowledging that Penzone had made much-needed changes, said of the incumbent's legacy, "[T]here will always be an asterisk … because the racial profiling continued, and you can't run away from that."

Democratic elected officials were more complimentary, with Secretary of State Adrian Fontes saying, "Even on the hardest days when there were very serious threats being hurled at me and my staff, I always felt safe knowing Paul and his team were always watching out for us."

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Morning Digest: GOP gerrymanders Ohio’s legislature again, but reform could be on the way

Posted on by Daily Kos Elections

The Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from the Daily Kos Elections team.

Subscribe to The Downballot, our weekly podcast

Embedded Content

Leading Off

● OH Redistricting: In a dismaying turn of events on Tuesday, both Democratic members of Ohio's bipartisan redistricting commission sided with their five Republican counterparts to approve new legislative gerrymanders that would likely lock in the GOP's three-fifths supermajorities just like the maps they were replacing. Despite winning just 53-45 statewide in 2020, Donald Trump would have carried a 24-9 majority of state Senate districts and a 63-36 majority of state House districts according to Dave's Redistricting App.

New maps were required for 2024 because the state Supreme Court had struck down the GOP's five prior sets of maps in 2022 for violating an Ohio constitutional amendment banning partisan gerrymandering. However, that flawed amendment didn't let the court draw its own maps after striking down illegal districts, so the GOP successfully ran out the clock for 2022 and was able to use a set of the unconstitutional maps last year thanks to a ruling by federal judges appointed by Donald Trump.

The state Supreme Court had held that the proportion of districts favoring each party must reflect the 54-46 advantage that Republicans had in statewide elections over the previous decade, but it's unlikely that the court will reject this sixth set of maps for benefiting Republicans well beyond that range. That's because those 2022 rulings saw Republican Chief Justice Maureen O'Connor side with the court's three Democrats to reject the gerrymanders, but age limits required O'Connor to retire last year, enabling hard-line Republicans to solidify a 4-3 GOP majority in November's elections.

Due to the state court's rightward lurch, new Republican gerrymanders for 2024 were practically guaranteed. State Senate Minority Leader Nickie Antonio and state House Minority Leader Allison Russo, who are the commission's two Democratic members, defended their "yes" votes by claiming the GOP would have passed even worse gerrymanders if they hadn't compromised, and that they still viewed the end results as unfair.

However, the GOP's draft proposals from last week were not drastically worse for Democrats than the maps Antonio and Russo approved, and it appeared that the compromise maps sacrificed partisan fairness for protecting Democratic incumbents. By providing them with bipartisan support, the Democratic commissioners likely ensured that the maps would remain valid for the rest of this decade, since maps passed on a party-line basis would only be valid for four years. Furthermore, this bogus bipartisanship could undermine the support for passing real redistricting reform in the future.

Ohio found itself in this situation because of two amendments that the Republican-dominated legislature put on the ballot and were subsequently approved by voters last decade. While these amendments purported to ban partisan gerrymandering and marginally improved upon the status quo, we noted at the time that they were fundamentally flawed and appeared designed to thwart efforts to pass truly fair reforms at the ballot box, like those passed by Michigan voters in 2018. The repeated rounds of unconstitutional maps following the 2020 census made these flaws readily apparent.

While Ohio will again be stuck with GOP gerrymanders in 2024, there is a potential way forward for voters. O'Connor, the former chief justice, is leading an effort with other good-government advocates to use a ballot initiative for November 2024 that would establish an independent redistricting commission to draw new legislative and congressional maps beginning with the 2026 elections, an initiative we previously explored in detail here.

Unlike previous flawed reforms, this proposal would strip elected officials of their control over the process, handing it to a citizens' commission, and set clearer standards for partisan fairness. Supporters are in the process of getting GOP officials to sign off on their ballot summary and the validity of their proposal before they can begin gathering voter signatures to get onto the November 2024 ballot.

The Downballot

● The Virginia House flipped to Democrats in 2019 and back to Republicans in 2021. Can Democrats win the three seats they need to regain control of the chamber? Blue Virginia's Lowell Feld joins us to run through the key races in both the Virginia Senate and House and how Democrats can win both chambers this November. We also look to 2024 and discuss some key announcements in competitive Virginia Congressional races.

Host David Beard and guest host Joe Sudbay also cover the huge news out of New Jersey, where Sen. Bob Menendez has been indicted (again) and this time most state and national Democrats are not standing by him. We also discuss the long-awaited entrance of hedge fund CEO Dave McCormick into the Pennsylvania Senate race for Republicans; the Supreme Court rejecting Alabama's long shot attempt to prevent a new Congressional map; and the gerrymandered state legislative maps Ohioans will be using for at least one cycle.

Subscribe to "The Downballot" on Apple Podcasts to make sure you never miss a show—new episodes every Thursday! You'll find a transcript of this week's episode right here by noon Eastern time.

Senate

● CA-Sen: The Public Policy Institute of California's new survey shows Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff and Katie Porter advancing out of the March top-two primary, which is the same outcome that UC Berkeley found in its most recent poll. PPIC shows Schiff in first with 20% as Porter edges out a third Democratic representative, Barbara Lee, 15-8.

● MI-Sen: Businessman Perry Johnson, who has failed to qualify for either GOP presidential debate despite spending millions of his own money, tells NBC he may run for the Senate after all. Johnson, whose primary bid for governor ended last year after he fell victim to a fraudulent petition signature scandal, insists, "I've only had, what, somewhere between 100 to 150 calls [to be] running for Senate."

● NJ-Sen: Rep. Donald Norcross didn't rule out a Democratic primary challenge to indicted incumbent Bob Menendez on Tuesday, telling the New Jersey Globe, "There are a number of things that are taking place right now in the state of New Jersey that are of great concern to everyone. We'll take it one day at a time." Norcross is the brother of George Norcross, a longtime party power player who has watched his influence diminish in recent years.

The Star-Ledger's Tom Moran also writes that former Rep. Tom Malinowski is considering, though there's no word from him. Malinowski lost a tight 2022 reelection contest against Republican Tom Kean Jr., and the Democrat announced earlier this year that he wouldn't try to regain his old seat.

● UT-Sen: Utah state House Speaker Brad Wilson on Wednesday launched his long-anticipated campaign for the Senate seat held by his fellow Republican, retiring incumbent Mitt Romney, and he entered the primary as the frontrunner. However, he got a reminder that the nomination battle remains unsettled hours before his kickoff when Rep. John Curtis told the Deseret News he was “very seriously” considering joining the race.

Wilson's exploratory committee finished June with $2.1 million in the bank thanks to a combination of fundraising and self-funding, and it remains to be seen if any of his intra-party foes will have the resources to put up a serious fight. However, as we've noted before, Wilson may not be quite right-wing enough to satisfy his party's base who would prefer someone in the mold of the Beehive State's other senator, Mike Lee. Political scientist Damon Cann told the Associated Press, "I think most people are expecting Brad Wilson would govern somewhat more conservatively. I think he would be toward the political center from where Mike Lee’s at but I think he would be more conservative than Mitt Romney has been."

Wilson made sure to emphasize his hardline credentials ahead of his launch: His campaign rolled out endorsements in August from fellow legislators that featured testimonials calling him a "conservative champion" and someone who worked to "advance pro-life legislation." (Altogether, three-quarters of House Republicans and two-thirds of the Senate caucus backed him.) However, while Wilson has indeed helped pass anti-abortion legislation, the AP also noted that he helped stop the legislature from formally rebuking none other than Romney in 2020 for his vote to convict Donald Trump during his first impeachment trial.

Wilson joins a contest that includes two mayors, Riverton's Trent Staggs and Roosevelt's Rod Bird. Staggs launched his campaign in late May but raised little during his first month, while Bird pledged to self-fund $1 million when he entered the race last week. Conservative activist Carolyn Phippen is also talking about running, and Curtis and other Republicans could end up campaigning to represent this dark red state.

House

● AL-02: John Sharp of AL.com takes a look at the many Democrats who could run for the 2nd District now that the U.S. Supreme Court has paved the way for a lower court to adopt a new map that creates a second district where Black voters could elect their preferred candidate. The exact boundaries of the new 2nd are not yet known, though judges next month will consider three different maps that each link Montgomery and Mobile.

The four state legislators who tell Sharp they're thinking about getting in are state Sens. Vivian Figures and Merika Coleman and state Reps. Napoleon Bracy and Juandalynn Givan. Figures, who was the 2008 nominee against then-Sen. Jeff Sessions, hails from Mobile, while Bracy is from the nearby suburb of Prichard. Coleman and Givan both represent Birmingham, which would not be located in the 2nd under any of the trio of maps advanced by the court-appointed expert.

Sharp also mentions two Montgomery-based politicians, state Sen. Kirk Hatcher and Mayor Steven Reed, as possibilities, though neither of them commented for his article. Reed, though, didn't rule out a House bid in July during his reelection campaign, saying instead, "I don't know what I'm going to do. For one, I've got to win first." He did indeed win by a convincing 57-39 the next month.

Most Republicans are treating this seat like an automatic Democratic flip, but former state Sen. Dick Brewbaker argues that he could run and win it for his party. Brewbaker, who unlike all the aforementioned Democrats is white, predicts to Sharp that if the general election comes down to "straight-up racial polarization ... the Republicans can potentially hang onto the seat."

● AL-07: Bobby Singleton, who serves as minority leader in the Alabama state Senate, announced Tuesday that he was forming an exploratory committee for a potential Democratic primary bid against Rep. Terri Sewell in the safely blue 7th District. A federal court will choose a new congressional map next month after blocking two consecutive maps enacted by GOP lawmakers for violating the Voting Rights Act, but there's little question that this will remain a majority-Black and heavily Democratic district covering parts of both the Black Belt and the Birmingham region.

Singleton, who was first elected in 2002 to represent part of the Black Belt in the legislature, argued to AL.com that Sewell hasn't done a good job serving his area. He instead argued that he could effectively represent the entire district, including Birmingham's Jefferson County. The congresswoman, who grew up in Selma in the Black Belt and resides in Birmingham, has not faced any serious primary opposition since she first won an open seat in 2010.

As one of multiple sets of plaintiffs in the litigation against the GOP's 2021 gerrymander, Singleton had tried to redraw the 7th District in a way that plenty of his fellow Democrats were unhappy with. The minority leader proposed a new map that split relatively few counties but didn't contain a single majority-Black seat: Instead African American residents would form a tiny 46.8-46.6 plurality in his 7th, while the other six seats would remain majority white.

Singleton's side would argue that the state was wrong to continue to divide Jefferson County's predominantly Black and white areas, claiming that the best solution was to unite the county in one district. After the courts blocked the GOP's 2023 map earlier this month, Singleton proposed another plan where all of Jefferson County and a small part of neighboring Shelby County would be based in the 6th, which is currently represented by GOP Rep. Gary Palmer, while Sewell's 7th would contain most of the Black Belt by adding all of the Montgomery area.

According to Dave's Redistricting App, Joe Biden would have carried both the 6th and the 7th under Singleton's latest plan. However, because several downballot Republicans over the past decade won or only narrowly lost the 6th, the GOP would have had a good chance to maintain control of six of the seven seats.

A different set of litigants known as the Milligan plaintiffs proposed a new map where Black voters would be a majority in two districts, but Singleton's side continued to promote their boundaries as the best solution. Several fellow Democrats were unconvinced, with state House Minority Leader Chris England reposting a thread from journalist Kareem Crayton declaring, "There are more problems with this case than I can discuss here." Sewell's team also filed a brief excoriating the proposed map.

A court-appointed expert tasked with assisting the judges proposed three maps on Monday for their consideration that largely mirrored the Milligan plaintiffs' proposal. The lower court will likely adopt one of them or something similar early next month.

While Singleton isn't getting the map he wants, he expressed interest Tuesday in taking on Sewell anyway. "I'm not running in the new district," he told Alabama Daily News Tuesday, "I'm running in Congresswoman Sewell's, that's what I want, I want the big fish." In a separate interview that day with AL.com, though, he acknowledged he hadn't actually decided, saying, "If the exploratory committee comes back with something positive, we'll be in it. If not, we wish [Sewell] good luck."

