I am once again interested in primaries, given all the NY news. Not only primaries however — I’ll be curious to see some other races too.
Some of the many races I’m watching in general:
- NY-16: Will Latimer get a primary? And if so, by whom?
- NY-15: Does Michael Blake have a shot at taking out Torres?
- PA-Sen: Technically this is 2028, but I am beginning to suspect Fetterman will resign early. If so, question for PA posters here — does Shapiro appoint the successor, or is there a special election?
- MI-13: Does Donavan McKinney have a shot at taking out Shri? If so, by how much?
- IL-2: Can anyone stop Jesse Jackson Jr’s comeback attempt?
- MN-Sen: Hoping for Flanagan - how likely is her win? And do the GOP have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting an actual candidate here?
- LA-3: A GOP primary. Clay Higgins being the sole Epstein no vote has me curious - could he get a primary?
- GA-14: How likely are MTG’s potential challengers to actually win?
- NY in general: With Mamdani’s recent win, could his wave carry others over the finish line?
- TN-9: How might Justin Pearson do?
- FL-7, FL-20: Cory Mills and Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, now disgraced, are on primary/possible resignation watch for me. Who might try for their seats if they do?
- FL-6: Randy Fine has primary challengers too, and he’s just vile. His challengers are attacking him for not living in his district. Do his challengers have a chance?
- MI-Sen: Will we blow it here with an overly-contentious primary? Can someone stop Haley Stevens from buying the primary?
- The Chicago area: Brandon Johnson is doing better from what I’ve heard, but still not great and is still unpopular. Could his unpopularity jeopardize the position of progressives in the city council, state legislature, etc.? Notably, 2024’s school board results were all over the place.
- Colorado state legislature: Progressives got battered here recently, with high profile losses including Elisabeth Epps and Tim Hernandez. The school board races however, saw the wins of pro-union candidates. Could this translate into wins in the state legislature?
There are a lot more but I’m getting tired of typing all this out on a phone.
Shapiro didn't want to give pardons to good prisoners with contested convictions on the Board because he's afraid of Willie Horton 2.0 and he's been wanting to be President since he was in high school. But Fetterman did, and they got into a huge fight about it. Fetterman threatened to primary him, so he backed down.
And Chicago City Council isn't up next year, they won't be until the rest of the city elections in 2027 (in theory with Johnson running for reelection, if he decideds to do that for some reason). I don't see him really damaging them much tbh, there's a lot of distance between him and most of them except for like BSL (and maybe Rossana?). It might get used in attack ads, but people like Jeanette Taylor/Andre Vasquez made pretty scathing comments about him and Matt Martin/Maria Hadden/Dan La Spata/Angela Clay have sort of carved a diplomatic lane breaking from him and are independently popular in their wards regardless.
He will not affect any state rep or the half of the state senate races up next year at all.
NY 16: Latimer will win re-election and only serve a few more terms. He is old and not in great shape. I doubt he'll have a credible primary, and if so, he'll still win.
NY 15: Yes, I believe Blake will have a shot considering Mamdani's big win in the district.
PA Sen: Fetterman will probably just retire in 2028.
MI 13: Since left support has coalesced around McKinney and Thanedar is pretty unpopular nowadays, I suspect McKinney could pretty easily oust him. Maybe by over 5.
IL 2: Robert Peters' progressive support puts him into at least second or third, then if Yumeka Brown or Donna Miller allow support to go to Peters he as a shot to upset Jackson.
MN Sen: Probably Flanagan, considering her newest endorsements from the establishment and the fact that she has statewide recognition.
LA 3: I doubt Higgins will lose a primary - he seems to have local support.
NY: I doubt Meng, Jeffries and Espaillat will be primaried, but there is an easy path for Goldman and Jeffries to fall to Lander and Blake, respectively.
TN 9: The institutional support Cohen has received over his 20 years in Congress solidifies him as the frontrunner, though I do enjoy Pearson.
FL 7: Mills will win re-election. He isn't as scandal-plagued as Cherfilus-McCormick. Same situation with Fine - though you should never underestimate antisemitism with conservatives.
