Morning Digest: Democrats in two red states are eyeing bids for attorney general

Republicans have held these powerful posts for years, but 2026 could change that

Texas state Sen. Nathan Johnson reportedly will seek to become the state’s first Democratic attorney general in almost three decades (credit: Nathan Johnson Facebook)

Leading Off

GA-AG, TX-AG

A pair of Democrats in Georgia and Texas are making moves to run for attorney general in their respective states, and if they jump in, they'd each be their party's first major candidate for these powerful GOP-held posts.

In Georgia, former House Minority Leader Bob Trammell said Tuesday that he was filing paperwork to run to replace Republican Chris Carr, who is leaving to run for governor. Trammell, who narrowly lost reelection in 2020 after Republicans spent over $1 million to beat him, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution he was still in the "exploratory process."

No other Peach State Democrats have said they're looking at running for this office. The Republican side is currently a duel between a pair of state senators, Bill Cowsert and Brian Strickland.

Over in Texas, meanwhile, the Quorum Report says that state Sen. Nathan Johnson will announce a campaign for attorney general on July 15. Johnson, who unseated a Republican incumbent to win a seat in the Dallas suburbs in 2018, previously expressed interest in taking GOP Sen. John Cornyn.

Johnson, however, has since turned his focus on the race to replace Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is challenging Cornyn for renomination.

Morning Digest: A powerful office is now open for only the third time this century

The only other notable Lone Star Democrat who has publicly talked about running for Paxton's job is former Galveston Mayor Joe Jaworski, who unsuccessfully sought the nomination for this post in 2022. Three prominent Republicans are already in: former Department of Justice official Aaron Reitz and state Sens. Joan Huffman and Mayes Middleton.

Democrats haven't won either office in decades. The last Georgia Democrat to serve as attorney general was Thurbert Baker, who won his third and final full term in 2006. Baker left in 2010 to wage an unsuccessful bid for governor, and the GOP has held his old job ever since.

Texas Democrats have been on the outside looking in for still longer. Democrat Dan Morales secured a second term as attorney general during the 1994 GOP wave, which was also the last year his party won a statewide race in Texas, but he chose not to run again four years later. (Morales later went to prison after pleading guilty to corruption charges.)

Cornyn won the 1998 contest to replace him, and the GOP has maintained control of this influential post for more than a quarter of a century.

David Nir here, publisher of The Downballot! We hope you love reading about elections as much as we love writing about them. If you appreciate coverage of overlooked contests like the two just above, we hope you’ll consider becoming a paid subscriber today:

2Q Fundraising

• IL-Sen: Raja Krishnamoorthi (D): $3.1 million raised, $21 million cash on hand

• CO-Gov: Phil Weiser (D): $1 million raised, $2.5 million cash on hand

• GA-Gov: Keisha Lance Bottoms (D): $900,000 raised (in six weeks), additional $200,000 self-funded, $1 million cash on hand

• CA-40: Esther Kim Varet (D): $445,000 raised, additional $160,000 self-funded

• CA-41: Brandon Riker (D): $457,000 raised, additional $457,000 self-funded

• CO-04: Eileen Laubacher (D): $1.9 million raised (in 54 days), $1.1 million cash on hand

• CO-08: Shannon Bird (D): $440,000 raised (in six weeks); Manny Rutinel (D): $415,000 raised

• MI-10: Eric Chung (D): $600,000 raised (in two months); Tim Greimel (D): $400,000 raised

• MI-11: Jeremy Moss (D): $425,000 raised (in two months)

Senate

SC-Sen

Former Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer announced Tuesday evening that he would challenge South Carolina Sen. Lindsay Graham in next year's Republican primary.

Bauer, a real estate developer, told the Associated Press he'd self-fund his campaign. However, he wouldn't say how much of his own money he'd use to defeat Graham, who has Donald Trump's endorsement.

Bauer won the lieutenant governor's office in both 2002 and 2006, but he's had no electoral success over the ensuing two decades. He took a distant last place in the four-way primary for governor in 2010 and went on to badly lose the primary runoff for the 7th Congressional District two years later.

Those defeats didn't crush Bauer's dreams of a comeback, though: The Charleston Post & Courier's Nick Reynolds writes that he's "flirted with federal-level races for years, relocating every few years as he teased bids for national office while rarely following through."

The former lieutenant governor, however, seemed to finally decide he'd had enough in November when he informed the paper, "My wife is an introvert. She would rather me not run for anything."

