How touching is it that Utah Republicans have such deep concern about having mixed urban and rural districts. Be nice if they had the same concerns about adhering to the will of the voters.
Both. The same BS talking points NC Republicans did when they were forced to redraw that Congressional map in 2022 to reflect the 50-50 split of the state.
If Gray can take out an incumbent under the current lines in a horrible environment for Dems, he can hold a friendlier version of the seat in basically any environment.
Considering Stockton isn't in the district, I'm not too concerned--especially if a blue wave emerges. The fact Gray ran so far ahead of Harris in 2024 is a good sign, too.
Former Rep. Ben McAdams is considering running again if Utah redistricting creates a winnable district for us. McAdams represented UT-4 as a Democrat from 2018-2020.
I understand what you’re saying. All I’m saying is he may have trouble winning the primary if it ends up being a solidly Democratic district, even if he moves to the left.
There are a lot of voters out there who believe that representatives should vote based on their conscience rather than based on political survival. Those voters may be turned off by the apparent shift in his views and ideology.
I can't wait for the Kennedy, Jr./Roger Waters collab where they sing:
"We don't need no education/We just huffed glue all day/Now chemtrails are turning the frogs gay!"
They also are birds of a feather since the worms ate into their brains (another Pink Floyd song reference about something that happened figuratively for Waters and literally for Kennedy).
I have no idea what happened to Waters. Animals is one of my all-time favorite albums, and now the guy was invited by Russia to speak at the UN (if I am recalling this correctly.) Appalling.
I guess something finally made her squeal (that is a reference to her campaign gimmick) and that was being passed up for SoD in favor of a drunken domestic abuser.
Brenna Byrd was Rob Sand's best chance of winning the Governorship. She turns everything into a press conference and hasn't done anything of note to help us deal with data protection for example. She is terrible. She has done oppo research on herself.
If the Iowa GOP is smart they try to keep the field as clear as possible for Hinson. That House seat is winnable without her as the incumbent. Tough sure, but winnable. If Hinson does get serious opposition in the primary, it will be from her right flank. If they have another person from the Branstad/governing wing jump in. then they risk losing the seat to some flame thrower that runs too hard on social issues. Like Brenna Byrd
CNN apparently suggested Matt Whitaker (former Grassley hand and current NATO Ambassador) might be interested. Maybe Hinson decides to wait until 2028 when Grassley presumably retires if he isn’t dead yet. She’s young enough she can afford to wait
Hegseth has the two criteria Trump requires - he “looks the part” on TV and his loyal. Everybody at Pentagon, even guys like Elbridge Colby, think he’s useless
Although the Republicans could surely use his bat during the annual Congressional baseball game, Mark Teixeira's bid for a Congressional seat in Texas might not fare much better than Walter Johnson losing effort to represent Maryland in Congress and Steve Garvey's 18-point loss to Adam Schiff in their Senate race.
Walter Johnson, a Republican, was elected to the Montgomery County, MD, Commission in 1938 and in 1940 ran for Congress, losing to Democrat William Byron. There's a Montgomery County high school named for him, which serves what is now of course a deep blue area and where few students or parents probably know of his politics. (In a further bit of irony, there's a middle school in the county named for Herbert Hoover, but no schools named for Franklin Roosevelt.)
Longtime House GOP leader (and two term Speaker) Joe Martin urged Johnson to run for Congress, but was disappointed with his campaign skills. Martin said of Johnson, ""He was an utterly inexperienced speaker. I got some of my boys to write two master speeches for him—one for the farmers of his district and the other for the industrial areas. Alas, he got the two confused. He addressed the farmers on industrial problems, and the businessmen on farm problems."
I was referring to Tex. Walter Johnson is an interesting footnote, but the GOP was a different party in 1940 than today.
If baseball players want a model, I guess Jim Bunning should be their idol. Hall of Fame pitcher and US Senator (but career ended just as Curt Flood was getting union movement going).
PASS — Sen. Ed Markey is rolling out another round of endorsements today, this time from state and local electeds from the North Shore.
The slate of nearly two dozen mayors, legislators and county politicians includes state Sens. Joan Lovely and Jason Lewis, Lynn Mayor Jared Nicholson, Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo and 14 state representatives. One notable north-of-Boston name from the you won’t see on the list: Rep. Seth Moulton.
Markey’s campaign has announced endorsements from four members of the all-Democratic Massachusetts congressional delegation, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Reps. Richard Neal, Jim McGovern, and Lori Trahan, often bundling the announcements with a slew of endorsements from officials in the same congressional district.
But so far, those viewed as the most likely or most competitive potential challengers to the 79-year-old incumbent — Moulton and Reps. Jake Auchincloss and Ayanna Pressley — haven’t made the lists.
Polls testing potential matchups between Markey and other members of the delegation, including Auchincloss, Moulton and Pressley, circulated this spring, and another popped up recently, according to screenshots of the surveys shared with Playbook, but no polling showing what a Democratic primary race would look like has been made public.
It’s still early. And some electeds may be wary of throwing their support behind Markey before they know what the field will actually look like. Multiple members endorsed Markey in 2020 before then-Rep. Joe Kennedy III officially got in the race, making things awkward for some of those who were close with Kennedy, but already on board with Markey.
Is Moulton seriously thinking about running? I can't imagine his trans comments and attempted Pelosi ouster have endeared him to anyone -- he'd be delusional to try. He already has a left primary challenger.
The delusional heightened sense of self-import that lead to Moulton doing all the things we dislike about him is exactly the same kind of thing that would make him launch a primary against Markey. Even if you disagree with my assessment, he did start his career by primarying an incumbent with potential vulnerabilities with the electorate that the establishment ignored.