The state's filing deadline is set for Nov. 10 and, because Alabama's legislative seats are only up in midterm years, Singleton would not have to risk his current post if he sought a promotion.

● MT-01: EMILY's List on Wednesday endorsed 2022 Democratic nominee Monica Tranel, who faces no serious intra-party opposition as she seeks a rematch against GOP Rep. Ryan Zinke.

● NH-01: Hollie Noveletsky, who runs a steel fabricator business, has filed FEC paperwork for a potential bid against Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas. Noveletsky would join a GOP nomination contest that includes former Executive Councilor Russell Prescott, who took fourth place in the 2022 primary.

● NJ-07: Former state Sen. Ray Lesniak said this week that he would not enter the Democratic primary to take on GOP Rep. Tom Kean Jr. The New Jersey Globe also reports that physician Tina Shah, who served in the Obama and Biden administrations, has decided not to run despite talking to party leaders about a potential bid; David Wildstein writes that one unnamed "party bigwig said at one point Shah said she was in, only to move back to the maybe list a week later."

● TX-28: Jose Sanz, who previously served as district director for Democratic incumbent Henry Cuellar, announced Wednesday that he'd challenge his old boss as a Republican. Sanz is the first notable Republican to launch a bid against Cuellar, who has long been one of the most conservative members of the Democratic caucus, but it remains to be seen if the GOP will seriously target him. Joe Biden won this constituency, which includes Laredo and the eastern San Antonio suburbs, 53-46 two years before Cuellar turned back a well-funded Republican foe 57-43.

It's also unclear if the congressman will be in for another competitive primary challenge. Attorney Jessica Cisneros hasn't ruled out taking him on again after narrowly losing in 2020 and 2022, and there's still a while to go before the Dec. 11 filing deadline.

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Morning Digest: Mitt Romney, facing a difficult path to reelection, won’t run for second term

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Leading Off

● UT-Sen: Republican Sen. Mitt Romney announced on Wednesday that he would not run for reelection next year, bringing to an end a three-decade political career that featured several bids for office but only two victories years apart. Romney's decision creates a wide-open race to succeed him in a deeply conservative state dominated by Republicans but one where critics of Donald Trump, including Romney himself, retain a measure of support.

Romney was born in Detroit in the years immediately after World War II and, as a 15-year-old in 1962, watched his father win election as governor of Michigan. While George Romney would serve three two-year terms and wage an ill-fated bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 1968, Mitt, his youngest son, did not get involved in politics until the early 1990s—and did so in a different state.

The younger Romney had moved to Massachusetts in 1972 to pursue a joint JD/MBA program at Harvard and went on to make his name in the business world, co-founding the private equity firm Bain Capital in 1984. A decade later, he sought to challenge veteran Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy, hoping that a favorable political climate for Republicans would help him oust the "liberal lion" of the Senate. But despite polls that showed a tight race, Kennedy prevailed by a comfortable 58-41 margin, though it would be the closest contest of his long career.

Romney immediately returned to Bain and was later credited with turning around the financially trouble committee responsible for running the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. Just weeks after the closing ceremonies, though, Romney announced a campaign for governor after acting Gov. Jane Swift, a fellow Republican, dropped her bid for a full term.

While Massachusetts had for many decades seldom sent Republicans to Congress, it had a long tradition of electing them to the governorship; when Romney sought the post, the last time a Democrat had won it was in 1986, when Michael Dukakis secured his third and final term. As he had in his race against Kennedy, Romney campaigned as a moderate and claimed to support abortion rights. (Kennedy had jeered that Romney was not pro-choice but "multiple-choice.") Thanks in part to a large financial advantage—the wealthy Romney self-funded $6 million, a record at the time—he defeated his Democratic opponent, state Treasurer Shannon O'Brien.

The victory was Romney's first, and it also marked the fourth straight gubernatorial win for Massachusetts Republicans. But the streak wouldn't last long for Romney: With more than a year left in his term, he announced he would not seek reelection. The move came ahead of a widely expected campaign for president, which he'd telegraphed by shifting to the right on key issues like abortion.

Romney's metamorphosis left many conservatives unconvinced, however, and he lost the nomination to John McCain, who in turn was beaten by Barack Obama. Four years later, though, true believers failed to rally around a strong alternative and Romney captured the GOP nod, but he, too, lost to Obama. (Romney was reportedly "shellshocked" by the loss despite the incumbent's consistent polling leads.)

Romney later relocated to Utah, where he'd earned his undergraduate degree at Brigham Young and had long maintained a vacation home. But despite declaring he'd been branded a "loser for life" in a documentary about his attempts to win the presidency, he made one last foray into the political arena. Following Sen. Orrin Hatch's retirement, Romney easily won both the GOP primary and general election to succeed him in 2018, making him the first person in 150 years—and just the second ever, after the legendary Sam Houston—to serve as governor and senator in two different states.

While Romney remained a traditional conservative, his Senate tenure was marked by his criticism of Trump. (Hard as it may be to believe now, Trump actually endorsed Romney's initial campaign for Senate.) He made history in 2020 when he became the first senator to vote in favor of convicting a president from his own party at an impeachment trial during Trump's first impeachment, then voted (along with a handful of other Republicans) to convict him again at his second impeachment the next year.

The hatred his apostasies engendered from the MAGA brigades all but ensured he'd face a difficult fight to win renomination had he sought another term. An August poll showed him taking just 44% in a hypothetical primary matchup, a soft showing for an incumbent. It turned out that his 2018 victory would not only be just his second ever but also his last.

In remarks on Wednesday announcing his departure, Romney noted that he'd be in his mid-80s at the end of a second Senate term and said that "it's time for a new generation of leaders." That new generation likely won't look much like the outgoing senator, though it's possible that a split among extremists could see the GOP nominate a relative pragmatist: In the recent special election primary for Utah's 2nd Congressional District, former state Rep. Becky Edwards took a third of the vote despite saying she'd voted for Joe Biden and opposed the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

At the moment, though, the only Republican in the race is Trent Staggs, mayor of the small community of Riverton. Other candidates, however, are already hovering in the wings, so we're likely to see a crowded primary in 2024.

The Downballot

● What do you do if you're associated with one of the biggest election fraud scandals in recent memory? If you're Republican Mark Harris, you try running for office again! On this week's episode of "The Downballot," we revisit the absolutely wild story of Harris' 2018 campaign for Congress, when one of his consultants orchestrated a conspiracy to illegally collect blank absentee ballots from voters and then had his team fill them out before "casting" them. Bipartisan officials wound up tossing the results of this almost-stolen election, but now Harris is back with a new bid for the House—and he won't shut up about his last race, even blaming Democrats for the debacle.

Co-hosts David Nir and David Beard also discuss a late entrant into the race for North Carolina governor; why Republicans are struggling to recruit in Ohio now that they can't gerrymander their congressional map again; how a Freedom Caucus member has bizarrely emerged as a voice of sanity within the GOP—and why it'll likely doom him; Mitt Romney's retirement in Utah; and proposed maps that our Daily Kos Elections colleague Stephen Wolf submitted to the federal court in Alabama that's about to impose new congressional districts.

Subscribe to "The Downballot" on Apple Podcasts to make sure you never miss a show—new episodes every Thursday! You'll find a transcript of this week's episode right here by noon Eastern time.

Senate

● MI-Sen: Wealthy businessman John Tuttle, who's the vice chair of the New York Stock Exchange, has declared that he won't run for the GOP nomination next year. Tuttle's announcement leaves former Rep. Mike Rogers as the only major candidate in the primary so far, though some other big GOP names are still considering the open seat contest.

● WI-Sen: Trempealeau County Board Supervisor Stacey Klein has filed paperwork to run as a Republican and said she would officially kick off her campaign on Saturday. Klein, who first won her board seat in April 2022, hails from a county that is home to less than 1% of Wisconsin's population, but her entry nonetheless makes her the most prominent GOP candidate so far in a longtime swing state where Republicans have struggled to land a major candidate to take on Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin.

Governors

● DE-Gov: Term-limited Gov. John Carney has endorsed Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long just one day after his fellow Democrat announced she was running to succeed him next year. Both Democrats are currently serving their second terms (governors and lieutenant governors are elected separately in Delaware), and Hall-Long faces a primary against New Castle County Executive Matt Meyer, whose county contains 58% of the state's population.

● IN-Gov: The far-right Club for Growth has endorsed Republican Sen. Mike Braun in his primary to succeed term-limited Gov. Eric Holcomb. Braun, who previously won the Club's endorsement during his competitive initial primary for Senate in 2018, faces a crowded GOP field for governor that includes Lt. Gov. Susanne Crouch, former state Commerce Secretary Brad Chambers, former Indiana Economic Development Corporation president Eric Doden, and former state Attorney General Curtis Hill.

House

● AR-03: Republican Rep. Steve Womack announced that he'll seek another term representing his safely red seat in northwestern Arkansas, which he first won in 2010. Although Womack himself is solidly conservative, he had nonetheless recognized Joe Biden's 2020 victory and had previously told the Washington Post that he had been considering retirement due to dissatisfaction with GOP leadership caving to far-right hardliners, though he's never had any trouble winning renomination before.

● OH-13: Former state GOP chairwoman Jane Timken, who unsuccessfully competed in her party's 2022 primary for Senate, announced Wednesday that she wouldn't run for the 13th District next year. Timken's decision comes just a week after the state Supreme Court granted a request by plaintiffs to dismiss their legal challenges against the GOP's current gerrymander, which ensured that Republicans won't get a chance to draw an even more extreme map for 2024 that could have targeted freshman Democratic Rep. Emilia Sykes in this 51-48 Biden seat in Akron.

Ballot Measures

● OH Ballot: Ohioans United for Reproductive Rights, which is supporting November's ballot initiative that would enshrine reproductive rights in the state constitution, has launched their first TV ad buy for $687,000 over the next week. The new spot argues that the government shouldn't be making difficult reproductive healthcare choices for Ohioans and that voting yes on Issue 1 would "end Ohio's extreme abortion ban," which has "no exceptions for rape or incest." It also emphasizes that the amendment would protect access to birth control and emergency care for miscarriages.

Legislatures

● NY State Assembly: Democrat Sam Berger won Tuesday's special election to fill a Democratic-held seat in Queens by a 55-45 spread against Republican David Hirsch. This district contains large Asian American and Orthodox Jewish populations, two demographics that Democrats have lost some ground with in recent years in New York City, and some had feared that Republican Lee Zeldin's 56-44 win over Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul here last year was a warning sign of things to come.

However, Berger enjoyed a large fundraising advantage and nearly matched Joe Biden's 56-43 victory in the district. Assembly Democrats will retain a 102-48 supermajority once he's sworn in, which will make the 25-year-older Berger the chamber's youngest member.

Morning Digest: Check out our preview of special elections in Utah and Rhode Island

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The Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from the Daily Kos Elections team.

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The Daily Kos Elections team will be taking Friday off for the Labor Day weekend. The Live Digest will be back on Tuesday, and the Morning Digest will return on Wednesday. Have a great holiday!

Leading Off

● Primary Night: Tuesday is primary night for two vacant House seats on opposite ends of the country: Rhode Island's 1st District, which Democrat David Cicilline departed at the end of May, and Utah's 2nd District, where Republican Chris Stewart remains in office but triggered a special election by notifying Gov. Spencer Cox in June that he would "irrevocably resign" effective the evening of Sept. 15.

Given the respective lean of each district—Joe Biden took Rhode Island's 1st 64-35, while Donald Trump carried Utah's 2nd 57-40—the primaries will likely be dispositive in both cases. It'll still be a little while, though, before either state sends a new member to Congress: The general election in Rhode Island will take place on Nov. 7, while Utah's is set for Nov. 21. Below, we preview both contests.

● RI-01: A total of 12 Democrats are on the ballot to replace Cicilline, though one of them, businessman Don Carlson, dropped out over the weekend amid a scandal.

