Not sure how I feel about your derisive and mocking condemnation of “activists” and the reform DA movement. Are you of the belief that we don’t need or shouldn’t implement reform? Unless the scandals are your primary concern.
NH-Sen: If Sununu can't even lead Pappas in a poll at this point, I feel like it's unlikely he ever could, unless by some freak occurrence Trump becomes popular.
Well, a GOP polling firm showed that Sununu is behind Pappas by just 2 percentage points.
However, if Sununu is behind by 2% points and facing what is going to be a brutal midterm election season for the GOP, I have no idea what he can do to turn his Senate race around.
IL-9 - Kat Abughazaleh, one of many candidates running in a contested primary, was assaulted and thrown violently by what appeared to be a masked ICE agent.
Maybe if ICE came to Maryland and did something like this there, it might convince the idiots in charge of the state legislature there to pass an 8-0 map.
Ferguson sounds confused at best on the subject. And this analysis really seems off:
"Any gains from redistricting in Maryland would be minimal: Democrats hold seven of the state’s eight House seats. Rep. Andy Harris (R-1st) is the sole Republican and efforts to massage district lines in a way that makes Harris vulnerable could open the door to a Republican challenger in one of the seven districts held by Democrats.
In one scenario, Harris’ district could be redrawn to push Annapolis Democrats into his Eastern Shore district. But that could come at a cost to first-term Rep. Sarah Elfreth (D-3rd), whose district now includes Annapolis. Other changes might affect first-term Reps. Johnny Olszewksi (D-2nd) or April McClain Delaney (D-6th) — in what is currently the most competitive district — or even veteran Rep. Kweisi MFume (D-7th)."
None of the seven incumbent Dems are likely to lose even in the current districts in 2026 or probably 2028 due to opinion shifts. As it is, Elfreth's district voted for Kamala Harris by a 60-37 margin, so she can afford to sacrifice some blue territory. And any changes to Delaney's are likely to make it bluer (that should in fact be a priority second only to ousting Andy Harris.)
I've been trying to understand whether districts can cross Chesapeake Bay. The state constitution, which only applies to the state legislature, states:
“Each legislative district shall consist of adjoining territory, be compact in form, and of substantially equal population. Due regard shall be given to natural boundaries and the boundaries of political subdivisions.”
The Governor's orders do apply to congressional districts, and they state that plans shall "respect natural boundaries ... to the extent practicable." They also say that plans shall "include nearby areas of population to the extent practicable." But I'm not clear what constitutes a nearby area of population and there is .
It's an older opinion, but in 2000 AG Curran opined the following concerning legislative districts:
"In our opinion, a legislative district that is divided by a body of navigable water, even though that water is not spanned by a bridge or tunnel or crossed by a ferry, does not violate the contiguity requirement of Article III, §4. However, a district that crossed the Chesapeake Bay to join portions of its western and eastern shores might be subject to challenge."
Have there ever been districts that cross Chesapeake Bay?
In the 1970s and 80s MD-01 took in the "Southern Maryland" counties of Charles, Calvert, and St. Mary's in addition to the Eastern Shore. (Since the early 1990's SoMD has been in MD-05). They are on the west side of the Bay, and there's no direct link (other than boat) between them and the Eastern Shore, unlike the Annapolis area which is linked to the ES by the Bay Bridge or Harford and Baltimore Counties which are at the northern end of the Bay.
They don’t have to touch the partisanship of MD-03 or MD-02 and still make MD-06 bluer. MD-04, MD-07, and MD-08 are the districts that could take substantial hits in partisanship.
We need to substantially curtail their operational powers. Maybe limit them to a short distance from the physical border and require warrants or similar for anything else. Something substantial. Maybe even do a symbolic replacement of ICE with a return to INS.
Yes but being that ICE is apart of the Department of Homeland Security, cracking down on ICE may not be enough.
I’ve said DHS should be eliminated all together. As long as all the primary functions go to both the Department of Defense (customs enforcement) and Department of State (immigration), billions added to the deficit can be saved and we have less of a headache.
It will not poll well or sound good; Republicans will portray it as opening the border and so will the human trafficking cartels in Latin America leading to another border crisis.
Eliminating the dept of education, cutting science research funding, cutting funding for national parks etc all do not poll well or sound good, but that doesn’t stop republicans from pursuing them. Dems shouldn’t let the republican propaganda machine dictate how they govern.
I broadly agree, but we can pursue our goals while being smarter about it. If we're worried about the rampant problems with ICE or DHS, we can solve that in a way that generates fewer bad headlines. Similar to how the "Defund" movement was a messaging blunder that could have been improved without abandoning the core policy ideals.
I'm open to creative ideas here. Far as I can tell, any future Democratic action against ICE would not only be a PR bonanza for Republicans but rinse and repeat the signal internationally that the borders are open again, leaving us with another deluge at the border and no fucking idea of what to do about it.
Other than behind-the-scenes tweaks that fail to make the headlines and lead to a relatively slow-motion defanging that doesn't result in more border chaos, I don't see how the Democrats can expect to keep touching this border enforcement stove and get a different outcome.
Well I wouldn’t run on eliminating DHS as a campaign strategy. However, if the goal is to transition to a NEW system that allows the Department of Defense and Department of State (or a new department all together) to execute the function of domestic national security, I don’t see how this would poll poorly so long as security is there for enforcement.
We’re not talking about Defunding Homeland Security. We’re talking about funding the RIGHT security and making sure the right department does not have the ability to commit any unlawful actions toward citizens, especially immigrants.
Besides, the buck stops with DHS with whatever goes on with ICE. Either you significantly reform it or eliminate it all together and get the functions transferred elsewhere.
NH is one state where Republicans would almost certainly pay a huge price in 2026 if they were seen as kowtowing to Trump’s demands. Ayotte knows this.
"In ‘Dead Center,’ Joe Manchin Says He’s Been Right All Along
In a new memoir, the former Democratic senator from West Virginia defends his centrist politics, portraying himself as a high-minded public servant with unshakable convictions."
