whereas such concerns were fully brushed aside in 2021 by Va dem establishment re terry. I say this as both a compliment to the folks on here and a complaint regarding the lack of party infrastructure, but why are we (mostly amateurs that donate, canvass, and sometimes more) seemingly so often ahead of where the conventional democratic consultant wisdom is. And I say this as someone that held my tongue and was a party apologist since at least 2014.
If even Emerson is giving Spanberger a 10-point lead, then she's definitely in very good shape. And the decline in ticket-splitting should give Hashmi and Jones easy wins as well.
As of 8/31, Jones is being way out-spent, had raised a lot less, and had a lot less money. While he should be aided by Dems voting for the whole ticket, he could really use some contributions.
Chaz Nuttycombe has given him a VERY high probability of winning the AG race -- as in 91%. Just because Miyares has outraised and outspent him doesn't mean Miyares automatically wins.
This is my thinking exactly. If Spanberger actually wins by 10, then Jones will win by at least 7 just because there will be so few ticket-splitters. Don't forget that all three 2021 statewide races were within 2 percent of each other, even though Dems also had an incumbent AG at the time.
Yeah, Republicans in the state have basically said if she wins by more than 5 he’s toast. Anything less than that and it’s more of a jump ball. 2-3 point win for Spanberger and I think he could pull it off. Miyares will perform the best on the GOP ticket obviously and the recent hit on Jones for speeding was not ideal, but partisanship is a hell of a drug and Trump is president. If Harris had won, I think he’d most likely get re-elected in the 2025 election.
I'm curious -- what do people here think of our chances regarding the House of Delegates? I've heard there are a number of GOP-held seats Kamala won -- thoughts?
Chaz Nuttycombe says there's a 15% chance VA Dems could score a Democratic supermajority in the House of Delegates, which is stunning for a blue leaning state with fair legislative maps.
Odds are very good they're expanding their majority from 2023, which bodes well for getting the three constitutional amendments on the November 2026 ballot.
Abortion protection, marriage equality, and automatic voter rights restoration to felons who completed prison time. They passed it in both houses this year and it needs to pass the HOD and state Senate again in early 2026 to get onto the ballot.
Correct - it's actually still a slight Republican gerrymander. You can see it in the small details:
HD-41 should be a safe Dem district based in Blacksburg, but instead it unnecessarily takes in a whole bunch of heavily Republican rural areas.
HD-57 should be entirely in Henrico, but a small slice of Goochland was added to make it redder, and that made the difference in 2023.
HDs 69 & 71 were carefully drawn to crack the Dem-leaning Williamsburg area between two Republican-leaning districts.
HD-72 puts a rapidly Dem-trending slice of Chesterfield in with several rural, heavily Republican counties.
HD-82 puts heavily African-American Petersburg with some heavily white, right-wing rural areas, so that in off-years they would just barely outvote Petersburg.
HD-86 should be entirely in Hampton, but instead they added ultra-far-right Poquoson to the district just to make it lean Republican.
Republicans hold 8 seats that Harris won (ranging from Harris+0.7 to +9.4) and Democrats don't hold any Trump seats. The weakest Dem seat is Harris +5.2. I'd say we're in a strong position to keep the majority.
I'm guessing those 8 seats are mostly affluent ancestrally Republican outer suburbs. In California most of those areas (like the one I live in) are much more blue at the federal level than at the state level.
That poll has Trump approval at 42-54 (about where his national average is) and party split as 37D-35R (2021 exit poll has 36D-34R) so it doesn't look like the sample is too blue.
If anything it looks slightly red, as that Trump approval for a recently blue state is about the same as the national average, though Emerson tends to give Trump better than average national numbers.
Gov. Youngkin's approval is a rather tepid 46-41, which isn't enough to save Earle-Sears, and might not have saved himself from the Trump downdraft.
Earle-Sears' best (only?) hope for overcoming the drag of the national GOP is/was that Youngkin would be sufficiently popular for the "I'm his second term" theme to work. If voters are "meh" even regarding him, then it's hard to see her winning unless Spanberger somehow implodes.
And Youngkin hasn't been particularly helpful to Earle-Sears with his cozying up to Trump (maybe in hopes of an appointment or presidential bid of his own?) and his pooh-poohing of the impacts of DOGE and other Trump policies on the state.
I figured someone with a prestigious background like Youngkin working for the Bush family’s favorite investment company, The Carlyle Group, would have better sense of the future he had when he originally ran for Governor.
The government shutdown should pretty much seal the deal for Abigail Spanberger winning the VA-GOV race.
I really don’t see how Winsome Earle-Sears is going to get any traction at this point, especially given she’s run a god awful campaign and really doesn’t give a damn about Virginians.
A Washington Post one-day survey of 1,010 adults asked: Who do you think is mainly responsible for the federal government partially shutting down? The response was R's 47%; D's 30%; Not sure 23%.
Fortunately history also tells us that we don't need an extra shutdown boost or other particularly special factors to do well in a midterm with an unpopular president and Congress controlled by the opposite party.
If ever there was data saying Democrats need to hold the line in the sand for once, this is definitely it. Almost a majority of voters blame Republicans and the issue Democrats are using to justify them withholding their votes is extremely popular. Can’t ask for a better setup to show the base their fight and come out on top of Trump and his cult party in the standoff. Will they follow through though? I guess time will tell.