The main contenders for this dark blue constituency are former Biden administration official Gabe Amo, state Sen. Sandra Cano, Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos, and former state Rep. Aaron Regunberg. Also running are Navy veteran Walter Berbrick, state Rep. Stephen Casey, Providence City Councilman John Goncalves, and state Sen. Ana Quezada.

Amo, Cano, Goncalves, Matos, and Quezada would each have the chance to make history as the first person of color to represent the Ocean State in Congress.

The only poll we've seen in the last month was a mid-August internal for Amo that showed Regunberg leading him 28-19 as Matos and Cano took 11% each. The survey, which found Carlson taking 8%, did not ask about the rest of the field by name and instead found 8% opting for "another candidate not mentioned here." However, there are further indications that Regunberg, who touts endorsements from prominent national progressives like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, is the frontrunner going into Tuesday.

Regunberg, who is the nephew of Illinois Rep. Brad Schneider, was on the receiving end of more attacks than any of his opponents at Tuesday's debate. A group called Committee for a Better Rhode Island followed up days later by making Regunberg its target in the first negative TV ad of the entire race, though WPRI says it's only putting $81,000 behind its offensive. The spot attacks the candidate over his May declaration that he would have voted against Biden's debt ceiling deal with Speaker Kevin McCarthy; Regunberg said at Tuesday's debate that he'd have supported the agreement if he'd been the decisive vote.

Amo, for his part, picked up an endorsement Thursday from former Rep. Patrick Kennedy, who represented prior versions of this seat from 1995 to 2011 but has since moved out of the state. Kennedy, who is the son of the late Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy, also appeared in a commercial for Amo and touted his work in the Biden administration.

Matos, meanwhile, looked like the frontrunner until July, when multiple local election boards asked the police to probe allegations that her campaign had turned in forged signatures in order to get on the ballot. State election authorities have reaffirmed that the lieutenant governor submitted a sufficient number of valid petitions, but the state attorney general's office is continuing to investigate the matter. Matos' allies at EMILY's List and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus remain in her corner, however, as she's benefited from more outside spending than any of her rivals.

Cano has trailed her opponents in fundraising and hasn't received any third-party help, but she has several influential labor groups on her side. The rest of the field has raised little money and hasn't picked up many notable endorsements.

● UT-02: The GOP contest to succeed Stewart is a three-way battle between Celeste Maloy, the congressman's former legal counsel; former state Rep. Becky Edwards; and former RNC member Bruce Hough. The winner will face Democratic state Sen. Kathleen Riebe, who has no intra-party opposition, for a seat located in central and western Salt Lake City and southwestern Utah.

Maloy, who has Stewart's support, earned her spot on the primary ballot by winning the support of delegates at the GOP's convention in June. Just days later, the Salt Lake Tribune reported that she'd last voted in Utah in 2018 before taking a job in D.C. to work for Stewart, which led election officials to move her voter registration to inactive status. Maloy's detractors unsuccessfully argued in court that she'd violated state law because she only became an active voter again after she filed to run for Congress, but they've continued working to portray her as an interloper.

Edwards, meanwhile, infuriated conservatives in 2020 when she endorsed Joe Biden (she has since expressed "regret"), a move she followed by waging a failed primary challenge to far-right Sen. Mike Lee in which she portrayed herself as a more pragmatic option. However, the one poll anyone has released finds voters may not be holding it against her: A mid-August survey from Dan Jones & Associates showed Edwards beating Hough 32-11, with Maloy at 9%. However, half of respondents were undecided, so if this survey is accurate, the race remains up for grabs.

Unlike in Rhode Island, there has been little outside activity in this contest. Hough and Edwards had each spent about $450,000 as of mid-August, while Maloy had spent about half that.

Senate

● AZ-Sen: Multiple media outlets reported Wednesday that Blake Masters, who was one of the GOP's very worst Senate nominees last cycle, has decided to try again this year, and Politico says his declaration could come as soon as next week. Masters would join Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb in the primary for the seat held by Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat-turned-independent who still hasn't revealed her 2024 plans.

The Republican that everyone's waiting on, though, is election denier Kari Lake, who Axios previously reported plans to launch in October. She and Masters campaigned together last year by urging voters to back "Lake and Blake," but their relationship is anything but friendly these days. Lake on Sunday responded to the news that Masters would be talking to a local conservative activist by tweeting, "I hope you bring up election fraud, and Election crime. You've been quite silent."

● MI-Sen: Following a new report on Thursday from the Detroit News that former Republican Rep. Peter Meijer had formed an exploratory committee ahead of a possible bid for Michigan's open Senate seat next year, the ex-congressman released a statement once again confirming that he's "considering running." The development comes as another former member of Congress, Mike Rogers, is also reportedly preparing to join the GOP primary. Democrats have a multi-way primary of their own, but Rep. Elissa Slotkin has raised far more money and earned more high-profile endorsements than the rest of the field.

● MT-Sen: Republican pollster J.L. Partners has shared a recent poll with Semafor that tests next year's primary and general election, though there's no indication about who, if anyone, was their client. The GOP primary portion finds far-right Rep. Matt Rosendale with a wide 52-21 edge over wealthy businessman Tim Sheehy, who is the favorite of establishment Republicans and the NRSC. That result is only modestly better for Sheehy than a June survey from Democratic firm Public Policy Polling that had found Rosendale up 64-10 right before Sheehy kicked off his campaign.

While Rosendale has yet to formally announce his own campaign, he's recently been acting like he's going to run, and Democrats likely would prefer to face him given that he already lost to Democratic Sen. Jon Tester when this seat was last up in 2018. However, J.L. Partners' poll finds little difference between the two Republicans in a hypothetical 2024 general election: Rosendale leads Tester 46-43 while Sheehy beats the incumbent 46-42. Polling has been very limited here so far, but those numbers are very similar to Rosendale’s 46-41 edge over Tester that GOP pollster OnMessage Inc. found in February.

Governors

● KY-Gov: Pluribus News reports that Democratic incumbent Andy Beshear and his allies have reserved $17.3 million in TV time for the remainder of the campaign, compared to $5 million from Republican Daniel Cameron and his backers.

● LA-Gov: Conservative independent Hunter Lundy has self-funded more than $1 million to air his first TV ad, which is a minute-long spot that highlights his working-class upbringing and emphasizes his Christian faith. Lundy also calls for raising the minimum wage, investing in education, and holding responsible the "people who wreck our air and water."

Ballot Measures

● MO Ballot: Missouri voters could see dueling ballot measures on abortion rights next year after a new group submitted six petitions that would create several exceptions to the state's near-total ban on the procedure, including in cases of rape or fatal fetal abnormalities. One version of the petition would also allow abortion through 12 weeks of pregnancy, while two others would permit it until fetal viability, which is generally viewed as beginning at around 23 to 24 weeks.

However, the proposals, which were put forward by a former Republican political operative and artist named Jamie Corley, have earned the ire of the state's Planned Parenthood affiliate, particularly for their focus on exceptions to Missouri's ban. Yamelsie Rodríguez, the president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region and Southwest Missouri, said in a statement that Corley's approach "will continue to harm Missourians" and warned that "exceptions have never provided meaningful access."

Reproductive rights activists have been working to qualify their own measure for the 2024 ballot after filing 11 different petitions earlier this year, all of which are more expansive than Corley's proposals. (Proponents will ultimately settle on a single plan.) However, the local Planned Parenthood has taken exception to this push, too: Politico reported in April that the organization had pulled out of the coalition behind the effort, called Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, because most of its petitions also impose a fetal viability limit.

Corley is arguing that her more restrictive petitions have a better chance of becoming law. "I have respect for other organizations that are working in this realm," she told KCUR. But, she added, "I would say I think we have a much different view and assessment about what is ultimately passable in Missouri."

Missourians for Constitutional Freedom is also in the midst of a lawsuit against Republican Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft over the summary language he drafted for six of the group's petitions.

Ashcroft, who is running for governor, wrote that the measures would "allow for dangerous, unregulated, and unrestricted abortions, from conception to live birth, without requiring a medical license or potentially being subject to medical malpractice." The ACLU of Missouri, which is leading the challenge, charged that the descriptions are "misleading" and prejudicial." A state court will hold a trial on the dispute on Sept. 11, with the judge promising to deliver a ruling "pretty quick."

Grab Bag

● Where Are They Now?: Former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was one of the most powerful Republicans in Arizona just seven years ago, announced Wednesday that he'll run again in 2024 for mayor of the Phoenix suburb of Fountain Hills, the 24,000-person community where incumbent Ginny Dickey beat him 51-49 last year. Arpaio, who is 91, previously lost his 2016 reelection campaign for sheriff, his 2018 primary for U.S. Senate, and the 2020 primary to regain the sheriff's office.

Morning Digest: New North Dakota initiative would bar octogenarians from Congress

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The Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from the Daily Kos Elections team.

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Leading Off

● ND Ballot: North Dakota officials on Friday gave the green light to advocates for term limits to start collecting signatures for a proposed amendment to the state constitution to bar anyone older than 80 from representing the state in Congress. The measure could, however, have a tough time surviving a court challenge, though it joins a long history of conservatives testing the limits of a 1995 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held that states cannot add further qualifications to candidates for Congress beyond those outlined in the U.S. Constitution.

That 1995 ruling, known as U.S. Term Limits v. Thornton, struck down an Arkansas ballot initiative that tried to impose term limits on members of the state's congressional delegation. The court's 5-4 decision, which saw swing Justice Anthony Kennedy join the four liberal justices, explained that the only restrictions states could impose on congressional candidates were the ones spelled out in the nation's governing document: namely, a minimum (but not maximum) age, a minimum period of U.S. citizenship, and residency in the state they're seeking to represent at the time of election. Clarence Thomas, however, wrote a dissent that three fellow conservatives joined, saying he would have allowed Arkansas' law to stand.

Last year, Republicans in Tennessee decided to test whether Thomas' views might now hold sway on the Supreme Court, whose membership is now considerably further to the right than it was three decades ago. The GOP-dominated state legislature imposed a requirement that U.S. House candidates must have voted in the previous three statewide general elections to be eligible to run, a move that seemed to be aimed at blocking Morgan Ortagus, a former State Department spokesperson, from seeking the open 5th Congressional District. (Ortagus had only relocated from D.C. in 2021.)

The bill didn't apply last cycle because Gov. Bill Lee only allowed it to become law after the candidate filing deadline had passed. However, the state GOP's executive committee later used a different state law to eject Ortagus and two others from the ballot for not meeting the party's definition of a "bona fide" Republican. At least two of the plan's proponents, though, had much more than 2022 in mind, as they explicitly said they hoped the Supreme Court would overturn U.S. Term Limits. First, though, a candidate impacted by the law would have to file suit, which has not yet happened.

In North Dakota, meanwhile, organizers are seeking to collect signatures to impose a different requirement that, like Tennessee's, also isn't found in the Constitution. The proposed amendment would forbid anyone who would turn 81 before the end of their term from being elected or appointed to Congress. The measure also includes a section saying that, in the event that the courts block this maximum age limit, a "ballot advisory" would appear next to the names of congressional candidates on the ballot informing voters how old they'd be when their term would end.

The effort is being spearheaded by Jared Hendrix, a GOP party official who played a key role in electing and defending members of the legislature's far-right "Bastiat Caucus" (named after the 19th century French economist who championed free markets) and last year helped pass a term-limits measure applying to the governor and state legislators. Hendrix tells the Associated Press' Jack Dura that his group is aiming to get the measure on the June primary ballot rather than wait for next year's general election, saying, "Our plan is to aggressively and quickly gather signatures before cold weather hits."

Hendrix and his allies have until Feb. 12 to turn in about 31,200 signatures, a figure that represents 4% of the state's population (North Dakota is the only state that doesn't require voter registration) in order to meet his timeline; if they submit in their petitions later, the amendment wouldn't go before voters until November 2024. No matter what, though, it would only take a simple majority to pass the proposal at the ballot box.

Congressional elections could experience some major changes coast to coast if the Supreme Court were to chart a new course, but it wouldn't immediately impact any of the three members of the Peace Garden State's all-GOP delegation. Sens. John Hoeven and Kevin Cramer are 66 and 62, respectively, while Rep. Kelly Armstrong is 46. Of course, many members of Congress have served (or currently serve) into their 80s and even beyond: Texas Rep. Ralph Hall was 91 when his career came to an end, while South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond remained in office until he was 100.