'Manchin’s book probably won’t be his last foray into the public eye. He expects to be involved in midterms, including an open offer to campaign for Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. In typical Manchin fashion, he’s also flirting once again with the possibility of a third-party presidential bid, broaching the topic in a New York Times interview."
Deleted some of the post, I uselessly got triggered.
But you can’t make people keep their expectations realistic, especially when realistic expectations are that the structural problems aren’t getting fixed. We just look feckless and weak if we say that we can’t actually fix those problems.
I feel this is something oft underestimated in our politics.
At the end of the day I'd rather we have an extra senator or representative than have red seats held by republicans. We need to understand that there are real costs to this, it's not a free win but a tradeoff. The overwhelming majority of voters don't know a damn thing about Manchin or Sinema or, back in the day, Lieberman. They see that we hold a trifecta and expect us to be able to implement our policy ambitions in full.
Whatever we accomplish will be perceived as the true desire of the democratic party. When we implement partial measures and watered down compromises as a result of the filibuster and strongly centrist veto points within the party, there is a not insignificant part of the electorate that thinks this is all democratic leadership wants or has ever wanted.
I think that tradeoff was worth preventing Biden from being a lame duck on day 1 of his term, but that doesn't change that the tradeoff exists.
I don't think I was wrong about Golden but I've become "untriggered" now and I believe Manchin was worth it because we were able to bail the American people out of COVID and got Kentanji Brown Jackson on the SC.
I'd rather he was senator from WV but he wasn't going to win in 24. I'd rather he be irrelevant if he plans to spend the remainder of his life trashing Dems and talking up the filibuster and a quixotic octogenarian run for president..
Exactly. I was very happy with his as a D from WV and was willing to tolerate his nonsense while he was in that role. Now that he's just a gladfly...no thanks...
He'll be 81 in 2028; the same age Biden was last year. I know the media only cared about Biden's age for their own reasons, but I do not believe he will have the energy or willingness to devote to even a half-assed spoiler third party campaign in three years. He's only after attention right now, knowing "presidential run" is catnip for the press who will trip over themselves to give him more coverage right now because he said those magic words.
MA-Gov, job approval. MassINC Polling Group, 1000 adults, Aug 11-18.
Healey: 56/33
Trump: 35/60
RFK Jr: 34/56
“Healey looks to me like a conventional Democrat,” said Steve Koczela, president of the MassINC Polling group. “She draws more cross-party support than Trump. Republicans don’t love her, but they also are not united against her the way Democrats oppose Trump.”
Separately, IMO Moulton will not primary Markey. He is not well known outside his (my) district, and I've not yet seen any reports of him doing a statewide "listening tour". Instead he'll cruise to another term. He won the 2020 primary 78/12/10 against stronger opponents than Andres-Beck.
I think he will run, he is very ambitious, and this may be his only shot for higher office without having to compete in an open field. Anyone remembers his failed run for Prez lol?
If Mamdani is what causes Jay Jacobs to finally no longer be State Party Chair we owe him a huge debt of gratitude, regardless of what he gets in the November election.
Then so be it. I’m pretty skeptical that the Mamdani experiment is going to work (NYC is possibly the least forgiving governing job in America after President and Mamdani is both quite green and has made promises that will be hard to keep) but electorates are allowed to entertain such experiments.
Now, I’m also skeptical that “endorsements” matter as much as the pro and anti camps seem to think. Jacobs has burned a lot of bridges and this is a bad thing to stick your neck out over. The party serves the electorate and if the electorate picks Mamdani as their standard bearer it’s up to the party to consolidate behind him, even if they prefer to do so quietly. The chance to find a better option like Lander rather than Cuomo was a while ago
Jacobs should have been gone after Dems got massacred on Long Island in the 2021 elections. This is the same guy that as chairman of the state party seeemed to take glee on election night 2020 when a red mirage made it look like Dems were gonna lose a bunch of seats in the state senate (they gained a few seats after the mail in ballots were counted) and was happy to blame “socialists” for the apparent early results.
In 2021, Jacobs wasted his time and the party resources trying to defeat a Democrat in the Buffalo mayor race rather than working to put out fires in the Long Island off year elections.
How does he put out those fires? Does he say that the spate of shoplifting and fentanyl users shuffling in the open like fresh zombies is all fake or not something to be concerned about? And would people even know who he is?
Connecticut's House delegation was quite disappointing here - four of their five House members (Larson, Courtney, DeLauro, and Himes) voted yes. Larson and DeLauro are particularly surprising, since Larson faces a competitive primary and DeLauro is a CPC member (and both represent solidly blue districts), but the fact is, both are old and, I guess, living in the past in terms of what politics is like. (Larson is 77 and DeLauro is 82.) Jahana Hayes, age 52, was the only CT Dem to vote no despite her district being the least Democratic of the five in CT. (I think Hayes would be a great Senator if Blumenthal retires in 2028.)
On the other end of the age spectrum, I will give some rare praise to my Congresswoman, Maggie Goodlander (age 38). Despite her district being substantially less blue than any of the ones that the four yes-voting CT Dems represent, Goodlander voted Present. I think that's a fair vote. Perhaps, at least for this, she understands modern-day American politics better than congresspeople who are twice her age. (I still don't think she knows much about New Hampshire, but this particular vote didn't really require her to.) Chris Pappas did vote yes, but he's running statewide next year and probably wanted to cover his back.
I was going to make a comment about my surprise with Goodlander and her present vote (we're both in her district). When she won the primary I expected to be disappointed with her, but she's exceeded my expectations from the start.
Pappas is only 45 and voted yes. I know he has a senate election but he's as well positioned for it as he can hope for and could easily have afford to vote present or not vote at all.
Would love to see her run for senate. NY, and our party everywhere, deserves so much better than Schumer and his "leadership." Considering his age and the risk of ending his career with the ignominy of losing a primary, it's not out of question that he would opt to retire if she announced early enough.
Has AOC been preparing anyone to be able to succeed her in the house? One of the more common mistakes from progressives has been not working to have like-minded successors.
