It’s good to see a robust primary for the Iowa seat. I hope whomever wins the Dem primary, be it Sage or Sholten, gives Ernst a run for her money. Force the GOP to divert money otherwise meant for Tillis or Collins to keep Ernst.
Yes! Would love to see a massive blue wave wash Joni Ernst out of Congress, Sand into the governor's mansion, and eliminate the GOP supermajority in the legislature.
I know it's wishful thinking, but having Sand in the governor's mansion alone would be a BIG improvement over the MAGA Karen who made Iowa the worst state to do business and find employment.
They just hate cities. With state-imposed tax limits, Iowa cities are forced into austerity by her nanny-state government despite rising property prices.
Guys, its not going to be Sage. You've got an overperforming state legislator with built-in name ID and a fundraising network vs. the director of the Chamber of Commerce for a city of 8,000. If Wahls gets in, you've got a primary, but the Sage guy screams also ran. Scholten has a legit chance at an upset here.
Then the Democrats probably blew their shot at the seat. Scholten also ran ads in 2018 in the entire western half of the state. Look we all obviously follow politics too closely because we're on the Downballot message board in the middle of the day, but this isn't a legit primary with these two candidates.
I just want Ernst out of her seat as badly as I want Tillis out of his. If both seats flipped next year, I will be ecstatic even if the Senate majority remains GOP controlled.
I agree. There is a path developing for Dems to take back the Senate majority with a 2018-style environment. Tillis is most endangered even if Cooper doesn't run. Dems have a solid bench in NC and NC was (relative to 2020) Kamala's 1st or 2nd best swing state (WI being the other). Ernst keeps putting her foot in her mouth and now has an overperforming challenger with strong fundraising network. Dems still need a candidate against Collins but she's clearly vulnerable. Paxton looks likely to win the primary in Texas and if Allred runs again (another overperformer w/ good fundraising), Dems have a shot there, especially if the polling showing latin voters souring on GOP are to be believed. Wild card is Alaska. Even though Peltola isn't likely to go for Senate, Valerie Davidson is likely to run statewide and has a Peltola-esque profile. Ohio is pretty far down at this point because it doesn't look like we'll be able to pull Ryan or Brown into the race.
You'd have to be a massive dolt not to be able to unseat Tillis in 2026. He's done nothing to stop or even ameliorate the federal assault on the biotech industry (which is a key economic driver in the very populous Reasearch Triangle region).
That said, us Cakalaky Democrats HAVE nominated some massive dolts (cough cough, Cal Cunningham) in prior cycles. Let's hope that the new Party leadership has adequately vetted Wiley Nickel, if he is indeed the "normie lane" candidate (95% sure he is/will be).
Wiley Nickel so far doesn't have any skeletons in his closet, ala Cunningham. I am praying and trying to manifest former governor Roy Cooper into running for the Senate seat though.
Cooper is way more battle tested than Nickel and voters know who he is. Tillis is not only very unpopular but he will have a hard time trying to define Cooper (even with his PAC buddies funding negative ads) and the latter has won more statewide races than the former.
I hope that Cooper has been impressed with the new Democratic leadership and the successful fight to keep Allison Riggs' seat that he's inspired to run against Tillis next year. I'd be so thrilled to vote for him on the ballot.
The 5% is my caveat for Cooper running. He doesn't want to, but there is an ever-so-slight chance that he will if polling shows that he - and ONLY he - would almost surely beat Tillis.
I think with our base mad about Trump and the Riggs shenanigans, the "no skeletons" is really all we will need.
Even the GOP voters who voted for Griffin are furious at his behavior and they may not vote for the GOP justices next go round. The whole Riggs/Griffin debacle made national AND international headlines.
I think you’re right that this is Scholten’s primary to lose and that it likely won’t be a close primary. However, late popping scandals or drop outs even for current elected politicians do sometimes occur (to D’s and R’s). It’s great to at least have a backup plan.
That said, I do think it would be a very good idea for Democrats to have both running campaigns in the primary race, because currently elected party insider vs WWC party outsider reaches different parts of the base/state and would likely target different audiences (which Democrats need both of to pull off a miracle in Iowa, part of their old ancestral base back from the GOP and their entire new educated base with high turn out).
I'm afraid this happened early enough that a) the stink will wear off in 1.5 years, or b) if her polling really does take a nosedive, she has enough time to decide not to run again. This would've been a great June 2026 gaffe.
I'm sure the Democratic nominee will use this recording in attack ads in 2026 to remind Iowa voters of her statement. The effectiveness of this attack will depend a lot on whether or not the "big, beautiful bill" actually passes. If it doesn't, then there's a good chance that the stink will wear off by the fall of next year.
If the bill passes, though, I think it'll definitely be an effective attack ad. In the 2014 Senate election, some people were saying that Bruce Braley's "farmer from Iowa" gaffe would be forgotten about by November 2014. Voters in Iowa never fully forgave him for that, and it's one reason why Joni Ernst won by a comfortable margin that year. The same thing could happen to Ernst next year, especially if the "big, beautiful bill" passes and voters in Iowa have to face the consequences of it.
I don't think Braley's "farmer from Iowa" comment had any real impact on the race. I just think Iowa was well within its pivot to becoming a red state by 2014 and Ernst's 8-point margin reflected the shift.