Senate

● MI-Sen: GOP Rep. Lisa McClain told The Detroit News Wednesday that she's decided not to seek Michigan's open Senate seat.

● NV-Sen: An unnamed source tells NBC that Jeffrey Ross Gunter, who had a turbulent tenure as Trump's ambassador to Iceland from 2019 to 2021, plans to launch a bid against Democratic Sen. Jackie Rosen sometime early next month. Gunter would join a GOP primary that includes Army veteran Sam Brown, whose kickoff this month came as welcome news to the NRSC, and Jim Marchant, the Big Lie spreader who narrowly lost last year's race for Nevada secretary of state.

Governors

● IN-Gov: Howey Politics wrote Thursday that it anticipates outgoing state Commerce Secretary Brad Chambers will join the GOP primary "[s]ometime between now and Labor Day."

● NC-Gov: Though term-limited Gov. Roy Cooper had previously declined to endorse Josh Stein to succeed him next year, he told a recent gathering of the Democratic Governors Association that one of his priorities is "getting North Carolina's Attorney General Josh Stein elected," in the words of Punchbowl News. Stein remains the only notable Democrat in the race for governor, but last month, Supreme Court Justice Mike Morgan, who is retiring from his current post, said that he's considering a bid. Cooper's comments might therefore be a subtle message that he'd prefer to see Stein avoid any competition in the primary, or that he'd be willing to help him secure the nomination if he does get company.

House

● CA-22: Democratic state Sen. Melissa Hurtado on Wednesday filed FEC paperwork for a potential campaign against GOP Rep. David Valadao. Hurtado would join a top-two primary that includes 2022 nominee Rudy Salas, who lost a tight and expensive race last time: Politico notes that Salas enjoys the support of the number-three Democrat in the House, 33rd District Rep. Pete Aguilar, for his second try.

● CO-03: Grand Junction Mayor Anna Stout announced Wednesday that she'll seek the Democratic nod to take on far-right Lauren Boebert, a move that comes months after 2022 nominee Adam Frisch launched his second bid after coming shockingly close to victory. Stout was elected in 2019 to the city council for this 68,000-person community where Trump won roughly 56-41 in 2020, and her colleagues chose her to serve a second one-year term as mayor in April. Colorado Public Radio also adds that she has "developed a reputation as a moderate lawmaker."

Stout will be in for an expensive fight against Frisch, who hauled in a massive $2.6 million during the second quarter of the year and finished June with $2.5 million in the bank. Boebert, who fended Frisch off by all of 546 votes last year, took in $810,000 during this time and had $1.4 million on-hand. Donald Trump carried this western Colorado district 53-45, but Democrats are hoping Boebert's tough race last year means she'll be in for another serious fight in 2024.

● NH-01: Former Executive Councilor Russell Prescott on Thursday became the first notable Republican to launch a campaign against Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas, an announcement that came less than a year after Prescott badly lost the 2022 primary for this eastern New Hampshire constituency. He's likely to once again face intra-party opposition, though, in a longtime swing seat that favored Joe Biden 52-46.

Prescott is a longtime Granite State politician who won reelection to the state Senate in the 2002 general election by fending off none other than now-Sen. Maggie Hassan; Hassan unseated him in their 2004 rematch, but Prescott reclaimed his seat by riding the 2010 red wave to victory in their third and final bout. (Hassan herself bounced back in 2012 by winning the governorship.) Prescott made the jump to the powerful Executive Council in 2016 and narrowly won re-election two years later before retiring in 2020.

Prescott tried to return to elected office last cycle when he kicked off his campaign to take on Pappas, who had served with him on the Executive Council during his first term, just three-and-a-half months before the primary, but things did not go well. The candidate, whose $350,000 loan accounted for most of his budget, struggled to gain traction in a 10-way contest dominated by 2020 nominee Matt Mowers and election denier Karoline Leavitt: Leavitt beat out Mowers 34-25, with former TV reporter Gail Huff Brown taking 17% and Prescott lagging in fourth place with just 10%. Republicans hoped that another red wave would wash up, but Pappas instead beat Leavitt by a convincing 54-46.

● NY-22: GOP Rep. Brandon Williams' office said Wednesday that the congressman was back in the hospital due to a "complication" following the heart bypass surgery he received two weeks ago. Williams' team added that he would be absent from the House "for the remainder of the week."

● RI-01: The State Board of Elections put out a statement Wednesday saying it would not review any signatures from Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos' campaign, declaring, "Local boards did their job, verifying signatures, rejecting signatures, identifying a subset of rejected signatures as potentially fraudulent, and referring these to state and local law enforcement for criminal investigation." The state attorney general's office is investigating allegations that Matos' team submitted fraudulent petitions, but the Board of Elections argues she still turned in more than enough valid signatures to appear on the crowded Sept. 6 special Democratic primary ballot.

Meanwhile, former state Rep. Aaron Regunberg has begun what his team tells WPRI's Ted Nesi is a $300,000 TV buy through Election Day, which is the most that anyone has committed to spending on the airwaves. Regunberg's two inaugural spots (here and here) tout him as an effective progressive who "took on the old guard" and touts his support for Medicare for All and a Green New Deal. The latter ad also informs viewers that Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is backing Regunberg, an endorsement that became public the same day the spots debuted.

Nesi relays that Matos and former Biden administration official Gabe Amo, who each began their own opening buys, have spent or booked $280,000 and $215,000, respectively. Nesi adds that a fourth candidate, clean energy investor Don Carlson has increased his broadcast TV budget to $240,000 and will start advertising on Tuesday rather than in mid-August as he originally planned. Navy veteran Walter Berbrick has yet to launch any spots, though he did secure an endorsement from VoteVets this week.

Secretaries of State

● OR-SoS: State Treasurer Tobias Read, who lost last year's Democratic primary for governor to Tina Kotek 56-32, this week became the first notable candidate to launch a bid for secretary of state. The post is held by LaVonne Griffin-Valade, whom Kotek appointed in late June after Democratic incumbent Shemia Fagan resigned in May following her admission that she'd been doing paid consulting work for a cannabis company at a time when her office was finishing an audit into how the state regulates such businesses. The Oregon Capitol Chronicle writes that Griffin-Valade "has said she doesn't plan to run for a full term," though there's no quote from her.

Because Oregon is one of a few states that lack a lieutenant governor’s office, the secretary of state is normally first in line to succeed the governor if the latter office becomes vacant. However, because that provision only applies to elected secretaries, Read took over the top spot in the line of succession once Fagan resigned, and if he’s elected secretary of state next year, he would remain first in line despite switching offices.

Ballot Measures

● ME Ballot: Democratic Gov. Janet Mills unexpectedly announced Wednesday that a referendum to replace Maine's current state flag with one that was in use from 1901 to 1909 will take place in November 2024 rather than this fall. Mills was able to delay the referendum by not signing or vetoing the bill authorizing the vote, a move that ensured it would only take effect when the legislature reconvenes in January. "Rather than sign the bill and rush the question to ballot in little more than three months, she will … allow time for robust public debate and discussion on all sides of the issue," her team explained.

Maine's existing flag features, in the words of the Associated Press, "the state's coat of arms, which includes a pine tree, a moose, a seafarer and a lumberjack, against a blue background." The 1901 design, by contrast, shows just a green pine tree and blue star across a yellow backdrop, which proponents argue makes for a more distinctive image. Critics of the existing flag also argue that the design is far too cluttered.

However, as the Boston Globe recently explained, the fight over what flag to fly goes far beyond aesthetic preferences. "They want to take the farmer and the fisherman off the flag, to disappear them," a supporter of the status quo told the paper, continuing, "and to me that’s like what’s been done to the lobstermen and the fishermen in real life, over-regulating them and making it harder if not impossible to make a living."

Mayors and County Leaders

● Houston, TX Mayor: The University of Houston is out with the first poll anyone has released since Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee launched her campaign four months ago, and it finds that, while she's well-positioned to advance to a runoff with state Sen. John Whitmire, she'd be the underdog against her fellow Democrat in a second round.

The school first looks at the Nov. 7 nonpartisan primary to succeed termed-out Democratic Mayor Sylvester Turner and has Whitmire and Jackson Lee taking 34% and 32%, respectively, with former METRO board chair Gilbert Garcia a very distant third with just 3%. U of H, though, shows Whitmire defeating the congresswoman 51-33 in a runoff. (The date has not yet been scheduled.)

While both the frontrunners are longtime Democratic officeholders in this blue city, the school shows Whitmer, who has sided with the GOP on multiple votes against bail reform, winning over Republican voters by an astounding 88-2 as independents back him 60-18. Jackson Lee, who reliably votes with her party in D.C., carries Democrats 55-28, but U of H says that's far from enough.

● Nashville, TN Mayor: Former city economic development chief Matt Wiltshire and state Sen. Jeff Yarbro each earned a big-name endorsement Wednesday with about a week to go before the Aug. 4 nonpartisan primary to succeed retiring Mayor John Cooper. In Wiltshire's corner is Davidson County Sheriff Daron Hall, of whom the Nashville Banner writes, "If there is any vestige of a political machine left in the county, it belongs to Hall."

Yarbro, meanwhile, has the support of former Rep. Jim Cooper, who represented the entire city in Congress from 2003 until he left office early this year after Republican mapmakers passed an aggressive new gerrymander. Cooper is the brother of the current mayor, who has not yet taken sides. A GBAO Strategies survey taken July 17-19 for the Tennessee Laborers PAC, which doesn't appear to have taken sides in the crowded contest, also finds both Wiltshire and Yarbro locked in a tight race along with GOP strategist Alice Rolli for the second spot in the all-but-certain Sept. 14 runoff.

Council member Freddie O'Connell, who has emphasized his opposition to John Cooper's successful drive this year to fund a new stadium for the Tennessee Titans, is a clear first with 21%. Rolli, who is the only notable Republican in the running, holds a tiny 13-12 edge over Yarbro for second, with Wiltshire at 10%. State Sen. Heidi Campbell and Council member Sharon Hurt respectively take 8% and 6%, with 4% going to Davidson County Property Assessor Vivian Wilhoite.

We've seen just one other survey this month, a Music City Research survey taken July 5-6 that put O'Connell at 22% as Wiltshire led Rolli 17-13 for second. As we've noted before, that pollster is affiliated with a firm run by one of O'Connell's supporters, fellow Metro Council member Dave Rosenberg: Rosenberg told us earlier this month that this survey was paid for by a "private entity" that, as far as he was aware, was not backing or opposing anyone.

● Wichita, KS Mayor: Campaign finance reports are in ahead of Tuesday's nonpartisan primary for mayor, and former TV reporter Lily Wu outpaced Democratic incumbent Brandon Whipple and the other contenders in the period spanning Jan. 1 through July 20. The two candidates who earn the most votes next week will compete in the Nov. 7 general election.

Wu, who switched her party affiliation from Republican to Libertarian last year, hauled in $207,000 thanks in large part to what KMUW's Kylie Cameron says are big donations from "prominent Wichita business leaders," and she finished with $88,000 available for the home stretch. Wu also has the support of Americans for Prosperity, which is part of the Wichita-reared Koch family's conservative political network (Koch Industries remains headquartered here); however, since these reports don't cover outside spending, it's not clear what it's doing to aid her.

GOP City Council member Bryan Frye, meanwhile, outraised Celeste Racette, a Democrat turned independent who leads a group advocating for the historic performance venue Century II, $93,000 to $39,000, and he went into the final weeks with a $26,000 to $4,000 cash-on-hand advantage. Whipple, by contrast, brought in $35,000, while he had $28,000 in the bank.

Prosecutors and Sheriffs

● Cook County, IL State's Attorney: Eileen O'Neill Burke, who retired this month as a local appellate court justice, announced this week that she was joining next year's party primary to succeed her fellow Democrat, retiring incumbent Kim Foxx, as the top prosecutor for America's second-most populous county. Burke, who pitched herself as "a steady hand at the wheel," is the second candidate to launch after attorney Clayton Harris, who has the backing of Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle.

