As a non-objective outside observer (since I’ve changed who I support thanks to McMorrow torpedoing her campaign alongside seeing El-Sayed’s Mamdani-esque social media campaign skills), yes. It’s surprising to me as well fwiw. At the start of this cycle I had McMorrow and Stevens dunking it out around 30-40% each and El-Sayed grabbing about 20% of the vote. But you know who else had large crowds of people show up at campaign stops everywhere he went? Who else had viral videos online every time he made a new post? Who else generated organic grassroots excitement among voters? Mamdani, who already defeated Cuomo and Graham Platner, our now Democratic nominee in Maine.
The only way El-Sayed loses imo is a massive career ending scandal or McMorrow dropping out. Even if she did do that, there’s no guarantee McMorrow voters go universally to Stevens, it’ll probably be split as McMorrow voters pulled from both sides camps. If she endorsed her, then that would probably be enough for Stevens to win the nomination, but in every scenario otherwise, El-Sayed will be our nominee. I said that a while ago and I’m sticking with it. I know when I see an election campaign take off and come from nowhere to win because it’s already happened twice.
Yes, with the caveat that barring something unexpected, he won’t win by a lot. But Democrats never have blowout wins in MI Senate races (except that one race by the campaign’s catastrophic failure to launch of Republican SoS Terry Lynn Land in 2014), it’s a close state politically. I’m certain he’d win by more than Slotkin though, even if it’s only by a little.
Whether he can hold onto the seat long term is the bigger question. There’s going to be a metric fuckton of Islamophobic ads blanketing the airwaves from Republicans, which is going to affect voters decisions, but just not enough to make a majority in this political and economic environment.
I think AES would get Islamophobic attacks even if he were Sephardic Jewish or Coptic Christian. It's the last name that triggers MAGAs like nobody's business.
In fairness a Sephardi Jew or Coptic/Maronire Christian probably would have a very different, even if Arabic-sounding, surname (for example Justin Amash). Lebanese Christians for instance have a roster of fairly community-specific surnames that are easily spotted (Haddad, Khoury, Malouf/Maloof, etc)
Just to be clear, you think that weighing in on an election website pointing out how unbelievably stupid tweeting anti-Michigan/anti-Midwest stuff is if you are ultimately going to run for office there is equivalent to "shaming her for having values"???
That's not what I was thinking of (and frankly I forgot about that), that was obviously poor judgement on her part. I was responding to the claim that she "torpedoed her campaign", in clear referenced to her anti-Hasan Piker statements.
If you can give me a word that means directly aiming something that will explode and destroy anything it comes in contact with at someone else, but ends up hitting yourself, by all means, let know and I’ll use that instead. But polling never showed McMorrow collapsing until after the moment she “stood up for and had values”. I actually (if you cared enough to ask instead of consistently and constantly assuming my intentions beyond the words I plainly write in comments here) side with McMorrow over Piker even though politically I’m more left wing then Piker.
I try to leave my bias and own ideological preference out of any analysis I do. I can also objectively say that politically it was a stupid move to attack Piker, since she needed the progressive/socialist/leftwing Democrats chunk of support to have a chance at squeezing between the two candidates to win the nomination. Once she did that and alienated her left flank, they moved to El-Sayed, which then predictably made McMorrow moderate supporters move to Stevens to stop him, leaving her campaign as an afterthought and no path to win.
She had the nomination in her grasp and threw it away because of 1 very bad POLITICAL miscalculation. If you have a problem with me stating the reality of what exactly happened to McMorrow’s campaign due to her actions, while I’ve not ever actually said I disagree with her (not once btw), then give me a different descriptor of those facts that happened, let me know and I’ll adjust my rhetoric to better accurately describe what happened then her torpedoing her campaign. I feel it an accurate descriptor, but maybe there’s something better I can use.
Ok, I had the date wrong as to when she made her comments, it was late March, not early May, whoops. However, her polling continued to rise until mid-April, when she then began to tank, so I really think this has nothing to do with Piker.
Ah...in that case, yes I agree with you. That said, the tweets were beyond stupid and, I think, probably torpedoed her candidacy. She was something of a Progressive darling before they came out.
CO-8: Original comment said a congressional poll in the digest days ago was linked to a gubernatorial poll in the digest today. The source confused me into believing they were the same pollster.
I'm disturbed by the ads in the Democratic primary attacking Bridget Brink in the 07 Michigan District. When Democrats attack each other by twisting the facts, then they show themselves to be no better than Republicans who constantly do so. If Michigan Values is working to support her rival in the primary, then that suggests that he is not running from a strong platform and so needs to engage in these attacks.
I have, in the past, given a couple of donations to Vote Vets, but I stopped when I saw them getting involved in Democratic primaries, solely because the candidate is a veteran, just as I stopped supporting EMILY's List when they did so. I don't know anything about Matt Maasdam, other than he is a former Navy Seal, Unless a Republican PAC is trying to influence a Democratic primary, I do not think outside groups should jump in.
Yeah, that ad is pretty slimy. Career diplomats shouldn't be attacked for being appointed as ambassadors in Republican administrations unless they did something worth attacking, which doesn't seem to be the case here. If anything, we should respect their commitment to public service. I have no real preference in the primary here, but attacking Brink's career in this way puts a bad taste in my mouth.
Without getting into specific races, I’m getting a little concerned that some of our candidates are gonna fumble winnable races in November. Not necessarily on this board, but the new crop of election twitter folks seem unaware of two very stable and basic concepts:
1) The out party can lose races in favorable territory in a wave with bad/extreme candidates
2) Primary performance is/can be unrelated to general election strength
Crossing my fingers because we may not have a chance like this again to run the table at every level.
Time will tell. Sometimes controversial candidates win too. Take Jay Jones, who was destined to lose a winnable race but won comfortably over an incumbent.
Of course, they're not in a vacuum, and some candidates will perform better than others. But for candidates you speak of that have already won primaries or seem destined to, it's up to the voters of the state.
jay jones winning by more than the redistricting referendum has dulled these fears in me largely, however that said the candidate choices in montana and me-2 seem like absolute fumbles
If Bankhead dropped out (she probably won't, sadly), Montana would be competitive. And I feel like any ME-2 candidate would have an uphill battle, though Dunlap is weaker than Baldacci.