Bauer, whom Trump unsuccessfully nominated as ambassador to Belize in 2020, instead said he hoped for a post in the new Trump administration. Reynolds writes that, according to Graham's office, Bauer spent the ensuing seven months speaking to the senator's staff about such an opportunity "on a weekly, if not daily basis." There is no indication that he received a job offer before he decided to take on Graham.

Bauer joins another wealthy businessman, Mark Lynch, in opposing the incumbent in the GOP primary, while pediatrician Annie Andrews is the only notable Democrat running in this conservative state. South Carolina requires candidates to win a majority in the primary to avert a runoff.

Governors

FL-Gov

Florida Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson, who's been talked about as a potential candidate for governor for years, still isn't ruling out the idea despite Donald Trump's endorsement of Rep. Byron Donalds.

"I was elected to do this job, and I'm going to do it, and we'll see about that next year," Simpson told The Floridian, a conservative news site.

The commissioner, a longtime enemy of term-limited Gov. Ron DeSantis, has barely registered in hypothetical polls of next year's GOP primary. However, he has $30 million stockpiled in his campaign war chest. So far, though, Donalds, who said he's raised $22 million over the last four months, has had the primary largely to himself.

IA-Gov

Attorney General Brenna Bird has said no to a bid for Iowa's open governorship after teasing a run with an emoji and a video of Donald Trump praising her back in May.

MN-Gov

Former state Sen. Scott Jensen will decide in August if he'll seek a rematch against Democratic Gov. Tim Walz, Blois Olson writes in Morning Take. Jensen lost the 2022 general election 52-45 to Walz, who has yet to announce whether he'll seek a third term.

Businessman Kendall Qualls, whom Jensen defeated at a party convention three years ago, is currently the only notable Minnesota Republican running for governor. State Sen. Zach Duckworth expressed interest back in February, but Olson writes that he "seem[s] to be leaning against running statewide to earn some more experience."

Olson says the same of state Sen. Jordan Rasmusson, whom we had not previously heard mentioned for higher office.

NJ-Gov

A new independent poll shows Democrat Mikie Sherrill demolishing Republican Jack Ciattarelli by a 56-35 margin in this fall's race for governor of New Jersey.

Rutgers University–New Brunswick conducted this survey a few days after Sherrill and Ciattarelli won their respective primaries on June 10. The only other poll we've seen since the primary was an internal for Ciattarelli's campaign that placed Sherrill up just 45-42.

Morning Digest: Why Republicans think they can win the race to lead New Jersey

Ciattarelli's team dismissed Rutgers' poll as "a steaming pile of shit," but one Garden State Republican believes the results. Bill Spadea, who has continued feuding with the GOP's nominee in the weeks since Ciattarelli blew him out in the primary, said Wednesday that Ciattarelli's campaign is "20 points down and desperate."

NY-Gov

Rep. Ritchie Torres, who's been flirting with a bid for governor for more than seven months, now says he's "unlikely" to challenge Gov. Kathy Hochul in next year's Democratic primary.

Last month, Torres said that he regarded a victory by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in New York City's mayoral primary as "a necessary condition for running." Now, though, the congressman is framing his reluctance differently, telling MSNBC on Wednesday that he wants to "keep my focus on Washington, D.C." so that he can "fight the catastrophe that is the Trump presidency."

A new Siena College poll released this week showed Torres taking just 10% in a hypothetical primary, with Hochul far ahead with 49% and Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado (who is actually running) at 12%.

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House

AZ-07

A new internal poll for progressive organizer Deja Foxx gives former Pima County Supervisor Adelita Grijalva a relatively small 43-35 lead in the July 15 Democratic primary for Arizona's vacant 7th District, with former state Rep. Daniel Hernandez at 9 and 11% undecided.

The survey, from Change Research, also includes previously unreleased numbers from a mid-May poll that found Grijalva, the daughter of the late Rep. Raul Grijalva, with a much larger 41-16 advantage over Hernandez as Foxx was in third with just 10%.

Whoever wins the primary will be favored in the Sept. 23 special election to replace the elder Grijalva: According to calculations from The Downballot, the Tucson-based 7th District voted for Kamala Harris by a 60-38 margin.

CA-27

Santa Clarita Councilman Jason Gibbs launched a bid against freshman Democratic Rep. George Whitesides on Wednesday, making him the first Republican to enter the race for the 27th District.

