Now that the 2026 primaries are clearer, I thought it would be interesting to make a list of incumbent house dems with primary challengers and rank them from highest risk of losing renomination to lowest. What do you all think about this ranking? Did I miss anyone?
Highest risk:
CA-07: Rep. Doris Matsui, challenger Mai Vang
CT-01: Rep. John Larson, challengers Luke Bronin, Jillian Gilchrest, and Ruth Fortune
GA-13: Rep. David Scott, several challengers including Emanuel Jones and Jasmine Clark
I would move Matsui, Scott, Cohen and Garcia to medium, move Omar, Thompson, Espaillat and Beyer to low, Torres up to medium now that Septimo is out, and probably keep the rest of them the same unless Heroux challenges Auchincloss.
Steve Cohen is facing an existential primary challenge from a Black progressive. Black political leaders have attempted to unseat him for years without success, but Justin Pearson may succeed where others failed by peeling away Cohen’s progressive base and Black support. Compounding the threat, Cohen is unlikely to receive support from progressive organizations this cycle after leaving the Congressional Progressive Caucus over disagreements on Israel.
David Trone launching a primary challenge cracks me up. He should have known the field wasn't split enough to win the primary for the U.S. Senate. If he truly wanted to stay in Congress, he should have just stayed put. Bad political instincts.
Maybe he thought that he could effectively spend his way into the Senate. He seems to think that too against Delaney, trying to put on the Resist Lib hat calling himself a "fighter" and implying that AMD is too timid.
But she's no slouch either, as a campaigner, representative, or fundraiser (including but not limited to her and her husband's own personal finances.) And there's not much to differentiate them, besides Delaney's vote for the Laken Riley act a year ago, which she has since repudiated and which probably isn't enough for a successful challenge. Otherwise she's voted reliably with the party and there's no reason to believe that anything would be different with Trone in the seat. (In what seems like either hubris or denial, his online ads urge voters to "Re-elect David Trone" as if he were still the incumbent.)
The media gunned SO HARD for Alsobrooks to lose (first to Trone, and then to Hogan). I could never figure out if the issue was Alsobrooks-specific, just generalized hate of women of color, or both.
No, I understood his strategy. Josh Rales trued to buy a Senate seat back in 2006. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I would have added some complex policy positions to my strategy if I were Trone, but he never really got there. Great analysis. I wish people would bring a little bit more than just money to the table. (:
And he'll have no support from the left based on his status as an AIPAC megadonor involved in efforts against progressives. AMD also tacked to the left on M4A, minimum wage and paid leave.
I'm not sure Bush is the highest risk to Bell, unfortunately. I also haven't really followed Garcia v Johnson, is that really highest risk? Did the new maps move it from being a more heavily Latino to Black district? Torres is definitely at least medium risk with Septimo ending her campaign tbh. The rest general make sense to me.
Torres is at low risk. DataForProgress found him to be more popular than AOC and Bernie in his district while Goldman was quite unpopular which is why they decided to target him.
Yes, Garcia is mostly because redistricting removed some latino voters and added black voters. I think Bell is at serious risk, even to Bush. He only won by 5.5 points in 2024 despite all the spending for him, and he's made bad headlines in congress. Maybe more anti-Bush spending can help him, but only a handful of voters need to change their mind from 2024 for him to lose.
Doris Matsui may lose the primary due to age being a factor. Otherwise, I can't imagine besides Mai Vung being younger and being even more liberal than Matsui is. Matsui I don't see any issues with other than perhaps she is just not serving on the key committees such as the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Also, Matsui replaced her late husband Bob Matsui back in 2005 after he died of cancer. It may be more personal to her in serving in the House, I suspect, in part to honor his legacy.
I will be content with anyone serving in Congress who actually has intention of serving constituents instead of making an ass out of themselves. Ken Calvert also has controversy going back decades whereas Young Kim does not. Frankly, I wish elections were more about perspectives and agenda instead of divisiveness all the time that polarizes politics.
On the other hand, Calvert isn't really MAGA so much as your traditional conservative Republican. I don't think he's changed much in all the decades he's been in the House but he's also got among one of the lowest profile images out of any House Republicans.
Although I would bet that Miller-Meeks would win, her 12 point victory in 2024 despite Pautsch's complete lack of funding means she if far from safe in my book.
I haven't looked at the map, but I presume FL-7 is probably out of reach for Dems no matter who the nominee is me. If Cory Mills were to be the nominee, could we at least see the Dem spring an upset because of the scandals surrounding Mills, kind of like Nick Lampson did following the Tom DeLay saga.
Lauren Boebert and Victoria Spartz both got only around 40% of the vote in their primaries in 2024 against split opposition. They are theoretically vulnerable if they get a prominent challenger.
In CA-32, Brad Sherman's challenger is Jake Levine, not Levin. Jake is not an outsider; his father is former Rep. Mel Levine. The senior Levine left his House seat to run a very unsuccessful race for US Senator in 1992. Mel got his ass kicked by Barbara Boxer, and also ran behind then-Lt. Gov. Leo McCarthy in the primary. Boxer served four terms in the Senate.
Probably not, but you never know. Sherman will get one of the spots in the top two runoff. If Levine can get more votes than the top Repub and make it to the November election he would have a chance, but even then it is not likely. I no longer live in that district because I moved from Sherman Oaks to North Hollywood. Brad jokes that he lives in the best named community in America...
I think he is now living in Porter Ranch (the fancier part of Northridge). His joke is now that he represents the best named community in the USA, since he moved. He needs some new comedy material...
He's making the case for generational change and getting a lot of support and fundraisers from former Biden administration officials, especially the forpol guys like Sullivan and Amos.
good list! I don't see Larson as facing a serious risk unless most of the challengers drop out, and there's time because CT has a late primary. Same situation in HI-01 where polling found Case vulnerable if the field was between him and one other, but he wins in a cakewalk if both challengers stay in. The one who's at serious risk IMO is GA-13, where it's a fractured field BUT if the challengers can keep Scott to under 50 percent, there's a primary runoff.
I thought about moving Larson to medium risk, but I saw that Luke Bronin has raised more money than him. I think a challenger outraising an incumbent warrants a second look.
Fwiw (2-3c, I guess), I think Holmes Norton is in a category by herself. High risk would be Scott, Thanedar, Johnson. I'd put Goldman, Neal, Lynch, Mfume and maybe Espaillat in medium and everyone else wins fairly easily. Omar might have been a medium risk, but ICE has gotten her re-elected.
For such a smart man, it’s incredible how out of touch and unlikable he is. I think he’s going to lose. He’s just going to keep saying stuff like this. He had the “lazy white people” comment a year ago, and now this. That’s probably already enough to sink him. Acton just needs to go for the jugular.
One thing worth noting in the discussion of if he is or isn't smart, is that individuals can be good ("smart") at one or multiple things, while bad ("stupid") at others.
Ramaswamy is likely good at the skills necessary to successfully navigate the business world and personally profit from it. He can be good at that and bad at electoral politics. Someone can even be good at politics in general while awful at the electoral side.
Ramaswamy did build his credibility in the business world without being a narcissist like Trump did and grave attention. When he decided to open his month and talk politics, that's when I thought he's so full of it.
On the other hand, I will give Ramaswamy credit for one thing - He's had a rift with Martin Shkrelli as Ramaswamy's hedge fund invested in Turning Pharmaceuticals, which ended up under Shkrelli's direction of jacking up the price of Daraprim, which is an essential drug for helping AIDS patients.
Let's just say Ramaswamy doesn't think highly of Shkrelli and I'll leave it at that.
“His strategy at a different company (Turing) of hiking drug prices is shockingly similar to what Big Pharma regularly does,” Ramaswamy added. “Big Pharma just dresses it up in the veneer of ‘do-good stakeholder capitalism,’ and that’s why they get away with it. It’s arguably even more corrupt because it’s less transparent. That’s just the hard truth.” QVT did not respond to a request for comment.
In his book, “Woke, Inc.,” Ramaswamy wrote that Shkreli was “pathologically incapable of telling the truth.” His involvement in the investment provides insight into the worlds Ramaswamy occupied and the characters he mingled with prior to entering the field of elected politics.
⬆️“I don’t need Medicaid. So I don’t know why anyone else would.”
I often wonder whether statements like this coming from GOP candidates and/or elected officials comes from ignorance/laziness or whether it simply calculated deceptiveness.