We should be clear about who Charlie Kirk was: a man who believed that the Civil Rights Act that granted Black Americans the right to vote was a “mistake,” who after the violent attack on Paul Pelosi claimed that “some amazing patriot out there” should bail out his assailant, and accused Jews of controlling “not just the colleges – it’s the nonprofits, it’s the movies, it’s Hollywood, it’s all of it.”
His rhetoric and beliefs were ignorant and sought to disenfranchise millions of Americans – far from “working tirelessly to promote unity” as asserted by the majority in this resolution.”
We can condemn his horrific assassination and the scourge of political violence without uplifting these ideas.
Slight correction: the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was about desegregation in public accommodations, not to be confused with the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Schumer won't retire. I can bet on it because he has always wanted to be the Senate Majority leader presiding over a trifecta which Manchin was de facto during 2020-22.
Brian Schatz would a huge upgrade, he is a moderate progressive, not a primary fixer like Schumer, long term ally of JStreet and would be much more antagonistic to Wall Street.
If he was six years younger I'd completely agree. He'll turn 78 in 2028, and in and of itself that's old enough to strongly consider retirement from politics. Especially with recent illnesses and deaths in office of older officials.
Faced with a difficult primary with a base that hates him and loves his opponent, it's not hard to imagine him calling it quits. Even if he was confident he'd win, such a brutal campaign would be anything but fun, especially in his late 70s.
Why would he give up the opportunity of being the second/third most powerful man in America in 2029? and he would have lots of financial backing from Wall Street and certain single issue PACs. It could well become the most expensive Senate primary ever.
Because he'll be signing up to spend his 80s in the senate at an age where aggressive campaigning will be difficult and he would face a very, very real chance of harming his legacy by losing.
Nobody wants to end their decades long political career with a defeat. A defeat in a primary is, if anything, worse for their legacy (and ego) than a defeat in a general election.
I'm not saying he's guaranteed to retire, I'm saying it's very plausible that he would retire.
It's weird, isn't it? He was never the pugilist that Reid was, but there was a time where Schumer seemed to revel in partisan politics and getting the most wins he could out of the hand he was dealt. I'm not sure he ever cared from an ideological perspective but he leaned into it regardless of his motivations.
Him being a street fighter was a big part of why he was finally able to take down D’Amato in 1998. He knew that in order the beat D’Amato, he had the use his own playbook against him.
However, for the last 10-15 he’s shown none of that aggressiveness. His media appearances consist him clearly reading some uninspired material off of a piece of paper.
Does anyone know how much the calculations showed Brad Lander would win by if Mamdani was eliminated in the last round? I know it's all hypothetical since many voters wouldn't vote in the primary at all without him. I'm just interested.
CA-22: Campaign launch for Randy Villegas (D). Seems interesting as an option against Valadao that's not Jasmeet Bains.
"I'm an educator, auto shop owner and the proud son of Mexican immigrants - and I’m running for Congress in California's Central Valley to make sure the hardworking families who feed the nation never go without food on our own tables."
Hadn't he already announced his candidacy awhile back?
I'm still of the opinion that in this district in particular, a Democrat with a Hispanic last name does have a meaningful advantage over anyone who doesn't. However, Jasmeet Bains has made a name for herself and is broadly well liked in the region. The primary will be telling.
I had no clue Cam Kasky was actually seriously thinking about running for Congress. I guess being Tim Miller's apprentice and being part of the MSNBC The Weekend revolving cast of guests for the past couple of months has gotten him thinking of running for Congress. When Kasky and Miller talked about this two weeks ago Kasky didn't sound like the thought of running had seriously crossed his mind.
so because the national leadership of the teamsters endorsed trump, we would gut all protections of unionized people? Beyond the fact that won't help win elections, the SEIU CWA etc went to the wall for us and always go to the wall for us. This line of commentary is out of line
do you have any connections with "labor," any loved ones that are here because of the hard work unions do for the good of all workers, union or non-union. I'm sure you must know many members of organized labor that are very different from Sean O'Brien.
I'm as pro-union as they come but if neither leadership nor the rank and file can return the favor for Dems, a vicious cycle that leads to irreconcilable differences and divorce is pending.
Unions have been shifting towards teachers, nurses, and public employees for a while now. Teamsters' bad politics is a bad reason to support RTW laws when those laws are being used to weaken unions that support us.
The largest union in the US is NEA (teachers). Second largest is SEIU (healthcare). Third largest is AFT (teachers). Fourth largest is AFSCME (public employees). Teamsters is all the way at fifth.
Focus on Teamsters and other unions like them in construction, manufacturing, or trades is a very outdated look. Unions today are increasingly college educated and non white male. Supporting unions is supporting those larger unions that do align with us.
The future doesn't look great for unions representing public employees getting bulldozed by DOGE and Scott Walker and his imitators.
The future doesn't look great for teachers' unions with plummeting birth rates and districts poised to consolidate because of it.
On the other hand, the future looks potentially brighter for trade unions representing blue-collar fields where demand is very high and employment prognosis is bright.
Taking a look at the Midwestern battleground states alone, it's pretty clear which union leadership and rank-and-file I'd most prefer to be on my side.
1. So you're OK with public employees getting paid almost nothing and being treated like shit?
2. Lower birth rates just means smaller class sizes, which is obviously good for the schoolkids. Firing teachers because of that is stupid.
3. Blue-collar fields that are heavily unionized are going to be hollowed out (even more than they already have been) as robots and AI become more widespread.
Not sure how it became interpreted that I'm for RTW laws. I am most definitively not. I'm simply speculating on the ugly trend lines for union affiliation and Democratic support amongst them in the era of attrition.
If you think shrinking birth rates will not be met with a corresponding decline of educators, particularly with the AI tidal wave about to crash upon us, then I want what you're smoking!
Electricians, HVAC technicians and the like are poised to weather the AI storm better than just about any other field. Hard to know exactly how this is gonna play out but it's extremely hard to imagine public employees in offices faring better than blue-collar workers post-AI.