Gibbs joined the fray with an endorsement from the man Whitesides narrowly ousted by a 51-49 margin last year, former Rep. Mike Garcia. However, Inside Elections' Jacob Rubashkin reported last month that Gibbs has "a long way to go to convince national Republicans he's the right candidate" for the job. It's not clear who else the GOP might prefer, though, since no other names have surfaced.

The 27th, based in the suburbs in northern Los Angeles County, has been competitive turf for more than a decade, dating back to its prior incarnation as the 25th District. The constituency, however, moved noticeably to the right last year: After backing Joe Biden 55-43 in 2020, it went for Kamala Harris by a much smaller 50-47 spread, according to calculations from The Downballot.

Whitesides, though, defied that trend to unseat Garcia, becoming the first Democrat to hold the seat since Katie Hill's brief tenure following the 2018 elections. Whitesides proved to be a monster fundraiser, bringing in $7.5 million for his campaign and self-funding another $1.3 million on top of that. Should the district revert to form, the congressman will be, as Rubashkin says, "a tough out."

IL-09

State Rep. Hoan Huynh jumped into the extremely busy Democratic primary for Illinois' 9th Congressional District on Wednesday, joining a race that features more than half a dozen notable candidates vying to replace retiring Rep. Jan Schakowsky in the House.

Huynh, a refugee from Vietnam whose parents are Vietnamese and Chinese, took aim at ICE raids in the district and across the state, telling the Chicago Sun-Times, "This campaign is about making sure that we protect fundamental human rights, democracy and freedom."

RI-02

Oral surgeon Stephen Skoly, whose medical practice was shut down by Rhode Island regulators during the pandemic after he refused to get a COVID vaccine, tells WPRI he's "aggressively exploring" a bid against Democratic Rep. Seth Magaziner and will decide by Labor Day.

Skoly filed a lawsuit challenging the state's vaccine mandate but has repeatedly lost in federal court. He'll be facing a similarly uphill challenge running as a Republican for the 2nd District, which includes western Providence and the western half of the state.

Magaziner won a difficult open-seat race in 2022, defeating a high-profile opponent, former Cranston Mayor Allan Fung, 50-47. The next cycle, though, he turned back an unheralded Republican by a much more comfortable 58-42 margin, running well ahead of Kamala Harris' 52-46 performance in the district.

Legislatures

Special Elections

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds has called a special election for a potentially competitive seat in the legislature for Aug. 26, following the death of Republican state Sen. Rocky De Witt last month.

De Witt's district, numbered the 1st, is located in the northwestern part of the state and includes much of Sioux City. It's bounced around politically in recent years: During his first presidential bid, Donald Trump carried it 50-44, then saw his margin narrow to 50-48 in 2020 before it ballooned to 55-44 last year.

That pattern has held downballot as well. In 2022, De Witt unseated Democratic Sen. Jackie Smith 55-45, four years after Smith had ousted a previous Republican incumbent in a 51-49 squeaker.

Republicans should be favored to hold the seat, but in three special elections in other parts of the state earlier this year, Iowa Democrats have turned in strong overperformances and even flipped a much redder district in January. As Laura Belin explains at Bleeding Heartland, both parties will pick candidates at conventions, which have yet to be scheduled.

Mayors & County Leaders

San Diego County, CA Board of Supervisors

Imperial Beach Mayor Paloma Aguirre prevailed in a Tuesday special election that restored Democrats' 3-2 majority on the San Diego County Board of Supervisors.

Aguirre holds a 54-46 lead over Chula Vista Mayor John McCann, who identifies as a Republican, as of Wednesday evening in the officially nonpartisan race. While there are still ballots to be tabulated, McCann conceded earlier on Wednesday. Aguirre will serve the remainder of the four-year term that Democratic Supervisor Nora Vargas won in 2024 shortly before she abruptly resigned.

Kamala Harris carried the 1st District, which is based in the southern portion of the county, 59-39 four years after Joe Biden took it by an even larger 67-31 spread. Aguirre, though, understood that McCann's name recognition could make him a formidable candidate in a race where he wouldn't be identified under a party label, and she did everything she could to link him to Donald Trump.

In the Digest published June 27, we incorrectly said that Andre Bauer was elected to his only term as lieutenant governor of South Carolina in 2006. Bauer was elected to that office in 2002 and reelected in 2006.