The GOP is great at selling the waste, fraud, and abuse fairytale - when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid much of the abuse is coming from providers and NOT recipients.
I think the best thing we can do is spread accurate information about who benefits from Medicaid. As long as GOP voters believe that the only recipients are poor people of color who are cheating the system, they will be OK with what the GOP has done. But that is far from the case.
Here are just a few articles with good info on the impact of the GOP's Big Ugly Bill's cuts to Medicaid:
"The GOP is great at selling the waste, FRAUD, and abuse fairytale - when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid much of the abuse is coming from providers and NOT recipients."
Malinowski is not the current favorite. Don't forget that the district he used to represent was a different district, not this one. Very few voters in the current NJ-11 have ever seen his name on the ballot.
And don't forget that he lost his seat partly due to a stock trading scandal that is definitely still relevant now.
Even if you're right about why they're targeting Malinowski, that confirms what I said. They're not targeting him because they're against progressives or promoting conservative candidates. If they were, they'd be attacking Mejia instead, as you mentioned originally. They're targeting Malinowski solely due to his stance on Israel (which, as I'm sure you know, doesn't fit neatly into ideological labels).
They are working toward a win by Way. Aside from whatever position she has on Middle Eastern matters, is she as progressive or more progressive than either Malinowski or Mejia? That and not their strategic decision to go after Malinowski is the test of whether this is on-brand for them in terms of supporting the further-right candidate.
I would guess she is more moderate than either, but it's hard to know when someone hasn't been in elected office since 2010, and the secretary of state role is pretty anonymous in NJ
If they want Way to win and they're attacking Malinowski and not Mejia, that suggests that they consider Malinowski the main obstacle to a victory by Way.
There is a lot of focus on AIPAC, but it seems a touch exaggerated. How high on the list of PACs is it? Well, according to FEC data, in the 2025–2026 election cycle so far, among all US Political Action Committees, AIPAC is in 13th place, slightly ahead of Emily’s List.
They call it the United Democracy Project, Democratic Majority for Israel and have other spin-offs. It’s not under the name AIPAC. This spending is under the UDP.
Then there is a difference between PAC contributions from AIPAC, donor contributions under FEC limits through AIPAC and its Super PAC like the UDP. This list shows the PAC contributions.
They sometimes transfer the sums to vaguely named Protect Progress or 314 Action in a case.
The United Democracy Project (UDP) spent approximately $37.86 million on outside spending in the 2024 federal elections, with most of that directed against Democrats, according to OpenSecrets data for the 2024 cyclehttps://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/detail/2024?cmte=C00799031&tab=summary. Their total spending across the entire 2023-2024 cycle was around $61.37 million, with significant funds allocated to media and campaign expenses, as detailed on OpenSecrets' PAC profile pagehttps://www.opensecrets.org/political-action-committees-pacs/united-democracy-project/C00799031/summary/2024.
It's good to see Krysten Sinema get her well-deserved comeuppance for being a sellout corporate stooge. I'm sure there's more scandalous stories out there.
Nope. Alienation of affections I think is the phrase. And I think they are actually separated and not actually divorced yet? I forget. I find this lawsuit so stupid.
I’m glad Wilder got the chance to see a woman sworn in as Governor after Mary Sue Terry was denied the chance of succeeding him in 1994. Days like this where I’m optimistic for my three-year-old daughter’s future.
Since it’s the weekend, a hypothetical to discuss:
Do people think Jay Jones wins if Trump doesn’t get elected (either both times or just the most recent)? I lean no, but 6 points is still a pretty strong victory margin for Republicans to overcome even with an incumbent.
I tend to think no with a Democratic president, especially with the controversial texts. But even without them Miyares might have won anyway, as no Trump means Dems don't have their best issue. Of course Miyares could also possibly have won in reality by not being a near-automatic defender of everything the WH said and did.
Governor is a more complicated case. Spanberger's win was large enough to suggest that even with a Democratic president she might have won, and Earle-Sears turned out to be a less than stellar candidate, relying too much on controversial cultural issues and evidently thinking the state was more conservative than it in fact is nowadays. Even if Spanberger would have won in that instance, though, a lot of downballot Dems probably wouldn't have. It might have been similar to 2013, when McAuliffe won narrowly against an opponent too conservative for many, but had little in the way of coattails.
Probably not. But in that scenario there's a good chance Virginia would have been a repeat of 2021 for us, except Spanberger would have probably been favored still.
In that hypothetical scenario we're not only losing an electoral advantage (unpopular republican incumbent admin); we're also gaining a disadvantage (democratic incumbent admin). Parties almost universally lose popularity upon gaining the presidency in this country, and that gets even worse when they retain that office.
Spanberger is the only one of the three that won by enough that I think she'd have stayed the favorite even in that alternate reality.
Races I’m interested in: I’ve already laid out the often overlooked AG, SOS, and court races in last week’s open thread. This week, I’ll focus on something on my mind: the primary calendar. In a lot of ways, fortunately the most nasty or concerning primaries are somewhat earlier in the year. It’s really only MI-Sen and WI-Gov that have later primaries. Of the gubernatorial and senate primaries I care about, we have in
March: the initial Texas primary. Hopefully Rs go to a runoff while Dems can unite behind Talarico early.
April: not a primary, but the Wisconsin court races will be nice to compare the national mood versus this time last year. And it will be our only opportunity before November to see how Trump’s statewide approval correlates with R/conservative vote share.
May: initial Georgia primary. I’m expecting the Democratic gubernatorial race goes to a runoff. I hope despite having the Trump endorsement that Burt Jones is held under 50 so as to waste more of his resources in a runoff. There’s a good shot the Republican Senate race also goes to a runoff, allowing Ossoff to build up even more of a cash lead while the GOP field destroys each other. There’s the Texas runoffs at the end of the month. Fingers crossed 🤞 for Paxton.
June: the Maine primary is the big one. Luckily the winner will have five months to allow the loser’s supporters to get over any hurt or hard feelings. Then we have the Georgia runoffs. I hope Esteves gets a runoff spot and that people flock to him once his name ID is built up.
July: nothing
August: Wisconsin and Michigan primaries. At least we’ll have three months to unite afterwards. I’d just rather not have to deal with the headache of Stevens or El-Sayed in Michigan or Barnes in Wisconsin.
I didn't notice that Michigan's primary isn't until August. That's frustratingly late for one of the more hotly contested senate primaries we have. Primaries shouldn't extend past July as far as I'm concerned.
SC has primaries early June and runoffs 2 weeks later. Fascinating races for Rs for Gov, Sen, and AG. There's an interesting D primary for Gov, with a drunken dudebro who seems to be the frontrunner vs a more serious guy. Also an interesting D race for SC01 (Mace; Charleston/Beaufort). Possible flip there.
Surprised no one has mentioned the idiotic Greenland and tariffs news. Par for the course for this circus. I’m glad I decided to get out of the Army and land a good job when I did so I don’t have to deal with this constant embarrassment. I’m sorry, I didn’t pledge an oath to be a game piece for Cadet Bone Spur’s Risk board.
It’s remarkable how much political capital he’s expending on an issue that A) less than 10% of his own party supports in polls B) hamstrings everything else he wants to do on FoPo and C) is one of the few things he’s actually gotten firm pushback from Congress on
It would be hilarious if SCOTUS shoots down his tariff power on Tuesday! And this obsession with monuments and Greenland does lead my conspiracy mind to wonder if there might be something to that rumor/theory that he’s only got 2-4 months left
I think this is one thing Vance would not do if he took over, so it would be very convenient for the world if Trump departed from the scene. And if any Federal agencies are monitoring this site, they should note that that is purely an observation on my part.
You have a valid point. Vance I've also observed doesn't exhibit the same impulses as Trump so if he were POTUS somehow if Trump left (say before the end of his term), I don't think he would throw tariffs randomly at countries because he's not getting things his way.
Of course, that doesn't mean Vance would be better than Trump as POTUS in this case. More like, he'd be the lesser of two evils. And I emphasize "lesser" of two evils.
Yeah, under pressure he would not be an authoritarian type like Trump in this sense. I have my issues with Vance (as everyone does here) but he isn't dumb compared to Trump.
I'm by no means convinced he wouldn't try to be an authoritarian, but only crazy people want to start a war with an ally and completely obliterate NATO!