I think you should specify which candidate choices are fumbles in Montana. Because I agree with the race for the Senate as the Democratic nominee Bankhead refuses to drop out and definitely couldn’t and can’t win a 1 on 1 race. But MT-01, I don’t agree at all with if you’re including that.
Yes, Forstag’s backed by Bernie, but he’s also an objectively attractive firefighter hero who literally jumps from planes to put out fires to save wildlife, the land as well as people’s families, livelihoods and properties. Bios matter more than policies to voters. Just look how many voted for Trump 3 times as the “apprentice tough businessman”.
He’s not favoured, even in this current environment, because Montana has gotten so red that it’s tough for any Democrat, but he’s also got a path and seems like a strong candidate if he managed beat the former Democratic candidate for Governor in the election, who already would have such a far bigger name ID and campaign resource advantage over him.. So he’s absolutely not a fumble imo.
Well, that's apples and oranges. Different elections with differet electorates. Though he won, Jones VASTLY underperformed Spanberger. He would've lost with the electorate that turned out for the referendum.
So the question is -- do we want candidates that underperform the baseline by 8 points? Or candidates that can persudae more voters.
Not even sure what we're arguing here. In a state less Democratic than VA, an 8% differential would be a loss. And not all states have the same number of persuadable voters.
Jay Jones was never destined to lose the AG race in 2025. He was only destined to do worse than Spanberger and Hashmi. After the text messages surfaced, polls showed him still having a shot at winning.
Out of 23 polls that were released after Jones's text messages resurfaced, he led in 5 of them, and was tied with Miyares in an additional 5 of them. Before the scandal, Jones lead every poll.
I think the environment, or lean of a state/district, can pull weaker candidates to victory, which is what I believe happened with Jones. It may well happen with Platner and AES this year, but what happens in 2032 when they're up for re-election in a different political environment? It's also why, for example, while I am horrified that we nominated someone like Avila Chevalier, I'm not worried about her costing us her seat. It's just too blue.
I think you’re making the mistake we made in 2022: It’s the economy, stupid.
No, it doesn’t matter our opponents were MAGA voting Republicans, or that women were now dying from not being treated when their pregnancy went wrong. Voters still handed the Republican Party power, because they didn’t like the Biden economy. Yes, we won races in seats over extreme candidates that we never should’ve won, we had a large chunk of voters swing to us from Dobbs atrocities and outcomes, but at the end of the day, voters still handed the GOP the keys.
So, do I think it’s plausible some of these candidates go down in flames because of bad campaigns, bad scandals or not enough appeal to voters in their respective districts? Yes. Do I think it’s enough to hand the GOP control? No. Do I think it’s the most likely outcome that candidates which are talking about the blank issue, are strident progressives and believe in leftwing policies nearly across the board? At a time when the party in power oversees a war in the Middle East, gas at $5 and the cost of everything going up? Also no.
I don’t think we can use the cases most people who agree with this line of thinking bring up either: Kara Eastman, Jamie-Mcloud Skinner, because both can very easily be explained by the economic conditions at that time. Eastman lost in 2020 because the economy for most people under Trump was pretty good. They hated everything else about him, but still supported him and his party for his economic handling. JMS lost because most people disliked the economy under Biden. Remember that incumbent Democrat Elaine Luria and many other moderate Democrats lost their races too in 2022.
The 2018 race you can absolutely say Eastman lost the seat due to being too progressive, but let’s also remember the former Democratic incumbent endorsed her Republican opponent that year too, so there’s special circumstances there as well, which doesn’t make it as clear cut as the “progressive = lose seats we should win” side believes. We know that in past history progressives haven’t fared well in elections, but we don’t know if in the worst economic and country conditions since the 2008 economic collapse, would still cause them to lose by being too far left.
Like the Republican lessons they took from 2022 to put in practice for 2024 and were right about. It always comes down to the economy, nothing else matters. You can even create and push out a fascist doctrine, pretend to not support it and voters will still vote for you if they don’t like the economy of the party in power. Unhappy voters with a party in power means they’re voting for the opposition. Republicans still won control that year and Democrats will still win control even if we do fumble a few seats because progressive Democrats won primaries and we don’t know if that’s going to happen yet.
OK, so here's the concern: It's very hard for the Democrats to flip the Senate. If their candidate were to lose in Michigan, and especially if their candidate in Maine also lost, it would become close to impossible.
Yes, but do Democrats lose purple and blue states with a Republican economy that’s in the shitter? With economic handling approval at -50?Regardless of their leftwing ideological beliefs? That, I think is an entirely different and open question and I don’t believe either loses, regardless of who Republicans think are their easier opponents.
In 2010 the economy was in the toilet, but the out party lost multiple Senate seats they were expected to win (for example, NV and DE) because they nominated toxic nominees. Do the nominees in ME and MI (assuming the leading candidate wins the primary) raise to that level of bad? Only time will tell.
Assuming and stating you know exactly what’s going to happen before it does, bold move cotton. The answer is undetermined until after voters have their say. Do you not agree?
Saying anything otherwise is purely being biased, just as much as if someone here said AES is guaranteed to win as our nominee (notice no one is saying that in comments here). I’m sure you’d disagree with that statement, so why don’t you disagree with your own? Some things to think about.
You know, there doesn't *have* to be a Republican gadfly for every single Democrat that does something controversial. Angle and Platner are not El-Sayed and Akin. Chevalier is not David Duke. Those people are beneath these people.
I think you've missed the point. In no way am I claiming any Democratic candidate is as bad as a Republican, and in no way do I believe sacman thinks so, either. The question is what the voters think and how they vote.
MA-Sen: Rep. Seth Moulton, already facing an uphill battle against Sen. Ed Markey in the Democratic primary, became very defensive when a tracker asked his thoughts on Maine Senate nominee Graham Platner, hitting a phone out of the tracker's hand. His defense was that the reporter was allegedly MAGA, so apparently that gave him the right to interfere with the man's personal property and be hostile towards him.
Say what you will about Platner or the question, but that's something very trivial for Moulton to lash out over.
The person whose phone he struck is not a reporter. It's a "tracker" for America Rising, i.e. someone goes around filming Democrats for opposition research on behalf of a conservative PAC. Bad move by Moulton to lose his composure.
Every elected official or credible candidate for the Hous or above has trackers falling them at all times. Both parties do it. Most just film while others try provoke, either way they should know just to ignore them.