Morning Digest: He ranted about ‘European cheese weenies.’ Now he’s running for Congress

Posted on by Daily Kos Elections

The Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from the Daily Kos Elections team.

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Leading Off

● CO-08: Weld County Commissioner Scott James announced Wednesday that he'd seek the Republican nomination to challenge freshman Rep. Yadira Caraveo in Colorado's 8th District, prompting Democrats to immediately blast him for an anti-abortion, Islamophobic rant he delivered as a talk radio host in 2007.

James, as Media Matters documented at the time, declared "the civilization that you know ... will be overtaken by those who would like you to practice Sharia law ... just by mass numbers" because "the European cheese weenies simply aren't breeding." James continued, "You can do the math and see the rapid decline of ... civilization," before saying of the United Kingdom, "Their birth rate declining, the abortion rate increasing. You do the math. You don't have the sanctity for the life like that, your society will simply extinguish."

Democrats also went after James, who remained on the radio after winning his seat on the county commission in 2018, for his vote the next year to designate Weld County as a "Second Amendment sanctuary." That action, which authorized the county sheriff to "exercise of his sound discretion to not enforce against any citizen an unconstitutional firearms law," came in response to a new red flag law that allows family and household members, as well as law enforcement officials, to petition a judge to confiscate firearms from an individual they fear is dangerous. "Taking constitutional rights away from citizens under the guise that it is for the 'greater good' is a very dangerous path to walk down," James said at the time, "and one we do not support."

James launched his campaign to unseat Caraveo hours after fellow Republican Barbara Kirkmeyer, the GOP's nominee last year, announced that she would seek reelection to the state Senate rather than try to avenge her narrow 48.4-47.7 general election loss. The commissioner is the first notable Republican to join the contest for this constituency in the northern Denver suburbs and Greeley area, turf Joe Biden carried 51-46 in 2020, but he's not the only one who is thinking about running here.

State Rep. Gabe Evans reiterated his interest Tuesday to the Colorado Sun, while Weld County Commissioner Steve Moreno and former state Rep. Dan Woog both said they were mulling over the idea last month. Multiple publications also reported in June that Joe O'Dea, who unsuccessfully challenged Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet last year, is considering as well, though he's shown no obvious sign that he's preparing for another run.

Redistricting

● NY Redistricting: A divided state appeals court ordered New York's redistricting commission to draw a new congressional map ahead of the 2024 elections on Thursday, overturning a lower court that had previously ruled in favor of retaining the state's current court-drawn boundaries. Republicans opposing the Democratic-backed lawsuit, however, immediately vowed to appeal in an effort to prevent the adoption of districts that would be less favorable to them.

The dispute wound up in court after the evenly divided bipartisan commission failed to reach an agreement on a single set of redistricting plans for Congress and the state legislature last year.  Instead, it forwarded dueling proposals—one batch supported by Democrats, the other by Republicans—to lawmakers, who rejected them both. After that failure, the commission refused to try again, which led the Democratic-run legislature to pass its own maps.

However, the state's highest court struck down that attempt last year in a 4-3 decision, saying that because the commission had never sent a second set of maps to the legislature as contemplated by the state constitution, lawmakers could not act on their own. As a remedy, an upstate trial court instead imposed maps drawn by an outside expert that saw Republicans make considerable gains in the November midterms.

A group of voters, though, filed a suit demanding that the commission be ordered back to work. While a lower court initially rejected that argument, the Appellate Division agreed with the plaintiffs. The commission still "had an indisputable duty under the NY Constitution to submit a second set of maps upon the rejection of its first set," wrote the majority in a 3-2 opinion, concluding that the court-ordered maps used in 2022 were interim in nature.

If New York's highest court, known as the Court of Appeals, upholds this decision, then the commission will again have to try to compromise on a new congressional map. If it again fails to produce an acceptable map, though, Democrats in the legislature—who enjoy two-thirds supermajorities in both chambers—would, this time, very likely be entitled to create new maps of their own design. That possibility could spur Republican commissioners to accept lines that tilt somewhat more in Democrats' favor than the current districts rather than face the alternative of an unfettered partisan gerrymander.

2Q Fundraising

The deadline to file fundraising numbers for federal campaigns is July 15. We'll have our House and Senate fundraising charts available soon afterwards.

  • AZ-Sen: Ruben Gallego (D): $3.1 million raised
  • CA-Sen: Katie Porter (D): $3.2 million raised, $10.4 million cash on hand
  • WV-Sen: Joe Manchin (D-inc): $1.3 million raised, $10.7 million cash on hand
  • LA-Gov: Jeff Landry (R): $4.5 million raised, $9 million cash on hand
  • NC-Gov: Mark Robinson (R): $2.2 million raised (in six months), $3.2 million cash on hand
  • AZ-06: Juan Ciscomani (R-inc): $815,000 raised, $1.6 million cash on hand
  • CA-45: Michelle Steel (R-inc): $1.1 million raised, $1.7 million cash on hand
  • IA-02: Ashley Hinson (R-inc): $690,000 raised, $1 million cash on hand
  • IA-03: Zach Nunn (R-inc): $729,000 raised, $1 million cash on hand
  • IL-17: Eric Sorensen (D-inc): $515,000 raised, $770,000 cash on hand
  • MI-10: John James (R-inc): $1.1 million raised, $1.7 million cash on hand
  • MT-01: Ryan Zinke (R-inc): $786,000 raised, $876,000 cash on hand
  • NC-14: Jeff Jackson (D-inc): $507,000 raised, $663,000 cash on hand
  • NJ-05: Josh Gottheimer (D-inc): $1.2 million raised, $15.1 million cash on hand
  • NJ-07: Tom Kean Jr. (R-inc): $860,000 raised, $1.47 million cash on hand
  • NY-02: Rob Lubin (D): $343,000 raised (in five weeks), additional $7,000 self-funded
  • NY-03: Anna Kaplan (D): $455,000 raised
  • OR-05: Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-inc): $717,000 raised, $1 million cash on hand
  • TX-15: Monica De La Cruz (R-inc): $833,000 raised, $1 million cash on hand
  • WA-03: Joe Kent (R): $245,000 raised, $392,000 cash on hand

Senate

● FL-Sen: Politico reports that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and the DSCC are trying to recruit former Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell to take on GOP incumbent Rick Scott, but another Democrat appears ready to launch his campaign before she makes up her mind.

Navy veteran Phil Ehr, who raised $2 million for his 2020 bid against the nationally infamous Rep. Matt Gaetz in the safely red 1st District, confirms he's interested and will decide in the coming weeks. An unnamed source, though, says that Ehr, who lost to Gaetz 65-34 as Trump was taking the old 1st by a similar 66-32 margin, is planning to get in "soon."

● MI-Sen: The Daily Beast's Ursula Perano reports that, while actor Hill Harper says he's lived in Michigan for the last seven years, the new Democratic candidate's residency "may be more complicated." Perano uncovered a 2020 Seattle Times article saying that Harper moved to that city during the first season of production for his show, The Good Doctor, so his son could attend school there. (That season aired in 2017 and 2018.) That same story said that "Harper commutes from Seattle to the show’s set in Vancouver, British Columbia."

Perano also found a pair of websites used to book the actor for speaking engagements, both of which appear to have been in use in recent years: One said that Harper would be traveling from California, where he also owns a condo, while the other said he'd be coming from Seattle. "Hill Harper began spending time in Michigan because of work, but quickly realized the greatest people in the world live in Michigan and decided to move there full time," his campaign told the Daily Beast for the story, "Ever since moving to Michigan in 2016, he’s voted as a Michigander, paid taxes to the state, and runs a small business in Detroit."

Governors

● IN-Gov: Howey Politics relays that there are still "rumors" that state Commerce Secretary Brad Chambers is considering seeking the GOP nod to succeed his boss, termed-out Gov. Eric Holcomb and would likely self-fund. There is no other information about Chambers' interest.

● MO-Gov: Businessman Mike Hamra, whose eponymous company operates almost 200 restaurants nationwide, tells the St. Louis Business Journal he's "seriously considering" seeking the Democratic nod and will "likely to have a final decision later in the fall." Hamra made his interest known days after state House Minority Leader Crystal Quade launched her own bid to lead what's become a tough state for Democrats.

● MS-Gov: Republican incumbent Tate Reeves is airing a transphobic new TV ad where the governor, after praising his daughter for working to earn a soccer scholarship, declares, "Now, political radicals are trying to ruin women's sports, letting biological men get the opportunities meant for women." Reeves, as Mississippi Today notes, signed a 2021 law banning trans athletes from women's sports even though the bill's sponsor acknowledged she didn't know of this happening in the state.

House

● AK-AL: Businessman Nick Begich on Thursday became the first notable Republican to announce a campaign against Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola, who twice beat him last year for Alaska's only House seat. But Begich is unlikely to have the top-four primary to himself, especially since many Republicans made it clear last fall that they still harbor a grudge over how he acquitted himself during the final months of longtime Rep. Don Young's life.

Begich, who is the rare Republican member of Alaska's most prominent Democratic family (his grandfather and namesake was Young's immediate predecessor, while his uncle Mark Begich served one term in the U.S. Senate), was initially a Young supporter, and he even co-chaired the congressman's 2020 campaign. But, as the Anchorage Daily News' Iris Samuels reported in April of 2022, Begich spent about a month working in the congressman's office the next year—at Young's invitation—only to launch a bid against Young soon afterward. "It was just such an invasion of our goodwill and the Congressman's goodwill," one unnamed staffer later told Insider's Bryan Metzger, adding, "We were completely hoodwinked and betrayed."    

Young, who'd represented the state in the House since 1973, died before that faceoff could occur, and Begich was one of the 48 candidates who filed to run in a special election that featured America's first-ever top-four primary. But after Begich advanced to the general against former GOP Gov. Sarah Palin and Peltola (a fourth finisher, independent Al Gross, dropped out), it looked likely that one of the two Republicans would prevail in a state Donald Trump took 53-43 in 2020.

Begich and Palin, though, instead went negative on one another while ignoring Peltola (that is, when they weren't smiling in selfies with her), which helped give the Democrat the opening she needed. Begich was only too happy to portray Palin as a disastrous governor who only cared about being a celebrity, while Palin hit back by castigating Begich for supporting his Democratic relatives.

An unscathed Peltola went into ranked-choice tabulations with 40% of first-choice votes, with Palin edging out Begich 31-28 for second. But following the fratricidal GOP campaign, Begich's backers only went for Palin by a 50-29 margin as a crucial 21% didn’t express a preference for either finalist. As a result, Peltola pulled off 51-49 upset.

All three candidates, plus Libertarian Chris Bye, competed again in November for a full two-year term, but things went even worse for the GOP this time. Begich and his allies pointed to data from the Alaska Division of Elections saying that he'd have defeated Peltola 52-48 had he come in second place in the special election to make his case that conservatives should choose him over Palin. But several of Young's former staffers not only endorsed Peltola, who had enjoyed a close relationship with the late congressman for decades, they also vocally aired their grievances against Begich for what they saw as his duplicity.

One particular incensed Young aide was a former communications director, Zack Brown, who posted a picture of Begich's congressional intern badge in a since-deleted tweet. "Begich was planning on primarying Young all along," he wrote. "He used DY & staff to secure inside info." Brown followed up, "According to FEC docs, he claimed campaign expenses BEFORE he came on as an INTERN in Don Young's office. He KNEW he was going to primary Young before he joined our office, but used the Congressman and staff for his own ends anyway. Disgraceful."

Peltola this time almost took a majority of first-choice ballots, scoring 49% of them as Palin once again staggered into second place, beating out Begich 26-23. Peltola then crushed Palin in a 55-45 drubbing after the instant-runoff process was finished. To add insult to injury for Begich, election data showed he would have lost by a slightly larger margin than Palin this time―just under 11 points―had he taken second.