Anyone that can pull the kind of intellectual 180, from Hillbilly Elegy to faithfully executing the wishes of the likes of Trump, Musk, Thiel and others, is either an absolute dark triad psychopath, or deeply deeply broken as you said. I personally think he is a stop-at-nothing sociopath willing to do and say anything to get power. And its gotten him one slot away from being the most powerful person on Earth. Vance is incredibly dangerous.
FWIW I've always felt that Vance's Catholicism was mostly performative, his (publicized) conversion intended to eliminate any doubt of where he stood on women's and LGBTQ+ issues.
He's mostly rational. He's a cynical, mean-spirited opportunist whose perceptions seem to be somewhat warped by being Very Online, but he's mostly in touch with reality, can control his impulses, and doesn't have the pathological needs to always dominate people and always be the center of attention. Psychologically I think he's far more similar to Nixon than to Trump or to any other president.
That’s as good description of Vance as any. The thing that strikes me about Vance is he has the same effect on people that Ron DeSantis has. The more people see him and get to know him the more they dislike him.
I think we should be extremely cautious here about how we view Vance, especially in reference to Trump. A smarter and less insane/outlandish Trump could easily be successfully turning America into a dictatorship instead of everything held together barely with duct tape as it is right now.
Even if he’s the lesser of two evils foreign policy wise (he is), that doesn’t mean he’s actually less evil or can do less evil than Trump worldwide and especially domestically. I hate Trump because of who he is. I hate Vance because his policy beliefs are unamerican. And who can enact horrid, even worse policy than Trump secretively and sneakily without alarming voters until it’s too late to stop it instead of trying to take it down with a wrecking ball and everyone being made aware every day? Vance could.
Vance may be the more dangerous and consequential of the two if you believe MAGA/Project 2025 is actually the biggest danger to the US in many decades, more so than Trump himself, which crazy enough, is something I actually do believe.
As I said, my assessment was the "lesser" of two evils, not because I don't think Vance doesn't have potential to become damaging. It's just a comparison of how Vance projects his public image vs. Trump, which there is a distinction, even if both are aligned with each other on the issues.
That said, I am in NO way arguing that we will have a sign of relief if Vance becomes POTUS. Trump can still exert power over Vance, even if he's out of office.
I just respectfully completely disagree with you that he’s the lesser of two evils. I think he’s more evil than Trump because he can actually enact a right wing utopia MAGA autocracy quietly in the shadows without pissing off the Republican reps or average voters he needs votes from to enact his nearly entirely the same agenda as Trump has. The only difference being foreign policy.
He wouldn’t be sending ICE into daycares, churches and courts. He wouldn’t send the national guard into blue cities. He wouldn’t have tariff chaos hitting the rural Republican base. He wouldn’t have fucked up the super easy Epstein issue. He wouldn’t have pardoned rapists, human traffickers. He would stock his government with competent fascists instead of inept grifters. He wouldn’t have created the COVID chaos. He wouldn’t have caused January 6th because he wouldn’t have lost in 2020.
Voters care about domestic things far more than international, the key reasons the GOP is facing a building blue wave right now is because Trump can’t do the evil part quietly. He has to be loud and tell the world of his evil every day.
Now imagine a midterm where none of the above is happening or has happened in America. Does the Democratic base still outvote Republicans in 2026? Yes, because of the party in power backlash. But it almost certainly wouldn’t be as stark a divide and may result in a reverse 2022 where the GOP could hang onto the trifecta, making 2 or many more years of awful policy via reconciliation a reality.
In 4 years Trump almost accomplished it, I think Vance would succeed in 8 years where Trump failed, winning re-election in 2020 (any other Republican probably would have) and that’s why he’s far, far worse imo.
I don't think Vance would have so many fanatical devotees, nor so much pull with Congress. If he is less likely to be able to successfully incite people, those cowed by Trump will be less scared of him.
As far as I'm concerned, JD Vance isn't far off from Marco Rubio. Both criticized Trump in the 2016 presidential election but in a different context:
Rubio went after Trump in the primaries because he believed what we all knew - He was a fraud. Ended up wiping Trump's ass when he was nominated as Secretary of State. Every time Rubio speaks, he talks like Trump is speaking instructions to Rubio in a hidden mic on how to serve him.
Vance criticized Trump as morally reprehensible and then walked back his comments when he was in the spotlight in being selected as Trump's running mate, saying he was wrong. No he wasn't. He just had to because he had to and because he saw the opportunity, as Peter Thiel taught him quite well when he pushed him to run for the Senate.
Hell, Elise Stefanik and Nancy Mace could go as hard MAGA like Vance and Rubio are doing and they'll be the same phonies as those two are. Another reason why one of my dreams is to see Mace and Stefanik as well as Rubio and Vance all run in the 2028 GOP presidential primaries so they can duke it out at each other.
Here are races I'm interested in that are lacking in Republican recruitments:
*MA-Gov, MA-Sen: Bruce Tarr and Lewis Evangelidis, two of the most prominent Massachusetts Republicans, are weighing runs for these offices. Will they jump in? Either way, it probably won't be competitive for Maura Healey and Ed Markey.
*NJ-Sen: Who will Republicans recruit to challenge Cory Booker? Word is that state Sen. Mike Testa, former state Sen. and governor candidate Ed Durr, and former U.S. Attorney Alina Habba, the most prominent of the contenders, are interested.
*MD-Gov: This looks like a crowded Republican primary between state Sen. Steve Hershey, state Del. Chris Bouchat and businessman Ed Hale. Will former governor Larry Hogan try another comeback? None of them seem to have much of a chance against Moore.
*VA-Sen: Who will Republicans recruit to challenge Warner after state Sen. Reeves dropped out and former Gov. Youngkin declined?
*OH-1: With the new map, what prominent Republicans could challenge Greg Landsman? Ditto with OH-13, though that seat is much bluer.
*NM-Sen: Lujan had a close race in 2020. Who will be his opponent this fall?
Barring something major and unforeseen, there's zero chance that MA's statewide offices are competitive in the general election this year.
Especially the senate seat. It took a deeply flawed democratic candidate at the nadir of Obama's popularity for a modest special election loss. Remove any of those details and even that doesn't happen. There are scenarios where the governor's office could be competitive in the future, but only with an open seat or a very deeply scandal plagued incumbent -- and even then it would need the cycle to be one that favors republicans by a decent amount.
Since this year is shaping up to be a blue wave and none of the other conditions apply, this isn't a "probably" uncompetitive scenario. It's plain uncompetitive, no qualifier.
GA-Gov: Can't seem to find anything, but apparently 2024 Libertarian presidential nominee Chase Oliver was nominated as the Libertarian candidate for Georgia governor.
He is the party nominee but the party is no longer automatically on the ballot in GA. To be on ballot, it needed to get 1% in the last election but it only got 0.4%. It now needs to get on by the collecting signatures of 1% of active voters (72,679) by July.
From the AJC 12/11/25: "The Libertarian Party of Georgia is struggling to qualify candidates for the midterms because of a state law passed in 1943 that was originally aimed at keeping Communists off the ballot.
The law says third-party statewide candidates have to win at least 1% of the vote in the previous election or collect signatures of 1% of active voters to automatically qualify. In last year’s presidential race, Libertarian presidential nominee Chase Oliver managed only about 0.4% of the vote in Georgia.
That means the party needs to gather 72,679 signatures by July to qualify candidates for the midterms. Oliver, also a leader of the Libertarian Party of Georgia, says they’re still short."
I think VA Dems should hold off releasing maps until after the referendum vote. The Florida special session for their planned redistricting is happening around the same time as the referendum in April. If Florida is aggressive VA Dems should go for 10-1 and if Desantis can’t redraw it because there’s no VRA ruling yet VA can do 9-2.
I agree. Even if the VRA stays intact, that still doesn’t change the fact that North Carolina has already redrawn their map in hopes of picking up one seat. If Florida redraws their map to gain three seats (or if they pick up two seats in Florida while picking up one seat in Missouri), then we’ll need a 10-1 map in Virginia to counter these redraws.
Cal Dem Party is holding its pre-endorsement conferences this weekend. In my district, we held the conference yest for two contested races: CA26 and AD42. Chris Espinosa showed up in person; Jacqui Irwin sent a representative while she was at a women's march; Kyle Rohrbach didn't show or send anyone. Our meeting was sparsely attended, and no public questions were allowed -- instead we just got to chat 1 on 1 with the candidates. From what I saw on a zoom call, the CA36 meeting was much more crowded -- Ted Lieu is the safe incumbent, but there's a hotly contested state senate seat.