Eh it was likely the culmination of a lot of harassment and invasion of personal space. I can't really condemn people for damaging the equipment of paparazzi or 'trackers' who continually harass and berate them.
There's a balance between an eye for an eye (Moulton) and taking the high road in a situation like that. I tend to be split between the two in those kinds of situations, but still think Moulton acted somewhat unreasonably.
I'm sure the tracker instigated it, but I tend to agree with Corey that this happens all the time, and we don't see a constant stream of reports of candidates knocking phones out of people's hands, so I don't think it reflects well on Moulton's temperament. It's hardly a scandal or anything though.
I do remember Greg Gianforte body slamming a reporter back in 2017 and more or less getting away with it. A lot of the RW media at the time was more than happy to cheer him on because he was sticking it to the 'liberal media'. Seeing those same folks clutch pearls over Moulton lightly knocking a trackers phone down makes me want to take Moulton's side on this.
Look DS, The Congressional Caucus PAC* has the right to support anyone running for anything, same as anyone else(including you of course). It's called a democracy. If no progressives were ever elected from purple districts, they--by definition--would never achieve a majority. That's not what anyone of any ideology ever wants, to be in a perpetual minority. Additionally you've presented zero evidence that either Lawrence in this district or progressives in general will ipso facto run weaker campaigns. Speaking as a former progressive political campaign professional who founded and ran a Super PAC myself, I'd say.......it depends. Some progressive campaigns are pedantic and self-righteous, some connect with working class voters in ways the Seth Moultons of the world never will.... I would urge my fellow posters to try and avoid lofty pronouncements, of which I see too many here--from a variety of ideological viewpoints. It's an agora for political opinions, but informed & informing of others is always better. *I never worked with them.
I can't prove that Lawrence is the weaker candidate because both general election polls did not test him, but his funding has been weaker, and both his opponents have what seem like much stronger backgrounds. The CPC can get to a majority of the caucus while avoiding most of the ever-dwindling number of swing seats, and they'll never realistically have a majority of congress. Of course they can support who they want, but I'd like a stronger candidate who has a better shot of holding this seat beyond 2026.
Thank you DS for not being defensive + for rising ably to the challenge by presenting a thoughtful and intellectually coherent post. That's wonderful & I appreciate it! It's also correct that the CPC [who are certainly not all Progressives ;>] can achieve a majority of the Caucus without winning swing seats, and it's an illuminating point I rarely hear made by anyone. A couple of things I would respectfully part company with you on:
1) "...but I'd like a stronger candidate"----that's in part why we HAVE primaries is to determine precisely that. PLENTY of people have been spectacularly wrong about who was a stronger candidate in both primaries and general elections(myself included). Mamdani is a great recent case of that, where the Dem donor class at least was stridently wrong in its prognostications.
2)" they'll [Progressives] never realistically have a majority of Congress." Never is a VERY strong word. I think most of us progressives don't believe that at the same time that most of us simultaneously know it won't be tomorrow(or the day after).
This reminds me of one of my favorite jokes ever, where the Brazilians used to say for decades about their then dynamic but horribly managed country, "Brazil is the country of the future--and it always will be! ;>)
But then along came Lula. (Not saying he's a saint, but now there's more bread and more hope among Brazil's most impoverished citizens).
Closer to home, I believe that many NYC DSA members(one of whom I'm not) are quite pleasantly surprised by their overwhelming success in their primaries ( and Lefty candidates won in Syracuse & Buffalo too).
None of us own a working crystal ball, longest journey starts with a single step etc. etc.
Lastly, on a pragmatic note, I believe that whomever comes out of a Dem primary in a swing district (e.g MI-7) will NOT lose a general election campaign because of lack of funds. They will get the dollars they need.
1. Primaries do not necessarily determine the stronger candidate. Republicans took turns shooting their party in the foot in 2022.
2. Fair, but I'm assuming there isn't a massive ideological shift in the electorate that shifts everything well to the left, at least on economic issues.
I mean, I don't like when Ed Case or Rich Torres types represent blue districts, but at least in those cases, they don't put a seat at risk. Also, there's a difference between a moderate running in a blue district, and a large chunk of the party apparatus supporting them. I wasn't thrilled when Boafo won in Maryland, either.
The so-called "Sunrise Movement" claims "We are the climate revolution", but it has moved beyond that into often emphasizing other issues (some not for discussion here), and often backs Green New Deal type proposals that are at best a hard sell in competitive states and districts.
Though the fact that I hadn't heard much about them lately until now may be indicative of their current level of influence.
Over on left Bluesky the national Sunrise are not well liked anymore - a post claiming Dems and the GOP are the same was particularly scrutinized.
Apparently the local branches are different, though I don’t know enough about them to verify this statement.
Incidentally, I do think the climate is an important issue — a really scary HuffPost piece just came out where a worst-case scenario for the climate in the distant future was just surpassed in France. (Unfortunately I cannot find the link for the life of me.)
I just wish the environmental movement had communicated their message better. I still think doomerism about the climate is a problem — I agree that things don’t look good but from what I’ve heard actual climate scientists are against this rhetoric about how it’s all hopeless because it’s A. inaccurate, and B. harmful as it encourages people to do nothing because why bother?
And when they aren't calling it hopeless, they're often instead yelling at people "Stop eating meat!" "No more air travel!" "No more air conditioning!" That's not going to win people over either, even those sympathetic to the climate cause.
Let me interject and say the environmental movement is a pretty diverse spectrum; there's a lot more aligned with the Nature Conservancy, EDF and WWF than Climate Extinction and Sunrise.
The worst thing an org can do is suffer mission creep that dilutes their purpose and Sunrise was already pretty mediocre even before they started getting stuck in the omnicause trap
The Sunrise Movement gained notoriety after its founding in the late 2010s by doing sit-ins in the offices of California politicians Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi. While they do advocate for Green New Deal policies and social justice issues such as abolishing ICE, I can't seem to find anything on forbidden issues on their website.
Immediately after the primary that Senator Cassidy lost, I said Letlow would almost certainly win the runoff, as I’d heard she had a much bigger war chest, as well as endorsements from both Trump and our governor. Those endorsements are the reason I voted for Fleming in the runoff (early in person), even though he would be as bad as Letlow - to send a message to Trump and our governor that they don’t control us. Glad to learn that Fleming has a chance. Either way I’ll be voting for the Democrat in the general. That’s what you get for closing our primaries, Governor - a RINO!
