Alabama Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth (credit: Will Ainsworth Facebook)
Leading Off
AL-Sen
Alabama Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth hinted Tuesday that he’s interested in making a late entry into the race to succeed Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a fellow Republican whose campaign for governor blocked Ainsworth from seeking the office he actually coveted.
“Hearing from a lot of people that the U.S. Senate race seems wide open right now,” Ainsworth wrote on Facebook. “What do you think?”
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Ainsworth, though, has already said what he thinks about the idea of running for Tuberville’s seat.
“I really have just never had a desire to serve in the Senate,” he told conservative radio host Jeff Poor in May. Ainsworth, who added that “the only office I would consider running for is governor,” announced later that month he wouldn’t run for that office or any other in 2026, a decision that all but ensured Tuberville would easily win the GOP nod in the race to succeed term-limited Gov. Kay Ivey.
The lieutenant governor did not respond to questions from the conservative outlet 1819 News about whether his new Facebook post means that he now does have a desire to serve in the Senate. The state’s filing deadline is Jan. 23, though, so Ainsworth can’t keep anyone in suspense for long.
Several Republicans who actually do want to serve in the Senate are already competing in the May 19 primary. The field includes Navy SEAL veteran Jared Hudson; state Attorney General Steve Marshall; Rep. Barry Moore; wealthy businessman Rodney Walker; and Morgan Murphy, a former White House aide who used to work for Tuberville.
Candidates need to win a majority of the vote to avoid a runoff on June 16.
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A mysterious outfit called Georgians for Integrity has now spent almost $5 million on ads attacking Republican Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Greg Bluestein reported Friday.
That marks a big escalation from the $1 million Bluestein and his colleagues tracked through the previous week. There’s still no information, though, about who’s behind the offensive against Jones, who has Donald Trump’s endorsement in the May 19 primary for governor.
“Burt voted to raise his taxpayer-funded pension, then backed a $10 billion deal to build data centers on his family’s land,” says the narrator in the group’s newest ad. “It’s no wonder Burt voted to let government steal Georgians’ land through eminent domain.”
The offensive comes a month after Georgia Democrats scored landslide victories for a pair of seats on the state Public Service Commission after attacking Republicans over data centers. One of those victorious candidates, Peter Hubbard, argued that the proliferation of data centers could force consumers to pay higher electricity rates.
House
IL-09
Political commentator Kat Abughazaleh on Thursday became the first of the 17 Democrats running for Illinois’ open 9th District to launch a cable TV ad, the Daily Herald reports.
Abughazaleh’s team told the paper she’s putting six figures behind her opening spot, which features footage of federal agents pushing her to the ground in September as she protested outside an ICE facility. Abughazaleh, who was indicted after the incident, is then shown addressing the media and decrying how “ICE has acted with impunity in Chicago.”
The commercial comes nine months after Abughazaleh launched her campaign with a “promise not to waste your money on old, ineffective tactics,” and she included “cable ads” on that list. Her campaign told the Daily Herald last week, though, that she’s since decided that such ads are needed “to reach voters effectively and equitably across the district.”
Abughazaleh is not the first progressive candidate who has reconsidered an initial aversion to TV advertising. Rep. Ilhan Omar stayed off the airwaves ahead of the 2022 Democratic primary in Minnesota’s 5th District, with HuffPost’s Daniel Marans writing she’d made this decision because of a belief that her base was made up of “young voters” who presumably wouldn’t be motivated by messages on television.
Omar, though, reevaluated that strategy after she fended off intraparty foe Don Samuels by an unexpectedly small 50-48 spread. When Samuels sought a rematch in 2024, the congresswoman spent millions on TV spots and won by a larger 56-43 margin.
TX-19
Lubbock County Judge Curtis Parrish said Monday that he had removed Jason Corley, a fellow Republican, from the County Commission because Corley announced his campaign for the open 19th Congressional District at a point when Texas’ resign-to-run law still applied to him.
Corley, who says he launched his bid to succeed retiring Rep. Jodey Arrington within the window of time that would allow him to keep his current job, responded by filing a lawsuit demanding his reinstatement.
The state constitution requires county commissioners to automatically resign their post if they seek higher office with more than one year and 30 days left in their term. Corley filed his congressional campaign paperwork with the state on Dec. 2, which is one year and 29 days before his term on the county commission concludes at the end of 2026.
But Parrish, who is seeking reelection next year as leader of Lubbock County (Texas county judges are executive rather than judicial posts), had a different take on whether Corley had successfully skirted the deadline in question.
Parrish, who has clashed with Corley repeatedly over local budgetary matters, said the now-former commissioner “became a candidate in fact for U.S. House of Representatives” on Nov. 12 when he announced the formation of an exploratory committee. On Monday, Parish concluded that Corley, through his actions, had removed himself from the commission, prompting Parish to appoint a successor to serve out the remainder of his term.
Afterward, Corley told the Texas Tribune that security escorted him out of the county courthouse, saying, “I had to pack like the rent was due and head out the door.” Parrish disputes that he forced Corley out of the building.
Corley faces several fellow Republicans in the March 3 GOP primary for the 19th Congressional District, a dark red constituency that includes Lubbock and rural West Texas that retiring GOP Rep. Jodey Arrington is leaving behind. The field includes conservative activist Abraham Enriquez, businessman Matt Smith, and lobbyist Tom Sell.
The Montana Supreme Court has once again rejected language drafted by Republican Attorney General Austin Knudsen to describe a constitutional amendment that would keep judicial races in the state nonpartisan, less than a month after it issued a similar ruling regarding a similar ballot measure.
In the previous case, the court determined that Knudsen’s proposed summary was misleading; in this case, the justices unanimously agreed that the attorney general lacked the authority to rewrite language submitted by the amendment’s sponsors because he failed to offer any explanation as to why that language was legally insufficient.
As a result, supporters of the amendment, known as Constitutional Initiative 131, can begin collecting signatures to place their proposal on the ballot. However, it’s competing with the related measure, CI-132, that the Supreme Court addressed last month. Both have similar aims but would amend the state constitution in different ways. It’s not clear yet how proponents of nonpartisan judicial elections intend to resolve their differences.
Is everyone aware of trump's absolutely disgusting remarks about Rob Reiner and his wife being murdered ? I won't post any link but you can find it easily enough. Waiting for Leavitt to defend this.
Just wish Montana was more purple, ie more statewide Democratic wins. Voters are comfortable with electing centrist judges to their state Supreme Court, but Republicans want to politicize judicial races like they do in NC, OH, GA and elsewhere.
Is everyone aware of trump's absolutely disgusting remarks about Rob Reiner and his wife being murdered ? I won't post any link but you can find it easily enough. Waiting for Leavitt to defend this.
Just wish Montana was more purple, ie more statewide Democratic wins. Voters are comfortable with electing centrist judges to their state Supreme Court, but Republicans want to politicize judicial races like they do in NC, OH, GA and elsewhere.