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Paleo's avatar

Canadian election recount update. Conservatives hang on to a Windsor riding in Ontario by 4 votes.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/windsor/article/recount-maintains-conservative-victory-in-windsor-tecumseh-lakeshore/

Final riding recount result, from Newfoundland, expected today.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/terra-nova-peninsulas-recount-decision-1.7538809

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the lurking ecologist's avatar

Canadian political junkies get to award their babka a lot sooner than we do.

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Henrik's avatar

It got lost in the shuffle a bit but the Tory sweep of Windsor ridings continues trend of global working class voters shifting ever more to the right

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Avedee Eikew's avatar

Did this particular riding swing right though? If it was a hold by 4 votes my guess is it moved left from 2021 but Canada's multi-party system makes swings less clear.

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Paleo's avatar

No, it had been held by the Liberals. And the other Windsor riding the Conservatives won had been held by the NDP for more than two decades.

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Avedee Eikew's avatar

Ah ok, I read hang on as held from the previous election.

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Ethan (KingofSpades)'s avatar

Dangit, the Terra Nova riding went for the CPC.

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Paleo's avatar

Went from a 12 vote Liberal lead to a 12 vote Conservative win. Assuning that 1 vote win Quebec holds up, Liberals end up with 169 seats.

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Paleo's avatar

I've noticed a lot of Sherrill ads on TV and online in the last week. After she had been dark for most the campaign. She apparently herded her resources for a final 3- week blitz.

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Kevin H.'s avatar

She may be putting this thing to bed.

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Zero Cool's avatar

Yes. Agreed.

I also think the association with Elon Musk was already put to rest by Sherrill when she was questioned about it.

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MPC's avatar

I wish Weil and Jolly well for the FL elections. It's a beautiful state and yet constantly lets us down electorally since 2016.

I wish Republican voters in the state realize that the problems in the state are because of their OWN elected representatives, not Democrats.

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AWildLibAppeared's avatar

FL Dems need to nominate someone who isn't an ex-Republican. I see no reason why Jolly will do any better than Crist.

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NewEnglandMinnesotan's avatar

This is what I've been thinking. Like there has to be some bench (even if small) of non-ex-republican Dems who can run

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MPC's avatar

What about the mayor of Jacksonville? As far as I know, she isn't an ex-Republican -- rather a center left Democrat.

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NewEnglandMinnesotan's avatar

I'm not at all well-versed in Florida politics, so I don't know about individual people. Admittedly, I also don't know if ex-Republican candidates would be consistently weak in Florida elections. I'm just generally skeptical of these types of candidates. I'd love to hear from someone with more insight into Florida politics.

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MPC's avatar

I wish Rick Wilson would focus his energy and resources on flipping FL instead of his 'insult and badger FDJT' Lincoln Project PAC. That guy knows the ins and outs of Florida politics as a former GOP strategist.

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MPC's avatar

I'm curious if the independent candidate for FL governor will pull away more votes from Jolly or Donalds.

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BF's avatar

Jolly.

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MPC's avatar

Florida is also a racist AF state, and Donalds won’t be immune to some Rs not voting for him because of his skin color. But he’s not problematic like Mark Robinson was either.

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ArcticStones's avatar

Jeez, we have really redefined the threshold for "problematic", haven’t we?

Given good, creative and effective messaging, our Democratic candidates should be able to convince a majority of voters that every Republican politician who is willing to take away health care from millions of Americans, and willing to take away Social Security money from seniors in order to give it to billionaires, is problematic!

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JanusIanitos's avatar

I'm pessimistic enough about Florida that my only concern with our statewide candidates there is that they do good enough to avoid costing us any of our house seats and manage to do so without hoovering up a bunch of money that could have gone to more winnable races.

Jolly will almost certainly lose. And I don't like that he's an ex-republican. But at the end of the day it's not like Florida is all that winnable anyway.

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Miguel Parreno's avatar

The next time Florida goes blue will be when a significant part of the state sinks beneath the sea and even then I doubt it.

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Zero Cool's avatar

At this point, what other choices do we have?