Your comment seems to imply that you're OK with public employees being fired en masse. I really hope you're not, because that would be absolutely disgusting and certainly something I would not expect to see on a Democratic website. My point is that public employees need strong unions to protect our jobs and prevent us from being run roughshod over by asshole governors and state legislatures. Because, as I hope you understand, public employees are the people who make each state run smoothly, and without us practically everything would grind to a halt.
I don't agree with the implication of the comment, because it doesn't matter which unions we want to support us in a question of should we or should not support ending RTW laws. Teamsters aren't going to shift in our direction if we opt to support RTW.
I'd also disagree on the future of unions. I'd say it doesn't look rosy for any of them, but it looks worst for manufacturing and many other manual labor unions. Manufacturing has been shifting towards the south, away from pro-union states, for decades now. Easy example with car manufacturing. New plants tend to be in Tennessee or Georgia these days, not Michigan or Ohio.
Some trades unions, state/local public employees (including teachers), and nurses are in the best position to weather the difficult future. They will at the minimum continue to have a bulwark in blue states. You cannot outsource the local hospital from the Northeast or Midwest down to Texas. You cannot outsource primary schools to Mississippi. You cannot outsource the DMV to South Carolina. All that is the same as how you cannot outsource the local plumber or electrician to Kentucky.
I definitely don't support RTW laws. Again, not sure how my comments were interpreted as such.
Between Medicaid cuts, corporate health care consolidation, and AI, I don't like the prospects of the local hospitals keeping their unionized labor force any better than manufacturing plants. My hometown is a union town of 18,000+ people that, over the last eight years, has had its new hospital hollowed out and sold for parts by Mayo, a health care provider with a better reputation than most. I'm skeptical the organized labor "bulwark", at least that that is the least bit friendly to Democrats survives the combination of AI job losses and autocratic governance.
I didn't think you supported RTW, but in the context of the discussion it seemed like you were arguing that we need to consider it in the context of Teamsters.
Healthcare workers are by and large not doing jobs that can be done by AI. At least not today, maybe in several decades. That relies as much on robotics advances as it does on AI advances. The types of healthcare work that can be done from far away is the type of stuff that wasn't unionized in the first place and isn't a good target for AI automation anyway. AI cannot physically help a surgeon, or do a blood draw, or change bedpans, or...
AI is probably it's biggest danger to people in (a) lower paying creative fields, like non-headline voice actors or poster artists, and (b) technical jobs like mine, where there's a lot of design work relying on math/science.
Meanwhile, US Rep. Laura Gillen, a freshman Democrat from a swing district in the Long Island suburbs, has told people in frustration that she’s heard that Mamdani has said he’d go campaign against her if she continued to criticize him, as she has done from the day after he won the primary through Gov. Kathy Hochul’s endorsement of him this week. Whatever strength Mamdani has shown in the city, Gillen backers note, her electorate is notably different. A Gillen spokesperson did not comment.
I do not agree with him on a lot of things and my views are closer to Brad Lander but when has it happened before that the party establishment has refused to back the nominee over Trump collaborating opponents?
I don't really keep track of endorsements. They barely ever matter. My point is that I'm not sure we need to keep amplifying the discord around Mamdani. The next 4 years might be tough enough.
Not sure how I feel about your derisive and mocking condemnation of “activists” and the reform DA movement. Are you of the belief that we don’t need or shouldn’t implement reform? Unless the scandals are your primary concern.
NH-Sen: If Sununu can't even lead Pappas in a poll at this point, I feel like it's unlikely he ever could, unless by some freak occurrence Trump becomes popular.
Well, a GOP polling firm showed that Sununu is behind Pappas by just 2 percentage points.
However, if Sununu is behind by 2% points and facing what is going to be a brutal midterm election season for the GOP, I have no idea what he can do to turn his Senate race around.
https://www.newsweek.com/us-senate-sununu-democrats-midterms-elections-2127091
*TRIGGER WARNING: PHYSICAL VIOLENCE*
---
IL-9 - Kat Abughazaleh, one of many candidates running in a contested primary, was assaulted and thrown violently by what appeared to be a masked ICE agent.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOyIovZDvU0/
My blood is boiling. ICE needs to fucking go
Maybe if ICE came to Maryland and did something like this there, it might convince the idiots in charge of the state legislature there to pass an 8-0 map.
Seriously, I hope that State Senate President is getting calls from Moore, Obama etc.
Ferguson sounds confused at best on the subject. And this analysis really seems off:
"Any gains from redistricting in Maryland would be minimal: Democrats hold seven of the state’s eight House seats. Rep. Andy Harris (R-1st) is the sole Republican and efforts to massage district lines in a way that makes Harris vulnerable could open the door to a Republican challenger in one of the seven districts held by Democrats.
In one scenario, Harris’ district could be redrawn to push Annapolis Democrats into his Eastern Shore district. But that could come at a cost to first-term Rep. Sarah Elfreth (D-3rd), whose district now includes Annapolis. Other changes might affect first-term Reps. Johnny Olszewksi (D-2nd) or April McClain Delaney (D-6th) — in what is currently the most competitive district — or even veteran Rep. Kweisi MFume (D-7th)."
None of the seven incumbent Dems are likely to lose even in the current districts in 2026 or probably 2028 due to opinion shifts. As it is, Elfreth's district voted for Kamala Harris by a 60-37 margin, so she can afford to sacrifice some blue territory. And any changes to Delaney's are likely to make it bluer (that should in fact be a priority second only to ousting Andy Harris.)
I've been trying to understand whether districts can cross Chesapeake Bay. The state constitution, which only applies to the state legislature, states:
“Each legislative district shall consist of adjoining territory, be compact in form, and of substantially equal population. Due regard shall be given to natural boundaries and the boundaries of political subdivisions.”
The Governor's orders do apply to congressional districts, and they state that plans shall "respect natural boundaries ... to the extent practicable." They also say that plans shall "include nearby areas of population to the extent practicable." But I'm not clear what constitutes a nearby area of population and there is .