Florida is stubborn, but perhaps the inflation, the Cuban/Venezuela population being hit by ICE raids and the unpopular RDS years may move the needle a bit.
He was in his 50’s when back in 2006 he ran for the Senate in the Democratic Primary Race against Ben Cardin to replace retiring Senator Paul Sarbanes.
DSA-backed NYC Councilwoman Alexa Aviles is considering challenging Dan Goldman in the Dem primary. Apparently Cameron Kasky is too, having previously considered NY-12.
My fear is that a split field will end up with Goldman winning again, like he did in 2022 and like Shri Thanedar keeps doing.
I lived through Cawthon's term in Congress as a constituent. His public statements and actions reflected poorly on us. Worse, however, was his disdain for his district. He seldom returned to the district; instead, he was in Florida or Texas raising funds for reelection. His local office was closed most of this time, and despite most of his staff being communication experts, he did not reply to his constituents.
He has been a dynamic speaker since his days as a child preacher. So he knows how to influence a group. I grew up in the district where he is running and hope the residents of Southwest Florida look closely at at Cawthon and question why he was defeated for reelection in the republican primary.
Cawthorn is an idiot and uses being in a wheelchair to try to spin anything he does in taking responsibility for his actions. He was a douche in college as well and had sexually harassed multiple women on campus even while it was a Christian school. Quite a “Christian” Cawthorn is.
There’s a reason House leadership went out of their way to get rid of him after only one term, and that hasn’t changed (especially with him parachuting into a traditionally red district with a deep bench of people who are actually, you know, from there)
If Christianity is really promoting child preachers, then it deserves its decline in this country. When I see "child preacher", I think either 'manipulative scammer' or 'brainwashed with terrible parents'.
I'm Jewish, and I don't want there to be any such thing as child rabbis.
There can't be child rabbis, but there can be children who are knowledgeable about Torah and can give a d'var Torah. I think the difference is that being a rabbi requires knowledge of law, scriptures and commentary as well as a degree of maturity and life experience; certain brands of Christianity require only explaining how everyone needs to be saved through faith in Jesus Christ, lest they perish in an eternal flame, etc., etc.
Yes but what you are describing is driven on the basis of acquiring knowledge instead of being driven by ego. This certainly evolves for anyone who practices any form of religion, be it any denomination of Christianity.
I definitely don't deny that knowledge and experience count, and I've heard brilliant and moving Christian preaching that could not have been given by a child, including by a former schoolmate whose debut as a preacher I was privileged to help accompany as part of a small band and whose ministry was tragically cut short by a severe stroke, but the sheer number of points of law that a rabbi needs to be intimately familiar with, such that they can resolve disputes on points of law among members of their congregation convincingly, is much greater than the number of Gospel verses and arguments from daily life a talented young preacher can mobilize in a fire-and-brimstone sermon.
I don’t know everything that goes on behind the scenes with rabbis but what you’re describing about them makes sense.
That said, if we were to compare between say Charlie Kirk and Madison Cawthorn, Kirk was definitely a better Christian. Like me, he was a Boy Scout which gives boys great leadership skills early on in their lives. Kirk also didn’t have controversy with women like Cawthorn did.
It baffles me how anyone could take seriously a preacher, of any religion, if they didn't have that knowledge, maturity, and experience that you mentioned.
You had good instincts there! I don't have a good finger on the pulse of republicans here, but with that qualification out of the way I doubt he'd be able to beat Ayotte. Would be good for us if he tried, regardless of the outcome.
I think that's very possible. Right now I'd have NH-Gov as an election we could win, but it's unlikely. If things stayed as-is and I woke up Nov 4 2026 and the first headline I saw was "Ayotte loses" I'd take that to mean we had a very big wave. Bigger than 2018. If Ayotte faces a credible primary challenge, that changes. I'd still start with her favored, but only lightly, pending how that primary challenge went.
It's hard to defeat incumbents here. A good part of that is the late September primary. Incumbents get to stockpile cash and stay above the fray while their opponents tear themselves apart in a primary. A credible primary challenger removes that advantage for Ayotte, and even if she wins she'd still be hurt by that.
It'd be nice if NH regains a Democratic state trifecta if only briefly, just to add early voting, higher wages and abortion protections to state law.
It's so bizarre to see NH behind -- they vote blue on the federal level but almost consistently put Rs in power on the state level. I know there's a libertarian streak to NH as a purple state, but the ticket splitting is ridiculous.
A bit of a nitpick: NH isn't libertarian at all. it's a weird bit of post-WW2 marketing that was so successful that almost everyone assumes it as a default.
Major democrats here are classic "business moderates" for lack of a better term. You won't find much support for criminal justice reform, marijuana legalization, or similar from major dems here. Republicans are a hybrid of non-theocratic MAGA and Bush era neoconservatives. The only part of their ideology that would fit libertarianism is a hatred of taxes, but that's standard republican orthodoxy across their entire party.
I would say unironically that NH is arguably the least libertarian state in New England, and one of the least in the country.