I don't want him as a senator but I suspect there's a non-zero chance he could pull it off. Depends on just how wary dem primary voters are of 80+ year old incumbents.
That would be my preference too, but it's looks clear that Markey will not drop out willingly.
I'm worried Pressley is squandering her otherwise strong position. She has advantages that other members of the state's delegation lack, but some of those will go away as time goes on. In the mean time, she isn't building up a fundraising network or stockpiling funds for a future statewide primary. She's in a ridiculously safe seat. I know fundraising is a soul draining task that they all hate, but if she put the effort in she could have a few million in the bank right now. If she started to put the effort in now she could have that few million in time for 2030 when Warren's seat is next up.
There's a reason that Krishnamoorthi has a very strong chance of being Illinois' next senator. He prepared for it and has the fundraising network and had preexisting cash on hand to be able to dominate the spending side of the election. Pressley, currently, is more likely to be on the receiving end of that situation. If she wants the promotion in 2030, let alone 2026, she needs to work for it now.
Our weak bench of successors for Markey and Warren is disappointing. Pressley is the only house member that could run that I'd be truly happy with. Trahan would probably be OK, but she seems mostly invisible for whatever reason. Auchinloss and Moulton would be awful. The others are de facto aged out of consideration. Healey would be OK, and would clear the field if she wanted it. JPK3 might try to mount a comeback and he'd be fine too, I guess. But the house options are limited and mostly unimpressive.
Auchincloss or Moulton would be fine in a more competitive state but we don't need them in Massachusetts. Katherine Clark would be fine if she weren't in a House leadership position, but obviously isn't likely to give that up for a Senate bid. (She will be 63 next year, the same age as Elizabeth Warren was when first elected Senator, so not too old.) A JPK3 run would be good in part due to the name, not because it would guarantee a win but it would be nice to restore some more luster to a family legacy that has been pissed on pretty heavily lately by its one member currently holding (unelected) office.
Yeah, out of the rest of the incumbents, Clark and McGovern would honestly both be above average senators but they have such high ranking House positions that it's hard to see them leave. Lynch and Moulton would be the worst, and Auchincloss is... eh. Trahan seems fine. I don't really have a sense of Keating. Obvi Pressley would be most ideal.
I don't have much sense of the other statewide electeds (other than Bill Galvin is a piece of shit, but he's too old to run anyway) and my impression of the state leg leadership is that there's pretty mid-tier (but that could be wrong). Michelle Wu would be really interesting but no clue if she has the statewide appeal without the same national money that Pressley would have.
There probably are, but that's not an area I'm where I'm clued in. I know everyone likes to dreamcast Wu for higher office but I suspect she wants to stay mayor until she's tired of politics. I could be wrong.
I could see some of the row officers being good candidates. Campbell is young enough and as far as I've noticed she hasn't done anything egregious. Although I disliked how she sided with the legislature on the auditing issue, that's not something that I expect would hurt her in 2030. That said, most AGs would rather run for governor than senate. DiZoglio has certainly pissed off the state establishment and I remember some stories about her being a bit odd politically, although I forget the details and if they were merited. Her anti-establishment thing could be an advantage in a primary, especially if it's crowded. Driscoll hasn't made any impressions on me at all, but I assume as LG she could make a credible run for statewide office.
I'd expect Marcus Graly knows the potential field far better than I. Hopefully he sees this chain and chimes in.
I think that's by far the most likely outcome, yes. But odd things happen and I'm not confident enough to say Markey is at 100.00% chance of winning a seriously contested primary. Especially with how late MA's primaries are in the calendar.
I hope this doesn't come off as nitpicky, but if you copied and pasted the whole article, you could have given us the key parts with a link, instead, for example like this:
"[N]early two dozen mayors, legislators and county politicians includes state Sens. Joan Lovely and Jason Lewis, Lynn Mayor Jared Nicholson, Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo and 14 state representatives [have endorsed Senator Markey, as have] Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Reps. Richard Neal, Jim McGovern, and Lori Trahan[.] One notable north-of-Boston name from the you won’t see on the list: Rep. Seth Moulton."
And her departing message is whiny and ungrateful, as per usual (although in fairness, she concedes that the conservative movement has problems and even failures.)
I’d note one implication here too is that Hagedorn, one of the conservative members, has been super swingy. So Ziegler could find herself on the receiving end of several 6-1 rulings, depending
Should a competitive seat emerge from the state legislature’s required remapping, former Rep. Ben McAdams, a conservative Democrat, would seriously consider entering the race. He has begun phoning donors to gauge interest, according to two people with direct knowledge of his thinking. Other names circulating within Democratic circles include state Sen. Nate Blouin. And some of the state’s Democratic donors say they are eager to back a candidate who would break Republicans’ grip on the state.
I hope this "pro-life" "conservative Democrat" loses the primary.
If the new Salt Lake City district is blue enough, then he may not win the primary. Democrats nominated him in 2018, because that version of UT-04 was a Republican-leaning district, and Democrats knew that a liberal candidate would not win the general election, especially if that candidate wasn’t Mormon.
Obama calls Texas Dem as he continues rallying the party against Trump
In public, he’s mobilizing Democrats to fight Republicans' mid-cycle gerrymandering efforts. In private, he’s holding calls with the party’s rising stars.
A wide-ranging conversation with the Texas state rep on his party’s flight from Texas, the value of being in the political wilderness, and his own Senate ambitions.
He seems to be a natural at giving interviews, a few of the QnAs:
1.) What other forms of “table-flipping” should Democrats consider?