It's an older opinion, but in 2000 AG Curran opined the following concerning legislative districts:
"In our opinion, a legislative district that is divided by a body of navigable water, even though that water is not spanned by a bridge or tunnel or crossed by a ferry, does not violate the contiguity requirement of Article III, §4. However, a district that crossed the Chesapeake Bay to join portions of its western and eastern shores might be subject to challenge."
Have there ever been districts that cross Chesapeake Bay?
MD-01 almost always crossed the Bay prior to the 2001 redistricting.
In the 1970s and 80s MD-01 took in the "Southern Maryland" counties of Charles, Calvert, and St. Mary's in addition to the Eastern Shore. (Since the early 1990's SoMD has been in MD-05). They are on the west side of the Bay, and there's no direct link (other than boat) between them and the Eastern Shore, unlike the Annapolis area which is linked to the ES by the Bay Bridge or Harford and Baltimore Counties which are at the northern end of the Bay.
They don’t have to touch the partisanship of MD-03 or MD-02 and still make MD-06 bluer. MD-04, MD-07, and MD-08 are the districts that could take substantial hits in partisanship.
We need to abolish the filibuster and crack down on ICE in 2029. Also, fire all the fascists in the agency and traumatize them like DOGE did.
We need to substantially curtail their operational powers. Maybe limit them to a short distance from the physical border and require warrants or similar for anything else. Something substantial. Maybe even do a symbolic replacement of ICE with a return to INS.
Yes but being that ICE is apart of the Department of Homeland Security, cracking down on ICE may not be enough.
I’ve said DHS should be eliminated all together. As long as all the primary functions go to both the Department of Defense (customs enforcement) and Department of State (immigration), billions added to the deficit can be saved and we have less of a headache.
It will not poll well or sound good; Republicans will portray it as opening the border and so will the human trafficking cartels in Latin America leading to another border crisis.
Eliminating the dept of education, cutting science research funding, cutting funding for national parks etc all do not poll well or sound good, but that doesn’t stop republicans from pursuing them. Dems shouldn’t let the republican propaganda machine dictate how they govern.
I broadly agree, but we can pursue our goals while being smarter about it. If we're worried about the rampant problems with ICE or DHS, we can solve that in a way that generates fewer bad headlines. Similar to how the "Defund" movement was a messaging blunder that could have been improved without abandoning the core policy ideals.
This. This. This. We need to figure out how to counteract these attacks. Stop fighting on their rhetorical battlegrounds.
I'm open to creative ideas here. Far as I can tell, any future Democratic action against ICE would not only be a PR bonanza for Republicans but rinse and repeat the signal internationally that the borders are open again, leaving us with another deluge at the border and no fucking idea of what to do about it.
Other than behind-the-scenes tweaks that fail to make the headlines and lead to a relatively slow-motion defanging that doesn't result in more border chaos, I don't see how the Democrats can expect to keep touching this border enforcement stove and get a different outcome.
Well I wouldn’t run on eliminating DHS as a campaign strategy. However, if the goal is to transition to a NEW system that allows the Department of Defense and Department of State (or a new department all together) to execute the function of domestic national security, I don’t see how this would poll poorly so long as security is there for enforcement.
We’re not talking about Defunding Homeland Security. We’re talking about funding the RIGHT security and making sure the right department does not have the ability to commit any unlawful actions toward citizens, especially immigrants.
Besides, the buck stops with DHS with whatever goes on with ICE. Either you significantly reform it or eliminate it all together and get the functions transferred elsewhere.
NH is one state where Republicans would almost certainly pay a huge price in 2026 if they were seen as kowtowing to Trump’s demands. Ayotte knows this.
Yep, i have no doubt the only thing stopping them is blowback from voters if they kowtow to Trump.
Ayotte does not want to be a one-term wonder a second time!
Manchin says he loves McConnell for preserving the Senate and heaps praise on Fetterman.
https://archive.ph/sFD3J
"In ‘Dead Center,’ Joe Manchin Says He’s Been Right All Along
In a new memoir, the former Democratic senator from West Virginia defends his centrist politics, portraying himself as a high-minded public servant with unshakable convictions."
https://www.semafor.com/article/09/18/2025/we-need-a-comforter-joe-manchin-re-enters-the-washington-arena
'Manchin’s book probably won’t be his last foray into the public eye. He expects to be involved in midterms, including an open offer to campaign for Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. In typical Manchin fashion, he’s also flirting once again with the possibility of a third-party presidential bid, broaching the topic in a New York Times interview."
Deleted some of the post, I uselessly got triggered.
Dudes always been desperate for attention, he's irrelevant.
With each passing day, Manchin only further buries his relevance six feet under.
I would rather have him in and have people keep their expectations realistic.
But you can’t make people keep their expectations realistic, especially when realistic expectations are that the structural problems aren’t getting fixed. We just look feckless and weak if we say that we can’t actually fix those problems.
I feel this is something oft underestimated in our politics.
At the end of the day I'd rather we have an extra senator or representative than have red seats held by republicans. We need to understand that there are real costs to this, it's not a free win but a tradeoff. The overwhelming majority of voters don't know a damn thing about Manchin or Sinema or, back in the day, Lieberman. They see that we hold a trifecta and expect us to be able to implement our policy ambitions in full.
Whatever we accomplish will be perceived as the true desire of the democratic party. When we implement partial measures and watered down compromises as a result of the filibuster and strongly centrist veto points within the party, there is a not insignificant part of the electorate that thinks this is all democratic leadership wants or has ever wanted.
I think that tradeoff was worth preventing Biden from being a lame duck on day 1 of his term, but that doesn't change that the tradeoff exists.
I don't think I was wrong about Golden but I've become "untriggered" now and I believe Manchin was worth it because we were able to bail the American people out of COVID and got Kentanji Brown Jackson on the SC.
I'd rather he was senator from WV but he wasn't going to win in 24. I'd rather he be irrelevant if he plans to spend the remainder of his life trashing Dems and talking up the filibuster and a quixotic octogenarian run for president..