I don't know...comments like this form a lasting impression in people's minds, even if they forget the details of what was actually said. She let her constituents know she's callous and unconcerned about their lives. That may stick with them longer than the actual words she said. And there will be plenty of campaign ads reminding Iowans of exactly what she said. Her quote was so bad, and yet so emblematic of Republican policies, that I wouldn't be surprised to see her comments end up in ads in other states! They all think that way; Ernst just said it out loud, and her comments may end up being an albatross for all Republicans.
He needs to enshrine free speech protections for feminists into law, they have witch-hunts against them going on in Korea. The gender voting difference is exponentially worse there compared to any western nation.
They harass singers to death if they suspect she made a feminist gesture in the music video and deface and occupy seats in public transport marked for pregnant and older women.
You don't have a 0.55 birth rate in city where most of the population lives for no reason.
At 6am, 14,295 polling stations will open nationwide. They close at 8pm, two hours later than usual elections, because this is a by-election following former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s impeachment over his Dec. 3 martial law declaration.
The number of eligible voters is about 44.39 million, including 15.42 million who participated in early voting last Thursday and Friday, and 205,268 who took part in overseas voting, according to the National Election Commission (NEC).
The governing coalition in the Netherlands collapsed on Tuesday after the populist leader Geert Wilders withdrew his party over a dispute about migration policy, ending a rocky 11-month rule by the country’s first far-right government and triggering early elections.
It was not immediately clear when new elections would take place, but they appeared unlikely to happen before October, plunging the country into political uncertainty for at least the rest of the year. Mr. Wilders’s party has been dropping in Dutch polls lately.
Mayor Ras J. Baraka of Newark, a Democratic candidate for governor who was arrested last month outside an immigration detention center, filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday against Alina Habba, the interim U.S. attorney for New Jersey, that argues that his arrest was motivated by political malice, not justice.
45 is a perfect age for a freshman Senator, but it is extraordinarily old for the starting pitcher on a professional baseball team. Pitching for the Sioux City Explorers, J.D. Scholten last year compiled a 6-2 record and 5.40 ERA with 29 strikeouts over 60 innings of work. Scholten just might have the right pitches for Iowa voters.
Okay, if "we're all going to die" and she apparently doesn't mind killing many off early, then wnat's their problem with abortion? How is dying from starvation or preventable disease a better choice?
One is “God’s will” and one isn’t. A lot of religious conservatives really don’t worry about dying since they think they’ll be going to a better place. Their response to Covid was more or less the same.
Midterm jitters: It's early, I know, but I feel like the generic ballot polling is ok, but not great -- not like it was heading into 2018. It seems like the punditry assumes Dems will win the House, but I don't think it's a given. There are fewer crossover seats, Trump really isn't as unpopular as he used to be, we're even more polarized (if that's possible), the threat of new district lines in OH/LA/elsewhere means we may be down a few more seats right out of the gate, and I'm not seeing the same level of "awful GOP candidate vs. awesome Dem candidate" dynamics we've had since 2010 or so. And the Dem party brand is still in the toilet (good special election results notwithstanding).
And the Senate -- if we can't get an A-tier candidate in Maine, we're really up shit creek for the next decade or more. A good (but not amazing) night would be definitely winning ME and NC. An amazing night would be winning 1 or 2 of the reach seats like IA, AK, OH, TX.
Honestly the answer here really is in your first sentence. It's early. I don't recall 2018 polling look as good as the final results by mid 2017. Same for Trump's approvals.
We don't know where things will go. It could be that 2026 is an amazing year, a disappointment, or anything in between. Right now the data points towards something at the good end of things but there's 17 months to go, which is multiple eternities in politics. It's not worth stressing about right now, just as it isn't worth celebrating in advance either.
The difference is in 2017-18, President Trump was still a novelty. What will he do? How low will he go? Can you believe he said that? Now he's a supremely known quantity (as a President). Nothing moves his supporters, and no outside event seems to ding his standing long-term. The mushy middle is giving him a wider leash because he won the popular vote and Dems can't figure out what they stand for. He gained support among typically Dem constituencies.
I think Dems will have to gain *some* seats due to midterm inertia and our educated coalition, but I can't imagine what would cause a 2006-08-style wipeout for the GOP at this time. But as you say, we shall wait and see..
Nothing ever moves his supporters. Their static nature on that front is inherent. Them staying supporters doesn't tell us anything, good or bad, about the next election.
We're only five months in. Don't expect things to shift instantly.
Wait until summer of next year to start agonizing over numbers. Even then it will still be early, but it will be a close-enough early for it to start to have predictive power.
Nothing will move his supporters, but a significant portion of them don't turn out when he's not on the ballot (this was most notably the case in 2022).
If Collins becomes genuinely unpopular (something I'm skeptical about), an obscure candidate could beat her. Otherwise, unless the Republican brand becomes really toxic (think Linc Chafee losing reelection in Rhode Island despite something like 62% popularity in exit polls), no-one can beat her.
Dems didn't really have a decisive brand in 2018 either-it was more just a hodge-podge of folks who were against Trump. That probably works again next year, but by 28 they'll need a clear alternative to market.
That will need to be accomplished by our presidential nominee. Easy example: Democrats as a party didn't fundamentally rebrand in 2008, but instead lined up behind Obama and his political brand.
Hopefully 2028 sees us with a nominee that can pull off a good message on that front.
And 2006 was mostly just "not Bush/GOP", despite Pelosi and other leading Dems putting forth some proposals, most of which of course needed a PresiDem to become law.