Federal republicans would do a lot better in NH if they weren't so proudly anti-intellectual and over the top in pushing evangelicalism. Local republicans benefit from being able to avoid that and do better as a result. Even then while the local-election advantage exists, their recent victories make it look larger than it is. They gerrymandered the legislature and executive council in 2010 and then again in 2020. They narrowly won the governor's office with a famous last name in 2016 and then won the 2024 open seat after avoiding an expensive, drawn out primary while we did have one, in what ended up being a lightly red year nationally.
Former Rep. Cori Bush is officially in. Whatever her flaws may be, I welcome someone primarying Wesley Bell after the bodyguard incident, among others.
Question: could Bell lose to Bush, or is Bell secure enough? Worth noting that St. Louis apparently has a base of white leftists, per Bluesky — I personally think this primary could be close. Thoughts?
Previous Republican nominee Monique DeSpain is trying again against Dem Rep. Val Hoyle. Question: given Hoyle’s ethics scandals, could she be in trouble? Or is the Dem-friendly environment enough for her?
I think Hoyle will be fine. Oregon Democrats are going to turn out. The BOLI scandal isn't great but is old news, and I don't think the stock disclosure mistakes are enough to break through.
For IL-SEN: Kelly might get some traction if she strongly opposes the ICE raid in her district this week. Still think this is Raja's and it won't be close.
I’m getting really sick of this argument. The GOP is filled with circus freaks and yet they keep winning and winning. Yet the Dems have to constantly moderate and moderate and moderate? Who are we appealing to? How did this work out for Kamala?
Bush may have issues but I’m tired of us having to moderate to nothingness. What the hell are we even supposed to stand for?
I think that the Dems should have something resembling a coherent ideology, or at least some form of guiding principle(s). We cannot be everything at once, otherwise we end up with the Manchin/Sinema mess we had last time (or for the flipside, the Dems who didn't vote for Biden's budget on left-related concerns). I'm not seeing that in today's Democratic Party. There are Dems voting for Trump nominees, Dems calling for socialism, different Dems with 10 stances on various issues. Ezra Klein just called for the Dems to run anti-abortion candidates.
At some point we stop standing for anything. I'd say democracy, but given the constant Dem voting for GOP nominees even that is shaky. I worry voters don't see us as standing for anything, and that that's a contributing factor to our reputational decline. I think we need to agree on something. If we moderate too much, we have no ideology left, we just become compromise on everything, even things like democracy. There's also the risk of being too pro-business, which does alienate people -- look at what happened with Macron in France. It's possible to do the opposite as well, go so far into progressivism that you end up alienating others like what happened with Corbyn in the UK. We need to at least agree on something. I worry the inverse is leading us to disaster.
The disaster already happened last year. Trying to drum people out of the party now is crazy, IMO. We need unity against tyranny and for democracy. The rest is tactics.
My problem with Bush isn't that she is too progressive, but rather just not very effective at getting anything done and isn't a reliable vote. It's the same problem with the most moderate Dems, even if I personally agree with Bush more.
That’s a very valid argument! Effective/ineffective legislators is an issue transcending political boundaries. Politicians left, right, and center have fallen prey to forgetting this step — Jamaal Bowman on the left, Sean Patrick Maloney in the center, and Madison Cawthorn on the right are some examples from different factions — and I’m a lot more sympathetic to arguments over effectiveness than I am pure ideology. I am a progressive myself for the record.
If Bush can’t do it maybe she isn’t the one. I don’t think Bell has been either. A third candidate is probably what’s needed, I just wish we could find one.
Also, I'll add that The Dissident's Alejandra Caraballo noted on Bluesky that Earle-Sears fixating universally on opposing transgender rights has not worked for her campaign.
Caraballo has a valid point. Youngkin is relatively popular for a Republican in Virginia, yet that isn't translating to support for Earle-Sears, and one of the reasons why is that Earle-Sears has decided to focus pretty much her entire campaign message on supporting discrimination against transgender people.
I'll add that, even with Trump on the ballot in 2024, Montana Dems had a net gain of ten seats in the state house there because of public backlash to Republicans' efforts to silence Zooey Zephyr, a transgender state representative, in the legislative session preceding the 2024 elections.
A big part of the Dem gain in Montana in 2024 was due to the favorable redistricting done by the commission (the legislature gets redistricted two years later than congressional here).
"🚨 It’s official: My Congressional campaign is launching! 🚨
Washington, DC deserves a strong voice in Congress at this critical moment in our history. I’m ready to fight for our city, your rights, and our future. Let’s do this together!
We actually need a smart and forceful advocate for DC statehood in the house for 2028. Holmes could not step up even when Trump deployed troops, she could have popularized the idea nationally.
At this point, Dems should just take the position that farm subsidies should be abolished. They almost all flow to multi billion dollar cooperative cooperatives anyway.
I love how people like Chuck Grassley and former senator Pat Roberts (KS) were always talking about how bad “big government” was when it came to helping people who actually needed it but when it came to wasteful farm subsidies for themselves and their rich friends, they loved “big government” and were the first ones to call for it.
Dems should stop voting for farm subsidies unless they get something substantial in return.
Historically farm subsidies were tied nicely with SNAP funding. Somewhere in the past decade republicans realized they could make the result one sided without any real consequences, and now we're in this mess.