Being able to draw attention to the abuses of power is probably more important than it’s ever been—so, not being afraid to protest. When it comes to policies, given what’s happening in our nation’s capital, passing D.C. statehood and offering statehood to Puerto Rico should be at the top of the agenda next time Democrats have a majority in Congress. Taking actions to reform the Supreme Court. Taking much more aggressive actions to curb the influence of big money in our politics—all of that has to be on the table if we’re going to fix the system itself, which I think Americans are demanding now. Of course they want to see progress on housing and healthcare and education, but I think they’re waking up to the fact that if you don’t fix the system itself, you’re never going to see progress on those issues.
2.) On Joe Rogan’s podcast, you talked about how, for all of the attention paid to age as a political liability for Joe Biden in 2024, a bigger problem was his ego—his belief that only he could beat Trump and his refusal to pass the torch to the next generation of leaders. How much blame do you think Biden deserves for the Democratic Party’s feeble standing today with voters and its difficulties in countering Trump and MAGA?
In these polls that show the public disapproves of the Democratic Party, the numbers of those who disapprove include a lot of Democrats. And I would count myself among those people who think that our party has failed to meet the moment—and not just this particular moment in 2025, but really the last 10 years. It feels like the Democratic Party is stuck in a different time in American politics and doesn’t fully appreciate the threat we’re facing.
A party is defined by its most prominent leaders, and we Democrats have suffered from not putting forward younger, more dynamic leaders who can speak to the country. I think that’s going to change. Everybody talks about how the Democratic Party is out in the wilderness. In every major faith tradition, including mine, the wilderness is a place where you can find out new things about yourself, about the world. It’s where new ideas come forth, where new leaders come forth. It’s a time of experimentation and innovation. So we should embrace this time in the wilderness. This is where our party is going to get reborn, and the old Democratic Party is going to fall away.
3.) A poll just came out that has you within striking distance of Colin Allred, the former Democratic congressman who fell a few points short of beating Ted Cruz last year and is the frontrunner, for the moment, to take on John Cornyn or Ken Paxton in next year’s Texas Senate race. There’s talk you might get in that race. Will you?
I am looking at that Senate seat. Obviously, this special session and the quorum break took up most of my attention and my focus, and that’ll be the case until this special session ends, hopefully within the next week or so. But once I’m past this, I am going to look at that race seriously and think about if it’s right for me, and, more importantly, right for the state.
And listen, people shouldn’t sleep on Texas [as a potential Democratic Senate pickup]. I get that our state has broken people’s hearts. It’s broken my heart, too. But Texas is a lot more competitive than people realize. I think a lot of people nationally, especially in the media, like to think of Texas as a mirror of California: the ultimate red state. But Texas is really much more of a pink state. Remember, Biden came within five points of beating Donald Trump here in 2020. And, honestly, for the Democratic Party, winning Texas is no longer a nice-to-have; it’s a need-to-have if you take these reapportionment numbers seriously in 2030. Unless people have a secret plan to win Florida, the Democrats better start thinking about how we make progress in Texas.
4.) One last question on the new Texas map, which seems to be premised on GOP congressional candidates doing as well with Latino voters as Trump did last year. But that’s no sure thing. Is it possible that, next November, Republicans might look back and say, Man, we really shouldn’t have messed with our map?
That’s very possible. Obviously, it doesn’t excuse what’s happening here. But there’s a term for what happens when you get too greedy and end up drawing your districts a little too thin: “dummymandering.” They’ve tried their best to divide communities of color, to dilute the power of Latinos in our elections. But it’s a fast-growing population, and it’s one that is turning against this Republican extremism. Latinos in Texas, along with all Texans, are disturbed by some of this extremism on immigration, separating families, deporting hardworking community members to countries they’ve never been to before.
But I also think people are disillusioned with the president’s record on the economy. I know a lot of Tejanos that voted for Donald Trump. They hated everything about him and his other policy beliefs, but they thought he could lower prices. The fact that he’s done the opposite and made inflation worse, I think has turned a lot of Texans, including a lot of Tejanos, against him. And I think that’s going to show up at the ballot box next year.
"for the Democratic Party, winning Texas is no longer a nice-to-have; it’s a need-to-have if you take these reapportionment numbers seriously in 2030. Unless people have a secret plan to win Florida, the Democrats better start thinking about how we make progress in Texas."
If it's really true, this country is in even deeper trouble than we already know.
I think that's really overstating the case, even if the worst case ACS survey numbers and projections pan out (the ones from earlier in the decade were even worse.) But I can't blame Talarico for urging Dems to make more of an effort at it, even if he had to exaggerate to make his point. While I don't think Texas will ever be a Democratic must win--it is likely to remain a GOP must have--it does prominently feature many of the demographics we need to win over or at least reliably increase our support from, which of course will help us win in many states that are less red. Talarico does point some hopeful signs here, such as Latinos (specifically Tejanos in this case) having second thoughts and indicating that they're not as red as the GOP hopes and the media often says.
This seemed to me to be another overstatement: "And I would count myself among those people who think that our party has failed to meet the moment—and not just this particular moment in 2025, but really the last 10 years. It feels like the Democratic Party is stuck in a different time in American politics and doesn’t fully appreciate the threat we’re facing."
Can we stop pretending that the 2018 and 2020 wins, as well as a better than expected showing in 2022 and various other victories, never happened?
Those are great answers. Well articulated, makes points in favor of rather significant changes without sounding like he's calling for a revolution. I see why people have been speaking well of him for a while.
These are the worst numbers I've recently seen for Dems in the generic ballot and for AOC (some polls had her -2 to -5) while being the best favorability numbers for the party (-13).