Republicans are likely to make a priority of beating Peltola, who represents the reddest Democratic-held seat in the chamber, but it remains to be seen who else will join Begich in the top-four. The Anchorage Daily News writes that Palin, who rather prematurely named her congressional chief of staff the day after the November election [i]In anticipation of an announcement of victory," hasn't shown any sign she's thinking of trying a third time, though that hardly means she won't surprise everyone like she did when she decided to run last year.

● MD-06: Hagerstown Mayor Tekesha Martinez on Wednesday joined the busy primary to succeed her fellow Democrat, Senate candidate David Trone, for a seat based in western Maryland and the northwestern D.C. exurbs. Martinez, who was elected to the city council in 2020, became this northwestern Maryland community's first Black mayor in February after her colleagues appointed her to fill the vacant post. She joins Dels. Lesley Lopez and Joe Vogel, as well as think tank founder Destiny Drake West, in seeking the Democratic nod for this 54-44 Biden constituency.

● NJ-07: Former state Sen. Ray Lesniak tells the New Jersey Globe he's "still waiting until this November" before deciding whether to seek the Democratic nod to take on GOP Rep. Tom Kean Jr.

● NY-22: New York State United Teachers, which is affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers and National Education Association, has endorsed Democratic state Sen. John Mannion's bid to take on GOP Rep. Brandon Williams. Mannion is a former public school teacher, and City & State says the labor group has enthusiastically backed him in past races.

● RI-01: Lincoln Town Councilor Pamela Azar at some point quietly ended her campaign for the Democratic nod and endorsed one of her many former rivals, state Sen. Ana Quezada.

● TX-34: House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has endorsed former GOP Rep. Mayra Flores in her rematch effort with Democratic incumbent Vicente Gonzalez.

● UT-02: State election officials confirmed this week that both former RNC member Bruce Hough and former state Rep. Becky Edwards have turned in enough valid signatures to make the Sept. 5 special Republican primary to succeed outgoing Rep. Chris Stewart. The pair will face Celeste Maloy, a former Stewart aide who qualified for the ballot by winning last month's party convention. The winner will be favored on Nov. 7 against Democratic state Sen. Kathleen Riebe in this gerrymandered 57-40 Trump seat.

● WI-03: Both state Rep. Katrina Shankland and former La Crosse County Board chair Tara Johnson tell the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that they're interested in joining the Democratic primary to take on GOP Rep. Derrick Van Orden.

Mayors and County Leaders

● Houston, TX Mayor: Former Republican City Councilmember Jack Christie tells the Houston Chronicle he's considering entering the Nov. 7 nonpartisan primary to succeed termed-out Democratic Mayor Sylvester Turner, though he said he was still "far from signing up." Attorney Tony Buzbee, an independent who lost the 2019 runoff to Turner 56-44 after spending $12 million, likewise says he hasn't ruled out another campaign even though he's representing Attorney General Ken Paxton at the Republican's upcoming impeachment trial. The filing deadline is Aug. 21, weeks before Paxton's Sept. 5 trial starts.

● Indianapolis, IN Mayor: Democratic incumbent Joe Hogsett has gone on TV well ahead of the Nov. 7 general with a spot hitting his wealthy foe, Republican Jefferson Shreve, that utilizes footage from the ads Shreve ran during his failed 2016 state Senate bid. "Jefferson Shreve will fight for the right to life," says Shreve's old narrator, "and our Second Amendment rights." Indianapolis backed Joe Biden 63-34, but Republicans are hoping Shreve's resources will help him argue that change is needed after Hogsett's two terms.

● Nashville, TN Mayor: The Nashville Scene reports that a conservative group called Save Nashville PAC is spending $150,000 on TV ad campaign to help the one notable Republican in the race, party strategist Alice Rolli, advance past the Aug. 3 nonpartisan primary. The messaging, unsurprisingly, invokes the specter of crime in big cities … other big cities, that is. "How many once-great cities around the U.S. are now complete disasters?" asks the narrator, "Is Nashville next? Alice Rolli will protect Nashville and keep it a clean, safe city."

The offensive comes at a time when two wealthy Democrats, former AllianceBernstein executive Jim Gingrich and former economic development chief Matt Wiltshire, continue to dominate the airwaves in the contest to succeed retiring Democratic Mayor John Cooper. AdImpact relays that Gingrich and his allies have outspent Wiltshire's side $1.6 million to $1.2 million in advertising, while Democratic Metro Council member Freddie O'Connell is far back with just $190,000.

A firm called Music City Research, though, has released a survey showing that, despite being heavily outspent, O'Connell leads with 22% as Wiltshire outpaces Rolli 17-13 for the second spot in the likely Sept. 14 runoff. The pollster is affiliated with Harpeth Strategies, which is run by one of O'Connell's supporters, fellow Metro Council member Dave Rosenberg. Rosenberg tells us this poll was conducted for a "private entity and not a mayoral campaign or an organization associated with a mayoral campaign." He added that, as far as he is aware, the sponsor is not backing or opposing anyone.

The last poll we saw was over a month ago, and it showed a far more unsettled race. The Democratic firm Public Policy Polling, working for real estate development group NAIOP Nashville, had O'Connell at 10% as two Democratic members of the state Senate, Jeff Yarbro and Heidi Campbell, respectively took 9% and 8%.

Morning Digest: Why this Nebraska district will host an even bigger barn-burner in ’24

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The Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from the Daily Kos Elections team.

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Leading Off

● NE-02: Democratic state Sen. Tony Vargas announced Wednesday that he'd seek a rematch against Rep. Don Bacon, the Republican who beat him 51-49 in last year's expensive campaign for Nebraska's 2nd District. Vargas, who is the son of immigrants from Peru, would be the first Latino to represent the Cornhusker State in Congress. He currently faces no serious intra-party opposition as he seeks to avenge his 2022 defeat, and unnamed Democratic sources also the Nebraska Examiner they don't expect that to change.

This constituency, which includes Omaha and several of its suburbs, favored Joe Biden 52-46, but the four-term Republican has been tough to dislodge. Vargas and his allies ran ads last year emphasizing Bacon's supports for a bill banning abortion nationally after 15 weeks, something the congressman tried to pass off as a moderate option. The GOP, meanwhile, hit back with commercials accusing Vargas of voting "to release violent prisoners." Vargas, who favored bipartisan legislation that would have made prisoners eligible for parole after two years instead of halfway through their term, responded by stressing his support for law enforcement, but it wasn't enough.

Bacon's profile has risen nationally since that tight win, and he's emerged as one of Speaker Kevin McCarthy's most outspoken allies. The Nebraskan made news during the speakership vote when he suggested that members of both parties could unite behind one candidate as a "last resort," arguing that such an outcome would be the fault of "six or seven" far-right Republicans. Bacon has continued to denounce his colleagues in the Freedom Caucus, but while he continues to muse, "I'm of the position that at some point we gotta just do coalition government with the Democrats and cut these guys out," he's yet to take any obvious action to actually make that happen.

A few other things will be different for the 2024 cycle. Vargas' Republican colleagues in the officially nonpartisan legislature passed a bill in May banning abortion after 12 weeks. Vargas, who opposed the measure, used his kickoff to emphasize how he'd "work to protect abortion rights" in Congress. But rather than try to downplay the issue, as many other Republicans have, Bacon has responded by claiming that Vargas "wants zero restrictions" on the procedure. (Vargas argued last year that "elected officials like me should be playing absolutely no role" over women's health decisions.)

The presidential election could also complicate things, especially since Nebraska, along with Maine, is one of just two states that awards an electoral vote to the winner of each congressional district. Bacon ran well ahead of the top of the ticket in 2020 and prevailed 51-46 even as Donald Trump was losing the 2nd 52-46 (the presidential numbers were the same under both the old and new congressional maps thanks to GOP gerrymandering), but Democrats are hoping that he'll have a much tougher time winning over ticket-splitters next year.

2Q Fundraising

The second fundraising quarter of the year, covering the period of Apr. 1 through June 30, has come to an end, and federal candidates will have to file campaign finance reports with the FEC by July 15. But as per usual, campaigns with hauls they're eager to tout are leaking numbers early, which we've gathered below.

  • CA-Sen: Adam Schiff (D): $8.1 million raised
  • MD-Sen: Angela Alsobrooks (D): $1.6 million raised (in seven weeks), $1.25 million cash on hand
  • MO-Sen: Lucas Kunce (D): $1.2 million raised
  • PA-Sen: Bob Casey (D-inc): $4 million raised
  • TX-Sen: Colin Allred (D): $6.2 million raised (in two months)
  • WI-Sen: Tammy Baldwin (D-inc): $3.2 million raised
  • CA-47: Scott Baugh (R): $545,000 raised, $1 million cash on hand
  • NY-22: Sarah Klee Hood (D): $319,000 raised (in 10 weeks), $221,000 cash on hand
  • RI-01: Don Carlson (D): $312,000 raised, additional $600,000 self-funded, $750,000 cash on hand
  • TX-32: Julie Johnson (D): $410,000 raised (in 11 days), Brian Williams (D): $360,000 raised (in six weeks)

Ballot Measures

● OH Redistricting: The U.S. Supreme Court vacated last year's ruling by the Ohio Supreme Court that struck down the state's congressional map in a brief order issued just before the holiday weekend, directing the Ohio court to reconsider the case in light of the federal Supreme Court's recent decision in a related redistricting case out of North Carolina.

In the North Carolina case, known as Moore v. Harper, the Supreme Court rejected a radical argument by Republican legislators that would have allowed them to gerrymander without limits. Republicans claimed that the U.S. Constitution forbids state courts from placing any curbs on state lawmakers with regard to laws that concern federal elections, including the creation of new congressional maps. The supreme courts in both states had struck down GOP maps as illegal partisan gerrymanders, and in both cases, Republicans responded by asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn those rulings.

The Supreme Court declined to do so in Moore, but a majority of justices in the North Carolina matter did embrace a more limited version of the GOP's argument, saying that "state courts may not transgress the ordinary bounds of judicial review" when assessing state laws that affect federal elections. The U.S. Supreme Court now is asking the Ohio Supreme Court to determine whether it did in fact transgress these bounds in its prior ruling.

The written opinion in Moore, however, declined to provide any guidance whatsoever as to what those bounds might be, or what transgressing them might look like. The Ohio Supreme Court, therefore, faces the awkward task of deciding whether to tattle on itself without really knowing what it might have done wrong. Still, it's hard to see how the court might have run afoul of this standard, even if interpreted loosely. But whatever it decides, the outcome likely won't make any difference.

That's because partisan Republicans took firm control of the state Supreme Court in November after moderate Republican Maureen O'Connor, who had sided with the court's three Democrats to block GOP gerrymanders, retired due to age limits. The new hardline majority would likely have overturned the court's previous rulings rejecting Republican maps regardless of the U.S. Supreme Court's new order. As a consequence, Ohio will likely be able to use the same tilted map next year, or possibly even a more egregiously slanted one, since Republicans recently said they might pass a new map this fall.

Senate

● IN-Sen: Egg farmer John Rust, who is reportedly wealthy and could self-fund a bid for office, has filed paperwork to run in next year's GOP primary for Indiana's open Senate seat. Rust, however, has not yet commented publicly, so it's not clear what kind of opening he might see for himself, given that Republican leaders have almost universally rallied behind Rep. Jim Banks' campaign to succeed Sen. Mike Braun.

● MI-Sen: Former Republican Rep. Mike Rogers, who previously said "never say never" in regard to a possible bid for Michigan's open Senate seat, is now "seriously weighing" a campaign, according to two unnamed sources cited by Politico's Burgess Everett. A consultant for Rogers, who's been weighing a hopeless campaign for president, also declined to rule out the possibility in a statement.

Meanwhile, Time's Mini Racker reports that John Tuttle, an executive with the New York Stock Exchange, "is likely to enter" the GOP primary, per an anonymous source, and could do so by the middle of this month. In May, NRSC chair Steve Daines praised Tuttle as "a strong potential recruit." Racker's source also says that former Rep. Peter Meijer is "seriously looking" at a campaign but "may wait months" to decide; earlier this year, Meijer would only say "no comment" when the New York Times asked about his interest.