FL 20: Cherfilus-McCormick's potential resignation depends on the result of her trial. If she is convicted, she'll resign, if she is acquitted, she could probably continue in Congress and still win re-nomination.
MI Sen: McMorrow seems to be picking up steam and drowning out even Stevens. It might possibly be between her and El-Sayed, with Stevens coming in a disappointing third. I believe McMorrow is in the best position to win a general.
Chicago: If the establishment wants to oust Johnson, they need to dwindle down their number of candidates. Too many candidates are being speculated right now for any of them to have a chance.
Colorado: As this state continues to move further to the left, I expect there to be more of a progressive movement that comes with it.
Idk about Cohen tbh. He's got a lot of old school goodwill (many many folks in Memphis still call him "Senator Cohen" from 19yrs ago when he was in the state senate for 24yrs), but I think the energy of the moment for a generational turnover and strong fighters is perfect for Pearson. Add the congressional district with the highest number of Black residents that is represented by a white member, which can make Cohen's frankly patronizing comments against Pearson's age have a particularly distasteful racial dimension (I don't think Cohen is intentionally racist, I'm saying it can easily be read that way). If he wants another successor from the Memphian political set, he should retire and endorse them now. Otherwise, I think he's one of the most primed Dems to lose renomination (behind Thandear and above Goldman bc of the possible Lander/Aviles split challenge).
Espaillat randomly fell to 59% of the vote in his 2020 primary over two paper candidates; he's held up better since but his local Squadriano machine seems like it may have reached its peak strength. He's definitely the favorite to start off but I'm interested to see what happens.
It continues to defy belief that Minnesota Republicans can't find even a C-lister to run for the open Senate seat. I could see Kendall Qualls or Scott Jensen giving up on the Gov race if they think Demuth has too much momentum and pivoting to the Senate race.
Maybe MN republicans are more cognizant of the reality of next year's likely environment? If I was a politician with any potential career ahead of me, I wouldn't want to run in a purple state in a year that by all accounts looks likely to be a drubbing for my party.
This gets magnified with gerrymandering, even just the unintentional gerrymandering of self-sorting. A lot of the potential field is going to be safe from waves in their districts. Why give up a sure thing for a very low chance shot at higher office?
I know that some continue to insist that Minnesota is on the verge of going the way of Iowa, and that might happen, but I highly, HIGHLY doubt that 2026 will be the year that it does.
I wouldn't expect any sort of red trend barring another realignment that scrambles the party coalitions. Minnesota has trended blue in the Trump era, like other states that are dominated by a single huge metro: Colorado, Georgia, Oregon, Washington, to a lesser extent Arizona. 5 of the 8 House districts are within the Twin Cities metro area, which consistently gains population while the rural areas lose it. IMO there's just nothing there for the Republicans.
IL-2: Teflon Toni will pull out all the stops to try to get Peters elected, but she has her own primary challenger this time, which will take her time and attention.
Johnson appears to be toast, but if for some reason he can get through 2026 without massive deficits, he might--might--survive. He won in '23 because he wasn't Vallas, but now he's got a record. The defeat of the head tax will hurt his effort to balance the budget, and if he doesn't figure out another way to do that, he can't make it. Someone else here said that the opposition has to coalesce around a candidate in '27, and they probably will--Conway appears to be popular with the 1%.
I’m going to be watching CO-04. Boebert only got a plurality in 2024, Douglas County is establishment GOP central, and I don’t think putting her name on the Epstein discharge petition is going to do her any favors with Trump.
Regarding IL-2, the leading candidates appear to be Robert Peters, Donna Miller, and Willie Preston, although the latter of the three is being attacked for having supported Trump in 2020 (there are enough centrist/conservative Democratic voters in IL-2 that someone like Preston could win a primary against a split field, but those voters are nowhere near a majority of the Democratic primary electorate). Peters is the candidate I'm strongly leaning towards voting for, although I don't know if he actually lives in or just outside of IL-2 (IIRC, his state senate district overlaps with a couple of Chicago-based congressional districts).