I don't have the access to the demographic breakdown, but I guess this ballot didn't find a swing among Gen Z, Millennials and POCs unlike other polls which would explain the result.
For example: New - Generic Ballot poll - (Age 18-29)
So no deliberate attempt to get it wrong. My feeling is that for now, we can rightly consider this poll an outlier, compared to other polls, and not dismiss it otherwise.
I wonder how different the numbers would be if Harris wasn't asked about.
I've noticed that democrats impose a large loser's penalty on our defeated presidential candidates. They get castigated as weak, ineffectual, etc. and then that opinion is carried over to the party at large when people think about them.
In contrast, we do the exact opposite for defeated republican presidential candidates. McCain and Romney got deified into some great moderate "good guy's at heart." Even Trump clearly benefited from a lot of image rehabilitation for 2024.
You're absolutely right and it has annoyed me for years now, even when I didn't think terribly highly of our candidate. Once they lose, Democrats very much turn against them and act like it was always clear that they were terrible candidates who never should have run and never should have been picked.
A consistent theme I've noticed in talking to people who do this is that they feel the natural outcome is for democrats to win. It is inherently an extension of Murc's Law: the intrinsic assumption that only democrats have agency in American politics. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murc's_law
Thus, the only way in their mind for a democrat to lose is for the democrat to be bad, or have made a mistake. The electoral environment, republican actions, the media, international events, all of those are irrelevant and impotent. In their mind the agency for victory and defeat is solely the purview of our candidate and no one else.
I’m patiently waiting for the Politico article detailing how GOP retirements mean the Senate is more at risk after a 2nd incumbent calls it quits instead of facing 2026 voters. Any day now…
We all know Politico, with it owned by a right-wing entity, will say something along the lines of "Senate is still very likely to stay in R hands after the 2026 midterms" and prop up Hinson as less toxic than Ernst.
Hinson voted for the Big Awful Bill as well as Ernst. People aren't stupid.
It really is incredible how the average person has more information at their fingertips than Middle Age Kings and Roman Emperors could dream of and yet a majority of them are still so incredibly ignorant.
Regarding the headline subject of this Digest, I highly doubt Maine Republicans' attempt to eliminate mail-in voting comes even close to passing.
Maine has had referendums on voter access issues before. In 2011, the newly-elected Republican trifecta passed a bill to eliminate same-day voter registration. But Democrats collected enough signatures to put a "people's veto" on the ballot, and the law eliminating same-day registration was overturned by a 21-point margin. Every county voted to keep same-day registration.
How touching is it that Utah Republicans have such deep concern about having mixed urban and rural districts. Be nice if they had the same concerns about adhering to the will of the voters.
Utah Republicans were drinking a lot of whine yesterday, especially the compliant governor Cox.
Whiners and whinos?
Both. The same BS talking points NC Republicans did when they were forced to redraw that Congressional map in 2022 to reflect the 50-50 split of the state.
CA-9, 13 item: "Former Stockton Mayor Kevin Lincoln, who's been pursuing a rematch against in California's 9th District"
I think you're missing a name after "against" :D
Him running against Gray makes me nervous. Should’ve made that district bluer.
If Gray can take out an incumbent under the current lines in a horrible environment for Dems, he can hold a friendlier version of the seat in basically any environment.
Considering Stockton isn't in the district, I'm not too concerned--especially if a blue wave emerges. The fact Gray ran so far ahead of Harris in 2024 is a good sign, too.
Stockton is in the district.
You're right--the Southern part of Stockton isn't. Hadn't realized that. My bad.
The new CA-13 is several points bluer than Gray’s current seat, and even the current CA-09 that Lincoln lost last year.
Lincoln might think that it would be harder to beat the CA-09 incumbent. Josh Harder (D-CA-09) is the current Representative...
If nothing else, anything that makes Ryan Walters unhappy and unsuccessful in advancing his career is a good thing
Former Rep. Ben McAdams is considering running again if Utah redistricting creates a winnable district for us. McAdams represented UT-4 as a Democrat from 2018-2020.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/29/democrats-seize-on-utah-in-redistricting-war-00535242
Depending on how blue the new SLC district is, it may be able to elect someone more liberal than McAdams.
I understand what you’re saying. All I’m saying is he may have trouble winning the primary if it ends up being a solidly Democratic district, even if he moves to the left.
There are a lot of voters out there who believe that representatives should vote based on their conscience rather than based on political survival. Those voters may be turned off by the apparent shift in his views and ideology.
According to the article, State Sen. Nate Blouin is another consideration as well.
This "Ice Recruitment Recruitment Song" speaks for itself. Priceless!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjGHf7OvglM
I can't wait for the Kennedy, Jr./Roger Waters collab where they sing:
"We don't need no education/We just huffed glue all day/Now chemtrails are turning the frogs gay!"
They also are birds of a feather since the worms ate into their brains (another Pink Floyd song reference about something that happened figuratively for Waters and literally for Kennedy).
I have no idea what happened to Waters. Animals is one of my all-time favorite albums, and now the guy was invited by Russia to speak at the UN (if I am recalling this correctly.) Appalling.
Not too farfetched when you realize this was kinda sorta the plot of "The Wall."
Ernst reportedly not running for re-election.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-republican-senator-joni-ernst-wont-run-re-election-cbs-news-reports-2025-08-29/
I guess something finally made her squeal (that is a reference to her campaign gimmick) and that was being passed up for SoD in favor of a drunken domestic abuser.
I imagine Hinson will replace her. Which will make her house seat more vulnerable.
How would she be as an opponent?
Probably more difficult than Ernst. She’s young, conventionally attractive, a former newscaster, marginally more moderate
Who else could run and have a competitive primary? Feenstra?