I'd agree. I don't know that they'll be willing to do that, but I think it's the right approach. The reason republicans did what they did is because of the expected lack of consequences. We need to re-establish that it doesn't work that way.
In geopolitical terms, we need to adopt an escalate to de-escalate posture.
Not only is it the right approach, but it would make Republicans consistently studder and stumble trying to explain why they support giving money away to wealthy corporate farms, but not spending on things like healthcare for those who actually needed it.
I read somewhere that Clinton gutting of TANF didn't hurt the poor much because farm lobbyists successfully tied SNAP, its successor, to farm subsidies in the 1st Bush admin.
That depends on how willing other countries are to shakeup their new supply lines that they are establishing now. If country A stops buying corn or soybeans or wheat or any other food from us because they decided we're unreliable, they're going to start buying from country B. What incentive do they have to abandon B and buy from the US again? Not much.
All commodities will face this problem in the years ahead. Some non-commodities will too, if it comes from a cultural shift, like what I've read about in Canada with respect to American alcohol.
VA Gov: Spanberger 52-42
https://emersoncollegepolling.com/virginia-2025-polling/
I’m old enough to remember severe concern by Democrats that Spanberger won’t be able to turnout black voters and she could lose because of it.
whereas such concerns were fully brushed aside in 2021 by Va dem establishment re terry. I say this as both a compliment to the folks on here and a complaint regarding the lack of party infrastructure, but why are we (mostly amateurs that donate, canvass, and sometimes more) seemingly so often ahead of where the conventional democratic consultant wisdom is. And I say this as someone that held my tongue and was a party apologist since at least 2014.
It's because you canvass and sometimes more. You come in contact with real people.
If even Emerson is giving Spanberger a 10-point lead, then she's definitely in very good shape. And the decline in ticket-splitting should give Hashmi and Jones easy wins as well.
I really want Jones to win, not just Spanberger. Miyares is a TACO ass kisser and doesn't deserve to be AG in a light blue state for another 4 years.
and jones would be the first ag to my knowledge to not be in the pocket of old dominion energy
As of 8/31, Jones is being way out-spent, had raised a lot less, and had a lot less money. While he should be aided by Dems voting for the whole ticket, he could really use some contributions.
Chaz Nuttycombe has given him a VERY high probability of winning the AG race -- as in 91%. Just because Miyares has outraised and outspent him doesn't mean Miyares automatically wins.
Chaz doesn't have a crystal ball either.
True. But his data analyses usually land correctly.
I would bet on him today but my point is that he can use donations.
There's no way he loses if she wins by 10
This is my thinking exactly. If Spanberger actually wins by 10, then Jones will win by at least 7 just because there will be so few ticket-splitters. Don't forget that all three 2021 statewide races were within 2 percent of each other, even though Dems also had an incumbent AG at the time.
Yeah, Republicans in the state have basically said if she wins by more than 5 he’s toast. Anything less than that and it’s more of a jump ball. 2-3 point win for Spanberger and I think he could pull it off. Miyares will perform the best on the GOP ticket obviously and the recent hit on Jones for speeding was not ideal, but partisanship is a hell of a drug and Trump is president. If Harris had won, I think he’d most likely get re-elected in the 2025 election.
I'm curious -- what do people here think of our chances regarding the House of Delegates? I've heard there are a number of GOP-held seats Kamala won -- thoughts?
I think there’s a few pickup opportunities but I don’t know enough about specifics to give you a hard number
Chaz Nuttycombe says there's a 15% chance VA Dems could score a Democratic supermajority in the House of Delegates, which is stunning for a blue leaning state with fair legislative maps.
Odds are very good they're expanding their majority from 2023, which bodes well for getting the three constitutional amendments on the November 2026 ballot.
Which amendments? Sorry if they were mentioned before and I missed it.
Abortion protection, marriage equality, and automatic voter rights restoration to felons who completed prison time. They passed it in both houses this year and it needs to pass the HOD and state Senate again in early 2026 to get onto the ballot.
Small note -- they are not "fair." GOP hack SeanTrende drew them. So it's even more noteworthy if that happens.
Correct - it's actually still a slight Republican gerrymander. You can see it in the small details:
HD-41 should be a safe Dem district based in Blacksburg, but instead it unnecessarily takes in a whole bunch of heavily Republican rural areas.
HD-57 should be entirely in Henrico, but a small slice of Goochland was added to make it redder, and that made the difference in 2023.
HDs 69 & 71 were carefully drawn to crack the Dem-leaning Williamsburg area between two Republican-leaning districts.
HD-72 puts a rapidly Dem-trending slice of Chesterfield in with several rural, heavily Republican counties.
HD-82 puts heavily African-American Petersburg with some heavily white, right-wing rural areas, so that in off-years they would just barely outvote Petersburg.
HD-86 should be entirely in Hampton, but instead they added ultra-far-right Poquoson to the district just to make it lean Republican.
Republicans hold 8 seats that Harris won (ranging from Harris+0.7 to +9.4) and Democrats don't hold any Trump seats. The weakest Dem seat is Harris +5.2. I'd say we're in a strong position to keep the majority.
If we won half of those I’d be happy
How many, if any, of those eight seats are open? That often helps in asserting the partisan lean of a district.