An interesting factor in IL-2, which is based in the Chicago Southland region but extends from Chicago in Cook County to Westville in Vermilion County, is that the primary could be decided by the rural southern portion of the district, as all of the Democratic primary candidates being either from the South or Southeast sides of Chicago or from the Chicago Southland (i.e., the southern Chicago suburbs). South of the Will/Kankakee county line, none of the candidates have a natural constituency, and, although there aren't a ton of Democratic primary voters south of the Will/Kankakee line, if the primary is decided by a handful of votes, you won't want to regret not doing some form of outreach to what few Democratic voters there are in places like Hoopeston, Watseka, and Tilton if you're a candidate.
Regarding PA-Sen, if Fetterman does resign for health or any other reasons, pretty much anyone Shapiro would appoint would be to the ideological left of Fetterman, although probably not as progressive as, for example, Summer Lee. Austin Davis, Conor Lamb, and Malcom Kenyatta immediately come to mind.
Interesting take. Sort of like Blagoyevich focusing on downstate counties to win the primary in '02. Peters lives just outside IL-2, but it's not a constitutional requirement nor an especially big deal. The fact that he's willing to ignore his constituents to do whatever TRP tells him to do is a big deal. We'll see if it matters.
I decided to repost this thread as it was better for me to do so by sharing more information.
Here's Steve Kornacki giving a breakdown as far as trends heading to 2026 based on what the Tennessee 7th Congressional District special election could reveal:
-NJ-GOV and VA-GOV election results compared to the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections, where Trump was on the ballot, show greater turnout by Democrats 2025 in percentage than the presidential election years.
-TN-07 did feature higher turnout in favor of Trump in 2024 vs 2020 but Kornacki has not ruled out there is a possibility turnout could be stronger than expected by Democrats in the special election.
-Just my own observations, when Mark Green was running for re-election in 2022 and 2024, Democrats got a 10% increase in margins compared to 2020. Could be change in demographics.
-Kornacki has mentioned that the Nashville suburbs could be key in increasing turnout for Democrats.
-Also, Kornacki has cited that TN-07 could show similar turnout trends as what has been observed in FL-01 and FL-06 special election results.
Anything less than a 15 point loss is a good night for us and single digits is a great night imo. Anything closer than that and alarms will be ringing across our opponents party strategists and leaders. It’s best to keep expectations here realistic, but I’ll be more than happy to be wrong if something incredible happens.
I have a reason to believe we’re going to see a smaller-than-expected margin of loss by Democrats in the TN-07 race providing turnout holds.
Due to redistricting, in 2022 and 2024 Democrats were able to get close to 40% in both elections. If this were 2018 or 2020, I’d say it would have been much harder.
Getting close to 40% vs what Mark Green got in 2022 and 2024 makes it easier improve turnout.
Kind of funny how much the strategy changes for a special election. Behn wouldn't want Kamala Harris anywhere near her race in a general election, but for driving up Democratic turnout in a special election, it happened.....Kamala Harris campaigning in Tennessee.
Harris coming to campaign really means Democrats have nothing to lose here. It’s not like we are expecting to win TN-07 but it sure could help Democrats improve their Southern State strategy, especially in rural communities.
If you keep her presence very localized, there are some D areas where she could help boost turnout. In a low turnout election, that could be significant. You just keep the rest of the district from being aware of it, which granted is a lot more difficult in modern times.
"NJ-GOV and VA-GOV election results compared to the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections, where Trump was on the ballot, show greater turnout by Democrats 2020 in percentage than the presidential election years."
"...greater turnout by Democrats 2020 in percentage than the presidential election years" is confusing. 2020 was a presidential election year. Did you mean "greater turnout by Democrats 2025"?
Yeah, get the pension and this turn will allow her to get treated like a serious/respectable person on the cable news and podcast circuit. I hope it's a genuine epiphany, but it's also maximally convenient for the next phase of her career.
That's a rather dramatic turn of events. She likely had that seat as long as she wanted it, with the way the republican base is.
