There was a few minutes of air where, due to reporting/data delays, he was kind of forced to stand there silently for a bit, only to grow increasingly exasperated as the data was not forthcoming, leaving him unable to make a final call after working up to it all night. the happy, arms-flailing Kornacki was gone.
Surprised by the WI results. Agreed with MPC, WI Dems dodged a bullet, as did the larger progressive movement, sparing us another several months of "see, the left is not ready for prime-time" out of Wisconsin.
Elon University poll says that Cooper has an 11-point lead over Michael Whatley among likely voters but say that Whatley is gaining more recognition thanks to the mudslinging PAC money advertisements.
Is there any *good* reason the DCCC isn't including Lawrence in their Red to Blue program?
Dunlap I can almost understand. I still think it's best to compete in every district we can (Howard Dean please come back), but in his case, the district has a pretty decent Republican lean, his opponent is very well known and well equipped to win the district, and Dunlap himself might not be the best candidate for the job. But regardless of how you feel about Lawrence and his politics, the 7th district is wide open. It's a complete 50-50 district. If Lawrence being a progressive drags him down by 3 points, I say the national environment and inevitable blue wave undoes that disadvantage, and maybe even gives him a boost.
It feels like a strange move to not include him... is there something I'm missing? A practical reason he isn't included yet?
Candidates who lead with bi-partisanship are not going to do well…neither are the focus group Democrats championed by Axelrod and Carville…convictions matter and even the occasional voter will know who means what they say, and who waffles.
I was expecting Crowley to overperform the polls to some degree due to the late relaunch of his campaign and momentum he had from that, but I was completely shocked that he won, and even more shocked that he won statewide despite barely winning Milwaukee County, which usually favors establishment candidates more strongly.
I attribute Hong's narrow loss to these major factors:
- Hong's handling of past controversial statements (Thanksgiving criticism and past support for abolishing law enforcement) was unconvincing and came across as absolutely insincere and caving to an hostile mainstream media campaign against her. Regarding the former, Hong would have been better served if she had doubled down and referred to Thanksgiving as a disgusting celebration of capitalism, genocide, and colonialism (or something to that affect) and claimed that the corporate media was trying to rig the election against her.
- Hong never made much of an argument against Crowley and acted like she was the nominee-in-waiting, especially after the Sara Rodriguez campaign finance scandal that ended her campaign. Hong spent plenty of time criticizing a man named David, but it was David Axelrod rather than David Crowley.
- For someone who was absolutely beloved by many on the left, Hong was rather uncharismatic, as much as she tried to be charismatic. Usually, most successful leftist/progressive candidates are firebrands like Bernie, AOC, Tlaib, etc..
- Hong never ran a regular TV ad, even though some of the digital ads she ran would have made very good TV ads.
- Progressive candidates tend to do better in legislative elections than executive or judicial elections.
Hong has called Crowley to concede, so, presumably, she will not be requesting a recount. I don't think a recount would significantly change the results if one was requested.
Regarding Crowley's general election prospects, he's going to get a ton of momentum from his shock primary win, but, like AES in Michigan, he'll have to try to unify a deeply divided Democratic Party. One thing in Crowley's favor is that there isn't going to be a ton of Hong/Tiffany voters short of Tiffany reinventing himself politically as Thomas Massie 2.0, which I can't envision Tiffany doing.
Ditto. I think people need to realize these were unusual circumstances and that Hong does not represent the progressive wing of the party just as Crowley doesn't represent all of the establishment.
I’m not surprised Crowley won. With all the volatility in the race and the large number of undecided, I figured that in the end a large number would make the pragmatic and safe decision. Unfortunately, Rodriguez, Barnes, etc. was not that choice.
Yeah. I'm not going to dispute that Hong was a weaker candidate but I'm pretty upset the alternative had to be Crowley of all candidates. "Calling me establishment is a slur" isn't quite as dumb as some of the things Hong said in the past (and present), but it's up there, not to mention his views on AI and Data Centers.
Agreed with your takeaways as someone who is a staunch progressive. I love Mamdani and like AES and Flanagan, but am somewhat relieved Hong didn’t win. She isn’t charismatic and has some of unlikeable “Super-Woke” stuff that drags progressive. I don’t mean super woke in terms of supporting trans/LGBT people or anything like that, but the anti-Thanksgiving and trashing her son for being half-white. We need to shed people like her from tanking the progressive movement and giving the right wing media red meat to turn moderates/independents against us
Took the words right out of my mouth. We're already having a hard time convincing Democrats to not throw transgender people under the bus, Hong holding some ridiculous views and going after Thanksgiving of all things would've just made it harder because she'd paint us in a bad light. And the trashing her son thing is super weird too.
Most of what you said is right but Hong would in no way have been rewarded if she'd doubled-down on bad-mouthing Thanksgiving. She'd have lost by a wider margin.
