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Diogenes's avatar

Donald Trump of course opposes Elon Musk's intention to form a new political party. However, demonstrating once again his embarrassing ignorance of American history, Trump wrote: "He even wants to start a Third Political Party, despite the fact that they have never succeeded in the United States.”

In fact, the Republican Party began as a third-party alternative to the Democrats and Whigs. It seems somewhat successful.

And the Reform Party was successful enough to elect a governor of Minnesota, Jesse Ventura. It was also successful enough to attract an opportunist named Donald Trump to attempt to secure its nomination for president in 2000.

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Techno00's avatar

Political news dump, recent stories.

NE-2:

https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2025/07/07/former-state-sen-brett-lindstrom-running-for-congress-in-nebraskas-2nd-district/

Ex-State Sen. Brett Lindstrom is running for the Republican nomination for NE-2, which Don Bacon is vacating. He's running as a "pragmatist" -- a virtually meaningless word in the modern GOP.

PA-10:

https://www.pennlive.com/news/2025/07/after-15-years-in-dauphin-county-post-official-weighs-run-for-congress.html

Dauphin County Commissioner Justin Douglas, a Democrat, is contemplating a bid against incumbent GOP Rep. Scott Perry. I don't know a whole lot about him but I welcome any Democrat willing to possibly unseat Perry -- particularly given how close elections have been in this seat in recent years.

CA-41. CA-LG:

https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article309969345.html

Tim Myers, bassist of the band OneRepublic, is dropping out of the Democratic primary for Ken Calvert's seat and entering the Democratic primary for Lieutenant Governor instead. Myers says he is doing so because he believes he can better oppose Trump in that position.

NC-SEN:

https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/07/07/congress/don-davis-senate-00441092

Rep. Don Davis, of NC-1, is considering running for the Democratic nomination for the Senate seat being vacated by Republican Thom Tillis. No word on if Roy Cooper running will affect Davis's moves, but honestly, given how swingy his seat is, I'd prefer he stay in Congress.

IA-4:

https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/politics/elections/2025/07/07/matt-windschitl-iowa-republican-house-majority-leader-congress-4th-district-campaign/83821151007/

This article is paywalled (and I can't access it), but apparently Matt Windschitl, the Iowa State House Majority Leader, is running for the GOP nomination for the seat being vacated by Rep. Randy Feenstra. The seat is very red so whoever wins the GOP nomination likely wins the seat.

Several NY state legislative races:

https://www.cityandstateny.com/politics/2025/07/these-state-lawmakers-just-won-new-york-city-primaries-who-could-replace-them-albany/406468/

Assuming they all win the general election, NY State Senators Brad Hoylman-Segal and Sean Ryan and State Assemblymembers Zohran Mamdani and Harvey Epstein will all be leaving the NY State Legislature for other positions (respectively, Manhattan Borough President, Buffalo Mayor, NYC Mayor, and NYC Council.) A number of candidates are thus being floated for the open seats. More details in the link, but Mamdani's seat interests me -- as noted by the article, the DSA and progressives in general are quite powerful in that district (it's sometimes jokingly nicknamed "the People's Republic of Astoria", including by those who agree with their politics), and the Queens Democratic leadership despises them. I personally think it is very likely the special election will see them try to pick a non-DSA candidate who then gets into a primary with a prospective DSA candidate later. We'll see. (Also Anthony Weiner may try again for Epstein's seat. Hopefully not.)

Make all of this what you will.

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