How do we change the culture of the democratic party apparatus to do this? In some ways I feel like there are already many Dems who are taking this approach in non-safe states (likely because they have true first-hand experience of what it means to be under full republican governance long-term). But we lack this type of forcefulness in Dems from safe coastal states.
We'll see some modest improvement by next year at least: Durbin and Shaheen, two consistent moderate squishes, are retiring. I think there's good odds of Schumer retiring in 2028, and decent-ish odds that if he doesn't he is primaried out. Far more likely he retires than loses a primary, though. Fetterman looks extremely likely to be replaced in 2028 as well. We already replaced Sinema with Gallego.
The house is less of a problem on this front I'd argue, and our caucus there has been drifting slowly leftward over time.
Both processes are slower than we need, but it is happening. If we want to accelerate the change democratic incumbents that make the whole party look weak and spineless need to actually lose some primaries. I'm not particularly optimistic of that happening soon but it isn't a huge stretch either: I think if Schumer or Fetterman were up in 2026 either would be at least seriously threatened if not an outright underdog.
People treat state/federal stuff different fairly often, but NY has some real opportunities for us on that front. Unfortunately the bad candidates are currently favored. If Cuomo loses the NYC mayoral primary and Hochul loses her primary next year, that could be high profile enough to help.
I should note here that I'm not focusing the fault on moderates. It's the ones that seem obsessed with capitulation or folding on ideology at the first sign of opposition that I'm talking about as "moderate squishes." E.g. Mark Kelly is clearly and unambiguously a moderate, but he is not a problem at all.
They'd have to move to the right on some matters and the left on others. The CNN poll the other day, if even within 8 points of being right, showed a 30-year high on the % of voters who want government to do more. That shows how fickle voters are. As I've been saying for a while now....the political spectrum is not left vs. right. It's security vs. risk.
I don’t think Dems need to shift their positions at all. They need to get better marketing themselves and also playing politics. Most voters don’t care enough about policy, if they did then we’d always be winning.
One of the reasons for the low approval compared to Republicans who themselves have a low approval are liberals and moderates disapproving that Democrats aren't fighting back unlike Reps who rate the GOP highly in the crosstabs. Also, our own voters didn't forget the Biden dropout mess and that we just lost an election against someone insane.
The good thing is that midterms are mostly fought on the President's image, agenda and approval because ours is a two party system. Labour UK should've been scared to death with this approval not so much for us. The GOP's image was in the gutter in 2008 then Obama's polling crashed by 2010 and the rest is history.
It's June and there's been so few quality GCB polls as to make a judgement statement based off of them practically impossible. AtlasIntel, which despite their dodgy methodology have a pretty good track record, just showed Ds up 9.
There might be new districts in Utah too, which could finally mean SLC gets a representative of their own. So redistricting might not be all bad for Dems.
I'm expecting like 225-230 Dems in the 2027 House. Senate is still too early to have any precise feelings, but maybe 15-20% chance of getting to 50/50 (and courting Lisa Murkowski with all we've got).
The most we can imagine from Murkowski is her becoming an Independent. Alaskan politics don't warrant a party change for her, and it's unlikely she'd stop caucusing as a Republican unless they threw her out of their caucus.
Yeah, I agree that's "best case" (Independent caucusing with us for a hefty price), and she might not be disgusted enough to do that yet. But at 50/50, it would be worth a shot.
The Republicans tossing Murkowski out of the caucus is definitely a scenario that's possible if Republicans still have the majority in 2026 (though I think for this scenario to happen, Susan Collins has to be replaced by another Republican).
I worry about two things regarding the midterms: (1) people becoming complacent and/or fearful and accepting this new dystopia as normal, which seems to be an important pillar of every authoritarian regime, and (2) Trump finding some reason to "cancel" the midterms by declaring martial law (or "marshal law" if you're a Trumper). States control elections, but red states may comply, and it's not hard to imagine Trump supporters getting involved in blocking access to polling places or other tactics.
I highly doubt the midterms will be cancelled. Aside from the fact that Trump can't force a state to cancel its elections, the states that would comply are all states Republicans are already winning anyway so it has no real tangible impact.
If Trump issued an order to cancel the midterm elections-pretty much every state except for California, New York and maybe Illinois would comply-Trump would likely be ordering the military to shoot to kill any voter or official trying to hold elections, and most state officials do not want to get murdered.
I think what you aren't realizing is that the higher-ups in the military are still very anti-Trump, the rank and file are very pro-Trump and would have no problems carrying out this kind of order.
Surely not all of them, especially if it meant disobeying their commanders who order them not to do it. I don't know if further speculation will be useful, but I don't think that outright cancellations of elections by force would be taken in stride if not reversed effectively by some peaceful means.
If a president tries to cancel elections the country will devolve into mayhem with protests and probably even riots. Any state that complied would face extreme civil unrest. Yeah, probably not as much as there *should* be in such a case, but there would absolutely be a large and negative response from the citizenry.
Also: CA, NY, and IL as the states to resist it? California makes sense as listing but NY and IL aren't close to being the bluest states around. All of New England (even NH) would resist that first. Them plus Maryland, Delaware, Washington, Oregon, Hawaii are all reliably more blue than IL and NY.