CT-1: Larson did so poorly for an incumbent that he only won his hometown of East Hartford by less than 6 points.
VT-State Senate: Progressive Nikhil Goyal defeated moderate state Sen. Martine Gulick to represent the heavily progressive Burlington, home to Bernie Sanders.
Ds outvoted Republicans statewide roughly 3:2. Historically thats about as low as that spread goes, DFL primaries always have more votes than GOP primaries, and isn't usually indicative of statewide results. In 2010 The DFL outvoted the GOP almost 3:1 for the primary en route to the giant red wave in November. I. In 2006 it was nearly 2:1 for the blue wave (except Republican Tim Pawlenty won reelection as governor). Heck even in 2014 when Democrats had incumbents in gimme primaries for both Senate and Governor outvoted Republicans in the primary when Reoublicans had a brutal 4 way. primary going on.
Biggest takeaway last night: polling is disastrously and irredeemably bad. In the last eight days, election outcomes in Wisconsin, Michigan, and two races in Minnesota have been off by double digits, and in different ideological directions. I'm not convinced this will be limited to primary polling either. I don't think anybody should go into any election night with any degree of confidence or certainty about anything anymore. The halcyon days of 2012-quality polling appear to buried in a shallow grave somewhere next to Obama's Midwestern coalition.
Great write up about the WI governor primary race. Voters dodged a bullet by going for Crowley for the Democratic nomination instead of Hong.
The WI GOP was denied their preferred candidate, although I'm sure they will dog whistle about crime in Milwaukee till the cows come home.
I think Wisconsin finally broke Kornacki last night
In what way? I didn't see his coverage.
He lit a Packers jersey on fire and dismissed the entire diary food group as a “woke Marxist psyop”
Nah he was just really overwhelmed and couldn’t keep up
There was a few minutes of air where, due to reporting/data delays, he was kind of forced to stand there silently for a bit, only to grow increasingly exasperated as the data was not forthcoming, leaving him unable to make a final call after working up to it all night. the happy, arms-flailing Kornacki was gone.
Surprised by the WI results. Agreed with MPC, WI Dems dodged a bullet, as did the larger progressive movement, sparing us another several months of "see, the left is not ready for prime-time" out of Wisconsin.
Hochul lead down to 10 as per Sienna, can’t get complacent.
Can you include a link to this poll?
https://sri.siena.edu/2026/08/12/siena-poll-of-likely-new-york-state-voters-hochul-49-blakeman-39/
Mamdani with a 69% favorability in NYC.
After winning with a narrow majority I'd say that's pretty good.
God bless the Wisconsin Democrats for getting their act together at the last second.
Elon University poll says that Cooper has an 11-point lead over Michael Whatley among likely voters but say that Whatley is gaining more recognition thanks to the mudslinging PAC money advertisements.
https://www.wral.com/news/nccapitol/elon-poll-cooper-leads-whatley-by-11-points-august-2026/
The survey was conducted with 800 NC adults from July 23 - 31, with a margin of error of 5.6 points for likely voters.
Is there any *good* reason the DCCC isn't including Lawrence in their Red to Blue program?
Dunlap I can almost understand. I still think it's best to compete in every district we can (Howard Dean please come back), but in his case, the district has a pretty decent Republican lean, his opponent is very well known and well equipped to win the district, and Dunlap himself might not be the best candidate for the job. But regardless of how you feel about Lawrence and his politics, the 7th district is wide open. It's a complete 50-50 district. If Lawrence being a progressive drags him down by 3 points, I say the national environment and inevitable blue wave undoes that disadvantage, and maybe even gives him a boost.
It feels like a strange move to not include him... is there something I'm missing? A practical reason he isn't included yet?
Candidates who lead with bi-partisanship are not going to do well…neither are the focus group Democrats championed by Axelrod and Carville…convictions matter and even the occasional voter will know who means what they say, and who waffles.
I would refrain from personal attacks on fellow posters + discussing policy.
easy there, bubba!!
Wisconsin gubernatorial election notes
---
I was expecting Crowley to overperform the polls to some degree due to the late relaunch of his campaign and momentum he had from that, but I was completely shocked that he won, and even more shocked that he won statewide despite barely winning Milwaukee County, which usually favors establishment candidates more strongly.
I attribute Hong's narrow loss to these major factors:
- Hong's handling of past controversial statements (Thanksgiving criticism and past support for abolishing law enforcement) was unconvincing and came across as absolutely insincere and caving to an hostile mainstream media campaign against her. Regarding the former, Hong would have been better served if she had doubled down and referred to Thanksgiving as a disgusting celebration of capitalism, genocide, and colonialism (or something to that affect) and claimed that the corporate media was trying to rig the election against her.