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NewEnglandMinnesotan's avatar

Something I can't get out of my head is how if we hadn't lost Gerry Connolly the other day, it's very possible the GOP budget bill would have been defeated in a tie. At first, I considered that two GOP members didn't vote and I thought they were just out of town, so Mike Johnson would have rescheduled the vote to a different day. But turns out those members (Andrew Garbarino and David Schweikert) were either asleep or submitted their vote late, meaning Johnson intended for them to vote. This means if Gerry Connolly (or Grijalva or Turner for that matter) were alive, or if their seats were occupied by someone else, GOP incompetence would have led to a tie vote. Maybe Andy Harris would have switched his "present" vote to a "yea" vote, but still it's quite infuriating to think about.

A separate yet related thing I think about is: What if Dems had retaken the House last year, but then lost the majority (within the first five months of the session no less) due to member deaths? Would people be more up-in-arms about the fact that Democratic insistence to remain in office is hurting the country?

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Paleo's avatar

They would have gotten the votes necessary even if Democrats had their full contingent of 215.

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NewEnglandMinnesotan's avatar

Typically I would agree, because Johnson would just reschedule the vote to a day when he knew he had the numbers. But in this instance it seems like the vote could have failed purely due to GOP incompetence. Garbarino was asleep during the vote, and Schweikert entered his vote after the deadline. Johnson intended for them to vote, and would have counted them when considering if he had the right numbers to schedule a vote.

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Avedee Eikew's avatar

Yeah i'm not understanding why some are so certain dem vacancies don't matter with the examples you mention.

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Tigercourse's avatar

Yeah, but if it was closer (which it would have been with our guy alive) he would have been more serious about the whip and the count. I don't think this is a Ginsberg. But still, more youth, vigor and health in the party don't hurt.

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Guy's avatar

Not exactly. Because their votes were not needed, Johnson let it slide. If there were more Democrats to vote no, he would have made sure Garbarino was there and Schweikert got his vote in on time or would have otherwise gotten Harris or Davidson to flip.

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Mark's avatar

Yep. If a scenario arose when they needed Davidson, he'd absolutely be there for them. Even Massie would have voted their way if they were still one vote short.

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JanusIanitos's avatar

People would be pissed in that latter scenario but I don't know that the anger would last until primary season, or that it'd be enough.

Long time incumbents are difficult to oust in a primary. Especially if they haven't committed any ideological sins. At a certain point it's up to the too old people to recognize that they should be retiring for the good of the nation. Party leadership can do a bit to push them out by encouraging/supporting primary challengers and denying committee leadership spots. But party leadership doesn't want to go down that path... probably in no small part because most of them are part of the too-old club themselves.

Personally I'm most worried about our senators in Vermont. As far as I know all of our other senators in their late 70s or older are in states with a dem governor or a same-party requirement for appointees filing a vacancy. That's not the case in Vermont and both Sanders (83) and Welch (78) could easily have health issues appear suddenly. Especially at their ages. Sanders just won reelection, with his 89th birthday falling before the end of his current term.

Shaheen would have been an additional risk on this front, but thankfully she's retiring.

The senate is such a huge obstacle for us that incumbents playing with fire like this worries me far more than the ancient members of the house do.

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NewEnglandMinnesotan's avatar

I was thinking very similarly regarding Vermont. Government officials dying in office and as a result either making it easier for Republicans to pass legislation or allowing a Republican to take their place, at least for me, really sours their legacy. I wonder what would happen to Bernie's legacy if Phil Scott got to appoint a replacement for him.

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Avedee Eikew's avatar

No party has had a larger then 222 seat majority in the House since the 2020 elections and we have three vacancies in the first four months of this congress. If the NC maps hadn't been nixed and Nickel held on Dems would have had a majority and lost it through vacancies.

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rayspace's avatar

There are 10 D Sens who are from states w/R Govs--GA, NV, NH, VT, & VA.

There are also 9 R Sens from states w/D Govs--KS, KY, ME, NC, PA, & WI.

In KY and NC, the Govs must choose a candidate from the party of the departing Senator, although I think Beshear has said he doesn't think the law is constitutional and might challenge it if he had the opportunity to make an appointment. (Good luck making that argument in the 6th Circuit).

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Jay's avatar

I doubt the negative ads from Baraka and Fulop will make much of an impact because the NJ governor field is so fractured and it's pretty late in the game, but I wonder if the insider stock trading attack will be reused in the general election? That, along with the Elon Musk connection attack, could hitch Sherrill to everything happening in DC right now, even if she is part of the opposition. Sherrill seems to have a solid election track record, though. Is NJ going to be closer than Virginia this year?