I wonder what her motivation to resign early is. Is she worried about her safety? Was she in fact a shockingly good actress and never a true believer, opting now to back out? Does she want to cash in on the grifter circuit?
God, I really desperately hope so... Well, only if this doesn't give her enough cred to win lol. I've been dreaming of her running for governor and giving us an autowin to clear Ossoff/Warnock's run for President lol.
I hope Ossoff runs in 2028 and Warnock sits it out and opts for another term. Ossoff's opponent next year is no guarantee, while Warnock's likely opponent seems to be Rep. Rich McCormick so far, unless Kemp decides to run in 2028 against Warnock instead of for president.
Wasn't the story with Kemp just that he did not want to be in the Senate? 2028 is almost certainly going to be a better environment for him than 2026, but that doesn't really change the dynamic that kept him out against Ossoff.
Maybe I'm wrong on this, but it seems like he wasn't really well-known outside of the terminally online (and perhaps on college/university campuses, but he was rapidly aging out of that shtick).
I have a good reason to believe that Marjorie Taylor Greene is resigning out of concern for her safety and with how Trump is treating her, especially with the Epstein investigation. She has softened up in recent months and apologized for her past QaNon rhetoric.
The jury is out as far as to whether MTG is being genuine about this but she has been vocal about improving the Affordable Care Act so small business owners (her and her family included) do not have to pay an arm and a leg to afford health insurance.
Maybe. With the clock ticking on a time sensitive issue, we are in a much better position if they are blocked from the new maps rather than being told they can carry on with planning.
My concern is if this Supreme Court can come up with any reason to allow Texas to use the new maps, at least for 2026, they will.
NJ 11 special: Way is expected to announce Monday, Platkin has declined, no reports on Helmy yet. Those three then Mallinowski and Gill I'd argue are the biggest candidates.
Gill already seems to have the establishment endorsements locked up, but the fact that Mallinowski already served in Congress should be a boon to his chances.
I just don't see any way Way wins or makes much of a splash. She doesn't really have any name recognition, because she last appeared on a ballot in 2009, and she hasn't really been high profile as secretary of state or lieutenant governor. Passaic County is the smallest and reddest part of the district, and there is a current county commissioner (Bartlett) already running. NJ-11 is all of 6% Black, so being the only Black candidate running won't get her very far either.
I don’t know if it was discussed in the Friday thread, but Zohran singlehandedly neutered the GOP’s plan to make him a bogeyman in the midterms with that White House visit today. Masterclass.
One thing I really appreciate is when a progressive becomes a media lightning rod but manages to be a solid and consistent messenger. AOC and Mamdani both succeed at this consistently. Being a strong communicator is something we need more of in our party, even if the official never moves beyond their current office. It helps tell voters why they should agree with us, and it avoids political embarrassments.
Applies to the rest of the party too, but I can't think of a moderate or center-left equivalent to those two that gets outsized media attention.
Mamdani was laser focused on one thing and one thing only in his mayoral campaign:
Cost of living
He kept on talking about it again and again to show how focused he was on the topic. A lesser candidate running for political office would veer from one topic to the next, even a presidential candidate. That's not what Mamdani did.
I don't think I've ever seen Trump look as political weak as he did in the White House with Zohran Mamdani.
Trump has, for lack of a better term, a professional wrestling mindset to politics, and one thing that, prior to several hours ago, was consistent about Trump's style of politics is that, to use a professional wrestling insider expression, he never puts anyone else over, regardless of whether it's an ally or an adversary. In scripted professional wrestling (WWE, AEW, etc., not legitimate wrestling like Olympic or college wrestling), to be "put over" means to boost another wrestler's standing with the fans. Trump did the political equivalent of putting someone else over in regards to Mamdani.
Between Trump putting Zohran over in the White House and MTG rage-quitting Congress, the last twelve hours or so has broken my brain.
I have to say that I was perplexed by the whole Mamdani-Trump thing and thought it was a politically naïve move. But perhaps my instincts aren't as great as I thought...