Voting is electronic so we won't know the results for a week.
As for why we do this... party rules are complicated, but if a candidate gets over 70 percent in this conference, they're endorsed; if everyone stays below 50 percent, no endorsement; if 50 to 70 percent, goes to convention.
This post on threads explaining why invading Greenland would devastate the US economy and our ability to travel. I’ve heard others like Malcom Nance mention similar.
Here are the bullet points:
- A U.S. invasion of Greenland would shatter NATO, turning allies against the U.S. and leaving America globally isolated.
- Europe would retaliate militarily and economically, shutting U.S. bases, expelling U.S. companies, and collapsing American global influence.
- The U.S. economy would crash as Europe dumps U.S. debt and the dollar, triggering extreme inflation and market shutdowns.
- Transatlantic travel, aviation, and supply chains would be cut off, isolating the U.S. from European goods, technology, and medicine.
- Americans would face personal consequences: loss of visa-free travel, deportations, cultural bans, and the U.S. becoming a pariah state.
My question is do yall expect the EU to comedown hard on the US like this?
My girlfriend and I have 6-month visas to live and work in Germany based in Berlin. We have plane tickets for departure in mid-February. So that would be a scary personal consequence for us. And the E.U. would be crazy not to react like that.
Some of them undoubtedly know, just like some Nazis knew it was crazy to attack the USSR and some Japanese officials knew it was crazy to attack the U.S. But they also knew the personal consequences for speaking up.
That's conceivable. I was talking to a person at a party just now who thinks Trump isn't going to invade Greenland and that it's a distraction from the Epstein files and tremendous corruption he's afraid of eventually being imprisoned for. I don't think he'll ever go to prison, and while I take the point about distraction seriously, he's mentioned Greenland a lot since at least the 2024 campaign, but I think before that, and he's insane and a megalomaniac, so I think there's a serious risk of him launching a unilateral war on NATO allies.
I think he could end up going to prison after his term in office ends. I don't think a NATO war will happen, though. I don't think anyone but the most die-hard Trumpers support invading Greenland, and I think an idea with 8% support might be somewhere the GOP is willing to rein him in on, and enough corporate bigwigs may be willing to draw the line on if it has negative impacts on their profits. That's how the tariffs got stopped last year.
The US seizing Greenland would also serve as a green light for China to take Taiwan and for Russia to invade the Baltics without US opposition. It's all Trump's theory of spheres of influence/control.
Yes. Corporate America might even go hard against Trump with the tariffs in the end if it means they are able to get more leverage with the Greenland issue being the one that makes CEOs, investors, VCs, etc. break with him.
Now that the 2026 primaries are clearer, I thought it would be interesting to make a list of incumbent house dems with primary challengers and rank them from highest risk of losing renomination to lowest. What do you all think about this ranking? Did I miss anyone?
Highest risk:
CA-07: Rep. Doris Matsui, challenger Mai Vang
CT-01: Rep. John Larson, challengers Luke Bronin, Jillian Gilchrest, and Ruth Fortune
GA-13: Rep. David Scott, several challengers including Emanuel Jones and Jasmine Clark
MI-13: Rep. Shri Thanedar, challenger Donavan McKinney
MO-01: Rep. Wesley Bell, challenger Cori Bush
NY-10: Rep. Dan Goldman, challenger Brad Lander
TN-09: Rep. Steve Cohen, challenger Justin Pearson
TX-18: Rep. Al Green, likely challenger Christian Menefee (might be incumbent vs incumbent)
TX-29: Rep. Sylvia Garcia, challenger Jarvis Johnson
TX-33: Rep. Julie Johnson, challenger Colin Allred
DC: Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, several challengers including Robert White and Brooke Pinto
Medium risk:
CA-04: Rep. Mike Thompson, challenger Eric Jones
CA-32: Rep. Brad Sherman, challengers Jake Levin, others
HI-01: Rep. Ed Case, challengers Della Au Belatti and Jarrett Keohokalole
IN-07: Rep. Andre Carson, challenger George Hornedo
MD-06: Rep. April McClain Delaney, challenger David Trone
MD-07: Rep. Kweisi Mfume, challenger Mark Conway
MA-01: Rep. Richard Neal, challenger Jeromie Whalen
MA-08: Rep. Stephen Lynch, challenger Patrick Roath
MN-05: Rep. Ilhan Omar, challenger Latonya Reeves
MS-02: Rep. Bennie Thompson, challenger Evan Turnage
NY-13: Rep. Adriano Espaillat, challenger Darializa Avila Chevalier
NC-04: Rep. Valerie Foushee, challenger Nida Allam
VA-08: Rep. Don Beyer, challengers Michael Duffin and Mohamed Seifeldein
Low risk:
CA-17: Rep. Ro Khanna, potential challenger Ethan Agarwal
CO-01: Rep. Diana DeGette, challengers Wanda James and Melat Kiros
FL-23: Rep. Jared Moskowitz, challenger Oliver Larkin
ME-01: Rep. Chellie Pingree, challenger Tiffany Roberts
MA-04: Rep. Jake Auchincloss, potential challengers Ihssane Leckey or Paul Heroux
MA-05: Rep. Katherine Clark, challenger Jonathan Paz
NJ-08: Rep. Rob Menendez, potential challenger Mussab Ali
NY-06: Rep. Grace Meng, challenger Chuck Park
NY-15: Rep. Ritchie Torres, challengers Michael Blake, Dalourny Nemorin, and Amanda Septimo
PA-12: Rep. Summer Lee, challenger Adam Forgie
The old Black congressmen from Mississippi and Georgia are facing primaries.
Both Thompson and Scott's challengers are mentioned
I would move Matsui, Scott, Cohen and Garcia to medium, move Omar, Thompson, Espaillat and Beyer to low, Torres up to medium now that Septimo is out, and probably keep the rest of them the same unless Heroux challenges Auchincloss.
Steve Cohen is facing an existential primary challenge from a Black progressive. Black political leaders have attempted to unseat him for years without success, but Justin Pearson may succeed where others failed by peeling away Cohen’s progressive base and Black support. Compounding the threat, Cohen is unlikely to receive support from progressive organizations this cycle after leaving the Congressional Progressive Caucus over disagreements on Israel.
Why do you think Matsui isn’t high risk?
Entrenched longtime incumbent, accomplished legislator, known figure in the district, generally in good health, support from the party and base
David Trone launching a primary challenge cracks me up. He should have known the field wasn't split enough to win the primary for the U.S. Senate. If he truly wanted to stay in Congress, he should have just stayed put. Bad political instincts.
Maybe he thought that he could effectively spend his way into the Senate. He seems to think that too against Delaney, trying to put on the Resist Lib hat calling himself a "fighter" and implying that AMD is too timid.
But she's no slouch either, as a campaigner, representative, or fundraiser (including but not limited to her and her husband's own personal finances.) And there's not much to differentiate them, besides Delaney's vote for the Laken Riley act a year ago, which she has since repudiated and which probably isn't enough for a successful challenge. Otherwise she's voted reliably with the party and there's no reason to believe that anything would be different with Trone in the seat. (In what seems like either hubris or denial, his online ads urge voters to "Re-elect David Trone" as if he were still the incumbent.)
The media gunned SO HARD for Alsobrooks to lose (first to Trone, and then to Hogan). I could never figure out if the issue was Alsobrooks-specific, just generalized hate of women of color, or both.
No, I understood his strategy. Josh Rales trued to buy a Senate seat back in 2006. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I would have added some complex policy positions to my strategy if I were Trone, but he never really got there. Great analysis. I wish people would bring a little bit more than just money to the table. (:
And he'll have no support from the left based on his status as an AIPAC megadonor involved in efforts against progressives. AMD also tacked to the left on M4A, minimum wage and paid leave.
I'm not sure Bush is the highest risk to Bell, unfortunately. I also haven't really followed Garcia v Johnson, is that really highest risk? Did the new maps move it from being a more heavily Latino to Black district? Torres is definitely at least medium risk with Septimo ending her campaign tbh. The rest general make sense to me.
Torres is at low risk. DataForProgress found him to be more popular than AOC and Bernie in his district while Goldman was quite unpopular which is why they decided to target him.
With Garcia v. Johnson it's just that - the district was made more Black, but I think it still has a Hispanic plurality.