I do wonder if this could be why Brenna Bird passed on a governor run.
Unless she knew Ernst was retiring, then probably not.
Brenna Byrd was Rob Sand's best chance of winning the Governorship. She turns everything into a press conference and hasn't done anything of note to help us deal with data protection for example. She is terrible. She has done oppo research on herself.
If the Iowa GOP is smart they try to keep the field as clear as possible for Hinson. That House seat is winnable without her as the incumbent. Tough sure, but winnable. If Hinson does get serious opposition in the primary, it will be from her right flank. If they have another person from the Branstad/governing wing jump in. then they risk losing the seat to some flame thrower that runs too hard on social issues. Like Brenna Byrd
CNN apparently suggested Matt Whitaker (former Grassley hand and current NATO Ambassador) might be interested. Maybe Hinson decides to wait until 2028 when Grassley presumably retires if he isn’t dead yet. She’s young enough she can afford to wait
A crowded field with airwaves full of attack ads would be ideal.
If Hegseth gets booted finally (unlikely but conceivable, given how bad a job he's doing), maybe Ernst will replace him.
Hegseth has the two criteria Trump requires - he “looks the part” on TV and his loyal. Everybody at Pentagon, even guys like Elbridge Colby, think he’s useless
It's likely for anyone to be fired by Trump.
People get fired by Tr*mp for doing a good job, not for being incompetent.
They get fired because they get on the outs with him, for whatever reason.
I wonder if Tuesday’s special sealed the deal?
I think those poll numbers released a few days ago probably sealed the deal.
Touché
First it was Thom Tillis. Now this "we're all going to die" harpy is leaving rather than lose in a D-favorable midterm.
Good riddance.
Could it be due to private polling showing a competitive race?
Seems likely.
More likely her losing a primary than a GE.
And she had Trump, Miller and NRSC's endorsement.
She had Trump, Miller and NRSC's endorsement.
Although the Republicans could surely use his bat during the annual Congressional baseball game, Mark Teixeira's bid for a Congressional seat in Texas might not fare much better than Walter Johnson losing effort to represent Maryland in Congress and Steve Garvey's 18-point loss to Adam Schiff in their Senate race.
Walter Johnson, a Republican, was elected to the Montgomery County, MD, Commission in 1938 and in 1940 ran for Congress, losing to Democrat William Byron. There's a Montgomery County high school named for him, which serves what is now of course a deep blue area and where few students or parents probably know of his politics. (In a further bit of irony, there's a middle school in the county named for Herbert Hoover, but no schools named for Franklin Roosevelt.)
Longtime House GOP leader (and two term Speaker) Joe Martin urged Johnson to run for Congress, but was disappointed with his campaign skills. Martin said of Johnson, ""He was an utterly inexperienced speaker. I got some of my boys to write two master speeches for him—one for the farmers of his district and the other for the industrial areas. Alas, he got the two confused. He addressed the farmers on industrial problems, and the businessmen on farm problems."
As inept as he was in politics, no one has ever surpassed Johnson in number of shutouts pitched - 110.
I'm surprised Herbert Hoover High School never renamed itself. Hardly a good example for students to emulate!
He was an awful president, but as director of U.S. Food Aid during and after World War I, he saved thousands of lives in Europe.
Ok, credit where it's due. Still, what he's famous for is being the president who failed to prevent the Great Depression.
Bet he was a proud union member when he was a player...
Walter Johnson played decades before the MLB Players Assn was formed.
Teixiera and Garvey were members and both get their baseball pensions.
I was referring to Tex. Walter Johnson is an interesting footnote, but the GOP was a different party in 1940 than today.
If baseball players want a model, I guess Jim Bunning should be their idol. Hall of Fame pitcher and US Senator (but career ended just as Curt Flood was getting union movement going).
Markey’s missing endorsements
By KELLY GARRITY 08/13/2025 07:28 AM EDT
PASS — Sen. Ed Markey is rolling out another round of endorsements today, this time from state and local electeds from the North Shore.
The slate of nearly two dozen mayors, legislators and county politicians includes state Sens. Joan Lovely and Jason Lewis, Lynn Mayor Jared Nicholson, Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo and 14 state representatives. One notable north-of-Boston name from the you won’t see on the list: Rep. Seth Moulton.
Markey’s campaign has announced endorsements from four members of the all-Democratic Massachusetts congressional delegation, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Reps. Richard Neal, Jim McGovern, and Lori Trahan, often bundling the announcements with a slew of endorsements from officials in the same congressional district.
But so far, those viewed as the most likely or most competitive potential challengers to the 79-year-old incumbent — Moulton and Reps. Jake Auchincloss and Ayanna Pressley — haven’t made the lists.
Polls testing potential matchups between Markey and other members of the delegation, including Auchincloss, Moulton and Pressley, circulated this spring, and another popped up recently, according to screenshots of the surveys shared with Playbook, but no polling showing what a Democratic primary race would look like has been made public.
It’s still early. And some electeds may be wary of throwing their support behind Markey before they know what the field will actually look like. Multiple members endorsed Markey in 2020 before then-Rep. Joe Kennedy III officially got in the race, making things awkward for some of those who were close with Kennedy, but already on board with Markey.
https://www.politico.com/newsletters/massachusetts-playbook/2025/08/13/markeys-missing-endorsements-00506400
Is Moulton seriously thinking about running? I can't imagine his trans comments and attempted Pelosi ouster have endeared him to anyone -- he'd be delusional to try. He already has a left primary challenger.