Putting aside what Trump's decision making has been in this case, I'm thinking of Mamdani and how this meeting with him and Trump makes him look even better heading into office as mayor.
We have a fearless soon-to-be Mayor of NYC who is willing to confront anyone in the GOP as high up as Trump himself and isn't going to relent in his pursuit of getting things done.
Rumors abound that Tim Ryan was set to declare his run Monday but a big crypto client of his was getting pressure from the Trump administration to drop him if he did.
Tim Ryan is basically a paid crypto lobbyist currently, which I did not know. He is Co-chair of Bitcoin Policy Institute.
Shows you his confidence level in a Gov bid if he cares if a client would drop him or not.
Tim Ryan, who has been unabashedly pro-labor, pro union and in the 2022 senate campaign pushed for more vocational training is pro crypto. And he has a client?
At this point, he might as well kiss his ass goodbye for a future political campaign.
Honestly maybe Acton was the better option if he’s that scared. At least she won’t have the lobbyist and career politician baggage that he would have had. And she worked for a Republican governor, which neturalizes the lockdown attacks that will inevitably be thrown her way.
I think the bigger issue is that Ryan simply has no base anymore (most of the Western Reserve has gone the way of West Virginia politically). He waited far too long to go statewide.
The declining population in my home state of WV and much of Ohio is probably a leading factor to those states shifting to conservatism. The population grows smaller as the native born residents vote further to the right. I happen to live in a moderately blue WV city, which also happens to be growing/stagnating, unlike most of WV, which is declining outright.
Overall, it's not as much of an exodus as it is that our resources are drying up and that people are not moving here. The ongoing economic situation in the state also forces younger generations to have to move to another state to afford their lifestyles and find better careers than those offered here (I eventually plan to move out of state as well). There isn't a specific place that people move to; the consensus is just that there isn't opportunity here.
I'm from Appalachian Ohio just across the river from WV. It's not just that large numbers of people are leaving that is making Appalachia so red. It's who is leaving. The people who leave tend to be younger and more educated than those who stay. Also, many LGBT people flee these areas for nearby large cities as well. There is a huge political divide among the people I know with the leavers being heavily blue and the ones that stayed being almost all full blown MAGA supporters.
It's basically just, what? Morgantown and parts of the Eastern Panhandle (i.e., where Morrisey and Mooney carpetbagged) that fall under that category now?
It's such a gorgeous state, too. I had long held out hope that some of Virginia/Maryland's growth would spill over eventually.
Pretty much. I'm in the Morgantown category. The Charleston-Huntington corridor still has a relatively high population but doesn't have much of an economy other than Charleston being our capital city and Huntington containing Marshall University. Believe it or not, Fayetteville, a small town south of Charleston, is growing quite a bit due to the emergence of New River Gorge National Park.
Are lockdown attacks that potent now? Most people seem to have memory-holed the pandemic for better or worse, and those who haven't are highly unlikely to vote for any Democrat.
I have no idea. I agree that most Americans have forgotten about the pandemic from a force of will, probably suppressing a deep-seated trauma, but I don't know if that means they wouldn't punish people who restricted things then.
Americans hate thinking about the political past in general. We couldn’t make Dobbs a relevant campaign issue past the 2022 midterms. Republicans couldn’t make Obamacare an issue beyond 2010. Nobody cared to remember the financial crisis after it was over.
Maybe this is the exception, but I’d hazard a guess that no one will care about anything COVID-19 related in any future elections.
Points taken. But about 2014, don't you think that wave was partly about the still-weak economic conditions for individuals, not just the ridiculous fear-mongering about a few Ebola cases or "caravans" of immigrants or whatever?
Gretchen Whitmer was basically the lightning rod for the lockdown ire and yet she won by 11 points a year later. I can’t imagine it being determinative of Acton’s chances.
I hope Elise Stefanik remains in the gubernatorial race. She’s making Kathy Hochul looking like she’ll get a much wider margin of victory than back in 2022 when Hochul faced Lee Zeldin.