Yes, Garcia is mostly because redistricting removed some latino voters and added black voters. I think Bell is at serious risk, even to Bush. He only won by 5.5 points in 2024 despite all the spending for him, and he's made bad headlines in congress. Maybe more anti-Bush spending can help him, but only a handful of voters need to change their mind from 2024 for him to lose.
Doris Matsui may lose the primary due to age being a factor. Otherwise, I can't imagine besides Mai Vung being younger and being even more liberal than Matsui is. Matsui I don't see any issues with other than perhaps she is just not serving on the key committees such as the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Also, Matsui replaced her late husband Bob Matsui back in 2005 after he died of cancer. It may be more personal to her in serving in the House, I suspect, in part to honor his legacy.
I have a question of my own: as far as GOP primaries go, might any Republicans be vulnerable to a primary? Thomas Massie? Tony Gonzales?
*High risk:*
Thomas Massie v. Ed Gallrein (KY 4)
Tony Gonzales v. Brandon Herrera and Quico Canseco (TX 23)
Celeste Maloy v. Mike Kennedy (UT 3) (if Burgess Owens opts not to retire)
Young Kim v. Ken Calvert (CA 40)
*Medium risk:*
Andrew Clyde v. Sam Couvillon and Greg Poole (GA 9)
Randy Fine v. Charles Gambaro and Will Furry (FL 6)
Andy Ogles v. Charlie Hatcher (TN 5)
Jim Baird v. Craig Haggard (IN 4)
Dan Crenshaw v. Steve Toth (TX 2)
John Carter v. Raymond Hamden, Vince Offer and Valentina Gomez (TX 31)
*Low risk:*
Scott Perry v. Karen Dalton (PA 10)
Carol Miller v. Derrick Evans (WV 1)
Tim Moore v. Kate Barr (NC 14)
Cory Mills v. Sarah Ulrich (FL 7)
Mariannette Miller-Meeks v. David Pautsch (IA 1)
Jeff Hurd v. Hope Scheppelman (CO 3)
Young Kim over Ken Calvert in a heart beat.
And I'm not saying this because I would vote for Kim.
Is that a preference between the two or a prediction?
I'd say probably a preference - she seems a little less controversial.
Yes, a preference but not an endorsement.
I will be content with anyone serving in Congress who actually has intention of serving constituents instead of making an ass out of themselves. Ken Calvert also has controversy going back decades whereas Young Kim does not. Frankly, I wish elections were more about perspectives and agenda instead of divisiveness all the time that polarizes politics.
On the other hand, Calvert isn't really MAGA so much as your traditional conservative Republican. I don't think he's changed much in all the decades he's been in the House but he's also got among one of the lowest profile images out of any House Republicans.
Although I would bet that Miller-Meeks would win, her 12 point victory in 2024 despite Pautsch's complete lack of funding means she if far from safe in my book.
I haven't looked at the map, but I presume FL-7 is probably out of reach for Dems no matter who the nominee is me. If Cory Mills were to be the nominee, could we at least see the Dem spring an upset because of the scandals surrounding Mills, kind of like Nick Lampson did following the Tom DeLay saga.
It does feel like one of those seats - the Foley and Kolbe seats flipped after the Page scandal, after all, and Ney's also flipped when DeLay's did.
Lauren Boebert and Victoria Spartz both got only around 40% of the vote in their primaries in 2024 against split opposition. They are theoretically vulnerable if they get a prominent challenger.
In CA-32, Brad Sherman's challenger is Jake Levine, not Levin. Jake is not an outsider; his father is former Rep. Mel Levine. The senior Levine left his House seat to run a very unsuccessful race for US Senator in 1992. Mel got his ass kicked by Barbara Boxer, and also ran behind then-Lt. Gov. Leo McCarthy in the primary. Boxer served four terms in the Senate.
Interesting, do you think the younger Levine is a real threat to Sherman?
Probably not, but you never know. Sherman will get one of the spots in the top two runoff. If Levine can get more votes than the top Repub and make it to the November election he would have a chance, but even then it is not likely. I no longer live in that district because I moved from Sherman Oaks to North Hollywood. Brad jokes that he lives in the best named community in America...
Doesn't Sherman live in Encino?
I think he is now living in Porter Ranch (the fancier part of Northridge). His joke is now that he represents the best named community in the USA, since he moved. He needs some new comedy material...
He's making the case for generational change and getting a lot of support and fundraisers from former Biden administration officials, especially the forpol guys like Sullivan and Amos.
This is truly impressive, Jay! I can't imagine that you missed anyone, but even if you did, this is such a helpful list. Thanks for making it. :)
good list! I don't see Larson as facing a serious risk unless most of the challengers drop out, and there's time because CT has a late primary. Same situation in HI-01 where polling found Case vulnerable if the field was between him and one other, but he wins in a cakewalk if both challengers stay in. The one who's at serious risk IMO is GA-13, where it's a fractured field BUT if the challengers can keep Scott to under 50 percent, there's a primary runoff.
I thought about moving Larson to medium risk, but I saw that Luke Bronin has raised more money than him. I think a challenger outraising an incumbent warrants a second look.
Fwiw (2-3c, I guess), I think Holmes Norton is in a category by herself. High risk would be Scott, Thanedar, Johnson. I'd put Goldman, Neal, Lynch, Mfume and maybe Espaillat in medium and everyone else wins fairly easily. Omar might have been a medium risk, but ICE has gotten her re-elected.
IL-13 [Low risk]: Rep. Nikki Budzinski, with Dylan Blaha challenging.
Ezra Klein: Were Medicare and Medicaid mistakes?
Vivek Ramaswamy: I believe they were. With the benefit of retrospect, particularly Medicaid.
https://x.com/MeidasTouch/status/2012349141406396645
A viral video on social media.
Ezra Klein's interviews with Vivek Ramaswamy are entertaining to watch because he really grills Ramaswamy on where he stands on issues.
Pure gold! If the Democratic candidate’s campaign fails to weaponize this in a winning manner, it’ll tantamount to political malpractice!
Especially because his most likely Dem opponent is a doctor.
For such a smart man, it’s incredible how out of touch and unlikable he is. I think he’s going to lose. He’s just going to keep saying stuff like this. He had the “lazy white people” comment a year ago, and now this. That’s probably already enough to sink him. Acton just needs to go for the jugular.
Are we sure that Ramaswamy is smart?
I think he is. He definitely didn’t get where he was through social skills. That much is evident.
One thing worth noting in the discussion of if he is or isn't smart, is that individuals can be good ("smart") at one or multiple things, while bad ("stupid") at others.
Ramaswamy is likely good at the skills necessary to successfully navigate the business world and personally profit from it. He can be good at that and bad at electoral politics. Someone can even be good at politics in general while awful at the electoral side.
Ramaswamy did build his credibility in the business world without being a narcissist like Trump did and grave attention. When he decided to open his month and talk politics, that's when I thought he's so full of it.
On the other hand, I will give Ramaswamy credit for one thing - He's had a rift with Martin Shkrelli as Ramaswamy's hedge fund invested in Turning Pharmaceuticals, which ended up under Shkrelli's direction of jacking up the price of Daraprim, which is an essential drug for helping AIDS patients.
Let's just say Ramaswamy doesn't think highly of Shkrelli and I'll leave it at that.
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/05/23/vivek-ramaswamy-martin-shkreli-pharma-00098338
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“His strategy at a different company (Turing) of hiking drug prices is shockingly similar to what Big Pharma regularly does,” Ramaswamy added. “Big Pharma just dresses it up in the veneer of ‘do-good stakeholder capitalism,’ and that’s why they get away with it. It’s arguably even more corrupt because it’s less transparent. That’s just the hard truth.” QVT did not respond to a request for comment.
In his book, “Woke, Inc.,” Ramaswamy wrote that Shkreli was “pathologically incapable of telling the truth.” His involvement in the investment provides insight into the worlds Ramaswamy occupied and the characters he mingled with prior to entering the field of elected politics.
Book smart, street stupid at least when it comes to anyone outside the red bubble.
“I don’t need Medicaid. So I don’t know why anyone else would.”
⬆️“I don’t need Medicaid. So I don’t know why anyone else would.”
I often wonder whether statements like this coming from GOP candidates and/or elected officials comes from ignorance/laziness or whether it simply calculated deceptiveness.
The GOP is great at selling the waste, fraud, and abuse fairytale - when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid much of the abuse is coming from providers and NOT recipients.