One is open; HD 89, Harris+3
Though the D base here is rural black voters who turn out at lower rates in non-presidential years.
I'm guessing those 8 seats are mostly affluent ancestrally Republican outer suburbs. In California most of those areas (like the one I live in) are much more blue at the federal level than at the state level.
They are:
22 (Prince William County)
57 (Henrico/Goochland; this is the one where last time the Democratic candidate's OnlyFans fundraising created controversy)
71 (Williamsburg area)
73 (Chesterfield County)
75 (Chesterfield/Hopewell)
82 (Petersburg and nearby counties)
86 (Hampton/Poquoson)
89 (Suffolk/Chesapeake; open)
That poll has Trump approval at 42-54 (about where his national average is) and party split as 37D-35R (2021 exit poll has 36D-34R) so it doesn't look like the sample is too blue.
If anything it looks slightly red, as that Trump approval for a recently blue state is about the same as the national average, though Emerson tends to give Trump better than average national numbers.
Gov. Youngkin's approval is a rather tepid 46-41, which isn't enough to save Earle-Sears, and might not have saved himself from the Trump downdraft.
If Youngkin’s approval rating is below 47%, then Earle-Sears is really in trouble.
Earle-Sears' best (only?) hope for overcoming the drag of the national GOP is/was that Youngkin would be sufficiently popular for the "I'm his second term" theme to work. If voters are "meh" even regarding him, then it's hard to see her winning unless Spanberger somehow implodes.
And Youngkin hasn't been particularly helpful to Earle-Sears with his cozying up to Trump (maybe in hopes of an appointment or presidential bid of his own?) and his pooh-poohing of the impacts of DOGE and other Trump policies on the state.
I figured someone with a prestigious background like Youngkin working for the Bush family’s favorite investment company, The Carlyle Group, would have better sense of the future he had when he originally ran for Governor.
The government shutdown should pretty much seal the deal for Abigail Spanberger winning the VA-GOV race.
I really don’t see how Winsome Earle-Sears is going to get any traction at this point, especially given she’s run a god awful campaign and really doesn’t give a damn about Virginians.
Under PA Gov, you have 2 different numbers for Shapiro (55 and 56). Not a big difference, but am a little confused by that.....
55 is against state treasurer Garrity, 56 is against state sen Mastriano
Ah, gotcha. Thought it was one question, but it's two. Ok. Thanks!
A Washington Post one-day survey of 1,010 adults asked: Who do you think is mainly responsible for the federal government partially shutting down? The response was R's 47%; D's 30%; Not sure 23%.
When asked if federal subsidies that reduce the cost of Affordable Care Act health insurance plans should be extended, these responses were: Yes 71%; No 29%. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/interactive/2025/government-shutdown-trump-congress-poll/?itid=hp-top-table-main_p001_f001
That's great but it means very little if history tells us anything
Fortunately history also tells us that we don't need an extra shutdown boost or other particularly special factors to do well in a midterm with an unpopular president and Congress controlled by the opposite party.
If ever there was data saying Democrats need to hold the line in the sand for once, this is definitely it. Almost a majority of voters blame Republicans and the issue Democrats are using to justify them withholding their votes is extremely popular. Can’t ask for a better setup to show the base their fight and come out on top of Trump and his cult party in the standoff. Will they follow through though? I guess time will tell.
Regardless of what happens, win elections.
Piggybacking on Rob Sand's "case" for a purple Iowa, Hopium is fundraising for the Dem parties in several states that NEED to be able build the capacity to mount a comeback, and Iowa is one of them. More at https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/p/launching-hopiums-audacious-expansion
Florida is stubborn, but perhaps the inflation, the Cuban/Venezuela population being hit by ICE raids and the unpopular RDS years may move the needle a bit.
https://twitter.com/MattPStout/status/1973795901023133701
MA State Senator Ed Kennedy has died. He was 74.
The 1st Middlesex Senate seat is solid Democratic. He won 63-36 in 2024, and had no challengers in 2020 or 2022.
Not very old. RIP. Was he a descendant of the Joseph Kennedy (JFK/RFK, Teddy Kennedy) family?
Wiki doesn't say one way or the other so probably not
he was not. rip nonetheless
Baltimore City Councilman Mark Conway appears to have filed to run in the primary for Kweisi Mfume's MD-07. https://docquery.fec.gov/cgi-bin/forms/H6MD07509/1917211
I see that Mfume is 76.
He was in his 50’s when back in 2006 he ran for the Senate in the Democratic Primary Race against Ben Cardin to replace retiring Senator Paul Sarbanes.
I remember that and was rooting for him at the time, but Cardin has done a fine job.
Did do. :-) He's retired now, replaced by Angela Alsobrooks.
Right. I frankly forgot about that, as Alsobrooks won the open seat last year.
Yeah, Cardin was fine as Senator
NY-10:
https://www.cityandstateny.com/politics/2025/10/alexa-aviles-exploring-challenge-rep-dan-goldman-ny-10/408566/
DSA-backed NYC Councilwoman Alexa Aviles is considering challenging Dan Goldman in the Dem primary. Apparently Cameron Kasky is too, having previously considered NY-12.