Plus it's not legal for the military to try to enforce such orders within the US, if the order itself was otherwise legal. That has to be done by the national guard while under the control of state governments. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act
Obviously we're assuming a scenario where the executive branch is ignoring laws, but it's a lot easier to get the military to disobey an order if the order is fundamentally and plainly illegal on multiple levels.
There’s no way that would happen, if we got to that point we’d be in a state of outright civil war, no one is just gonna roll over to democracy explicitly ending.
Or FDJT backstabbing him? He projected his radical right-libertarian fantasies onto Ol' Donny just like many others and their own opposition fantasy projections during 2020-2024.
Delgado is clearly the best option in a field against Hochul and Torres, but have to note the mixed feelings around his claiming Latino identity as authentic or political. Not sure how this has gone on since he became LG, but it's definitely going to be a wedge tactic that Torres will use (and probably Hochul too tbh).
Torres was one of the wokest people in Congress before the Gaza war which we are not allowed to discuss here and called for Defunding the Police, Abolish ICE, Medicare for All etc. He always wanted to seen the most eminent person on the pro Israel side. One article aptly summarized it in the headline "Torres chose Israel over his progressive colleagues". But Dan Goldman is still a member of the Progressive Caucus, perhaps because he has moderate positions the conflict unlike Torres' extremely one sided views and regular loathing of his own party on Social Media. He thinks Fetterman's health scare and the death toll are conspiracy theories by leftists.
It’s good to see a robust primary for the Iowa seat. I hope whomever wins the Dem primary, be it Sage or Sholten, gives Ernst a run for her money. Force the GOP to divert money otherwise meant for Tillis or Collins to keep Ernst.
Exactly. And strong campaigns at the top of the ticket also help to win downballot races!
Yes! Would love to see a massive blue wave wash Joni Ernst out of Congress, Sand into the governor's mansion, and eliminate the GOP supermajority in the legislature.
I know it's wishful thinking, but having Sand in the governor's mansion alone would be a BIG improvement over the MAGA Karen who made Iowa the worst state to do business and find employment.
They just hate cities. With state-imposed tax limits, Iowa cities are forced into austerity by her nanny-state government despite rising property prices.
Whether it's Sage or Scholten, may the best Democrat win the primary. Most important thing is uniting post-primary and flipping the damn seat!! 💙🇺🇲
Guys, its not going to be Sage. You've got an overperforming state legislator with built-in name ID and a fundraising network vs. the director of the Chamber of Commerce for a city of 8,000. If Wahls gets in, you've got a primary, but the Sage guy screams also ran. Scholten has a legit chance at an upset here.
What happens if Iowa Dem primary voters want Sage? Scholten does have more name recognition in his state but only in his district.
Then the Democrats probably blew their shot at the seat. Scholten also ran ads in 2018 in the entire western half of the state. Look we all obviously follow politics too closely because we're on the Downballot message board in the middle of the day, but this isn't a legit primary with these two candidates.
I just want Ernst out of her seat as badly as I want Tillis out of his. If both seats flipped next year, I will be ecstatic even if the Senate majority remains GOP controlled.
I agree. There is a path developing for Dems to take back the Senate majority with a 2018-style environment. Tillis is most endangered even if Cooper doesn't run. Dems have a solid bench in NC and NC was (relative to 2020) Kamala's 1st or 2nd best swing state (WI being the other). Ernst keeps putting her foot in her mouth and now has an overperforming challenger with strong fundraising network. Dems still need a candidate against Collins but she's clearly vulnerable. Paxton looks likely to win the primary in Texas and if Allred runs again (another overperformer w/ good fundraising), Dems have a shot there, especially if the polling showing latin voters souring on GOP are to be believed. Wild card is Alaska. Even though Peltola isn't likely to go for Senate, Valerie Davidson is likely to run statewide and has a Peltola-esque profile. Ohio is pretty far down at this point because it doesn't look like we'll be able to pull Ryan or Brown into the race.
NC had a closer margin than PA and other states?
2020->2024
AZ D+0.3 ->R+5.5 (5.8 pt swing)
GA D+0.2 -> R+2.2 (2.4 pt swing)
MI D+2.8 -> R+1.4 (4.2 pt swing)
NC R+1.3 -> R+3.2 (1.9 pt swing)
NV D+2.4 -> R+3.1 (5.5 pt swing)
PA D+1.2 -> R+1.7 (2.9 pt swing)
WI D+0.6 -> R+0.9 (1.7 pt swing)
WI, NC, & GA all held up relatively well compared to AZ, MI, NV, & PA.
Would be why I'm bullish on Tillis losing and Dems having a good night in GA in 2026.
You'd have to be a massive dolt not to be able to unseat Tillis in 2026. He's done nothing to stop or even ameliorate the federal assault on the biotech industry (which is a key economic driver in the very populous Reasearch Triangle region).
That said, us Cakalaky Democrats HAVE nominated some massive dolts (cough cough, Cal Cunningham) in prior cycles. Let's hope that the new Party leadership has adequately vetted Wiley Nickel, if he is indeed the "normie lane" candidate (95% sure he is/will be).
Wiley Nickel so far doesn't have any skeletons in his closet, ala Cunningham. I am praying and trying to manifest former governor Roy Cooper into running for the Senate seat though.
Cooper is way more battle tested than Nickel and voters know who he is. Tillis is not only very unpopular but he will have a hard time trying to define Cooper (even with his PAC buddies funding negative ads) and the latter has won more statewide races than the former.