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Paleo's avatar

The Musk attack would only hurt in the primary. The stock trades were late disclosures for which she paid a $400 fine and are not insider trading.

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Essex Democrat's avatar

she will win going away, in the general at least. Candidacy made for the general election. That said Baraka's accomplishments in Newark deserve to net him more votes than the 12% he's sitting around imo

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Paleo's avatar

I think she'd win the general, but I'm not so sure it will be a big margin. The best thing she has going for her is Trump in the white house. The worst thing is that Democrats have held the governor's mansion for two terms. The last 5 times a party was in that position in the state, they lost.

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Essex Democrat's avatar

full speculative mode here but many of our voters that pulled the lever for trump in passaic county and southern hudson county are coming home. the tariff madness is only going to make people more irritated in this already incredibly expensive state, and the contrast between jack "i've been running for governor longer than mikie has been in politics" Citarelli is a great one.

thank god republicans aren't smart enough to nominate bramnick

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Mike in MD's avatar

I think that's true of a lot of places, not just in Jersey.

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Mike in MD's avatar

Sherrill and Fulop would be my two favourite candidates, but any Democrat would be acceptable--even Gottheimer.

Baraka's record may well merit more than 12% of the vote. What he doesn't deserve, IMO, is to coast to the nomination by casting himself as a martyr after the arrest, which so far doesn't seem to be happening.

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Essex Democrat's avatar

can't blame him for the trump admin trying to pick a candidate. but his accomplishments in newark are astounding. As someone who has worked in Newark for the last five years its even visible to the naked eye. Homelessness is down almost 60%, violent crime is the lowest it has been since before the riots in the 60's, and the once spiraling city now has a better handle on its finances than fulop's much beloved jersey city

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Essex Democrat's avatar

full disclosure: already voted for mikie by mail, but it's worth pointing out ras has done the work in Newark

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AWildLibAppeared's avatar

I think it's likely NJ is going to be closer than Virginia no matter who the Democrats nominate.

The two states were basically even in the 2024 Presidential election. Demographically, trends favor Democrats in Virginia. Virginia has been more severely impacted by the first 100 days of the Trump administration. And in Virginia, Democrats have nominated the strongest possible candidate, while Republicans have nominated their weakest.

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Mike in MD's avatar

I don't think Winsome Earle-Sears is the weakest possible candidate for Virginia; either Dave LaRock or Amanda Chase, both of whom tried to compete for the nomination but were disqualified due to lack of valid signatures, would be much weaker.

Miyares would probably be stronger than Sears, but also probably wouldn't be favoured and is in danger of losing his current office. Even Youngkin would have a fight on his hands due to Trump and DOGE, and Youngkin and Sears' dismissiveness of its effects. Youngkin's approval dropped to 46% in a poll released yesterday, so running as his second term may not work for Sears even leaving Trump aside.

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MPC's avatar
May 23Edited

While the 2026 midterms are still more than a year away (and a lot of things can change), a Data for Progress poll says that Iowa Senator Joni Ernst is narrowly trailing potential Democratic candidate Nathan Sage by two points. (Margin of error is +/- 4 points.)

https://www.newsweek.com/democrat-nathan-sage-republican-joni-ernst-iowa-senate-poll-2076479

Sage is already traveling the state talking with people, which is a good start. His unvarnished approach may win some independent and squishy R voters.

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Zero Cool's avatar

Let’s do it!

Ernst won re-election by less than she won her first Senate election by back in 2014.

Not a wise decision for Ernst to have been the Chair of the Senate DOGE Coin (I’m sorry, DOGE) Caucus.

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MPC's avatar

She got elected in R favorable years, but she doesn’t have that going for her in 2026 (especially with her proudly voting for DOGE cuts). I would love it so much if she lost her seat next year.

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ArcticStones's avatar

Not a wise decision for Joni Ernst, a military veteran, to help confirm Trump’s DUI hire, Pete Hegseth, as SecDef!

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Zero Cool's avatar

Hegseth isn’t even a real Defense Secretary to begin with. Another hit on Ernst’s reputation.

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BF's avatar

Former state senator Heather Steans also endorsed Dan Biss, with the real question being if she's also going to put her money behind him... Her father was a billionaire who founded the Financial Investments Corporation, and she's the board chair of their Steans Family Foundation that gave out over $25M in grants in their 2023 990. Would help keep him competitive with the inevitable AIPAC/DMFI money that's going to back up Laura Fine.

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