My fear is that a split field will end up with Goldman winning again, like he did in 2022 and like Shri Thanedar keeps doing.
Thanedar did win a majority in 2024, albeit after the strongest challenger got thrown off the ballot
Yuh-Line Niou
@yuhline
Look who I bumped into when out here for
@alexaforcouncil
!
@marcelaforny
!
https://x.com/yuhline/status/1937657121337692482
This link isn't coming up. "You are rate limited". Huh? Never mind. I guess there was just a glitch on X earlier.
I lived through Cawthon's term in Congress as a constituent. His public statements and actions reflected poorly on us. Worse, however, was his disdain for his district. He seldom returned to the district; instead, he was in Florida or Texas raising funds for reelection. His local office was closed most of this time, and despite most of his staff being communication experts, he did not reply to his constituents.
He has been a dynamic speaker since his days as a child preacher. So he knows how to influence a group. I grew up in the district where he is running and hope the residents of Southwest Florida look closely at at Cawthon and question why he was defeated for reelection in the republican primary.
Cawthorn is an idiot and uses being in a wheelchair to try to spin anything he does in taking responsibility for his actions. He was a douche in college as well and had sexually harassed multiple women on campus even while it was a Christian school. Quite a “Christian” Cawthorn is.
There’s a reason House leadership went out of their way to get rid of him after only one term, and that hasn’t changed (especially with him parachuting into a traditionally red district with a deep bench of people who are actually, you know, from there)
Deeply red, but is there really a bench? The other candidates are Chris Collins and Jim Oberweis lol
They're problematic from our point of view, but I don't think Republicans in Congress dislike either of them the way they hate Cawthorn.
"Child preacher"? Really?
If Christianity is really promoting child preachers, then it deserves its decline in this country. When I see "child preacher", I think either 'manipulative scammer' or 'brainwashed with terrible parents'.
I'm Jewish, and I don't want there to be any such thing as child rabbis.
There can't be child rabbis, but there can be children who are knowledgeable about Torah and can give a d'var Torah. I think the difference is that being a rabbi requires knowledge of law, scriptures and commentary as well as a degree of maturity and life experience; certain brands of Christianity require only explaining how everyone needs to be saved through faith in Jesus Christ, lest they perish in an eternal flame, etc., etc.
Yes but what you are describing is driven on the basis of acquiring knowledge instead of being driven by ego. This certainly evolves for anyone who practices any form of religion, be it any denomination of Christianity.
I definitely don't deny that knowledge and experience count, and I've heard brilliant and moving Christian preaching that could not have been given by a child, including by a former schoolmate whose debut as a preacher I was privileged to help accompany as part of a small band and whose ministry was tragically cut short by a severe stroke, but the sheer number of points of law that a rabbi needs to be intimately familiar with, such that they can resolve disputes on points of law among members of their congregation convincingly, is much greater than the number of Gospel verses and arguments from daily life a talented young preacher can mobilize in a fire-and-brimstone sermon.
I don’t know everything that goes on behind the scenes with rabbis but what you’re describing about them makes sense.
That said, if we were to compare between say Charlie Kirk and Madison Cawthorn, Kirk was definitely a better Christian. Like me, he was a Boy Scout which gives boys great leadership skills early on in their lives. Kirk also didn’t have controversy with women like Cawthorn did.
It baffles me how anyone could take seriously a preacher, of any religion, if they didn't have that knowledge, maturity, and experience that you mentioned.
Think about how there are child prodigies on instruments like the piano and violin, or as chess players. There can also be child prodigy preachers.
@JanusIanitos, just as expected!
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/02/trump-ally-corey-lewandowski-would-consider-gov-bid-against-ayotte-in-nh-00592330
You had good instincts there! I don't have a good finger on the pulse of republicans here, but with that qualification out of the way I doubt he'd be able to beat Ayotte. Would be good for us if he tried, regardless of the outcome.
Yep, he always want to take a crack up there, and I'd welcome it.
Would that damage Ayotte to the point where she loses re-election?
I think that's very possible. Right now I'd have NH-Gov as an election we could win, but it's unlikely. If things stayed as-is and I woke up Nov 4 2026 and the first headline I saw was "Ayotte loses" I'd take that to mean we had a very big wave. Bigger than 2018. If Ayotte faces a credible primary challenge, that changes. I'd still start with her favored, but only lightly, pending how that primary challenge went.
It's hard to defeat incumbents here. A good part of that is the late September primary. Incumbents get to stockpile cash and stay above the fray while their opponents tear themselves apart in a primary. A credible primary challenger removes that advantage for Ayotte, and even if she wins she'd still be hurt by that.
It'd be nice if NH regains a Democratic state trifecta if only briefly, just to add early voting, higher wages and abortion protections to state law.
It's so bizarre to see NH behind -- they vote blue on the federal level but almost consistently put Rs in power on the state level. I know there's a libertarian streak to NH as a purple state, but the ticket splitting is ridiculous.
A bit of a nitpick: NH isn't libertarian at all. it's a weird bit of post-WW2 marketing that was so successful that almost everyone assumes it as a default.
Major democrats here are classic "business moderates" for lack of a better term. You won't find much support for criminal justice reform, marijuana legalization, or similar from major dems here. Republicans are a hybrid of non-theocratic MAGA and Bush era neoconservatives. The only part of their ideology that would fit libertarianism is a hatred of taxes, but that's standard republican orthodoxy across their entire party.