I hope that Cooper has been impressed with the new Democratic leadership and the successful fight to keep Allison Riggs' seat that he's inspired to run against Tillis next year. I'd be so thrilled to vote for him on the ballot.
The 5% is my caveat for Cooper running. He doesn't want to, but there is an ever-so-slight chance that he will if polling shows that he - and ONLY he - would almost surely beat Tillis.
I think with our base mad about Trump and the Riggs shenanigans, the "no skeletons" is really all we will need.
Even the GOP voters who voted for Griffin are furious at his behavior and they may not vote for the GOP justices next go round. The whole Riggs/Griffin debacle made national AND international headlines.
I'll believe Republican voters are mad at a Republican for trying to steal an election the first time they vote against someone for that.
I think you’re right that this is Scholten’s primary to lose and that it likely won’t be a close primary. However, late popping scandals or drop outs even for current elected politicians do sometimes occur (to D’s and R’s). It’s great to at least have a backup plan.
That said, I do think it would be a very good idea for Democrats to have both running campaigns in the primary race, because currently elected party insider vs WWC party outsider reaches different parts of the base/state and would likely target different audiences (which Democrats need both of to pull off a miracle in Iowa, part of their old ancestral base back from the GOP and their entire new educated base with high turn out).
"My Senate career is going to die."
– Senator Jon Ernst, paraphrased
From your keyboard to God's ears...
Maybe she's just going through a Goth phase?
I'm afraid this happened early enough that a) the stink will wear off in 1.5 years, or b) if her polling really does take a nosedive, she has enough time to decide not to run again. This would've been a great June 2026 gaffe.
I'm sure the Democratic nominee will use this recording in attack ads in 2026 to remind Iowa voters of her statement. The effectiveness of this attack will depend a lot on whether or not the "big, beautiful bill" actually passes. If it doesn't, then there's a good chance that the stink will wear off by the fall of next year.
If the bill passes, though, I think it'll definitely be an effective attack ad. In the 2014 Senate election, some people were saying that Bruce Braley's "farmer from Iowa" gaffe would be forgotten about by November 2014. Voters in Iowa never fully forgave him for that, and it's one reason why Joni Ernst won by a comfortable margin that year. The same thing could happen to Ernst next year, especially if the "big, beautiful bill" passes and voters in Iowa have to face the consequences of it.
I don't think Braley's "farmer from Iowa" comment had any real impact on the race. I just think Iowa was well within its pivot to becoming a red state by 2014 and Ernst's 8-point margin reflected the shift.
I don't know...comments like this form a lasting impression in people's minds, even if they forget the details of what was actually said. She let her constituents know she's callous and unconcerned about their lives. That may stick with them longer than the actual words she said. And there will be plenty of campaign ads reminding Iowans of exactly what she said. Her quote was so bad, and yet so emblematic of Republican policies, that I wouldn't be surprised to see her comments end up in ads in other states! They all think that way; Ernst just said it out loud, and her comments may end up being an albatross for all Republicans.
Exit polls in South Korea election show landslide victory for left-wing leader Lee Jae Myung
https://bsky.app/profile/the-independent.com/post/3lqp5nplzus2v
That's a relief considering how disappointing the Poland election was this past Sunday.
After the attempted coup anything other than that would've been considered a colossal disappointment
Considering the DP’s majorities in Congress there’s much he can accomplish
He needs to enshrine free speech protections for feminists into law, they have witch-hunts against them going on in Korea. The gender voting difference is exponentially worse there compared to any western nation.
Korea might legit be the first country in history to have a boys vs. girls civil war. Not even joking, it’s that toxic
Like fully unvarnished misogyny? I can't imagine Korean feminists are all that prickly.
They harass singers to death if they suspect she made a feminist gesture in the music video and deface and occupy seats in public transport marked for pregnant and older women.
You don't have a 0.55 birth rate in city where most of the population lives for no reason.
So no veneer of chivalry? That's disgusting.
With 20% of ballots counted, Lee Jae-myung is in the lead with 47.6% of the vote, while Kim Moon-soo has 44.2%.
Earlier, with 10% counted, the two were nearly neck and neck. The latest numbers, along with exit polls, suggest Lee’s lead may continue to grow.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/live-blog/2025-06-03/south-korean-presidential-election
"40% of votes counted: Lee Jae-myung leads with 48.9% Kim Moon-soo at 42.8%."
UPDATE: 70% of Votes Counted – Lee 48.5%, Kim 43%.
Kim Moon-soo concedes defeat.
UPDATE: With 90% of votes counted – Lee 48.4%, Kim 42.6%. Decisive!
Closer than polling indicated however (which was over a double-digit win).
Considering that American incels are Gloria Steinem by Korean standards I can’t say I’m surprised
Now up to a 8% magin.
SOUTH KOREA
At 6am, 14,295 polling stations will open nationwide. They close at 8pm, two hours later than usual elections, because this is a by-election following former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s impeachment over his Dec. 3 martial law declaration.
The number of eligible voters is about 44.39 million, including 15.42 million who participated in early voting last Thursday and Friday, and 205,268 who took part in overseas voting, according to the National Election Commission (NEC).
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/southkorea/politics/20250602/koreans-to-head-to-polls-to-elect-new-president-tuesday
PS. Anyone have links to the live count? It’s past 10pm in Seoul now; polls throughout South Korea closed over two hours ago.