Meanwhile, if Trump is getting along with Mamdani, who grew up in Queens just like him, this will only depress the GOP turnout in the midterms.
Keep it up Trump! You’re doing a great job for Democrats!
Both were elected as moderates in the GOP wave of 2014 flipping Democratic-held seats and then shifted far to the right after Trump's election - and now both get to say they ran against Kathy Hochul for governor in a midterm year.
Fair enough. The same applies to centrist Democrats. The likes of Golden and Suozzi are generally pretty conservative as well (and, infamously, West Virginia's not-so-favorite son, Manchin).
Following up on my post yesterday with some people wondering why Andy Beshear is polling so high among young people. It's this:
Andy Beshear has been growing a massive fanbase on TikTok (sustained entirely by small Gen Z fan accounts). He has actually, for a politician, had many viral posts.
Agree, a younger Biden might well have been reelected in 2024 even with inflation as bad as it was.
Also, in 2028 voters might be looking for 'establishment' after four years of this horror show. Even this year, Sherrill and Spanberger are about as establishment as you can get.
I'm talking irrespective of inflation being everything for a plurality of fucking idiotic American voters. Biden got a hell of a lot done in one term while having to depend on Manchin and Sinema. His failings had to do with some appointments and some communication issues, but inflation was not his fault at all, and the loss is not due to anything he was able to do and didn't do. A younger man who can communicate more effectively and is otherwise like the rather progressive Biden who served as president could be very good.
The only disagreement I’d make is that the highlighted failings were rather substantial and are consistent to his core political identity. I think on general policy and legislative leadership he was surprisingly great! But we need future leaders to not be the type to assume republican malfeasance can be swept under the rug and assumed dealt with after a single electoral victory.
Especially after a 2nd Trump term. The rest of the world is not going to treat the U.S. as a normal country it's reasonable to make long-term deals with after this, and they'd be fools if they did.
That is one idea. Another idea is that the pendulum will swing back and the liberals will want a Democratic Trump. They might have given up on "healing the soul of the nation" and "national unity" which used to be a big deal in 2019-2020 polls. Polls also changed from Democrats wanting to become more moderate in February to wanting to become more liberal or progressive in October.
A Democratic Trump would be a rapist, a massive fraudster, a habitual liar, a seditionist and borderline if not outright traitor, who has no respect for law or treaties but behaves erratically and inconsistently. And you think liberals might want that? Please express yourself clearly and don't make this kind of suggestion.
I should clarify what I meant. When I said "Democratic Trump," I wasn't referring to Trump's personal behavior, depravity, or moral conduct. I meant an imperial Democratic president who would use executive power very aggressively — pushing the limits of what's legally permissible, strong-arming Congress, primarying opponents, taking maximalist positions with the courts, and being willing to abolish the filibuster or pack the courts rather than compromise in order to advance a liberal agenda.
In other words, Trump's style of governance, not Trump’s personal qualities.
I understand why the phrase "Democratic Trump" sounded like I meant the full package, including the worst aspects of Trump. My point was just about political strategy and the possibility that liberals have become more open to hardball tactics since they believe the other side is already using them.
Appointing James Comey was a mistake, not pursuing impeachment just after J6 in the pursuit of national unity was a mistake too. I want a President who is willing to remake America in the image of liberalism.
Andy Beshear has something of an Andy Taylor (the character Andy Griffith played on The Andy Griffith Show) vibe to him, even though he's from Kentucky and not North Carolina.
I don't know if Andy Beshear was named after Andy Griffith, but that's interesting to think about.
I'm interested in who will replace Chrystia Freeland when she resigns from the House of Commons in the spring to take up a position in the UK. University-Rosedale is a downtown Toronto district, high income and high education (I mean, it's right in the name) and I expect a few people would like to run for the Liberals. It broke 64-24-10 for the Liberals in the general election, so unless Carney does something colossally stupid in the next six months, it should be a cakewalk.