Frankly, it was nothing short of miraculous that he managed to hang on in 2018. (He didn't hit 50% of the vote, though.)
Exactly. I was very happy with his as a D from WV and was willing to tolerate his nonsense while he was in that role. Now that he's just a gladfly...no thanks...
The "center" is a meaningless place when the game is a tug-of-war.
Manchin's just pissy that he's irrelevant now, and will be for the rest of his life.
He'll be 81 in 2028; the same age Biden was last year. I know the media only cared about Biden's age for their own reasons, but I do not believe he will have the energy or willingness to devote to even a half-assed spoiler third party campaign in three years. He's only after attention right now, knowing "presidential run" is catnip for the press who will trip over themselves to give him more coverage right now because he said those magic words.
He’s not worth spending time on.
Who cares about Manchin’s book?
I’d rather read Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “Be Useful” book than have to hear anything that comes out of Manchin’s mind.
Trump seems pretty panicky if he’s putting this much effort into getting one, pretty iffy district.
MA-Gov, job approval. MassINC Polling Group, 1000 adults, Aug 11-18.
Healey: 56/33
Trump: 35/60
RFK Jr: 34/56
“Healey looks to me like a conventional Democrat,” said Steve Koczela, president of the MassINC Polling group. “She draws more cross-party support than Trump. Republicans don’t love her, but they also are not united against her the way Democrats oppose Trump.”
https://commonwealthbeacon.org/by-the-numbers/healey-holds-her-head-above-water-in-new-poll/
Separately, IMO Moulton will not primary Markey. He is not well known outside his (my) district, and I've not yet seen any reports of him doing a statewide "listening tour". Instead he'll cruise to another term. He won the 2020 primary 78/12/10 against stronger opponents than Andres-Beck.
I think he will run, he is very ambitious, and this may be his only shot for higher office without having to compete in an open field. Anyone remembers his failed run for Prez lol?
https://nypost.com/2025/09/18/us-news/powerful-ny-democratic-party-chair-jay-jacobs-refuses-to-back-zohran-mamdani-could-step-down-over-hochuls-shock-endorsement-sources/
NYPost reports that Jay Jacobs is likely to step down or be kicked out.
If Mamdani is what causes Jay Jacobs to finally no longer be State Party Chair we owe him a huge debt of gratitude, regardless of what he gets in the November election.
Mamdani could be a spectacular failure as Mayor and he will have already nonetheless had one huge accomplishment lol
But then the endorsers will eat crow. At least the state can take the wheel in that scenario.
Then so be it. I’m pretty skeptical that the Mamdani experiment is going to work (NYC is possibly the least forgiving governing job in America after President and Mamdani is both quite green and has made promises that will be hard to keep) but electorates are allowed to entertain such experiments.
Now, I’m also skeptical that “endorsements” matter as much as the pro and anti camps seem to think. Jacobs has burned a lot of bridges and this is a bad thing to stick your neck out over. The party serves the electorate and if the electorate picks Mamdani as their standard bearer it’s up to the party to consolidate behind him, even if they prefer to do so quietly. The chance to find a better option like Lander rather than Cuomo was a while ago
Jacobs should have been gone after Dems got massacred on Long Island in the 2021 elections. This is the same guy that as chairman of the state party seeemed to take glee on election night 2020 when a red mirage made it look like Dems were gonna lose a bunch of seats in the state senate (they gained a few seats after the mail in ballots were counted) and was happy to blame “socialists” for the apparent early results.
Where did he show glee? That's news to me. And 2021 was due to the rise in petty crime and antisocial behavior making the suburbs cringe.
In 2021, Jacobs wasted his time and the party resources trying to defeat a Democrat in the Buffalo mayor race rather than working to put out fires in the Long Island off year elections.
How does he put out those fires? Does he say that the spate of shoplifting and fentanyl users shuffling in the open like fresh zombies is all fake or not something to be concerned about? And would people even know who he is?
https://x.com/findareaction/status/1563954801649618945
Maybe they can find a party leader whose main goals isn’t fighting others in the party.
Only 58 Dems dared to vote against praising Charlie Kirk. Most fall into 3 categories:
1. Progressives
2. Vulnerable in a primary (Menendez, Moulton, Thanedar + Krishnamoorthi for Senate)
3. Black Dems (more than 75% voted no)
Only 2 of the 58 Nos (Moulton & Quigley) are white.
https://x.com/aaronnarraph/status/1969068256532005268
Pathetic.
Slightly more data: 95 dems voted yes, 58 voted no, 38 voted present, 22 didn't vote.
I'll give leeway to most that aren't in the 95 bucket.
Looks like the NDC whipped their caucus while the PC let it be a free vote.
This vote proves that age really does matter.
Connecticut's House delegation was quite disappointing here - four of their five House members (Larson, Courtney, DeLauro, and Himes) voted yes. Larson and DeLauro are particularly surprising, since Larson faces a competitive primary and DeLauro is a CPC member (and both represent solidly blue districts), but the fact is, both are old and, I guess, living in the past in terms of what politics is like. (Larson is 77 and DeLauro is 82.) Jahana Hayes, age 52, was the only CT Dem to vote no despite her district being the least Democratic of the five in CT. (I think Hayes would be a great Senator if Blumenthal retires in 2028.)
On the other end of the age spectrum, I will give some rare praise to my Congresswoman, Maggie Goodlander (age 38). Despite her district being substantially less blue than any of the ones that the four yes-voting CT Dems represent, Goodlander voted Present. I think that's a fair vote. Perhaps, at least for this, she understands modern-day American politics better than congresspeople who are twice her age. (I still don't think she knows much about New Hampshire, but this particular vote didn't really require her to.) Chris Pappas did vote yes, but he's running statewide next year and probably wanted to cover his back.
I was going to make a comment about my surprise with Goodlander and her present vote (we're both in her district). When she won the primary I expected to be disappointed with her, but she's exceeded my expectations from the start.