The delusional heightened sense of self-import that lead to Moulton doing all the things we dislike about him is exactly the same kind of thing that would make him launch a primary against Markey. Even if you disagree with my assessment, he did start his career by primarying an incumbent with potential vulnerabilities with the electorate that the establishment ignored.
I don't want him as a senator but I suspect there's a non-zero chance he could pull it off. Depends on just how wary dem primary voters are of 80+ year old incumbents.
I sincerely hope not. I almost wish Markey would retire to prevent that. Then Pressley or someone else good could run.
To say nothing of AIPAC possibly smelling blood in the water and backing a centrist challenger to Markey.
That would be my preference too, but it's looks clear that Markey will not drop out willingly.
I'm worried Pressley is squandering her otherwise strong position. She has advantages that other members of the state's delegation lack, but some of those will go away as time goes on. In the mean time, she isn't building up a fundraising network or stockpiling funds for a future statewide primary. She's in a ridiculously safe seat. I know fundraising is a soul draining task that they all hate, but if she put the effort in she could have a few million in the bank right now. If she started to put the effort in now she could have that few million in time for 2030 when Warren's seat is next up.
There's a reason that Krishnamoorthi has a very strong chance of being Illinois' next senator. He prepared for it and has the fundraising network and had preexisting cash on hand to be able to dominate the spending side of the election. Pressley, currently, is more likely to be on the receiving end of that situation. If she wants the promotion in 2030, let alone 2026, she needs to work for it now.
Our weak bench of successors for Markey and Warren is disappointing. Pressley is the only house member that could run that I'd be truly happy with. Trahan would probably be OK, but she seems mostly invisible for whatever reason. Auchinloss and Moulton would be awful. The others are de facto aged out of consideration. Healey would be OK, and would clear the field if she wanted it. JPK3 might try to mount a comeback and he'd be fine too, I guess. But the house options are limited and mostly unimpressive.
Auchincloss or Moulton would be fine in a more competitive state but we don't need them in Massachusetts. Katherine Clark would be fine if she weren't in a House leadership position, but obviously isn't likely to give that up for a Senate bid. (She will be 63 next year, the same age as Elizabeth Warren was when first elected Senator, so not too old.) A JPK3 run would be good in part due to the name, not because it would guarantee a win but it would be nice to restore some more luster to a family legacy that has been pissed on pretty heavily lately by its one member currently holding (unelected) office.
Yeah, out of the rest of the incumbents, Clark and McGovern would honestly both be above average senators but they have such high ranking House positions that it's hard to see them leave. Lynch and Moulton would be the worst, and Auchincloss is... eh. Trahan seems fine. I don't really have a sense of Keating. Obvi Pressley would be most ideal.
I don't have much sense of the other statewide electeds (other than Bill Galvin is a piece of shit, but he's too old to run anyway) and my impression of the state leg leadership is that there's pretty mid-tier (but that could be wrong). Michelle Wu would be really interesting but no clue if she has the statewide appeal without the same national money that Pressley would have.
Are there any state legislators or mayors who would be good U.S. Senate candidates?
There probably are, but that's not an area I'm where I'm clued in. I know everyone likes to dreamcast Wu for higher office but I suspect she wants to stay mayor until she's tired of politics. I could be wrong.
I could see some of the row officers being good candidates. Campbell is young enough and as far as I've noticed she hasn't done anything egregious. Although I disliked how she sided with the legislature on the auditing issue, that's not something that I expect would hurt her in 2030. That said, most AGs would rather run for governor than senate. DiZoglio has certainly pissed off the state establishment and I remember some stories about her being a bit odd politically, although I forget the details and if they were merited. Her anti-establishment thing could be an advantage in a primary, especially if it's crowded. Driscoll hasn't made any impressions on me at all, but I assume as LG she could make a credible run for statewide office.
I'd expect Marcus Graly knows the potential field far better than I. Hopefully he sees this chain and chimes in.
Markey would win comfortably
I believe and hope so.
I think that's by far the most likely outcome, yes. But odd things happen and I'm not confident enough to say Markey is at 100.00% chance of winning a seriously contested primary. Especially with how late MA's primaries are in the calendar.
I hope this doesn't come off as nitpicky, but if you copied and pasted the whole article, you could have given us the key parts with a link, instead, for example like this:
"[N]early two dozen mayors, legislators and county politicians includes state Sens. Joan Lovely and Jason Lewis, Lynn Mayor Jared Nicholson, Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo and 14 state representatives [have endorsed Senator Markey, as have] Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Reps. Richard Neal, Jim McGovern, and Lori Trahan[.] One notable north-of-Boston name from the you won’t see on the list: Rep. Seth Moulton."
WI-Supreme Court: Rebecca Bradley also throwing in the towel: https://www.wispolitics.com/2025/alert-rebecca-bradley-not-seeking-reelection-to-supreme-court/
Hell yeah
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
There are few people less deserving of public office than Bradley, good riddance
SC WI Rebecca BRadley J-right wing not running for reelection https://x.com/jrrosswrites/status/1961459538776744218
I'm loving this Friday news dump. First Joni Ernst says she's not running for re-election, now this other RWNJ isn't in Wisconsin.
AP article:
https://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/a-conservative-wisconsin-supreme-court-justice-21021832.php
And her departing message is whiny and ungrateful, as per usual (although in fairness, she concedes that the conservative movement has problems and even failures.)
https://bsky.app/profile/the-downballot.com/post/3lxkhuhweos22
I’d note one implication here too is that Hagedorn, one of the conservative members, has been super swingy. So Ziegler could find herself on the receiving end of several 6-1 rulings, depending
I hope Ziegler decides to retire after 2026.
She’s up next in ‘27, no?