I suspect Matt Jeneroux's seat of Edmonton-Riverbend might stay Conservative, although it was very competitive in the general election. If the federal government advances a pipeline project that might defuse some of the natural Albertan antipathy towards the Liberals, plus if anything comes out about why Jeneroux felt forced to resign that could damage the Tories, well, all bets are off.
"Tina Smith pledges neutrality while praising Flanagan
Endorsing Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan over Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) in the state’s Senate Democratic primary is quickly turning into a progressive litmus test."
Great. Angie Craig is an anti-police reform, anti-M4A, corporate Democrat to her bones who loves to vote for GOP messaging bills and resolutions.
Auchincloss' and Lis Smith's neoliberal DLC 2.0 /"Majority Democrats PAC" and AIPAC who are fundraising for her, need to be defeated in this race. Craig asserts everywhere she goes that the new resistance is all about fighters, not about ideology or positions, which is kind of funny because unlike the Resistance 1.0, left-liberals like Bernie, AOC, Mamdani, Khanna, Murphy and so on, have been getting a lot more attention. It's great that neoliberals have passed the task of coalition building and recruitment to out-of-touch elitists like Auchincloss.
New: The super PAC Center Forward Committee is spending $630,000 on digital and direct mail ads backing Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) over Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan in the Minnesota Senate Democratic primary."
Do we know when Babka winners will be announced? I actually did moderately well for once, though I understated the size of the legislative gains in Virginia.
"AOC built her own political machine. Now she’s deciding her next move.
Seven years after Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez leapt onto the national stage as an outsider, she’s learned an inside game and is considering a run for Senate or president."
Random political trivia I learned from reading old political almanacs:
Sherrod Brown was 21 when he was elected to the Ohio House in 1974. When he was elected State Secretary of State in 1982, his brother Charlie Brown was elected West Virginia Attorney General that same year.
David Axelrod worked on the 1992 Senate campaign of businessman Al Hofeld. According to the 1994 political almanac, Hofeld and incumbent Alan Dixon spent much of the 1992 Dem primary attacking each other, helping Carol Moseley-Braun win the primary.
Also personal old campaign story: in 1998, the college democrats from my school took a road trip to Binghamton to help the reelection campaign of Rep Maurice Hinchey. He was opposed by an apple farmer, who was giving out apples as part of his campaign. At a meeting, some of the local democrats (I did not do this) were bragging about they were taking apples that they received and were throwing them at, or at least in the direction of, the candidate and his staff. No way to verify that it was true, but if so, the Democrats up there at the time are kind of crazy.
If memory is correct, Biden was 29 but just roughly a couple of weeks before he turned 30. Biden’s birthday is just 8 days before mine although I was born in the late 70’s.
Charlie Brown also had a major scandal as AG around the same time James Manchin, uncle of Joe Manchin, had a scandal as Treasurer - which, in return, hurt his nephew Joe's 1996 campaign for Governor.
In a writ of special election issued today, Murphy ordered that the primary election will be held on Thursday, February 5 and the general election will be held on Thursday, April 16. (Those were the latest dates available for him to choose under the state’s special election laws, presumably a choice made to give election officials and candidates more time to prepare.)
I’m sorry but that’s BS. It’s easy for you to say when you’re not involved in preparing and running an election. There’s so much that goes behinds the scenes. I say this as a previous election official. An earlier election would mean folks would have to work over the holidays. These folks are already underpaid and overworked. And they just finished working a major state election! Do you not believe they deserve rest and time with their families? As it stands, it’s gonna be an all out sprint to just get the primary election up and running.
Speaking from the perspective of someone who runs a precinct on election day, there's a lot that goes into standing up an election. Aside from the paperwork, petition signature confirmations, etc. you also have to recruit poll workers (who wouldn't necessarily have set those dates aside like regularly scheduled elections), then train them, etc. All with a small staff that probably doesn't have overtime pay funding. Volunteers aren't likely to be available over the holidays. You need 4 (where I live) per precinct. It's not a small task.
It’s seriously as if an oversized part of our party’s officials are allergic to exercising or attaining power. Even when it’s clearly legal without any ethical issues.
Choosing the last dates available is pure political malpractice. It’s pathetic.