After more votes were counted, Ben McAdams is leading with only 52% despite benefiting from near-universal name recognition, spending millions of his own raised money, and receiving millions in outside spending. Progressive and anti-Israel groups, Bernie and AOC largely refused to counter that because of the split progressive field caused in part due to Blouin's very misogynistic social media history, instead focusing on NYC and Colorado. If McAdams isn't drawn out by 2028—which seems very likely after two retirements and four new far-right appointments due to the GOP packing the state Supreme Court —he could be taken out easily in 2028.
If you just put together what Blouin and Mohamed got in percentage of the votes, Mohamed would have received a total of 44% points (rounded off from 43.8%). He would have had to hit at least 8% more of the votes to have a credible shot at defeating McAdams.
However, looking back at Mohamed's campaign, he mainly got recognized because of the Utah Democratic Convention. Given the UT-01 race was quite crowded, every candidate stood out in their own respective way. Mohamed would have benefitted more if it was just a two-way race between him and McAdams but McAdams could have captured part of the percentage of the votes too as well from Farrell.
It's the support from Blouin I'm sure McAdams wouldn't have been able to capture.
No, Dent, is clerked twice for Dem judges at at federal trial and appellate courts and then was a career AUSA thru the Biden admin. And between then he was at Gibson Dunn, not like Jones Day or Kirkland. Think you're dooming a bit.
I doubt it. McAdams still has to actually be in the House and represent UT-01. If he’s already become unabashedly pro-choice in his campaign, it’s a matter of his votes and overall performance at this point.
Little. There's plenty of other red states that have had similar legislation put forward like this. Louisiana has the Ten Commandments on school walls now, and that didn't make much of an impact.
Really good numbers. I expected Sand to be leading and it is good to see a second (and this time R) poll showing Turek is within the m/e. There's lots of time for him. At first blush, I was disappointed by the generic number as I have hopes to win two and hopefully three of four seats, but IA-4 is R-15 so being down by 4 statewide may be fine for our house candidates in the three competitive districts.
In 2018 the combined statewide House vote was 50.5D-46.5R, which resulted in a 3-1 Dem delegation and two pickups. Perhaps Loebsack's incumbency and comfortable win tilted the scales a little bit towards the D side. R+4 still seems compatible with 2 (close) pickups...
I am too. if 2018 is taken as a baseline, where dems won 3 congressional seats and almost won the governor's race with a less strong candidate, i think there's a lot of reasons to believe dems can and will sweep there
Pro-Choice Majority Action mentioned in the digest which spent for Bains, Von Wilpert, Powell, Galane-Woods and now DeGette has been confirmed as an AIPAC/DMFI shell.
EDW Action is an arm of Elect Dem Women, which is the campaign side of the Dem Women's Caucus. DWC/EDW is institutionally corporatist, so like it's an AIPAC shell in the sense that Dem Members are still too heavily tied to AIPAC, and the caucus's campaign chair is Lois Frankel (under whom, I think EDW uses really despicable tactics and she badly needs to hang it up). But I think saying everyone who takes the endorsement and support of the main congressional arm supporting women candidates is therefore ipso facto smeared with AIPAC to be a bit of a stretch. Can define these candidates more by what they just say and do.
AIPAC and DMFI transfers accounted for a majority of EDW Action Fund's fundraising in this quarter which they transferred to this shell. It's not rocket science. Did you not see the reporting in media outlets after the recent filings or the tweets I quoted?
Yeah, I know the schitck lol. It's like calling EMILY's List an AIPAC shell lol. AIPAC/UDP/DMFI donate to leadership committees. This is extremely well known and it should stop. The over-fixation on calling everything AIPAC is diluting the message and becoming more of [insert Charlie Cox conspiracy meme from IASIP].
But Pro Choice Majority Action is actually just a new AIPAC shell run by an DMFI operative which serves no purpose other than to complicate the money trail, why would EDW and Frankel suddenly need another Super PAC which gets all of its money from their first Super PAC.
It’s an old poll (came out at the start of June), but it’s still great to see.
You are right and I even discussed it then. Deleting.
El-Sayed the only Dem running ahead in latest poll? Does he have that much momentum?
As a non-objective outside observer (since I’ve changed who I support thanks to McMorrow torpedoing her campaign alongside seeing El-Sayed’s Mamdani-esque social media campaign skills), yes. It’s surprising to me as well fwiw. At the start of this cycle I had McMorrow and Stevens dunking it out around 30-40% each and El-Sayed grabbing about 20% of the vote. But you know who else had large crowds of people show up at campaign stops everywhere he went? Who else had viral videos online every time he made a new post? Who else generated organic grassroots excitement among voters? Mamdani, who already defeated Cuomo and Graham Platner, our now Democratic nominee in Maine.
The only way El-Sayed loses imo is a massive career ending scandal or McMorrow dropping out. Even if she did do that, there’s no guarantee McMorrow voters go universally to Stevens, it’ll probably be split as McMorrow voters pulled from both sides camps. If she endorsed her, then that would probably be enough for Stevens to win the nomination, but in every scenario otherwise, El-Sayed will be our nominee. I said that a while ago and I’m sticking with it. I know when I see an election campaign take off and come from nowhere to win because it’s already happened twice.
I don’t think an endorsement would swing things one way or the other. As for the effect of her dropping out, I agree it would be pretty much a wash.
Do you think AES has a chance against Mike Rogers? It's still MI after all and quite a bit of anti-Muslim sentiment.
Absolutely. But it would be nice if he could also win in 2032, which is another story.
Yes, with the caveat that barring something unexpected, he won’t win by a lot. But Democrats never have blowout wins in MI Senate races (except that one race by the campaign’s catastrophic failure to launch of Republican SoS Terry Lynn Land in 2014), it’s a close state politically. I’m certain he’d win by more than Slotkin though, even if it’s only by a little.
Whether he can hold onto the seat long term is the bigger question. There’s going to be a metric fuckton of Islamophobic ads blanketing the airwaves from Republicans, which is going to affect voters decisions, but just not enough to make a majority in this political and economic environment.