This is well worth watching – Live stream with Heather Cox Richardson.
https://open.substack.com/live-stream/54993
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/29/democrats-seize-on-utah-in-redistricting-war-00535242
Should a competitive seat emerge from the state legislature’s required remapping, former Rep. Ben McAdams, a conservative Democrat, would seriously consider entering the race. He has begun phoning donors to gauge interest, according to two people with direct knowledge of his thinking. Other names circulating within Democratic circles include state Sen. Nate Blouin. And some of the state’s Democratic donors say they are eager to back a candidate who would break Republicans’ grip on the state.
I hope this "pro-life" "conservative Democrat" loses the primary.
If the new Salt Lake City district is blue enough, then he may not win the primary. Democrats nominated him in 2018, because that version of UT-04 was a Republican-leaning district, and Democrats knew that a liberal candidate would not win the general election, especially if that candidate wasn’t Mormon.
We don't know what the shape or voting history of the new district will be yet. I'd be happy with -any- Democratic Representative from Utah!
Yes exactly a Democrat.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/29/obama-democrats-trump-talarico-00535507
Obama calls Texas Dem as he continues rallying the party against Trump
In public, he’s mobilizing Democrats to fight Republicans' mid-cycle gerrymandering efforts. In private, he’s holding calls with the party’s rising stars.
https://archive.ph/tlBxN
PUCK: The James Talarico Experience
A wide-ranging conversation with the Texas state rep on his party’s flight from Texas, the value of being in the political wilderness, and his own Senate ambitions.
He seems to be a natural at giving interviews, a few of the QnAs:
1.) What other forms of “table-flipping” should Democrats consider?
Being able to draw attention to the abuses of power is probably more important than it’s ever been—so, not being afraid to protest. When it comes to policies, given what’s happening in our nation’s capital, passing D.C. statehood and offering statehood to Puerto Rico should be at the top of the agenda next time Democrats have a majority in Congress. Taking actions to reform the Supreme Court. Taking much more aggressive actions to curb the influence of big money in our politics—all of that has to be on the table if we’re going to fix the system itself, which I think Americans are demanding now. Of course they want to see progress on housing and healthcare and education, but I think they’re waking up to the fact that if you don’t fix the system itself, you’re never going to see progress on those issues.
2.) On Joe Rogan’s podcast, you talked about how, for all of the attention paid to age as a political liability for Joe Biden in 2024, a bigger problem was his ego—his belief that only he could beat Trump and his refusal to pass the torch to the next generation of leaders. How much blame do you think Biden deserves for the Democratic Party’s feeble standing today with voters and its difficulties in countering Trump and MAGA?
In these polls that show the public disapproves of the Democratic Party, the numbers of those who disapprove include a lot of Democrats. And I would count myself among those people who think that our party has failed to meet the moment—and not just this particular moment in 2025, but really the last 10 years. It feels like the Democratic Party is stuck in a different time in American politics and doesn’t fully appreciate the threat we’re facing.
A party is defined by its most prominent leaders, and we Democrats have suffered from not putting forward younger, more dynamic leaders who can speak to the country. I think that’s going to change. Everybody talks about how the Democratic Party is out in the wilderness. In every major faith tradition, including mine, the wilderness is a place where you can find out new things about yourself, about the world. It’s where new ideas come forth, where new leaders come forth. It’s a time of experimentation and innovation. So we should embrace this time in the wilderness. This is where our party is going to get reborn, and the old Democratic Party is going to fall away.
3.) A poll just came out that has you within striking distance of Colin Allred, the former Democratic congressman who fell a few points short of beating Ted Cruz last year and is the frontrunner, for the moment, to take on John Cornyn or Ken Paxton in next year’s Texas Senate race. There’s talk you might get in that race. Will you?
I am looking at that Senate seat. Obviously, this special session and the quorum break took up most of my attention and my focus, and that’ll be the case until this special session ends, hopefully within the next week or so. But once I’m past this, I am going to look at that race seriously and think about if it’s right for me, and, more importantly, right for the state.
And listen, people shouldn’t sleep on Texas [as a potential Democratic Senate pickup]. I get that our state has broken people’s hearts. It’s broken my heart, too. But Texas is a lot more competitive than people realize. I think a lot of people nationally, especially in the media, like to think of Texas as a mirror of California: the ultimate red state. But Texas is really much more of a pink state. Remember, Biden came within five points of beating Donald Trump here in 2020. And, honestly, for the Democratic Party, winning Texas is no longer a nice-to-have; it’s a need-to-have if you take these reapportionment numbers seriously in 2030. Unless people have a secret plan to win Florida, the Democrats better start thinking about how we make progress in Texas.
4.) One last question on the new Texas map, which seems to be premised on GOP congressional candidates doing as well with Latino voters as Trump did last year. But that’s no sure thing. Is it possible that, next November, Republicans might look back and say, Man, we really shouldn’t have messed with our map?
That’s very possible. Obviously, it doesn’t excuse what’s happening here. But there’s a term for what happens when you get too greedy and end up drawing your districts a little too thin: “dummymandering.” They’ve tried their best to divide communities of color, to dilute the power of Latinos in our elections. But it’s a fast-growing population, and it’s one that is turning against this Republican extremism. Latinos in Texas, along with all Texans, are disturbed by some of this extremism on immigration, separating families, deporting hardworking community members to countries they’ve never been to before.
But I also think people are disillusioned with the president’s record on the economy. I know a lot of Tejanos that voted for Donald Trump. They hated everything about him and his other policy beliefs, but they thought he could lower prices. The fact that he’s done the opposite and made inflation worse, I think has turned a lot of Texans, including a lot of Tejanos, against him. And I think that’s going to show up at the ballot box next year.