I think the best thing we can do is spread accurate information about who benefits from Medicaid. As long as GOP voters believe that the only recipients are poor people of color who are cheating the system, they will be OK with what the GOP has done. But that is far from the case.
Here are just a few articles with good info on the impact of the GOP's Big Ugly Bill's cuts to Medicaid:
https://www.aarp.org/pri/topics/health/coverage-access/state-fact-sheets-medicaid-older-adults/
https://wheninyourstate.com/usa/one-third-of-americas-rural-hospitals-could-vanish-under-medicaid-cuts/
https://100r.org/2025/08/nursing-home-crisis/
"The GOP is great at selling the waste, FRAUD, and abuse fairytale - when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid much of the abuse is coming from providers and NOT recipients."
Senator Rick Scott, we’re looking at you!
2030. Nuff said.
https://x.com/umichvoter/status/2012527005799981551
AIPAC ad buy of 400k associated with Tahesha Way is attacking Malinokowski over funding ICE in Trump's first term.
AIPAC is going for the leading moderate in this race and not attacking Mejia who has the left lane for herself.
Does that suggest they don't consider Mejia likely to win?
It suggests that not everything AIPAC does is strictly moderate vs. progressive or left vs. right.
Which is something that unbiased observers knew already.
Not really, Malinowski and Andy Kim worked at the state department and have been longtime allies of JStreet.
Malinowski is the current favorite to win this race so they need to take him down first.
Malinowski is not the current favorite. Don't forget that the district he used to represent was a different district, not this one. Very few voters in the current NJ-11 have ever seen his name on the ballot.
And don't forget that he lost his seat partly due to a stock trading scandal that is definitely still relevant now.
Although no polling has been done, he probably is the favorite in a multi-candidate field due to name recognition
Even if you're right about why they're targeting Malinowski, that confirms what I said. They're not targeting him because they're against progressives or promoting conservative candidates. If they were, they'd be attacking Mejia instead, as you mentioned originally. They're targeting Malinowski solely due to his stance on Israel (which, as I'm sure you know, doesn't fit neatly into ideological labels).
They are working toward a win by Way. Aside from whatever position she has on Middle Eastern matters, is she as progressive or more progressive than either Malinowski or Mejia? That and not their strategic decision to go after Malinowski is the test of whether this is on-brand for them in terms of supporting the further-right candidate.
I would guess she is more moderate than either, but it's hard to know when someone hasn't been in elected office since 2010, and the secretary of state role is pretty anonymous in NJ
I just see it as them doing whatever they need to win to get their preferred candidate to victory
If they want Way to win and they're attacking Malinowski and not Mejia, that suggests that they consider Malinowski the main obstacle to a victory by Way.
I'd say Gill is the leading moderate, Malinowski is running to his left
There is a lot of focus on AIPAC, but it seems a touch exaggerated. How high on the list of PACs is it? Well, according to FEC data, in the 2025–2026 election cycle so far, among all US Political Action Committees, AIPAC is in 13th place, slightly ahead of Emily’s List.
https://beautifydata.com/us-campaign-donations/2025-2026/top-pacs-by-total-amount-disbursed
They call it the United Democracy Project, Democratic Majority for Israel and have other spin-offs. It’s not under the name AIPAC. This spending is under the UDP.
Then there is a difference between PAC contributions from AIPAC, donor contributions under FEC limits through AIPAC and its Super PAC like the UDP. This list shows the PAC contributions.
They sometimes transfer the sums to vaguely named Protect Progress or 314 Action in a case.
The United Democracy Project (UDP) spent approximately $37.86 million on outside spending in the 2024 federal elections, with most of that directed against Democrats, according to OpenSecrets data for the 2024 cyclehttps://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/detail/2024?cmte=C00799031&tab=summary. Their total spending across the entire 2023-2024 cycle was around $61.37 million, with significant funds allocated to media and campaign expenses, as detailed on OpenSecrets' PAC profile pagehttps://www.opensecrets.org/political-action-committees-pacs/united-democracy-project/C00799031/summary/2024.
It's good to see Krysten Sinema get her well-deserved comeuppance for being a sellout corporate stooge. I'm sure there's more scandalous stories out there.
Would kindly explain what you mean? Clearly I missed something.
She allegedly had an affair with her bodyguard, and the bodyguard's ex-wife has the ability to sue her for that in North Carolina, stupid as that is.
Clearly you don’t mean "sue for divorce", since she’s already ex-wife?
Nope. Alienation of affections I think is the phrase. And I think they are actually separated and not actually divorced yet? I forget. I find this lawsuit so stupid.
Jeez, perhaps "spousal microaggressions" can also be included in the lawsuit?
North Carolina, the one(?) state where you can sue someone for boinking your spouse.
Wouldn’t it be more civilized to allow duels? Brickbats at 20 feet?
Bring back the pillory.
Naw, more like this:
https://www.sandydenny.co.uk/lyrics/mattygroves.htm
FYI, this is just an accusation so far. Due process has yet to unfold.
That said, the more I have read about Sinema, the more I've realized she should have never run for political office in the first place.
Abigail Spanberger, Ghazala Hashmi and Jay Jones have been sworn in to Virginia's statewide offices.
Coincidentally, Doug Wilder, the first Black governor of Virginia, is 95 today.
I’m glad Wilder got the chance to see a woman sworn in as Governor after Mary Sue Terry was denied the chance of succeeding him in 1994. Days like this where I’m optimistic for my three-year-old daughter’s future.
Just saw that he attended the inauguration along with every former Virginia governor alive. Pretty awesome
Since it’s the weekend, a hypothetical to discuss:
Do people think Jay Jones wins if Trump doesn’t get elected (either both times or just the most recent)? I lean no, but 6 points is still a pretty strong victory margin for Republicans to overcome even with an incumbent.
He may not have won the primary, granted
I tend to think no with a Democratic president, especially with the controversial texts. But even without them Miyares might have won anyway, as no Trump means Dems don't have their best issue. Of course Miyares could also possibly have won in reality by not being a near-automatic defender of everything the WH said and did.
Governor is a more complicated case. Spanberger's win was large enough to suggest that even with a Democratic president she might have won, and Earle-Sears turned out to be a less than stellar candidate, relying too much on controversial cultural issues and evidently thinking the state was more conservative than it in fact is nowadays. Even if Spanberger would have won in that instance, though, a lot of downballot Dems probably wouldn't have. It might have been similar to 2013, when McAuliffe won narrowly against an opponent too conservative for many, but had little in the way of coattails.
Probably not. But in that scenario there's a good chance Virginia would have been a repeat of 2021 for us, except Spanberger would have probably been favored still.
In that hypothetical scenario we're not only losing an electoral advantage (unpopular republican incumbent admin); we're also gaining a disadvantage (democratic incumbent admin). Parties almost universally lose popularity upon gaining the presidency in this country, and that gets even worse when they retain that office.
Spanberger is the only one of the three that won by enough that I think she'd have stayed the favorite even in that alternate reality.
Races I’m interested in: I’ve already laid out the often overlooked AG, SOS, and court races in last week’s open thread. This week, I’ll focus on something on my mind: the primary calendar. In a lot of ways, fortunately the most nasty or concerning primaries are somewhat earlier in the year. It’s really only MI-Sen and WI-Gov that have later primaries. Of the gubernatorial and senate primaries I care about, we have in
March: the initial Texas primary. Hopefully Rs go to a runoff while Dems can unite behind Talarico early.
April: not a primary, but the Wisconsin court races will be nice to compare the national mood versus this time last year. And it will be our only opportunity before November to see how Trump’s statewide approval correlates with R/conservative vote share.
May: initial Georgia primary. I’m expecting the Democratic gubernatorial race goes to a runoff. I hope despite having the Trump endorsement that Burt Jones is held under 50 so as to waste more of his resources in a runoff. There’s a good shot the Republican Senate race also goes to a runoff, allowing Ossoff to build up even more of a cash lead while the GOP field destroys each other. There’s the Texas runoffs at the end of the month. Fingers crossed 🤞 for Paxton.
June: the Maine primary is the big one. Luckily the winner will have five months to allow the loser’s supporters to get over any hurt or hard feelings. Then we have the Georgia runoffs. I hope Esteves gets a runoff spot and that people flock to him once his name ID is built up.