I think AES would get Islamophobic attacks even if he were Sephardic Jewish or Coptic Christian. It's the last name that triggers MAGAs like nobody's business.
In fairness a Sephardi Jew or Coptic/Maronire Christian probably would have a very different, even if Arabic-sounding, surname (for example Justin Amash). Lebanese Christians for instance have a roster of fairly community-specific surnames that are easily spotted (Haddad, Khoury, Malouf/Maloof, etc)
There are also lots of Muslims in MI who bailed on Biden/Harris over the forbidden topic.
If he can pull some of those folk back in, it could help other Dems in MI.
McMorrow's decline began before then, in late April. I'm tired of the shaming of her for having values.
Seconded
Just to be clear, you think that weighing in on an election website pointing out how unbelievably stupid tweeting anti-Michigan/anti-Midwest stuff is if you are ultimately going to run for office there is equivalent to "shaming her for having values"???
That's not what I was thinking of (and frankly I forgot about that), that was obviously poor judgement on her part. I was responding to the claim that she "torpedoed her campaign", in clear referenced to her anti-Hasan Piker statements.
If you can give me a word that means directly aiming something that will explode and destroy anything it comes in contact with at someone else, but ends up hitting yourself, by all means, let know and I’ll use that instead. But polling never showed McMorrow collapsing until after the moment she “stood up for and had values”. I actually (if you cared enough to ask instead of consistently and constantly assuming my intentions beyond the words I plainly write in comments here) side with McMorrow over Piker even though politically I’m more left wing then Piker.
I try to leave my bias and own ideological preference out of any analysis I do. I can also objectively say that politically it was a stupid move to attack Piker, since she needed the progressive/socialist/leftwing Democrats chunk of support to have a chance at squeezing between the two candidates to win the nomination. Once she did that and alienated her left flank, they moved to El-Sayed, which then predictably made McMorrow moderate supporters move to Stevens to stop him, leaving her campaign as an afterthought and no path to win.
She had the nomination in her grasp and threw it away because of 1 very bad POLITICAL miscalculation. If you have a problem with me stating the reality of what exactly happened to McMorrow’s campaign due to her actions, while I’ve not ever actually said I disagree with her (not once btw), then give me a different descriptor of those facts that happened, let me know and I’ll adjust my rhetoric to better accurately describe what happened then her torpedoing her campaign. I feel it an accurate descriptor, but maybe there’s something better I can use.
Ok, I had the date wrong as to when she made her comments, it was late March, not early May, whoops. However, her polling continued to rise until mid-April, when she then began to tank, so I really think this has nothing to do with Piker.
Ah...in that case, yes I agree with you. That said, the tweets were beyond stupid and, I think, probably torpedoed her candidacy. She was something of a Progressive darling before they came out.
https://www.coloradoan.com/story/news/politics/2026/06/26/colorado-polls-congress-trump/90685204007/
CO-8: Original comment said a congressional poll in the digest days ago was linked to a gubernatorial poll in the digest today. The source confused me into believing they were the same pollster.
Do you mean the GBAO poll of CO-08? We hit that one earlier this week.
I did. My apologies.
I'm disturbed by the ads in the Democratic primary attacking Bridget Brink in the 07 Michigan District. When Democrats attack each other by twisting the facts, then they show themselves to be no better than Republicans who constantly do so. If Michigan Values is working to support her rival in the primary, then that suggests that he is not running from a strong platform and so needs to engage in these attacks.
I have, in the past, given a couple of donations to Vote Vets, but I stopped when I saw them getting involved in Democratic primaries, solely because the candidate is a veteran, just as I stopped supporting EMILY's List when they did so. I don't know anything about Matt Maasdam, other than he is a former Navy Seal, Unless a Republican PAC is trying to influence a Democratic primary, I do not think outside groups should jump in.
Yeah, that ad is pretty slimy. Career diplomats shouldn't be attacked for being appointed as ambassadors in Republican administrations unless they did something worth attacking, which doesn't seem to be the case here. If anything, we should respect their commitment to public service. I have no real preference in the primary here, but attacking Brink's career in this way puts a bad taste in my mouth.
Brown and Acton ahead is a pleasant sight! Peltola, too in recent polling.
Sullivan hasn't lead a poll all cycle iirc
Without getting into specific races, I’m getting a little concerned that some of our candidates are gonna fumble winnable races in November. Not necessarily on this board, but the new crop of election twitter folks seem unaware of two very stable and basic concepts:
1) The out party can lose races in favorable territory in a wave with bad/extreme candidates
2) Primary performance is/can be unrelated to general election strength
Crossing my fingers because we may not have a chance like this again to run the table at every level.
Time will tell. Sometimes controversial candidates win too. Take Jay Jones, who was destined to lose a winnable race but won comfortably over an incumbent.
Of course, they're not in a vacuum, and some candidates will perform better than others. But for candidates you speak of that have already won primaries or seem destined to, it's up to the voters of the state.
jay jones winning by more than the redistricting referendum has dulled these fears in me largely, however that said the candidate choices in montana and me-2 seem like absolute fumbles
If Bankhead dropped out (she probably won't, sadly), Montana would be competitive. And I feel like any ME-2 candidate would have an uphill battle, though Dunlap is weaker than Baldacci.
ME-2 is a single digit Trump district it's not exactly a red stronghold
I think you should specify which candidate choices are fumbles in Montana. Because I agree with the race for the Senate as the Democratic nominee Bankhead refuses to drop out and definitely couldn’t and can’t win a 1 on 1 race. But MT-01, I don’t agree at all with if you’re including that.
Yes, Forstag’s backed by Bernie, but he’s also an objectively attractive firefighter hero who literally jumps from planes to put out fires to save wildlife, the land as well as people’s families, livelihoods and properties. Bios matter more than policies to voters. Just look how many voted for Trump 3 times as the “apprentice tough businessman”.
He’s not favoured, even in this current environment, because Montana has gotten so red that it’s tough for any Democrat, but he’s also got a path and seems like a strong candidate if he managed beat the former Democratic candidate for Governor in the election, who already would have such a far bigger name ID and campaign resource advantage over him.. So he’s absolutely not a fumble imo.
indeed, i meant the senate race. I think we have a strong nominee in Forstag in MT-1
Well, that's apples and oranges. Different elections with differet electorates. Though he won, Jones VASTLY underperformed Spanberger. He would've lost with the electorate that turned out for the referendum.