Pappas is only 45 and voted yes. I know he has a senate election but he's as well positioned for it as he can hope for and could easily have afford to vote present or not vote at all.
Craig and Stevens both voted yes.
Both are also funded by crypto and aipac.
AOC and her team are positioning her to run for president or primary Schumer for the U.S. Senate in 2028.
https://www.axios.com/2025/09/19/aoc-2028-democrats-president-senate
Let's not discuss the President part since it's against the rules of The Downballot.
Would love to see her run for senate. NY, and our party everywhere, deserves so much better than Schumer and his "leadership." Considering his age and the risk of ending his career with the ignominy of losing a primary, it's not out of question that he would opt to retire if she announced early enough.
Has AOC been preparing anyone to be able to succeed her in the house? One of the more common mistakes from progressives has been not working to have like-minded successors.
We should be clear about who Charlie Kirk was: a man who believed that the Civil Rights Act that granted Black Americans the right to vote was a “mistake,” who after the violent attack on Paul Pelosi claimed that “some amazing patriot out there” should bail out his assailant, and accused Jews of controlling “not just the colleges – it’s the nonprofits, it’s the movies, it’s Hollywood, it’s all of it.”
His rhetoric and beliefs were ignorant and sought to disenfranchise millions of Americans – far from “working tirelessly to promote unity” as asserted by the majority in this resolution.”
We can condemn his horrific assassination and the scourge of political violence without uplifting these ideas.
https://x.com/AOC/status/1969074559602110509
This is the clarity we need rn.
I actually don't think he truly believed much of anything at all—which, IMO, makes his revolting rhetoric all the worse.
He believed in the ability of the grift to make him very rich, like most RW mouthpieces
Exactly. I have more respect for true believers like Ron Johnson.
Slight correction: the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was about desegregation in public accommodations, not to be confused with the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Schumer won't retire. I can bet on it because he has always wanted to be the Senate Majority leader presiding over a trifecta which Manchin was de facto during 2020-22.
Brian Schatz would a huge upgrade, he is a moderate progressive, not a primary fixer like Schumer, long term ally of JStreet and would be much more antagonistic to Wall Street.
If he was six years younger I'd completely agree. He'll turn 78 in 2028, and in and of itself that's old enough to strongly consider retirement from politics. Especially with recent illnesses and deaths in office of older officials.
Faced with a difficult primary with a base that hates him and loves his opponent, it's not hard to imagine him calling it quits. Even if he was confident he'd win, such a brutal campaign would be anything but fun, especially in his late 70s.
Why would he give up the opportunity of being the second/third most powerful man in America in 2029? and he would have lots of financial backing from Wall Street and certain single issue PACs. It could well become the most expensive Senate primary ever.
Because he'll be signing up to spend his 80s in the senate at an age where aggressive campaigning will be difficult and he would face a very, very real chance of harming his legacy by losing.
Nobody wants to end their decades long political career with a defeat. A defeat in a primary is, if anything, worse for their legacy (and ego) than a defeat in a general election.
I'm not saying he's guaranteed to retire, I'm saying it's very plausible that he would retire.
Time for Schumer to call it quits. There was a time where I thought he was good at his job but his street fighter days are very painfully over.
It's weird, isn't it? He was never the pugilist that Reid was, but there was a time where Schumer seemed to revel in partisan politics and getting the most wins he could out of the hand he was dealt. I'm not sure he ever cared from an ideological perspective but he leaned into it regardless of his motivations.
Those days are long gone.
Him being a street fighter was a big part of why he was finally able to take down D’Amato in 1998. He knew that in order the beat D’Amato, he had the use his own playbook against him.
However, for the last 10-15 he’s shown none of that aggressiveness. His media appearances consist him clearly reading some uninspired material off of a piece of paper.
Does anyone know how much the calculations showed Brad Lander would win by if Mamdani was eliminated in the last round? I know it's all hypothetical since many voters wouldn't vote in the primary at all without him. I'm just interested.
CA-22: Campaign launch for Randy Villegas (D). Seems interesting as an option against Valadao that's not Jasmeet Bains.
"I'm an educator, auto shop owner and the proud son of Mexican immigrants - and I’m running for Congress in California's Central Valley to make sure the hardworking families who feed the nation never go without food on our own tables."
https://x.com/Villegas_CA22/status/1968691485034881071
Hadn't he already announced his candidacy awhile back?
I'm still of the opinion that in this district in particular, a Democrat with a Hispanic last name does have a meaningful advantage over anyone who doesn't. However, Jasmeet Bains has made a name for herself and is broadly well liked in the region. The primary will be telling.
I had no clue Cam Kasky was actually seriously thinking about running for Congress. I guess being Tim Miller's apprentice and being part of the MSNBC The Weekend revolving cast of guests for the past couple of months has gotten him thinking of running for Congress. When Kasky and Miller talked about this two weeks ago Kasky didn't sound like the thought of running had seriously crossed his mind.
https://youtu.be/OcYQYoPO5WE?si=sdT2oR90QuD6Vbsv&t=1677
Be a lot happier to see Tim run for LA-Gov. Not that he'd win, but it would be super fun.
WTH is the FCC Chair (and fascist) Brendan Carr posting
https://x.com/GavinNewsom/status/1968744136040759804
Ramaswamy nabs Teamsters endorsement
https://x.com/semafor/status/1969025442125422768
Chickens endorsing hard right-libertarian version of Colonel Sanders for "the guns, gays and abortion".
Ah, I am coming around to Spanberger being against ending VA's RTW law and not just because it is unpopular there.
That makes no sense.
Labor has lost the plot. They got their pensions bailed out in vain.
One union. So you want to keep RTW because of one union?
It's hard to feel forgiving when their national organization punished Dems for bailing out their failing pension fund.
so because the national leadership of the teamsters endorsed trump, we would gut all protections of unionized people? Beyond the fact that won't help win elections, the SEIU CWA etc went to the wall for us and always go to the wall for us. This line of commentary is out of line
do you have any connections with "labor," any loved ones that are here because of the hard work unions do for the good of all workers, union or non-union. I'm sure you must know many members of organized labor that are very different from Sean O'Brien.