July: nothing
August: Wisconsin and Michigan primaries. At least we’ll have three months to unite afterwards. I’d just rather not have to deal with the headache of Stevens or El-Sayed in Michigan or Barnes in Wisconsin.
I didn't notice that Michigan's primary isn't until August. That's frustratingly late for one of the more hotly contested senate primaries we have. Primaries shouldn't extend past July as far as I'm concerned.
you obv have never checked out the New England primary calendar :)
I live in NH, I know all about our stupidly late primaries. I've thought about it more because of being in New England!
SC has primaries early June and runoffs 2 weeks later. Fascinating races for Rs for Gov, Sen, and AG. There's an interesting D primary for Gov, with a drunken dudebro who seems to be the frontrunner vs a more serious guy. Also an interesting D race for SC01 (Mace; Charleston/Beaufort). Possible flip there.
Surprised no one has mentioned the idiotic Greenland and tariffs news. Par for the course for this circus. I’m glad I decided to get out of the Army and land a good job when I did so I don’t have to deal with this constant embarrassment. I’m sorry, I didn’t pledge an oath to be a game piece for Cadet Bone Spur’s Risk board.
It’s remarkable how much political capital he’s expending on an issue that A) less than 10% of his own party supports in polls B) hamstrings everything else he wants to do on FoPo and C) is one of the few things he’s actually gotten firm pushback from Congress on
It would be hilarious if SCOTUS shoots down his tariff power on Tuesday! And this obsession with monuments and Greenland does lead my conspiracy mind to wonder if there might be something to that rumor/theory that he’s only got 2-4 months left
I think this is one thing Vance would not do if he took over, so it would be very convenient for the world if Trump departed from the scene. And if any Federal agencies are monitoring this site, they should note that that is purely an observation on my part.
You have a valid point. Vance I've also observed doesn't exhibit the same impulses as Trump so if he were POTUS somehow if Trump left (say before the end of his term), I don't think he would throw tariffs randomly at countries because he's not getting things his way.
Of course, that doesn't mean Vance would be better than Trump as POTUS in this case. More like, he'd be the lesser of two evils. And I emphasize "lesser" of two evils.
More importantly, he wouldn't threaten to invade Greenland, let alone actually fight Denmark and Greenland!
Yeah, under pressure he would not be an authoritarian type like Trump in this sense. I have my issues with Vance (as everyone does here) but he isn't dumb compared to Trump.
I'm by no means convinced he wouldn't try to be an authoritarian, but only crazy people want to start a war with an ally and completely obliterate NATO!
Vance strikes me as an asshole - but a rational one
I wish I had your confidence. He's a deeply-broken man.
agree! I have less than zero confidence that he would be the least bit rational!
There's no indication he's anything more mentally ill than an amoral opportunist. I've seen no indication that he's insane.
Anyone that can pull the kind of intellectual 180, from Hillbilly Elegy to faithfully executing the wishes of the likes of Trump, Musk, Thiel and others, is either an absolute dark triad psychopath, or deeply deeply broken as you said. I personally think he is a stop-at-nothing sociopath willing to do and say anything to get power. And its gotten him one slot away from being the most powerful person on Earth. Vance is incredibly dangerous.
Asshole but a sellout is the best way I can describe him.
I wouldn't call him rational. I'd say he lacks the ability to fully manifest the shamelessness and ego that is central to MAGA surviving media cycles.
Instead of being rational, he's more constrained.
The rumor in Ohio is that he is heavy into traditional Opus Dei type Catholicism.
If so, then that puts him at odds with where the real Catholic leadership has been for a decade or more, including under the new American pope.
FWIW I've always felt that Vance's Catholicism was mostly performative, his (publicized) conversion intended to eliminate any doubt of where he stood on women's and LGBTQ+ issues.
He's mostly rational. He's a cynical, mean-spirited opportunist whose perceptions seem to be somewhat warped by being Very Online, but he's mostly in touch with reality, can control his impulses, and doesn't have the pathological needs to always dominate people and always be the center of attention. Psychologically I think he's far more similar to Nixon than to Trump or to any other president.
Nixon was paranoid, though. And of course when people were out to get him, he had totally unnecessarily brought it upon himself.
That’s as good description of Vance as any. The thing that strikes me about Vance is he has the same effect on people that Ron DeSantis has. The more people see him and get to know him the more they dislike him.
I think we should be extremely cautious here about how we view Vance, especially in reference to Trump. A smarter and less insane/outlandish Trump could easily be successfully turning America into a dictatorship instead of everything held together barely with duct tape as it is right now.
Even if he’s the lesser of two evils foreign policy wise (he is), that doesn’t mean he’s actually less evil or can do less evil than Trump worldwide and especially domestically. I hate Trump because of who he is. I hate Vance because his policy beliefs are unamerican. And who can enact horrid, even worse policy than Trump secretively and sneakily without alarming voters until it’s too late to stop it instead of trying to take it down with a wrecking ball and everyone being made aware every day? Vance could.
Vance may be the more dangerous and consequential of the two if you believe MAGA/Project 2025 is actually the biggest danger to the US in many decades, more so than Trump himself, which crazy enough, is something I actually do believe.
As I said, my assessment was the "lesser" of two evils, not because I don't think Vance doesn't have potential to become damaging. It's just a comparison of how Vance projects his public image vs. Trump, which there is a distinction, even if both are aligned with each other on the issues.
That said, I am in NO way arguing that we will have a sign of relief if Vance becomes POTUS. Trump can still exert power over Vance, even if he's out of office.
I just respectfully completely disagree with you that he’s the lesser of two evils. I think he’s more evil than Trump because he can actually enact a right wing utopia MAGA autocracy quietly in the shadows without pissing off the Republican reps or average voters he needs votes from to enact his nearly entirely the same agenda as Trump has. The only difference being foreign policy.
He wouldn’t be sending ICE into daycares, churches and courts. He wouldn’t send the national guard into blue cities. He wouldn’t have tariff chaos hitting the rural Republican base. He wouldn’t have fucked up the super easy Epstein issue. He wouldn’t have pardoned rapists, human traffickers. He would stock his government with competent fascists instead of inept grifters. He wouldn’t have created the COVID chaos. He wouldn’t have caused January 6th because he wouldn’t have lost in 2020.
Voters care about domestic things far more than international, the key reasons the GOP is facing a building blue wave right now is because Trump can’t do the evil part quietly. He has to be loud and tell the world of his evil every day.
Now imagine a midterm where none of the above is happening or has happened in America. Does the Democratic base still outvote Republicans in 2026? Yes, because of the party in power backlash. But it almost certainly wouldn’t be as stark a divide and may result in a reverse 2022 where the GOP could hang onto the trifecta, making 2 or many more years of awful policy via reconciliation a reality.
In 4 years Trump almost accomplished it, I think Vance would succeed in 8 years where Trump failed, winning re-election in 2020 (any other Republican probably would have) and that’s why he’s far, far worse imo.
I don't think Vance would have so many fanatical devotees, nor so much pull with Congress. If he is less likely to be able to successfully incite people, those cowed by Trump will be less scared of him.
As far as I'm concerned, JD Vance isn't far off from Marco Rubio. Both criticized Trump in the 2016 presidential election but in a different context:
Rubio went after Trump in the primaries because he believed what we all knew - He was a fraud. Ended up wiping Trump's ass when he was nominated as Secretary of State. Every time Rubio speaks, he talks like Trump is speaking instructions to Rubio in a hidden mic on how to serve him.
Vance criticized Trump as morally reprehensible and then walked back his comments when he was in the spotlight in being selected as Trump's running mate, saying he was wrong. No he wasn't. He just had to because he had to and because he saw the opportunity, as Peter Thiel taught him quite well when he pushed him to run for the Senate.
Hell, Elise Stefanik and Nancy Mace could go as hard MAGA like Vance and Rubio are doing and they'll be the same phonies as those two are. Another reason why one of my dreams is to see Mace and Stefanik as well as Rubio and Vance all run in the 2028 GOP presidential primaries so they can duke it out at each other.
Agreed
Greenland made MAGA hats - make America go away.
Should be MTGA, which stands for Make Trump Go Away. Pronounced "Mount Ga."
Either way, thank you for your service!
Between NJ-11 Special and NJ-07 + NJ-12, 31 Dem candidates are running for Congress across the 3 districts in North and Central Jersey.
Does that count the incumbents running in NJ-6, NJ-8, NJ-9 and NJ-10 and their challengers?