The only noteworthy Republican in the race so far is state Board of Education member Nikki Snyder, though her presence hasn't deterred anyone else. Democrats, by contrast, have largely coalesced around Rep. Elissa Slotkin, though she faces a few opponents, most notably state Board of Education President Pamela Pugh.

● MT-Sen: Rep. Ryan Zinke took himself out of the running for the right to take on Democratic Sen. Jon Tester by endorsing former Navy SEAL Tim Sheehy for the GOP nomination instead. But while Sheehy is a favorite of D.C. Republicans, he's still likely to have company in the primary in the form of Montana's other congressman, the hard-right Matt Rosendale.

● NV-Sen: The Nevada Independent's Gabby Birenbaum flags that Army veteran Sam Brown, who's reportedly a favorite of national Republicans, has a "special announcement" planned for Monday. So far, the only prominent Republican seeking to challenge first-term Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen is notorious election conspiracy theorist Jim Marchant, who came very close to winning last year's race for secretary of state.

● OH-Sen: East Carolina University's new poll gives Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown small leads against a trio of Republican foes:

  • 45-44 vs. state Sen. Matt Dolan
  • 44-42 vs. Secretary of State Frank LaRose
  • 46-42 vs. businessman Bernie Moreno

LaRose hasn't announced yet, though he unsubtly tweeted a picture of an FEC statement of organization form dated July 15.

● VA-Sen: Navy veteran Hung Cao, who was last year's GOP nominee against Democratic Rep. Jennifer Wexton, has filed FEC paperwork for what would be a longshot campaign against Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine.

Governors

● WA-Gov: Former Rep. Dave Reichert on Friday filed paperwork for a potential campaign for governor, which is the furthest the Republican has ever come to running for statewide office despite flirting with the idea several times during his career. Reichert, a former swing district congressman who is arguably his party's most formidable candidate, has yet to publicly commit to entering the top-two primary.

● WV-Gov: 2020 Democratic nominee Ben Salango said Wednesday he's decided not to run to succeed termed-out Gov. Jim Justice, the Republican who beat him 63-30. No serious Democrats have entered the race to lead what has become an inhospitable state for their party especially over the last decade, though Huntington Mayor Steve Williams responded to the news by reaffirming his interest to MetroNews.

"I said at the Juneteenth that I intend to run, but that it won't be official until I intend to file and that wouldn't be until sometime in July or August" said Williams, who runs West Virginia's second-largest state. The mayor didn't commit to anything, adding, "It's never official until it's official."

House

● AZ-06: Businessman Jack O'Donnell has quietly ended his month-old campaign for the Democratic nomination, a move the Arizona Republic says he made "without comment." O'Donnell's departure leaves former state Sen. Kirsten Engel without any intra-party opposition as she seeks a rematch against freshman Republican Rep. Juan Ciscomani, who beat her 51-49 last cycle.

● CO-08: Thornton Mayor Jan Kulmann, who took second in last year's GOP primary, says she won't try again this cycle.

● FL-11: While far-right troll Laura Loomer declared early this year that she'd be seeking a GOP primary rematch against veteran Rep. Daniel Webster, whom she held to a shockingly close 51-44 last cycle, she now tells Florida Politics she's still making up her mind about another try. "Right now, my entire focus is the re-nomination and reelection of President Donald J. Trump, and exposing Ron DeSantis for the con man that he is," she said, continuing, "I am preserving all of my options regarding a potential candidacy for U.S. Congress in Florida's 11th district."

Loomer also predicted that if she ran she'd "pulverize" both Webster and former state Rep. Anthony Sabatini, who is the congressman's only notable declared intra-party foe in this conservative seat in the western Orlando suburbs. Sabatini, a hard-right extremist who lost last year's primary for the neighboring 7th District to now-Rep. Cory Mills, says he's raised $205,000 during the first three months in his campaign to replace Webster as the congressman for the gargantuan retirement community of The Villages.

● IL-12: Darren Bailey, the far-right former state senator who was the GOP’s nominee for governor of Illinois last year, used a Fourth of July celebration at his family farm to announce that he’d challenge Rep. Mike Bost for renomination. Bost, who confirmed last month that he’d seek a sixth term in downstate Illinois' dark red 12th District, is himself an ardent Trumpist who voted to overturn Joe Biden’s win in the hours after the Jan. 6 attacks.

Bailey did not mention the incumbent in his kickoff or subsequent launch video, preferring instead to praise Trump and denounce “weak-kneed politicians who refuse to stand up and fight.” The also posted a picture on Facebook reading “Hands off my AR” on Tuesday—the first anniversary of the mass shooting in Highland Park. (The Chicago Tribune reminds us that last year, before the gunman was even caught, Bailey urged his followers to “move on and let’s celebrate — celebrate the independence of this nation.”)

The NRCC wasted no time making it clear that it was firmly in Bost's corner and previewed some of the material it might use. “Darren Bailey moved to a downtown Chicago penthouse to get blown out by JB Pritzker, now he’s back seeking another political promotion,” said in a statement. Bailey, who filed a 2019 bill to kick Chicago out of Illinois, sought to explain why he’d taken up residence in the Windy City last year. “You can’t deny there’s problems here," he argued. "And if we keep denying these problems, the problems are going to get worse.”

Just a day after 55-42 drubbing by Pritzker, the Tribune reported that Bost’s allies were worried the senator would turn around and take on the congressman—and they may have good reason to fret that he could put up a fight. According to an estimate from OurCampaigns, Bailey ran slightly ahead of Trump's 71-28 performance in the 12th District, carrying it 73-25 last year. Bost, though, also bested Trump's showing, winning his own race 75-25.

Trump has lent his support to both men in the past, so there's no telling whether he'll take sides this time. Just ahead of last year's primary, he endorsed Bailey—much to the delight of Democrats, who spent a fortune to help him win the nod in the ultimately correct belief he'd prove a weak opponent for Pritzker. Trump also headlined a rally for Bost in 2018, when the congressman was in the midst of a tough reelection battle. (Democrats later redrew the 12th District to make it much redder by packing in as many Republican voters as possible.)

● MD-06: State House Minority Leader Jason Buckel tells Maryland Matters' Josh Kurtz that, while he's still considering a bid for the GOP nod, he's postponing his decision from late July to late August.

Former Del. Dan Cox, the election denier who cost the GOP any chance it had to hold Maryland's governorship last year, also says he remains undecided, but he adds that he had nothing to do with a "Dan Cox for U.S. Congress" FEC committee that was set up Monday. "I'd like to know who did this," Cox said of the committee, which ceased to exist the following day.

● MI-07: Former state Sen. Curtis Hertel on Wednesday filed FEC paperwork for his long-anticipated campaign for this competitive open seat, a development that came days after the Democrat stepped down as Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's director of legislative affairs.

● NJ-07, NJ-Sen: Roselle Park Mayor Joseph Signorello told the New Jersey Globe Monday that he's decided to end his longshot Democratic primary bid against Sen. Robert Menendez and instead challenge freshman GOP Rep. Tom Kean Jr. Signorello's entire 14,000-person community is located in Democratic Rep. Donald Payne's 10th District, but the mayor previously said he lives "five minutes away" from Kean's constituency.

The only other notable Democrat campaigning for the 7th is Working Families Party state director Sue Altman, who says she raised $200,000 during her first month in the primary. Former state Sen. Ray Lesniak has talked about getting in as well, while the Globe reported last week that former State Department official Jason Blazakis is also considering joining the race.

● NY-17: Former Rep. Mondaire Jones announced on Wednesday that he'd seek the Democratic nomination to take on freshman Republican Rep. Mike Lawler in New York's 17th District, a lower Hudson Valley constituency that Joe Biden carried 54-44 in 2020. Jones, who unsuccessfully ran in New York City last year because of a strange set of redistricting-induced circumstances, used his intro video to emphasize his local roots in Rockland County and record securing funds for the area during his one term in D.C.

Before Jones can focus on reclaiming this seat, though, he has to get through what could be an expensive primary against local school board member Liz Gereghty, the sister of Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. Gereghty, who launched her campaign in mid-May, announced this week that she'd raised $400,000 though the end of last month. The field also includes former Bedford Town Supervisor MaryAnn Carr, but it remains to be seen if she'll have the resources to run a strong campaign.

In the 2020 election cycle, Jones sought what was, at the time, a safely blue seat held by Democratic Rep. Nita Lowey. Lowey, however, retired soon after Jones launched his campaign, and he won a competitive, multi-way battle for the Democratic nomination. Jones made history with his comfortable victory that fall by becoming the first openly gay black member of Congress, a distinction he shared with fellow New York Democrat Ritchie Torres. (It was only after she died in 1996 that news accounts identified legendary Texas Rep. Barbara Jordan as a lesbian; she never discussed her sexuality during her lifetime.)

Two years later, Jones seemed to be on track for another easy win, but everything changed after New York's highest court rejected state's new Democratic-drawn congressional map and substituted in its own lines. Fellow Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, who represented a neighboring district and also chaired the DCCC, infuriated Jones and many local Democrats when he decided to seek reelection in the 17th District rather than defend the 18th, a slightly more competitive seat that included the bulk of his current constituents.

Jones decided to avoid a primary by campaigning for the open 10th District, an open seat based in Brooklyn and lower Manhattan that was far from his home turf, though he offered an explanation for his change of venue. "This is the birthplace of the LGBTQ+ rights movement," he tweeted, "Since long before the Stonewall Uprising, queer people of color have sought refuge within its borders."

But while Jones enjoyed the support of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, he had a tough time in a primary dominated by politicians with far stronger ties to New York City. Former federal prosecutor Dan Goldman, a self-funder who served as House Democrats' lead counsel during Donald Trump's first impeachment, massively outspent the rest of the field and secured the influential support of the New York Times. Goldman ultimately beat Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou in a 25-24 squeaker, while Jones finished third with 18%.

Maloney, for his part, acknowledged months before his own general election that "there are a lot of strong feelings" among Democrats who felt he'd sent Jones packing. "I think I could've handled it better," he admitted. He'd soon have more reasons for regret: One local progressive leader would recount to Slate that volunteers canvassing for Maloney would be asked, "Isn't he the guy that pushed Mondaire out of this district?" Maloney ended up losing to Lawler 50.3-49.7 at the same time that Republican Lee Zeldin was beating Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul 52-48 in the 17th, according to Bloomberg's Greg Giroux. (Ironically, Democrat Pat Ryan held the 18th District that Maloney left behind.)

Jones soon made it clear that he was interested in returning to his home base to challenge Lawler, saying in December, "I've also learned my lesson, and that is home for me is in the Hudson Valley." (The Daily Beast reported in February that Jones hadn't ruled out waging a primary against Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, but there was little indication he'd ever seriously considered the idea.)

The once and perhaps future congressman continues to express strong feelings about how the midterm elections went down. "I never imagined that I would wake up one day and would have to decide against primarying a member of the Democratic Party at a time when we were seeing an assault on our democracy," he told News12 Westchester on Wednesday. "To that extent, yeah, I do regret not being the Democratic nominee last cycle."

Gereghty's team, though, made it clear they'd use his campaign in New York City against him. "Liz Whitmer Gereghty has lived in the Hudson Valley for 20 years," her campaign said in a statement, "and the reason you'll never see her moving to Brooklyn to chase a congressional seat is because the only place and only people she wants to represent are right here in the Hudson Valley."

● RI-01: Candidate filing closed Friday for the special election to succeed former Rep. David Cicilline, and 22 of his fellow Democrats are campaigning for this 64-35 Biden constituency. The notable candidates competing in the Sept. 5 Democratic primary appear to be (deep breath):

  • State Rep. Marvin Abney
  • former Biden administration official Gabe Amo
  • former state official Nick Autiello
  • Lincoln Town Councilor Pamela Azar
  • Navy veteran Walter Berbrick
  • State Sen. Sandra Cano
  • Businessman Don Carlson
  • State Rep. Stephen Casey
  • Providence City Councilman John Goncalves
  • Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos
  • Narragansett Aboriginal Nation tribal elder Bella Machado Noka
  • State Sen. Ana Quezada
  • former state Rep. Aaron Regunberg

The field isn't quite set, though, because candidates still need to turn in 500 valid signatures by July 14. The general election will be Nov. 7.