- Hong never made much of an argument against Crowley and acted like she was the nominee-in-waiting, especially after the Sara Rodriguez campaign finance scandal that ended her campaign. Hong spent plenty of time criticizing a man named David, but it was David Axelrod rather than David Crowley.
- For someone who was absolutely beloved by many on the left, Hong was rather uncharismatic, as much as she tried to be charismatic. Usually, most successful leftist/progressive candidates are firebrands like Bernie, AOC, Tlaib, etc..
- Hong never ran a regular TV ad, even though some of the digital ads she ran would have made very good TV ads.
- Progressive candidates tend to do better in legislative elections than executive or judicial elections.
Hong has called Crowley to concede, so, presumably, she will not be requesting a recount. I don't think a recount would significantly change the results if one was requested.
Regarding Crowley's general election prospects, he's going to get a ton of momentum from his shock primary win, but, like AES in Michigan, he'll have to try to unify a deeply divided Democratic Party. One thing in Crowley's favor is that there isn't going to be a ton of Hong/Tiffany voters short of Tiffany reinventing himself politically as Thomas Massie 2.0, which I can't envision Tiffany doing.
Ditto. I think people need to realize these were unusual circumstances and that Hong does not represent the progressive wing of the party just as Crowley doesn't represent all of the establishment.
I’m not surprised Crowley won. With all the volatility in the race and the large number of undecided, I figured that in the end a large number would make the pragmatic and safe decision. Unfortunately, Rodriguez, Barnes, etc. was not that choice.
Yeah. I'm not going to dispute that Hong was a weaker candidate but I'm pretty upset the alternative had to be Crowley of all candidates. "Calling me establishment is a slur" isn't quite as dumb as some of the things Hong said in the past (and present), but it's up there, not to mention his views on AI and Data Centers.
And higher taxes on the wealthy.
Agreed with your takeaways as someone who is a staunch progressive. I love Mamdani and like AES and Flanagan, but am somewhat relieved Hong didn’t win. She isn’t charismatic and has some of unlikeable “Super-Woke” stuff that drags progressive. I don’t mean super woke in terms of supporting trans/LGBT people or anything like that, but the anti-Thanksgiving and trashing her son for being half-white. We need to shed people like her from tanking the progressive movement and giving the right wing media red meat to turn moderates/independents against us
Took the words right out of my mouth. We're already having a hard time convincing Democrats to not throw transgender people under the bus, Hong holding some ridiculous views and going after Thanksgiving of all things would've just made it harder because she'd paint us in a bad light. And the trashing her son thing is super weird too.
Most of what you said is right but Hong would in no way have been rewarded if she'd doubled-down on bad-mouthing Thanksgiving. She'd have lost by a wider margin.
Calling it "painful" was kinda sorta dipping her toes in doubling down.
New England:
CT-1: Larson did so poorly for an incumbent that he only won his hometown of East Hartford by less than 6 points.
VT-State Senate: Progressive Nikhil Goyal defeated moderate state Sen. Martine Gulick to represent the heavily progressive Burlington, home to Bernie Sanders.
Have to say I’m perplexed on this one. Other than age, there was no reason to replace Larson. Unless there’s something I don’t know.
Health may have been a factor. Larson's had a few incidents in recent years where he has frozen up while speaking.
I think the lesson is that right now age can be enough all by itself
Senileness is, not necessarily the mere number.
Looks like Ds outvoted Rs in the MN-01 and MN-08 primaries last night. Could be potential upsets especially with Klob at top of ticket.
Too bad Lindell lost. Klobuchar would've pummeled the MN Rs even more downballot.
Lisa Demuth is still going to lose the general, but the chance of divided state government is higher since she's not cray cray like Lindell.
Johnson and Swanson seem decent as candidates.
Ds outvoted Republicans statewide roughly 3:2. Historically thats about as low as that spread goes, DFL primaries always have more votes than GOP primaries, and isn't usually indicative of statewide results. In 2010 The DFL outvoted the GOP almost 3:1 for the primary en route to the giant red wave in November. I. In 2006 it was nearly 2:1 for the blue wave (except Republican Tim Pawlenty won reelection as governor). Heck even in 2014 when Democrats had incumbents in gimme primaries for both Senate and Governor outvoted Republicans in the primary when Reoublicans had a brutal 4 way. primary going on.
Biggest takeaway last night: polling is disastrously and irredeemably bad. In the last eight days, election outcomes in Wisconsin, Michigan, and two races in Minnesota have been off by double digits, and in different ideological directions. I'm not convinced this will be limited to primary polling either. I don't think anybody should go into any election night with any degree of confidence or certainty about anything anymore. The halcyon days of 2012-quality polling appear to buried in a shallow grave somewhere next to Obama's Midwestern coalition.
The polling snafus have me worried for the statewide NC elections this fall.