No
Question: how much is the 'frugal" U.S Government spending every day on the 73,000 detainees who have been imprisoned by ice?
Here are races I'm interested in that are lacking in Republican recruitments:
*MA-Gov, MA-Sen: Bruce Tarr and Lewis Evangelidis, two of the most prominent Massachusetts Republicans, are weighing runs for these offices. Will they jump in? Either way, it probably won't be competitive for Maura Healey and Ed Markey.
*NJ-Sen: Who will Republicans recruit to challenge Cory Booker? Word is that state Sen. Mike Testa, former state Sen. and governor candidate Ed Durr, and former U.S. Attorney Alina Habba, the most prominent of the contenders, are interested.
*MD-Gov: This looks like a crowded Republican primary between state Sen. Steve Hershey, state Del. Chris Bouchat and businessman Ed Hale. Will former governor Larry Hogan try another comeback? None of them seem to have much of a chance against Moore.
*VA-Sen: Who will Republicans recruit to challenge Warner after state Sen. Reeves dropped out and former Gov. Youngkin declined?
*OH-1: With the new map, what prominent Republicans could challenge Greg Landsman? Ditto with OH-13, though that seat is much bluer.
*NM-Sen: Lujan had a close race in 2020. Who will be his opponent this fall?
Barring something major and unforeseen, there's zero chance that MA's statewide offices are competitive in the general election this year.
Especially the senate seat. It took a deeply flawed democratic candidate at the nadir of Obama's popularity for a modest special election loss. Remove any of those details and even that doesn't happen. There are scenarios where the governor's office could be competitive in the future, but only with an open seat or a very deeply scandal plagued incumbent -- and even then it would need the cycle to be one that favors republicans by a decent amount.
Since this year is shaping up to be a blue wave and none of the other conditions apply, this isn't a "probably" uncompetitive scenario. It's plain uncompetitive, no qualifier.
GA-Gov: Can't seem to find anything, but apparently 2024 Libertarian presidential nominee Chase Oliver was nominated as the Libertarian candidate for Georgia governor.
Slightly up the chance of a runoff.
He is the party nominee but the party is no longer automatically on the ballot in GA. To be on ballot, it needed to get 1% in the last election but it only got 0.4%. It now needs to get on by the collecting signatures of 1% of active voters (72,679) by July.
How likely do you think that is? Seems possible.
Statewide offices I think it requires 1/4 of 1%? That would be some 19000 valid signatures.
From the AJC 12/11/25: "The Libertarian Party of Georgia is struggling to qualify candidates for the midterms because of a state law passed in 1943 that was originally aimed at keeping Communists off the ballot.
The law says third-party statewide candidates have to win at least 1% of the vote in the previous election or collect signatures of 1% of active voters to automatically qualify. In last year’s presidential race, Libertarian presidential nominee Chase Oliver managed only about 0.4% of the vote in Georgia.
That means the party needs to gather 72,679 signatures by July to qualify candidates for the midterms. Oliver, also a leader of the Libertarian Party of Georgia, says they’re still short."
https://www.ajc.com/politics/2025/12/could-georgias-2026-statewide-races-be-runoff-free/
Interested to see what goes down in the Democratic primaries for VA and NJ Senate
Will anti-establishment attitudes finally give us some credible challenges to incumbents? Keeping my fingers crossed
I think VA Dems should hold off releasing maps until after the referendum vote. The Florida special session for their planned redistricting is happening around the same time as the referendum in April. If Florida is aggressive VA Dems should go for 10-1 and if Desantis can’t redraw it because there’s no VRA ruling yet VA can do 9-2.
Dems should go 10-1 in either case.
I agree. Even if the VRA stays intact, that still doesn’t change the fact that North Carolina has already redrawn their map in hopes of picking up one seat. If Florida redraws their map to gain three seats (or if they pick up two seats in Florida while picking up one seat in Missouri), then we’ll need a 10-1 map in Virginia to counter these redraws.
Trump says he will endorse Louisiana Rep. Julia Letlow if she runs for Senate, setting up a primary against incumbent Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy.
*if*
I imagine if that does happen, most if not all of the other challengers will drop out
Cal Dem Party is holding its pre-endorsement conferences this weekend. In my district, we held the conference yest for two contested races: CA26 and AD42. Chris Espinosa showed up in person; Jacqui Irwin sent a representative while she was at a women's march; Kyle Rohrbach didn't show or send anyone. Our meeting was sparsely attended, and no public questions were allowed -- instead we just got to chat 1 on 1 with the candidates. From what I saw on a zoom call, the CA36 meeting was much more crowded -- Ted Lieu is the safe incumbent, but there's a hotly contested state senate seat.
Voting is electronic so we won't know the results for a week.
As for why we do this... party rules are complicated, but if a candidate gets over 70 percent in this conference, they're endorsed; if everyone stays below 50 percent, no endorsement; if 50 to 70 percent, goes to convention.
No public questions is very weird. About how many people were they talking with one on one?
maybe about 20 people total. From pix I've seen, CA-32 (Sherman) had about 40 people in the room?
https://www.threads.com/@reiidiate/post/DTnl0EBEang?xmt=AQF0RzZazWhTuOSQmFM2mzo3nZM_QyQ2Hr52dWztUeXFbCI5UBMi1tT1Urs1Yab3-34qPaj1&slof=1
This post on threads explaining why invading Greenland would devastate the US economy and our ability to travel. I’ve heard others like Malcom Nance mention similar.
Here are the bullet points:
- A U.S. invasion of Greenland would shatter NATO, turning allies against the U.S. and leaving America globally isolated.
- Europe would retaliate militarily and economically, shutting U.S. bases, expelling U.S. companies, and collapsing American global influence.
- The U.S. economy would crash as Europe dumps U.S. debt and the dollar, triggering extreme inflation and market shutdowns.
- Transatlantic travel, aviation, and supply chains would be cut off, isolating the U.S. from European goods, technology, and medicine.
- Americans would face personal consequences: loss of visa-free travel, deportations, cultural bans, and the U.S. becoming a pariah state.
My question is do yall expect the EU to comedown hard on the US like this?
100%. If they didn't do that, they would lose all their credibility.
My girlfriend and I have 6-month visas to live and work in Germany based in Berlin. We have plane tickets for departure in mid-February. So that would be a scary personal consequence for us. And the E.U. would be crazy not to react like that.
This is all self-evidently obvious to basically everyone. But does “basically everyone” include anyone at the WH?
Some of them undoubtedly know, just like some Nazis knew it was crazy to attack the USSR and some Japanese officials knew it was crazy to attack the U.S. But they also knew the personal consequences for speaking up.
I think people are also aware of the long term consequences for not speaking up. Corporate America could very well force people's hands here.
That's conceivable. I was talking to a person at a party just now who thinks Trump isn't going to invade Greenland and that it's a distraction from the Epstein files and tremendous corruption he's afraid of eventually being imprisoned for. I don't think he'll ever go to prison, and while I take the point about distraction seriously, he's mentioned Greenland a lot since at least the 2024 campaign, but I think before that, and he's insane and a megalomaniac, so I think there's a serious risk of him launching a unilateral war on NATO allies.
I think he could end up going to prison after his term in office ends. I don't think a NATO war will happen, though. I don't think anyone but the most die-hard Trumpers support invading Greenland, and I think an idea with 8% support might be somewhere the GOP is willing to rein him in on, and enough corporate bigwigs may be willing to draw the line on if it has negative impacts on their profits. That's how the tariffs got stopped last year.
I hope you're right. If he is even alive at the end of this term, I don't see him going to prison. Presidents have become above the law in the U.S.
Bond markets are undefeated as I like to say.
That said, even if walked back, it’ll be very difficult to ever get back to the level of transatlantic trust we had in 2023, let alone 2013
The US seizing Greenland would also serve as a green light for China to take Taiwan and for Russia to invade the Baltics without US opposition. It's all Trump's theory of spheres of influence/control.
I think you mean the Baltics. And yes, exactly. China has a way better claim to Taiwan, too.
Thanks for the correction. Brain freeze.
Yes to the EU in answer to your last question. United Nations would also have a field day with this.
This could be the event that leads corporate America to break away from Trump.
Yes. Corporate America might even go hard against Trump with the tariffs in the end if it means they are able to get more leverage with the Greenland issue being the one that makes CEOs, investors, VCs, etc. break with him.
Hell yes!!