So the question is -- do we want candidates that underperform the baseline by 8 points? Or candidates that can persudae more voters.
It depends. A win's a win.
Not even sure what we're arguing here. In a state less Democratic than VA, an 8% differential would be a loss. And not all states have the same number of persuadable voters.
I think I agree with the premise, but I'd disagree on Spanberger being the baseline. She represents an overperformance relative to the baseline.
based on what?
Jay Jones was never destined to lose the AG race in 2025. He was only destined to do worse than Spanberger and Hashmi. After the text messages surfaced, polls showed him still having a shot at winning.
Out of 23 polls that were released after Jones's text messages resurfaced, he led in 5 of them, and was tied with Miyares in an additional 5 of them. Before the scandal, Jones lead every poll.
I think the environment, or lean of a state/district, can pull weaker candidates to victory, which is what I believe happened with Jones. It may well happen with Platner and AES this year, but what happens in 2032 when they're up for re-election in a different political environment? It's also why, for example, while I am horrified that we nominated someone like Avila Chevalier, I'm not worried about her costing us her seat. It's just too blue.
I think you’re making the mistake we made in 2022: It’s the economy, stupid.
No, it doesn’t matter our opponents were MAGA voting Republicans, or that women were now dying from not being treated when their pregnancy went wrong. Voters still handed the Republican Party power, because they didn’t like the Biden economy. Yes, we won races in seats over extreme candidates that we never should’ve won, we had a large chunk of voters swing to us from Dobbs atrocities and outcomes, but at the end of the day, voters still handed the GOP the keys.
So, do I think it’s plausible some of these candidates go down in flames because of bad campaigns, bad scandals or not enough appeal to voters in their respective districts? Yes. Do I think it’s enough to hand the GOP control? No. Do I think it’s the most likely outcome that candidates which are talking about the blank issue, are strident progressives and believe in leftwing policies nearly across the board? At a time when the party in power oversees a war in the Middle East, gas at $5 and the cost of everything going up? Also no.
I don’t think we can use the cases most people who agree with this line of thinking bring up either: Kara Eastman, Jamie-Mcloud Skinner, because both can very easily be explained by the economic conditions at that time. Eastman lost in 2020 because the economy for most people under Trump was pretty good. They hated everything else about him, but still supported him and his party for his economic handling. JMS lost because most people disliked the economy under Biden. Remember that incumbent Democrat Elaine Luria and many other moderate Democrats lost their races too in 2022.
The 2018 race you can absolutely say Eastman lost the seat due to being too progressive, but let’s also remember the former Democratic incumbent endorsed her Republican opponent that year too, so there’s special circumstances there as well, which doesn’t make it as clear cut as the “progressive = lose seats we should win” side believes. We know that in past history progressives haven’t fared well in elections, but we don’t know if in the worst economic and country conditions since the 2008 economic collapse, would still cause them to lose by being too far left.
Like the Republican lessons they took from 2022 to put in practice for 2024 and were right about. It always comes down to the economy, nothing else matters. You can even create and push out a fascist doctrine, pretend to not support it and voters will still vote for you if they don’t like the economy of the party in power. Unhappy voters with a party in power means they’re voting for the opposition. Republicans still won control that year and Democrats will still win control even if we do fumble a few seats because progressive Democrats won primaries and we don’t know if that’s going to happen yet.
OK, so here's the concern: It's very hard for the Democrats to flip the Senate. If their candidate were to lose in Michigan, and especially if their candidate in Maine also lost, it would become close to impossible.
Yes, but do Democrats lose purple and blue states with a Republican economy that’s in the shitter? With economic handling approval at -50?Regardless of their leftwing ideological beliefs? That, I think is an entirely different and open question and I don’t believe either loses, regardless of who Republicans think are their easier opponents.
In 2010 the economy was in the toilet, but the out party lost multiple Senate seats they were expected to win (for example, NV and DE) because they nominated toxic nominees. Do the nominees in ME and MI (assuming the leading candidate wins the primary) raise to that level of bad? Only time will tell.
That is what my original post was about. The answer is Yes, but the vibe these days has become "maybe, let's try it out."
Assuming and stating you know exactly what’s going to happen before it does, bold move cotton. The answer is undetermined until after voters have their say. Do you not agree?
Saying anything otherwise is purely being biased, just as much as if someone here said AES is guaranteed to win as our nominee (notice no one is saying that in comments here). I’m sure you’d disagree with that statement, so why don’t you disagree with your own? Some things to think about.
I'm worried that El-Sayed is going to be the Sharron Angle of this cycle and Platner the Todd Akin.
You know, there doesn't *have* to be a Republican gadfly for every single Democrat that does something controversial. Angle and Platner are not El-Sayed and Akin. Chevalier is not David Duke. Those people are beneath these people.
I think you've missed the point. In no way am I claiming any Democratic candidate is as bad as a Republican, and in no way do I believe sacman thinks so, either. The question is what the voters think and how they vote.
You don't believe that, but it's a real and very legitimate fear.
https://www.wcvb.com/article/moulton-responds-after-viral-video/71735781
MA-Sen: Rep. Seth Moulton, already facing an uphill battle against Sen. Ed Markey in the Democratic primary, became very defensive when a tracker asked his thoughts on Maine Senate nominee Graham Platner, hitting a phone out of the tracker's hand. His defense was that the reporter was allegedly MAGA, so apparently that gave him the right to interfere with the man's personal property and be hostile towards him.
Say what you will about Platner or the question, but that's something very trivial for Moulton to lash out over.
That sounds like a real asshole move, regardless of the reporter's politics.
Back in 2014-16ish I quite liked Moulton but what a disappointment he’s been
I'm surprised Moulton didn't just trash Platner, frankly.
The person whose phone he struck is not a reporter. It's a "tracker" for America Rising, i.e. someone goes around filming Democrats for opposition research on behalf of a conservative PAC. Bad move by Moulton to lose his composure.
Every elected official or credible candidate for the Hous or above has trackers falling them at all times. Both parties do it. Most just film while others try provoke, either way they should know just to ignore them.
Absolutely, still wouldn't call them reporters though.
Eh it was likely the culmination of a lot of harassment and invasion of personal space. I can't really condemn people for damaging the equipment of paparazzi or 'trackers' who continually harass and berate them.