I would say unironically that NH is arguably the least libertarian state in New England, and one of the least in the country.
Federal republicans would do a lot better in NH if they weren't so proudly anti-intellectual and over the top in pushing evangelicalism. Local republicans benefit from being able to avoid that and do better as a result. Even then while the local-election advantage exists, their recent victories make it look larger than it is. They gerrymandered the legislature and executive council in 2010 and then again in 2020. They narrowly won the governor's office with a famous last name in 2016 and then won the 2024 open seat after avoiding an expensive, drawn out primary while we did have one, in what ended up being a lightly red year nationally.
Good post. Pot remains illegal in NH?
"Ironically, of all people, Marjorie Taylor Greene has some electorally salient critiques for her fellow Republicans, if they were willing to listen."
https://x.com/StatisticUrban/status/1973900561025282291
The link seems to have been taken down. Never mind, it's working now. So what is she going to do about these costs? Cooperate with Democrats?
Is this today's thread?
I guess so.
NJ Stockton poll. No H2H numbers on the Governor’s race, but these favorables and job approval numbers.
Democrat Mikie Sherrill is at 34%-35%, while Republican Jack Ciattarelli is at 32%-38%.
Gov. Phil Murphy’s job approval rating is at 42%-42%, with Donald Trump at 38%-56%.
https://newjerseyglobe.com/campaigns/stockton-poll-shows-favorables-unfavorables-of-n-j-gubernatorial-candidates-about-the-same/
Are they embargoed for now?
🤷♂️
Some updates.
MO-01:
https://fox2now.com/news/missouri/cori-bush-announces-bid-to-reclaim-missouri-congressional-seat/
Former Rep. Cori Bush is officially in. Whatever her flaws may be, I welcome someone primarying Wesley Bell after the bodyguard incident, among others.
Question: could Bell lose to Bush, or is Bell secure enough? Worth noting that St. Louis apparently has a base of white leftists, per Bluesky — I personally think this primary could be close. Thoughts?
IL-Sen:
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/emilys-list-picks-sides-crowded-democratic-primary-senate-illinois-rcna235205
EMILY’s List is backing Julianna Stratton for Senate. Question for those in the know — how powerful is EMILY’s List in primaries?
OR-04:
https://oregoncapitalchronicle.com/2025/10/02/republican-air-force-vet-monique-despain-again-challenges-u-s-rep-val-hoyle-for-congressional-seat/
Previous Republican nominee Monique DeSpain is trying again against Dem Rep. Val Hoyle. Question: given Hoyle’s ethics scandals, could she be in trouble? Or is the Dem-friendly environment enough for her?
What ethics scandal?
https://oregoncapitalchronicle.com/2025/09/18/oregon-rep-val-hoyle-violated-stock-act-by-missing-deadlines-to-disclose-217-stock-transactions/
Major STOCK Act violations - 217 of them actually. That, and accusations of racial discrimination in her office:
https://www.opb.org/article/2023/12/14/bureau-labor-industries-settles-racial-discrimination-lawsuit-val-hoyle-second-employee/
Certainly not helpful. She has a couple of nobody’s challenging her in the primary so far.
I think Hoyle will be fine. Oregon Democrats are going to turn out. The BOLI scandal isn't great but is old news, and I don't think the stock disclosure mistakes are enough to break through.
St Louis also has a Bosniak base. I frankly am not fond of her; its corrupt vs corrupt but I'll take someone willing to distract AIPAC a bit.
I welcome Bush in the race in MO-01.
In IL-Sen, Stratton nabbing the EMILY's List endorsement should be a decent get.
For IL-SEN: Kelly might get some traction if she strongly opposes the ICE raid in her district this week. Still think this is Raja's and it won't be close.
No, Cori Bush is just a lead weight for Dems. She can go the way of Nina Turner, but I doubt she can gift as well.
I’m getting really sick of this argument. The GOP is filled with circus freaks and yet they keep winning and winning. Yet the Dems have to constantly moderate and moderate and moderate? Who are we appealing to? How did this work out for Kamala?
Bush may have issues but I’m tired of us having to moderate to nothingness. What the hell are we even supposed to stand for?
What's your argument?
I think that the Dems should have something resembling a coherent ideology, or at least some form of guiding principle(s). We cannot be everything at once, otherwise we end up with the Manchin/Sinema mess we had last time (or for the flipside, the Dems who didn't vote for Biden's budget on left-related concerns). I'm not seeing that in today's Democratic Party. There are Dems voting for Trump nominees, Dems calling for socialism, different Dems with 10 stances on various issues. Ezra Klein just called for the Dems to run anti-abortion candidates.
At some point we stop standing for anything. I'd say democracy, but given the constant Dem voting for GOP nominees even that is shaky. I worry voters don't see us as standing for anything, and that that's a contributing factor to our reputational decline. I think we need to agree on something. If we moderate too much, we have no ideology left, we just become compromise on everything, even things like democracy. There's also the risk of being too pro-business, which does alienate people -- look at what happened with Macron in France. It's possible to do the opposite as well, go so far into progressivism that you end up alienating others like what happened with Corbyn in the UK. We need to at least agree on something. I worry the inverse is leading us to disaster.