● VA-02: Navy veteran Missy Cotter Smasal, reports Inside Elections' Jacob Rubashkin, is "moving toward" challenging freshman Republican Rep. Jen Kiggans in a competitive seat where Democrats are awaiting their first serious contender. Cotter Smasal previously lost an expensive race for the state Senate 52-48 against GOP state Sen. Bill DeSteph. (Donald Trump had carried that constituency 51-43 in 2016, though Joe Biden would take it 50-48 the year after Cotter Smasal's defeat.)

The current version of the 2nd Congressional District, which includes all of Virginia Beach and other Hampton Roads communities, also supported Biden 50-48. Kiggans last year went on to unseat Democratic Rep. Elaine Luria 52-48, and while Luria went on to form a PAC to help her party in this fall's state legislature contests, Rubashkin says she's "unlikely" to seek a rematch.

Ballot Measures

● NY Ballot: New York could join the ranks of states whose constitutions protect the right to an abortion next year when voters decide whether to approve a far-reaching amendment placed on the ballot by lawmakers.

The amendment, which the legislature passed for the required second time in January, would outlaw discrimination based on a wide variety of factors, including race, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, religion, and sex. Under "sex," the measure further adds several more categories, including sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as "pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy."

It is that last grouping that proponents say will protect abortion rights, though the amendment doesn't actually reference the word "abortion" anywhere. State law expert Quinn Yeargain expressed concern about that omission in an essay earlier this year. While noting that the amendment "encompasses a number of really good ideas" that would put New York at the vanguard of prohibiting a number of types of discrimination, he opined that it "leaves a lot to be desired" if it's to be regarded as "an abortion-rights amendment."

Yeargain contrasted New York's approach with a much more explicit amendment that will appear on the Maryland ballot next year. That amendment guarantees "the fundamental right to reproductive freedom, including but not limited to the ability to make and effectuate decisions to prevent, continue, or end one's own pregnancy." Regarding the New York amendment, Yeargain concluded that if he lived in the state, "I'd enthusiastically vote for this measure next year—but I wouldn't do so with the assumption that it'll constitutionalize abortion rights."

● OH Ballot: Activists seeking to enshrine abortion rights into the Ohio constitution submitted 710,000 signatures on Wednesday to place an amendment on the November ballot, far more than the 413,000 required by law. That figure gives organizers a sizable cushion should any petitions get thrown out after state officials review them, but a much more serious hurdle looms: Next month, voters will decide on a separate amendment approved by Republican lawmakers that would raise the threshold for passage for any future amendments from a simple majority to 60%.

Republicans have been explicit in explaining why they're pushing their measure. "This is 100% about keeping a radical, pro-abortion amendment out of our constitution," Secretary of State Frank LaRose said at an event in May, according to video obtained by News 5 Cleveland. "The left wants to jam it in there this coming November." A broad array of organizations are opposing the GOP amendment, which will go before voters in an Aug. 8 special election.

Morning Digest: North Carolina Democrats have a long but plausible path to retaking Supreme Court

Posted on by Daily Kos Elections

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

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Leading Off

● NC Supreme Court: Longtime jurist Mike Morgan, one of the last two Democratic justices on North Carolina's Supreme Court, announced on Thursday that he would not seek reelection when his current eight-year term is up next year. His decision leaves open a critical seat that Democrats must defend as part of a long-term plan that represents their only realistic path toward rolling back the GOP's iron grip on state politics.

Morgan's 54-46 victory over Republican incumbent Robert Edmunds in 2016 gave Democrats control of the court for the first time since the late 1990s, putting it in a position to finally impose some curbs on GOP lawmakers. Those same lawmakers, however, reacted to Morgan's win by transforming what had previously been nonpartisan elections into partisan contests, meaning that Supreme Court candidates would be identified by their party labels on the ballot.

But that change failed to achieve the outcome Republicans wanted as Democrat Anita Earls flipped a second GOP seat in 2018. And thanks to the resignation of the Republican chief justice the following year, Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper was able to appoint a replacement, extending Democrats' majority to 6-1. Under Democratic leadership, the court handed down rulings in many areas that clamped down on Republican power-grabs and efforts to undermine democracy, including a critical decision just last year holding that partisan gerrymandering violated the state constitution.

That era did not last long. Republicans narrowly won two Democratic seats in 2020, including one by just 401 votes, then won two more last year by margins of 4-5 points. That string of victories returned the GOP to the majority and left Morgan and Earls as the only Democrats and only Black justices on the court. It also immediately ushered in a series of decisions that saw the Republican justices overturn multiple rulings in favor of voting rights by the previous Democratic majority, including the case outlawing gerrymandering.

As a result, Republican legislators will once again be able to draw maps that favor them in the extreme, allowing them to lock in supermajorities despite North Carolina's perennial swing-state status. And the road back to fair maps is a narrow one. North Carolina doesn't allow its citizens to pass laws or amend their constitution through ballot initiatives, and the governor lacks the power to veto redistricting plans. With federal courts closing their doors to partisan gerrymandering challenges thanks to the far-right majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, the only option is for Democrats to focus all their energies on winning back the state Supreme Court.

The road, however, is a long one. It starts with defending Morgan's seat in 2024, though if Democrats are successful, his decision not to run again would come with a silver lining: Morgan would have faced mandatory retirement at the age of 72 in 2027, less than halfway through a second term. A younger justice, by contrast, would be able to serve the full eight years.

They'll then have to ensure Earls wins reelection in 2026 (she would not hit the mandatory retirement age until 2032). After that, they'd have to win two of the three Republican seats that will be up in 2028 for a 4-3 majority. It's also critical that they elect Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein to succeed Cooper next year, since he'd be able to fill any vacancies that arise, including when Republican Chief Justice Paul Newby turns 72 in 2027. A Stein victory would also prevent Republicans from adding two seats to the court that a GOP governor could fill, a plan Republicans have been contemplating for some time.

Republicans also have more immediate designs on changing the rules to benefit themselves. A Republican bill would raise the retirement age to 76, which would allow Newby to complete his term, which otherwise would conclude at the end of 2028, and even run for reelection that year. That would also prevent Stein, should he prevail, from naming a Democrat to Newby's seat in 2027. This retirement provision is included in the GOP's recently unveiled budget, suggesting it's likely to pass before the legislature adjourns this summer.

Yet while 2028 might seem far away, it's still within reach. North Carolina Democrats had to wait 18 years, from 1998 to 2016, to regain a court majority, while progressives in Wisconsin, another similarly swingy state, at last reclaimed control of their own high court earlier this year after a 15-year drought. The horizon this time is five years off. And given the new 12-week abortion ban Republicans just passed over Cooper's veto, Democrats will be able to highlight GOP extremism on the issue, an approach that proved very effective in Wisconsin. The path is not easy, but it is navigable, and it's the one Democrats must take.

Senate

● MI-Sen: Michigan Board of Education President Pamela Pugh has filed FEC paperwork for a bid for the Democratic Senate nod. Pugh would be in for a challenging primary battle against Rep. Elissa Slotkin, a former CIA analyst and Department of Defense official who earned an endorsement this week from VoteVets.

Governors

● KY-Gov: Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear is launching his first TV ad campaign on Monday, and the GOP firm Medium Buying says the incumbent is putting at least $454,000 behind it. The commercial does not mention Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who won Tuesday's GOP primary, and instead focuses on a first term where Beshear acknowledges, "We've been through a lot these past four years, and some days have been tougher than others."

The governor, who is seated in a church, continues by touting his record bringing jobs to Kentucky, establishing clean drinking water "to folks who've been overlooked and underserved," and working on disaster recovery. "My granddad and great-granddad were preachers in this church," he says before informing the audience, "It was flattened by the tornadoes. But when Kentuckians get knocked down, we get right back up again and we rebuild stronger and better than before."

● LA-Gov: Republican Stephen Waguespack has launched what his team says is an opening "six-figure ad buy" for the October all-party primary less than two weeks after his super PAC allies began a $1.75 million campaign to get the first-time candidate's name out. Waguespack, who is a former head of the state's Chamber of Commerce affiliate, introduces himself as "Wags" before bemoaning the state's economic, education, and public safety struggles.

Prosecutors and Sheriffs

● Northampton County, PA District Attorney: While Democratic incumbent Terry Houck almost certainly won the Republican nomination through a write-in campaign Tuesday, local Republican Party head Glenn Geissinger is making it clear that his organization won't do anything to help the district attorney in the general election. Instead, Geissinger tells LehighValleyNews.com that he's even spoken to an unidentified Republican interested in waging their own November write-in effort to compete with the incumbent and former local Judge Stephen Baratta, who beat Houck 54-46 for the Democratic nod. Biden won this Lehigh Valley county 50-49.

Obituaries

● Charles Stenholm: Former Texas Rep. Charles Stenholm, a leader of the conservative "boll weevil" Democrats who lost his seat in rural West Texas in 2004 as a result of GOP Majority Leader Tom DeLay's infamous gerrymander, died Wednesday at 84. The congressman, who was later a prominent Blue Dog Democrat, often frustrated his party during his 26-year career, though he always turned down GOP appeals to join their own ranks.  

Stenholm, who managed his family's cotton farm and was known as the "cotton farmer from Stamford" throughout his career, first got the chance to run for office in 1978 when his fellow Democrat, Rep. Omar Burleson, retired from what was then numbered the 17th District. While today the communities contained within the borders of that sprawling constituency, which included Abilene, are some of the most Republican places in America today, Democrats back then were still the dominant faction. Jimmy Carter, according to analyst Kiernan Park-Egan, had defeated President Gerald Ford 57-43 two years before, and Stenholm's decisive win in the primary runoff set him up for an easy victory in the fall.  

The new congressman was reelected without opposition in 1980 even as, per Park-Egan, Ronald Reagan triumphed 55-44 in his seat, and he quickly made himself an ally of the new administration. Stenholm was a prominent boll weevil, a faction that handed Reagan crucial victories on tax and budget bills in the Democratic-run House, and he even launched a doomed leadership challenge from the right against Speaker Tip O'Neil following Reagan's 1984 landslide. But the Texan thrived electorally during this era, and he didn't even face a single Republican foe for reelection until 1992―a campaign he won with 66%.

The incumbent experienced his first single-digit victory in 1994 when he prevailed 54-46 as the GOP was taking control of the House, a campaign that came weeks before Stenholm badly failed to unseat Michigan Rep. David Bonior as party whip, but he was still able to maintain more than enough crossover support to remain in office for another decade. Stenholm, whom Speaker Newt Gingrich unconvincingly dubbed "the most effective left-winger in Congress," experienced a closer scare in 1996 when he held on 52-47 against Republican Rudy Izzard as his constituents backed Bob Dole for president 50-39, but he won their rematch 54-45 the following cycle.

Stenholm was one of five Democrats to vote for three of the four articles of impeachment against Bill Clinton, but his area's increasing drift to the right made his political survival all the more difficult. In 2002 he secured another term 51-47 in a constituency that George W. Bush had won 72-28 two years prior (Donald Trump would have carried that version of the 17th 79-19 in 2020), a win that came the same day that Texas Republicans were taking full control of the legislature for the first time since Reconstruction.

DeLay soon engineered a gerrymandered map that led to a faceoff between Stenholm and Republican Rep. Randy Neugebauer in a new 19th District that had favored Bush 75-25 and included far more of Neugebauer's territory, but the Democrat still fought to stay in office. Stenholm, who was the top Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, aired ads touting his seniority and "old-fashioned values," and he argued that he could do a better job providing for his district than his opponent. Stenholm, though, struggled to win crossover support from voters who didn't know him, especially with Bush himself touting Neugebauer, and he looked doomed well before Election Day.

Stenholm ran far ahead of John Kerry, but the new 19th was so red that it was far from enough: Bush took the new 19th 78-23, while Neugebauer toppled Stenholm 58-40. The Democrat, who went on to become a lobbyist and college instructor, did express optimism weeks after his defeat that four new Blue Dogs would be joining Congress, saying, "These Blue Puppies are very impressive. They will carry on the fight."