They called it for Lee, who secured 51.7% of the vote. Nearly 80% of registered voters in South Korea participated in the snap election.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/politics/government/liberal-lee-jae-myung-projected-to-win-south-korea-presidency-in-martial-law-judgement-day/ar-AA1G01LM?ocid=BingNewsVerp
No, these are not the official count – just projections based on exit polls.
To me, it doesn't sounds like Artiles is appealing at all.
VA-11 special date set. September 9, https://x.com/bluevirginia/status/1929882320271466627
It's better then November maybe Youngkin thought it would juice turnout in NOVA?
Quick note: Jermaine Johnson went to the College of Charleston, not university of Charleston
Thank you for the catch! We've corrected it.
The governing coalition in the Netherlands collapsed on Tuesday after the populist leader Geert Wilders withdrew his party over a dispute about migration policy, ending a rocky 11-month rule by the country’s first far-right government and triggering early elections.
It was not immediately clear when new elections would take place, but they appeared unlikely to happen before October, plunging the country into political uncertainty for at least the rest of the year. Mr. Wilders’s party has been dropping in Dutch polls lately.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/03/world/europe/geert-wilders-netherlands-coalition.html?smtyp=cur&smid=bsky-nytimes
Sounds like a remarkably high stakes gamble on Wilders’ part
Reading the Qur'an will apparently be safe for at least a while. Wilders had called for banning it.
far right led* government, there are centrist parties in the coalition.
Did Geert say "We hebben een serieus probleem" before ducking out?
Presumably nobody else in government wanted a schmoke and a pancake
Mayor Ras J. Baraka of Newark, a Democratic candidate for governor who was arrested last month outside an immigration detention center, filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday against Alina Habba, the interim U.S. attorney for New Jersey, that argues that his arrest was motivated by political malice, not justice.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/03/nyregion/ras-baraka-alina-habba-lawsuit-ice.html
Baraka definitely doesn't waste time. He's a fighting Democrat.
Regardless of who wins in the NJ-GOV primary next Tuesday, I hope Baraka continues to be relevant in the Democratic Party.
45 is a perfect age for a freshman Senator, but it is extraordinarily old for the starting pitcher on a professional baseball team. Pitching for the Sioux City Explorers, J.D. Scholten last year compiled a 6-2 record and 5.40 ERA with 29 strikeouts over 60 innings of work. Scholten just might have the right pitches for Iowa voters.
Okay, if "we're all going to die" and she apparently doesn't mind killing many off early, then wnat's their problem with abortion? How is dying from starvation or preventable disease a better choice?
Right, but expecting logic from Republican voters is not a good bet.
One is “God’s will” and one isn’t. A lot of religious conservatives really don’t worry about dying since they think they’ll be going to a better place. Their response to Covid was more or less the same.
Midterm jitters: It's early, I know, but I feel like the generic ballot polling is ok, but not great -- not like it was heading into 2018. It seems like the punditry assumes Dems will win the House, but I don't think it's a given. There are fewer crossover seats, Trump really isn't as unpopular as he used to be, we're even more polarized (if that's possible), the threat of new district lines in OH/LA/elsewhere means we may be down a few more seats right out of the gate, and I'm not seeing the same level of "awful GOP candidate vs. awesome Dem candidate" dynamics we've had since 2010 or so. And the Dem party brand is still in the toilet (good special election results notwithstanding).
And the Senate -- if we can't get an A-tier candidate in Maine, we're really up shit creek for the next decade or more. A good (but not amazing) night would be definitely winning ME and NC. An amazing night would be winning 1 or 2 of the reach seats like IA, AK, OH, TX.
Honestly the answer here really is in your first sentence. It's early. I don't recall 2018 polling look as good as the final results by mid 2017. Same for Trump's approvals.
We don't know where things will go. It could be that 2026 is an amazing year, a disappointment, or anything in between. Right now the data points towards something at the good end of things but there's 17 months to go, which is multiple eternities in politics. It's not worth stressing about right now, just as it isn't worth celebrating in advance either.
The difference is in 2017-18, President Trump was still a novelty. What will he do? How low will he go? Can you believe he said that? Now he's a supremely known quantity (as a President). Nothing moves his supporters, and no outside event seems to ding his standing long-term. The mushy middle is giving him a wider leash because he won the popular vote and Dems can't figure out what they stand for. He gained support among typically Dem constituencies.
I think Dems will have to gain *some* seats due to midterm inertia and our educated coalition, but I can't imagine what would cause a 2006-08-style wipeout for the GOP at this time. But as you say, we shall wait and see..
A depression or severe recession could cause a wipeout.
Nothing ever moves his supporters. Their static nature on that front is inherent. Them staying supporters doesn't tell us anything, good or bad, about the next election.
We're only five months in. Don't expect things to shift instantly.
Wait until summer of next year to start agonizing over numbers. Even then it will still be early, but it will be a close-enough early for it to start to have predictive power.
Nothing will move his supporters, but a significant portion of them don't turn out when he's not on the ballot (this was most notably the case in 2022).
If Collins becomes genuinely unpopular (something I'm skeptical about), an obscure candidate could beat her. Otherwise, unless the Republican brand becomes really toxic (think Linc Chafee losing reelection in Rhode Island despite something like 62% popularity in exit polls), no-one can beat her.
I thought Jon Tester was safe last year too... until he was ousted.
Same thing for Susan "I'm Very Concerned" Collins.
Tester never won by big margins, though, and MT is much more Republican than Maine is Democratic.