The disaster already happened last year. Trying to drum people out of the party now is crazy, IMO. We need unity against tyranny and for democracy. The rest is tactics.
Perhaps. I just think that, if we want to win democracy back, we need to make sure voters know we’re superior on policy too.
My problem with Bush isn't that she is too progressive, but rather just not very effective at getting anything done and isn't a reliable vote. It's the same problem with the most moderate Dems, even if I personally agree with Bush more.
That’s a very valid argument! Effective/ineffective legislators is an issue transcending political boundaries. Politicians left, right, and center have fallen prey to forgetting this step — Jamaal Bowman on the left, Sean Patrick Maloney in the center, and Madison Cawthorn on the right are some examples from different factions — and I’m a lot more sympathetic to arguments over effectiveness than I am pure ideology. I am a progressive myself for the record.
If Bush can’t do it maybe she isn’t the one. I don’t think Bell has been either. A third candidate is probably what’s needed, I just wish we could find one.
VA-Gov: WaPo/Schar School poll has Spanberger +12 over Earle-Sears
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/10/03/virginia-election-poll-spanberger-earle-sears/
Also, I'll add that The Dissident's Alejandra Caraballo noted on Bluesky that Earle-Sears fixating universally on opposing transgender rights has not worked for her campaign.
https://bsky.app/profile/esqueer.net/post/3m2cjsmzvwc26
Caraballo has a valid point. Youngkin is relatively popular for a Republican in Virginia, yet that isn't translating to support for Earle-Sears, and one of the reasons why is that Earle-Sears has decided to focus pretty much her entire campaign message on supporting discrimination against transgender people.
I'll add that, even with Trump on the ballot in 2024, Montana Dems had a net gain of ten seats in the state house there because of public backlash to Republicans' efforts to silence Zooey Zephyr, a transgender state representative, in the legislative session preceding the 2024 elections.
A big part of the Dem gain in Montana in 2024 was due to the favorable redistricting done by the commission (the legislature gets redistricted two years later than congressional here).
Would Tester's coattails also have helped in some of those districts?
Correct, this is 100% why Dems had so many pickups in Montana last year.
Youngkin was in the negative approval territory in a recent poll. I guess Virginians are fed up of his culture warriorism.
"🚨 It’s official: My Congressional campaign is launching! 🚨
Washington, DC deserves a strong voice in Congress at this critical moment in our history. I’m ready to fight for our city, your rights, and our future. Let’s do this together!
#JoinRobertWhite #FightforDC"
https://x.com/RobertWhite_DC/status/1973841688683798809
We actually need a smart and forceful advocate for DC statehood in the house for 2028. Holmes could not step up even when Trump deployed troops, she could have popularized the idea nationally.
Are you actually Robert White, or are you just supporting him?
I once again forgot quotes, sorry for the confusion.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/02/trump-bailouts-farmers-tariffs-usda-00591846
The farmers want socialism once again.
I was surprised to find out that most farmers are very wealthy -- hence them mostly voting for Republican.
At this point, Dems should just take the position that farm subsidies should be abolished. They almost all flow to multi billion dollar cooperative cooperatives anyway.
I love how people like Chuck Grassley and former senator Pat Roberts (KS) were always talking about how bad “big government” was when it came to helping people who actually needed it but when it came to wasteful farm subsidies for themselves and their rich friends, they loved “big government” and were the first ones to call for it.
Dems should stop voting for farm subsidies unless they get something substantial in return.
Historically farm subsidies were tied nicely with SNAP funding. Somewhere in the past decade republicans realized they could make the result one sided without any real consequences, and now we're in this mess.
Well then Dems should just stop voting for these bills. Don’t let Republicans have it both ways when it comes to “big government”.
I'd agree. I don't know that they'll be willing to do that, but I think it's the right approach. The reason republicans did what they did is because of the expected lack of consequences. We need to re-establish that it doesn't work that way.
In geopolitical terms, we need to adopt an escalate to de-escalate posture.
Not only is it the right approach, but it would make Republicans consistently studder and stumble trying to explain why they support giving money away to wealthy corporate farms, but not spending on things like healthcare for those who actually needed it.
I read somewhere that Clinton gutting of TANF didn't hurt the poor much because farm lobbyists successfully tied SNAP, its successor, to farm subsidies in the 1st Bush admin.
It might make sense to subsidize really small farms, but I suppose homeowners with small gardens for personal use might get most of those subsidies.
Don't be surprised. Small family farms are pretty much a thing of the past in the U.S., as they simply can't compete with huge corporate farms.
All the more reason to abolish the subsidies.
Abolish or at least reform them, but yeah, probably abolish them.
Revert tariffs to previous levels and you won't need bailouts.
That depends on how willing other countries are to shakeup their new supply lines that they are establishing now. If country A stops buying corn or soybeans or wheat or any other food from us because they decided we're unreliable, they're going to start buying from country B. What incentive do they have to abandon B and buy from the US again? Not much.
All commodities will face this problem in the years ahead. Some non-commodities will too, if it comes from a cultural shift, like what I've read about in Canada with respect to American alcohol.