I'm as pro-union as they come but if neither leadership nor the rank and file can return the favor for Dems, a vicious cycle that leads to irreconcilable differences and divorce is pending.
RTW laws are loathsome and need to be repealed yesterday.
Unions have been shifting towards teachers, nurses, and public employees for a while now. Teamsters' bad politics is a bad reason to support RTW laws when those laws are being used to weaken unions that support us.
The largest union in the US is NEA (teachers). Second largest is SEIU (healthcare). Third largest is AFT (teachers). Fourth largest is AFSCME (public employees). Teamsters is all the way at fifth.
Focus on Teamsters and other unions like them in construction, manufacturing, or trades is a very outdated look. Unions today are increasingly college educated and non white male. Supporting unions is supporting those larger unions that do align with us.
well said
The future doesn't look great for unions representing public employees getting bulldozed by DOGE and Scott Walker and his imitators.
The future doesn't look great for teachers' unions with plummeting birth rates and districts poised to consolidate because of it.
On the other hand, the future looks potentially brighter for trade unions representing blue-collar fields where demand is very high and employment prognosis is bright.
Taking a look at the Midwestern battleground states alone, it's pretty clear which union leadership and rank-and-file I'd most prefer to be on my side.
1. So you're OK with public employees getting paid almost nothing and being treated like shit?
2. Lower birth rates just means smaller class sizes, which is obviously good for the schoolkids. Firing teachers because of that is stupid.
3. Blue-collar fields that are heavily unionized are going to be hollowed out (even more than they already have been) as robots and AI become more widespread.
Not sure how it became interpreted that I'm for RTW laws. I am most definitively not. I'm simply speculating on the ugly trend lines for union affiliation and Democratic support amongst them in the era of attrition.
If you think shrinking birth rates will not be met with a corresponding decline of educators, particularly with the AI tidal wave about to crash upon us, then I want what you're smoking!
Electricians, HVAC technicians and the like are poised to weather the AI storm better than just about any other field. Hard to know exactly how this is gonna play out but it's extremely hard to imagine public employees in offices faring better than blue-collar workers post-AI.
Your comment seems to imply that you're OK with public employees being fired en masse. I really hope you're not, because that would be absolutely disgusting and certainly something I would not expect to see on a Democratic website. My point is that public employees need strong unions to protect our jobs and prevent us from being run roughshod over by asshole governors and state legislatures. Because, as I hope you understand, public employees are the people who make each state run smoothly, and without us practically everything would grind to a halt.
I don't agree with the implication of the comment, because it doesn't matter which unions we want to support us in a question of should we or should not support ending RTW laws. Teamsters aren't going to shift in our direction if we opt to support RTW.
I'd also disagree on the future of unions. I'd say it doesn't look rosy for any of them, but it looks worst for manufacturing and many other manual labor unions. Manufacturing has been shifting towards the south, away from pro-union states, for decades now. Easy example with car manufacturing. New plants tend to be in Tennessee or Georgia these days, not Michigan or Ohio.
Some trades unions, state/local public employees (including teachers), and nurses are in the best position to weather the difficult future. They will at the minimum continue to have a bulwark in blue states. You cannot outsource the local hospital from the Northeast or Midwest down to Texas. You cannot outsource primary schools to Mississippi. You cannot outsource the DMV to South Carolina. All that is the same as how you cannot outsource the local plumber or electrician to Kentucky.
I definitely don't support RTW laws. Again, not sure how my comments were interpreted as such.
Between Medicaid cuts, corporate health care consolidation, and AI, I don't like the prospects of the local hospitals keeping their unionized labor force any better than manufacturing plants. My hometown is a union town of 18,000+ people that, over the last eight years, has had its new hospital hollowed out and sold for parts by Mayo, a health care provider with a better reputation than most. I'm skeptical the organized labor "bulwark", at least that that is the least bit friendly to Democrats survives the combination of AI job losses and autocratic governance.
I didn't think you supported RTW, but in the context of the discussion it seemed like you were arguing that we need to consider it in the context of Teamsters.
Healthcare workers are by and large not doing jobs that can be done by AI. At least not today, maybe in several decades. That relies as much on robotics advances as it does on AI advances. The types of healthcare work that can be done from far away is the type of stuff that wasn't unionized in the first place and isn't a good target for AI automation anyway. AI cannot physically help a surgeon, or do a blood draw, or change bedpans, or...
AI is probably it's biggest danger to people in (a) lower paying creative fields, like non-headline voice actors or poster artists, and (b) technical jobs like mine, where there's a lot of design work relying on math/science.
It’s the state Teamsters but a disgrace regardless.
Meanwhile, US Rep. Laura Gillen, a freshman Democrat from a swing district in the Long Island suburbs, has told people in frustration that she’s heard that Mamdani has said he’d go campaign against her if she continued to criticize him, as she has done from the day after he won the primary through Gov. Kathy Hochul’s endorsement of him this week. Whatever strength Mamdani has shown in the city, Gillen backers note, her electorate is notably different. A Gillen spokesperson did not comment.
https://edition.cnn.com/2025/09/18/politics/zohran-mamdani-nyc-mayor-preparations
Seems fair enough, she has been attacking him too harshly since Day 1 and throwing labels like Republicans. She would not lose the primary anyways.
He should just ignore Gillen and Suozzi.
"So what? Who cares?"
Yeah, I mean at this point, what does it matter if Schumer or Jeffries endorse. Does anyone think it will affect even one vote.
Maybe we shouldn't focus too much on the friction around Mamdani.
I do not agree with him on a lot of things and my views are closer to Brad Lander but when has it happened before that the party establishment has refused to back the nominee over Trump collaborating opponents?
I don't really keep track of endorsements. They barely ever matter. My point is that I'm not sure we need to keep amplifying the discord around Mamdani. The next 4 years might be tough enough.
Perhaps Rahm Emanuel could have a chat with Rep. Gillen.