What about Sherrod Brown then?
You're analogizing bright red Ohio with light blue Maine? Yes, it could happen, but did you bet against Brown until he lost?
No, i didn’t.
Neither did I. And therefore, as we've been repeatedly disappointed by serious candidates losing to Collins,
I similarly won't bet against her until she actually loses, leaves office for another reason or dies.
Woah, you thought Tester was safe?
I thought with abortion on the ballot in MT and how moderate he was, he'd eke out a narrow win.
Nope.
Her approval rating is in the toilet now and in a far worse place then it was in 2019.
"Her approval rating is only 24%, with 61% of voters disapproving of her. She faces strong
disapproval from both Harris (17/71) and Trump (30/52) voters alike.
Trump is unpopular in Maine too, with 44% of voters approving of him to 52% who disapprove.
A big part of Collins’ problem is that when it comes to Trump her approach is just antagonizing
everyone. 81% of Harris voters think she votes with Trump too often…and 73% of Trump voters
think she doesn’t vote with Trump often enough. Only 10% think she’s striking the right balance"
https://www.publicpolicypolling.com/polls/mainers-concerned-with-collins/
Especially in Maine, opinion polls don't vote. I'll believe she'll lose when we see it.
Maine politicians are acting like she's safe.
How do we improve the Dem Party Brand? Especially in States that aren't on the coast.
Economic populism and a take no prisoners style of politics practiced by Republicans. And leaders willing to do both.
We're doomed.
LOL.
Dems didn't really have a decisive brand in 2018 either-it was more just a hodge-podge of folks who were against Trump. That probably works again next year, but by 28 they'll need a clear alternative to market.
That will need to be accomplished by our presidential nominee. Easy example: Democrats as a party didn't fundamentally rebrand in 2008, but instead lined up behind Obama and his political brand.
Hopefully 2028 sees us with a nominee that can pull off a good message on that front.
And 2006 was mostly just "not Bush/GOP", despite Pelosi and other leading Dems putting forth some proposals, most of which of course needed a PresiDem to become law.
How do we change the culture of the democratic party apparatus to do this? In some ways I feel like there are already many Dems who are taking this approach in non-safe states (likely because they have true first-hand experience of what it means to be under full republican governance long-term). But we lack this type of forcefulness in Dems from safe coastal states.
Simplest way to change is replacement.
We'll see some modest improvement by next year at least: Durbin and Shaheen, two consistent moderate squishes, are retiring. I think there's good odds of Schumer retiring in 2028, and decent-ish odds that if he doesn't he is primaried out. Far more likely he retires than loses a primary, though. Fetterman looks extremely likely to be replaced in 2028 as well. We already replaced Sinema with Gallego.
The house is less of a problem on this front I'd argue, and our caucus there has been drifting slowly leftward over time.
Both processes are slower than we need, but it is happening. If we want to accelerate the change democratic incumbents that make the whole party look weak and spineless need to actually lose some primaries. I'm not particularly optimistic of that happening soon but it isn't a huge stretch either: I think if Schumer or Fetterman were up in 2026 either would be at least seriously threatened if not an outright underdog.
People treat state/federal stuff different fairly often, but NY has some real opportunities for us on that front. Unfortunately the bad candidates are currently favored. If Cuomo loses the NYC mayoral primary and Hochul loses her primary next year, that could be high profile enough to help.
I should note here that I'm not focusing the fault on moderates. It's the ones that seem obsessed with capitulation or folding on ideology at the first sign of opposition that I'm talking about as "moderate squishes." E.g. Mark Kelly is clearly and unambiguously a moderate, but he is not a problem at all.
Primaries. Especially in Dark Blue districts.
Probably have to move right on a whole host of issues. The cake is baked for a lot of these voters and they're not budging
Even if they did move right, they wouldn't believe it in the near to medium term.
They'd have to move to the right on some matters and the left on others. The CNN poll the other day, if even within 8 points of being right, showed a 30-year high on the % of voters who want government to do more. That shows how fickle voters are. As I've been saying for a while now....the political spectrum is not left vs. right. It's security vs. risk.
But based on some big misunderstandings.
I don’t think Dems need to shift their positions at all. They need to get better marketing themselves and also playing politics. Most voters don’t care enough about policy, if they did then we’d always be winning.
Right, but while they like things, a lot of white people want to deny them to Black people, et al.
One of the reasons for the low approval compared to Republicans who themselves have a low approval are liberals and moderates disapproving that Democrats aren't fighting back unlike Reps who rate the GOP highly in the crosstabs. Also, our own voters didn't forget the Biden dropout mess and that we just lost an election against someone insane.
The good thing is that midterms are mostly fought on the President's image, agenda and approval because ours is a two party system. Labour UK should've been scared to death with this approval not so much for us. The GOP's image was in the gutter in 2008 then Obama's polling crashed by 2010 and the rest is history.
I scoured the internet and I found this generic ballot average, https://www.racetothewh.com/senate/26polls
A 7 point swing from November to +3 now doesn't seem so bad!
It's June and there's been so few quality GCB polls as to make a judgement statement based off of them practically impossible. AtlasIntel, which despite their dodgy methodology have a pretty good track record, just showed Ds up 9.
There might be new districts in Utah too, which could finally mean SLC gets a representative of their own. So redistricting might not be all bad for Dems.
When? After the 2030 Census?
I think the reference is to reversing the gerrymander.