There's a balance between an eye for an eye (Moulton) and taking the high road in a situation like that. I tend to be split between the two in those kinds of situations, but still think Moulton acted somewhat unreasonably.
I agree but just saying I understand someone snapping in that situation.
I'm sure the tracker instigated it, but I tend to agree with Corey that this happens all the time, and we don't see a constant stream of reports of candidates knocking phones out of people's hands, so I don't think it reflects well on Moulton's temperament. It's hardly a scandal or anything though.
Looks like more Moulton Lava is coming his way to end his campaign!
I do remember Greg Gianforte body slamming a reporter back in 2017 and more or less getting away with it. A lot of the RW media at the time was more than happy to cheer him on because he was sticking it to the 'liberal media'. Seeing those same folks clutch pearls over Moulton lightly knocking a trackers phone down makes me want to take Moulton's side on this.
He is a jerk and has been for a while now.
MI-07:
https://weareprogressives.org/congressional-progressive-caucus-pac-endorses-william-lawrence-for-mi-07/
The Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC has endorsed Sunrise Movement co-founder Will Lawrence for this seat.
Is it that hard to stick to blue districts?
Look DS, The Congressional Caucus PAC* has the right to support anyone running for anything, same as anyone else(including you of course). It's called a democracy. If no progressives were ever elected from purple districts, they--by definition--would never achieve a majority. That's not what anyone of any ideology ever wants, to be in a perpetual minority. Additionally you've presented zero evidence that either Lawrence in this district or progressives in general will ipso facto run weaker campaigns. Speaking as a former progressive political campaign professional who founded and ran a Super PAC myself, I'd say.......it depends. Some progressive campaigns are pedantic and self-righteous, some connect with working class voters in ways the Seth Moultons of the world never will.... I would urge my fellow posters to try and avoid lofty pronouncements, of which I see too many here--from a variety of ideological viewpoints. It's an agora for political opinions, but informed & informing of others is always better. *I never worked with them.
I can't prove that Lawrence is the weaker candidate because both general election polls did not test him, but his funding has been weaker, and both his opponents have what seem like much stronger backgrounds. The CPC can get to a majority of the caucus while avoiding most of the ever-dwindling number of swing seats, and they'll never realistically have a majority of congress. Of course they can support who they want, but I'd like a stronger candidate who has a better shot of holding this seat beyond 2026.
Thank you DS for not being defensive + for rising ably to the challenge by presenting a thoughtful and intellectually coherent post. That's wonderful & I appreciate it! It's also correct that the CPC [who are certainly not all Progressives ;>] can achieve a majority of the Caucus without winning swing seats, and it's an illuminating point I rarely hear made by anyone. A couple of things I would respectfully part company with you on:
1) "...but I'd like a stronger candidate"----that's in part why we HAVE primaries is to determine precisely that. PLENTY of people have been spectacularly wrong about who was a stronger candidate in both primaries and general elections(myself included). Mamdani is a great recent case of that, where the Dem donor class at least was stridently wrong in its prognostications.
2)" they'll [Progressives] never realistically have a majority of Congress." Never is a VERY strong word. I think most of us progressives don't believe that at the same time that most of us simultaneously know it won't be tomorrow(or the day after).
This reminds me of one of my favorite jokes ever, where the Brazilians used to say for decades about their then dynamic but horribly managed country, "Brazil is the country of the future--and it always will be! ;>)
But then along came Lula. (Not saying he's a saint, but now there's more bread and more hope among Brazil's most impoverished citizens).
Closer to home, I believe that many NYC DSA members(one of whom I'm not) are quite pleasantly surprised by their overwhelming success in their primaries ( and Lefty candidates won in Syracuse & Buffalo too).
None of us own a working crystal ball, longest journey starts with a single step etc. etc.
Lastly, on a pragmatic note, I believe that whomever comes out of a Dem primary in a swing district (e.g MI-7) will NOT lose a general election campaign because of lack of funds. They will get the dollars they need.
1. Primaries do not necessarily determine the stronger candidate. Republicans took turns shooting their party in the foot in 2022.
2. Fair, but I'm assuming there isn't a massive ideological shift in the electorate that shifts everything well to the left, at least on economic issues.
Is it that hard for moderate Democrats to stop running in blue districts? They're allowed to do this, dude.
I mean, I don't like when Ed Case or Rich Torres types represent blue districts, but at least in those cases, they don't put a seat at risk. Also, there's a difference between a moderate running in a blue district, and a large chunk of the party apparatus supporting them. I wasn't thrilled when Boafo won in Maryland, either.
Touché. Who knows if Lawrence will even win the primary, let alone jeopardize the seat in a future general.
why does it matter? their endorsee has no chance of being the nominee, and even if he did, vote blue no matter who
The so-called "Sunrise Movement" claims "We are the climate revolution", but it has moved beyond that into often emphasizing other issues (some not for discussion here), and often backs Green New Deal type proposals that are at best a hard sell in competitive states and districts.
Though the fact that I hadn't heard much about them lately until now may be indicative of their current level of influence.
Over on left Bluesky the national Sunrise are not well liked anymore - a post claiming Dems and the GOP are the same was particularly scrutinized.
Apparently the local branches are different, though I don’t know enough about them to verify this statement.
Incidentally, I do think the climate is an important issue — a really scary HuffPost piece just came out where a worst-case scenario for the climate in the distant future was just surpassed in France. (Unfortunately I cannot find the link for the life of me.)
I just wish the environmental movement had communicated their message better. I still think doomerism about the climate is a problem — I agree that things don’t look good but from what I’ve heard actual climate scientists are against this rhetoric about how it’s all hopeless because it’s A. inaccurate, and B. harmful as it encourages people to do nothing because why bother?
And when they aren't calling it hopeless, they're often instead yelling at people "Stop eating meat!" "No more air travel!" "No more air conditioning!" That's not going to win people over either, even those sympathetic to the climate cause.
Let me interject and say the environmental movement is a pretty diverse spectrum; there's a lot more aligned with the Nature Conservancy, EDF and WWF than Climate Extinction and Sunrise.
that's not really an accurate characterization of progressive candidates or activists
The worst thing an org can do is suffer mission creep that dilutes their purpose and Sunrise was already pretty mediocre even before they started getting stuck in the omnicause trap
The Sunrise Movement gained notoriety after its founding in the late 2010s by doing sit-ins in the offices of California politicians Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi. While they do advocate for Green New Deal policies and social justice issues such as abolishing ICE, I can't seem to find anything on forbidden issues on their website.