Thanks, interesting. But is this really true?
"for the Democratic Party, winning Texas is no longer a nice-to-have; it’s a need-to-have if you take these reapportionment numbers seriously in 2030. Unless people have a secret plan to win Florida, the Democrats better start thinking about how we make progress in Texas."
If it's really true, this country is in even deeper trouble than we already know.
I think that's really overstating the case, even if the worst case ACS survey numbers and projections pan out (the ones from earlier in the decade were even worse.) But I can't blame Talarico for urging Dems to make more of an effort at it, even if he had to exaggerate to make his point. While I don't think Texas will ever be a Democratic must win--it is likely to remain a GOP must have--it does prominently feature many of the demographics we need to win over or at least reliably increase our support from, which of course will help us win in many states that are less red. Talarico does point some hopeful signs here, such as Latinos (specifically Tejanos in this case) having second thoughts and indicating that they're not as red as the GOP hopes and the media often says.
This seemed to me to be another overstatement: "And I would count myself among those people who think that our party has failed to meet the moment—and not just this particular moment in 2025, but really the last 10 years. It feels like the Democratic Party is stuck in a different time in American politics and doesn’t fully appreciate the threat we’re facing."
Can we stop pretending that the 2018 and 2020 wins, as well as a better than expected showing in 2022 and various other victories, never happened?
Those are great answers. Well articulated, makes points in favor of rather significant changes without sounding like he's calling for a revolution. I see why people have been speaking well of him for a while.
The Argument Generic Ballot: D+2.5 and +1.4 (when pushing leaners)
Trump -10
Harris -13
Vance -9 (10% don't know)
GOP -11
DP -13
AOC -9 (25% don't know)
https://www.theargumentmag.com/p/when-americans-bite-their-tongues
These are the worst numbers I've recently seen for Dems in the generic ballot and for AOC (some polls had her -2 to -5) while being the best favorability numbers for the party (-13).
Up only 1.4% when pushing leaners . .is pretty terrible
I don't have the access to the demographic breakdown, but I guess this ballot didn't find a swing among Gen Z, Millennials and POCs unlike other polls which would explain the result.
For example: New - Generic Ballot poll - (Age 18-29)
🔵 Democrats 48% (+26)
🔴 Republicans 22%
Economist #B - A - 8/25
While I'm not big on saying "this poll is wrong" post 2024, this poll sounds a bit off.
Never heard of the firm and is definitely an outlier - would be interesting to see their sample info and modeling assumptions
It's Lakshya Jain's Split Ticket.
So no deliberate attempt to get it wrong. My feeling is that for now, we can rightly consider this poll an outlier, compared to other polls, and not dismiss it otherwise.
sounds a lot off!
I wonder how different the numbers would be if Harris wasn't asked about.
I've noticed that democrats impose a large loser's penalty on our defeated presidential candidates. They get castigated as weak, ineffectual, etc. and then that opinion is carried over to the party at large when people think about them.
In contrast, we do the exact opposite for defeated republican presidential candidates. McCain and Romney got deified into some great moderate "good guy's at heart." Even Trump clearly benefited from a lot of image rehabilitation for 2024.
I can't quite bring myself to tip this, because it really makes me sick, but it rings true. Fuck!!!
You're absolutely right and it has annoyed me for years now, even when I didn't think terribly highly of our candidate. Once they lose, Democrats very much turn against them and act like it was always clear that they were terrible candidates who never should have run and never should have been picked.
A consistent theme I've noticed in talking to people who do this is that they feel the natural outcome is for democrats to win. It is inherently an extension of Murc's Law: the intrinsic assumption that only democrats have agency in American politics. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murc's_law
Thus, the only way in their mind for a democrat to lose is for the democrat to be bad, or have made a mistake. The electoral environment, republican actions, the media, international events, all of those are irrelevant and impotent. In their mind the agency for victory and defeat is solely the purview of our candidate and no one else.
A radical right party like the Republican party shouldn't win. We lost winnable elections in 2000, 2016 and 2024.
Who lost in 2000? That was due to vote-suppression and Supreme Court fuckery.
Even in a rigged system, we could have won easily.
I’m patiently waiting for the Politico article detailing how GOP retirements mean the Senate is more at risk after a 2nd incumbent calls it quits instead of facing 2026 voters. Any day now…
We all know Politico, with it owned by a right-wing entity, will say something along the lines of "Senate is still very likely to stay in R hands after the 2026 midterms" and prop up Hinson as less toxic than Ernst.
Hinson voted for the Big Awful Bill as well as Ernst. People aren't stupid.
Agreed with all except "People aren't stupid." If they weren't, our country and the world as a whole would be in much better shape.
I thought the same thing. If people weren't stupid, then how would one possibly explain the 2024 election results?
"People are bad", would be the explanation.
But they're also stupid because they hurt themselves.
It really is incredible how the average person has more information at their fingertips than Middle Age Kings and Roman Emperors could dream of and yet a majority of them are still so incredibly ignorant.
And in denial of facts and science.
I saw the election results last year
Regarding the headline subject of this Digest, I highly doubt Maine Republicans' attempt to eliminate mail-in voting comes even close to passing.
Maine has had referendums on voter access issues before. In 2011, the newly-elected Republican trifecta passed a bill to eliminate same-day voter registration. But Democrats collected enough signatures to put a "people's veto" on the ballot, and the law eliminating same-day registration was overturned by a 21-point margin. Every county voted to keep same-day registration.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Maine_Question_1
Dems retook the legislature the next year and have held the state House ever since then.