If the lawsuit is successful, it would be for 2026.
https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2025/02/01/utah-judge-hears-final-arguments/
Thanks. That could be important.
I'm expecting like 225-230 Dems in the 2027 House. Senate is still too early to have any precise feelings, but maybe 15-20% chance of getting to 50/50 (and courting Lisa Murkowski with all we've got).
The most we can imagine from Murkowski is her becoming an Independent. Alaskan politics don't warrant a party change for her, and it's unlikely she'd stop caucusing as a Republican unless they threw her out of their caucus.
Yeah, I agree that's "best case" (Independent caucusing with us for a hefty price), and she might not be disgusted enough to do that yet. But at 50/50, it would be worth a shot.
Oh sure. I'm sure Democrats continually engage in such discussions with Murkowski.
I think it'll take a pretty major red line cross for her to make that jump . . .which means it could happen!
Very low chance. If it ever happens, she'd become an independent caucusing with the Democrats.
The Republicans tossing Murkowski out of the caucus is definitely a scenario that's possible if Republicans still have the majority in 2026 (though I think for this scenario to happen, Susan Collins has to be replaced by another Republican).
I don't see any Republican Majority Leader throwing someone out of their caucus and making themselves a minority. That's wishful thinking.
I'm assuming Maine is the only seat we win in 2026.
Then we very well may not flip any seats. But why do you think Tillis will win?
The North Carolina GOP is more than willing to steal elections -I suspect they'll actually be successful in a federal race.
Point taken. Do Democrats have no control over NC elections?
I'm actually not sure.
I worry about two things regarding the midterms: (1) people becoming complacent and/or fearful and accepting this new dystopia as normal, which seems to be an important pillar of every authoritarian regime, and (2) Trump finding some reason to "cancel" the midterms by declaring martial law (or "marshal law" if you're a Trumper). States control elections, but red states may comply, and it's not hard to imagine Trump supporters getting involved in blocking access to polling places or other tactics.
I highly doubt the midterms will be cancelled. Aside from the fact that Trump can't force a state to cancel its elections, the states that would comply are all states Republicans are already winning anyway so it has no real tangible impact.
If Trump issued an order to cancel the midterm elections-pretty much every state except for California, New York and maybe Illinois would comply-Trump would likely be ordering the military to shoot to kill any voter or official trying to hold elections, and most state officials do not want to get murdered.
There would be appeals for the military to disobey the order, and it could lead to civil unrest.
I think what you aren't realizing is that the higher-ups in the military are still very anti-Trump, the rank and file are very pro-Trump and would have no problems carrying out this kind of order.
Surely not all of them, especially if it meant disobeying their commanders who order them not to do it. I don't know if further speculation will be useful, but I don't think that outright cancellations of elections by force would be taken in stride if not reversed effectively by some peaceful means.
If a president tries to cancel elections the country will devolve into mayhem with protests and probably even riots. Any state that complied would face extreme civil unrest. Yeah, probably not as much as there *should* be in such a case, but there would absolutely be a large and negative response from the citizenry.
Also: CA, NY, and IL as the states to resist it? California makes sense as listing but NY and IL aren't close to being the bluest states around. All of New England (even NH) would resist that first. Them plus Maryland, Delaware, Washington, Oregon, Hawaii are all reliably more blue than IL and NY.
Plus it's not legal for the military to try to enforce such orders within the US, if the order itself was otherwise legal. That has to be done by the national guard while under the control of state governments. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act
Obviously we're assuming a scenario where the executive branch is ignoring laws, but it's a lot easier to get the military to disobey an order if the order is fundamentally and plainly illegal on multiple levels.
There’s no way that would happen, if we got to that point we’d be in a state of outright civil war, no one is just gonna roll over to democracy explicitly ending.
MAGA divorce https://x.com/BaddCompani/status/1929960747468997009
Musk backstabbing FDJT is delicious.
Or FDJT backstabbing him? He projected his radical right-libertarian fantasies onto Ol' Donny just like many others and their own opposition fantasy projections during 2020-2024.
Today in "most predictable news ever"....
https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/06/03/congress/virginia-special-election-gerry-connolly-00382072
The Special Election for VA-11 has been set for September 9.
The day after I turn the big 4-0...
Ten days before I turn the big 5-0...
7 months and 7 days after I turn 60...
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5yg8dxv5w9o
Mongolian Prime Minister Luvsannamsrain Oyun-Erdene has been sacked amid a corruption investigation.
Delgado is clearly the best option in a field against Hochul and Torres, but have to note the mixed feelings around his claiming Latino identity as authentic or political. Not sure how this has gone on since he became LG, but it's definitely going to be a wedge tactic that Torres will use (and probably Hochul too tbh).
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/21/nyregion/antonio-delgado-afro-latino.html
I’d be surprised if Torres runs.
still such a shame that Torres replaced Serrano
Torres was one of the wokest people in Congress before the Gaza war which we are not allowed to discuss here and called for Defunding the Police, Abolish ICE, Medicare for All etc. He always wanted to seen the most eminent person on the pro Israel side. One article aptly summarized it in the headline "Torres chose Israel over his progressive colleagues". But Dan Goldman is still a member of the Progressive Caucus, perhaps because he has moderate positions the conflict unlike Torres' extremely one sided views and regular loathing of his own party on Social Media. He thinks Fetterman's health scare and the death toll are conspiracy theories by leftists.