They are awful.
Immediately after the primary that Senator Cassidy lost, I said Letlow would almost certainly win the runoff, as I’d heard she had a much bigger war chest, as well as endorsements from both Trump and our governor. Those endorsements are the reason I voted for Fleming in the runoff (early in person), even though he would be as bad as Letlow - to send a message to Trump and our governor that they don’t control us. Glad to learn that Fleming has a chance. Either way I’ll be voting for the Democrat in the general. That’s what you get for closing our primaries, Governor - a RINO!
Update on a primary covered in the morning digest as a landslide a couple of days ago.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-primary-elections/utah-us-house-district-1-results
After more votes were counted, Ben McAdams is leading with only 52% despite benefiting from near-universal name recognition, spending millions of his own raised money, and receiving millions in outside spending. Progressive and anti-Israel groups, Bernie and AOC largely refused to counter that because of the split progressive field caused in part due to Blouin's very misogynistic social media history, instead focusing on NYC and Colorado. If McAdams isn't drawn out by 2028—which seems very likely after two retirements and four new far-right appointments due to the GOP packing the state Supreme Court —he could be taken out easily in 2028.
Blouin should have dropped out so Mohamed could have had a chance.
I’m skeptical this would have made a difference.
If you just put together what Blouin and Mohamed got in percentage of the votes, Mohamed would have received a total of 44% points (rounded off from 43.8%). He would have had to hit at least 8% more of the votes to have a credible shot at defeating McAdams.
Farrell also ran as a progressive and 5-10 is a gap that can easily closed by spending money which nobody did.
That would have been a possiblity.
However, looking back at Mohamed's campaign, he mainly got recognized because of the Utah Democratic Convention. Given the UT-01 race was quite crowded, every candidate stood out in their own respective way. Mohamed would have benefitted more if it was just a two-way race between him and McAdams but McAdams could have captured part of the percentage of the votes too as well from Farrell.
It's the support from Blouin I'm sure McAdams wouldn't have been able to capture.
I'm pretty sure one of the two appointees Cox made so far is a Dem tbh.
No, not at all.
No, Dent, is clerked twice for Dem judges at at federal trial and appellate courts and then was a career AUSA thru the Biden admin. And between then he was at Gibson Dunn, not like Jones Day or Kirkland. Think you're dooming a bit.
He declined to say whether he supports the precedent and described himself as a staunch textualist and originalist.
Yeah, I still think it's dooming.
listening to the words the guy said is dooming?
I doubt it. McAdams still has to actually be in the House and represent UT-01. If he’s already become unabashedly pro-choice in his campaign, it’s a matter of his votes and overall performance at this point.
How much impact will TX decision on school religion have on elections?
Little. There's plenty of other red states that have had similar legislation put forward like this. Louisiana has the Ten Commandments on school walls now, and that didn't make much of an impact.
https://taxrelief.org/itr-foundation-poll-shows-iowans-want-taxpayer-protection/
IA-Gov, IA-Sen, IA-AG (respectively): Cygnal poll (Republican)
-Rob Sand (D) 48%, Zach Lahn (R) 43%
-Ashley Hinson (R) 46%, Josh Turek (D), 44%
-Brenna Bird (R) 44%, Josh Willems (D) 39%
Generic ballot: Republicans 48%, Democrats 44%
still say Turek wins!
Really good numbers. I expected Sand to be leading and it is good to see a second (and this time R) poll showing Turek is within the m/e. There's lots of time for him. At first blush, I was disappointed by the generic number as I have hopes to win two and hopefully three of four seats, but IA-4 is R-15 so being down by 4 statewide may be fine for our house candidates in the three competitive districts.
It would be interesting if Dave Dawson put up a fight in the 4th like J.D. Scholten did in 2018.
In 2018 the combined statewide House vote was 50.5D-46.5R, which resulted in a 3-1 Dem delegation and two pickups. Perhaps Loebsack's incumbency and comfortable win tilted the scales a little bit towards the D side. R+4 still seems compatible with 2 (close) pickups...
I’m skeptical the generic ballot will end up being more Republican than Democrat.
I am too. if 2018 is taken as a baseline, where dems won 3 congressional seats and almost won the governor's race with a less strong candidate, i think there's a lot of reasons to believe dems can and will sweep there
Pro-Choice Majority Action mentioned in the digest which spent for Bains, Von Wilpert, Powell, Galane-Woods and now DeGette has been confirmed as an AIPAC/DMFI shell.
https://x.com/RobletoFire/status/2070246277791560151
https://x.com/Popstonox/status/2061141105853219238
EDW Action is an arm of Elect Dem Women, which is the campaign side of the Dem Women's Caucus. DWC/EDW is institutionally corporatist, so like it's an AIPAC shell in the sense that Dem Members are still too heavily tied to AIPAC, and the caucus's campaign chair is Lois Frankel (under whom, I think EDW uses really despicable tactics and she badly needs to hang it up). But I think saying everyone who takes the endorsement and support of the main congressional arm supporting women candidates is therefore ipso facto smeared with AIPAC to be a bit of a stretch. Can define these candidates more by what they just say and do.
AIPAC and DMFI transfers accounted for a majority of EDW Action Fund's fundraising in this quarter which they transferred to this shell. It's not rocket science. Did you not see the reporting in media outlets after the recent filings or the tweets I quoted?
Yeah, I know the schitck lol. It's like calling EMILY's List an AIPAC shell lol. AIPAC/UDP/DMFI donate to leadership committees. This is extremely well known and it should stop. The over-fixation on calling everything AIPAC is diluting the message and becoming more of [insert Charlie Cox conspiracy meme from IASIP].
But Pro Choice Majority Action is actually just a new AIPAC shell run by an DMFI operative which serves no purpose other than to complicate the money trail, why would EDW and Frankel suddenly need another Super PAC which gets all of its money from their first Super PAC.
Sure.
I also forgot that transfers are usually earmarked for a particular race.
Hmm. This kind of reminds me of how 314 Action is normally a pro-scientist group, but was being used by AIPAC to funnel money. Maybe this is similar?