Since she takes office three weeks before the primary, even if she had the authority there would be no point. And I’m sure she was consulted before the dates were chosen.
Neither election officials nor candidates in other countries need such absurdly long time. Heck, in Europe, even snap elections at the national level are held with much shorter time frames!
I am once again interested in primaries, given all the NY news. Not only primaries however — I’ll be curious to see some other races too.
Some of the many races I’m watching in general:
- NY-16: Will Latimer get a primary? And if so, by whom?
- NY-15: Does Michael Blake have a shot at taking out Torres?
- PA-Sen: Technically this is 2028, but I am beginning to suspect Fetterman will resign early. If so, question for PA posters here — does Shapiro appoint the successor, or is there a special election?
- MI-13: Does Donavan McKinney have a shot at taking out Shri? If so, by how much?
- IL-2: Can anyone stop Jesse Jackson Jr’s comeback attempt?
- MN-Sen: Hoping for Flanagan - how likely is her win? And do the GOP have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting an actual candidate here?
- LA-3: A GOP primary. Clay Higgins being the sole Epstein no vote has me curious - could he get a primary?
- GA-14: How likely are MTG’s potential challengers to actually win?
- NY in general: With Mamdani’s recent win, could his wave carry others over the finish line?
- TN-9: How might Justin Pearson do?
- FL-7, FL-20: Cory Mills and Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, now disgraced, are on primary/possible resignation watch for me. Who might try for their seats if they do?
- FL-6: Randy Fine has primary challengers too, and he’s just vile. His challengers are attacking him for not living in his district. Do his challengers have a chance?
- MI-Sen: Will we blow it here with an overly-contentious primary? Can someone stop Haley Stevens from buying the primary?
- The Chicago area: Brandon Johnson is doing better from what I’ve heard, but still not great and is still unpopular. Could his unpopularity jeopardize the position of progressives in the city council, state legislature, etc.? Notably, 2024’s school board results were all over the place.
- Colorado state legislature: Progressives got battered here recently, with high profile losses including Elisabeth Epps and Tim Hernandez. The school board races however, saw the wins of pro-union candidates. Could this translate into wins in the state legislature?
There are a lot more but I’m getting tired of typing all this out on a phone.
Under the theory of Fetterman resigning early, PA straight up does an appointment and they run in the next general.
https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/vacancies-in-the-united-states-senate
So he's not resigning because he and Shapiro dont get along
Precisely what are the issues between Fetterman and Shapiro? I’ve never quite been able to step inside Fetterman’s mind...
Shapiro didn't want to give pardons to good prisoners with contested convictions on the Board because he's afraid of Willie Horton 2.0 and he's been wanting to be President since he was in high school. But Fetterman did, and they got into a huge fight about it. Fetterman threatened to primary him, so he backed down.
Thx.
I think most of this is correct but I don't think Fetterman could've primaried him since he doesn't have a law degree?
In the gubernatorial primary.
What is a law degree required for?
And Chicago City Council isn't up next year, they won't be until the rest of the city elections in 2027 (in theory with Johnson running for reelection, if he decideds to do that for some reason). I don't see him really damaging them much tbh, there's a lot of distance between him and most of them except for like BSL (and maybe Rossana?). It might get used in attack ads, but people like Jeanette Taylor/Andre Vasquez made pretty scathing comments about him and Matt Martin/Maria Hadden/Dan La Spata/Angela Clay have sort of carved a diplomatic lane breaking from him and are independently popular in their wards regardless.
He will not affect any state rep or the half of the state senate races up next year at all.
NY 16: Latimer will win re-election and only serve a few more terms. He is old and not in great shape. I doubt he'll have a credible primary, and if so, he'll still win.
NY 15: Yes, I believe Blake will have a shot considering Mamdani's big win in the district.
PA Sen: Fetterman will probably just retire in 2028.
MI 13: Since left support has coalesced around McKinney and Thanedar is pretty unpopular nowadays, I suspect McKinney could pretty easily oust him. Maybe by over 5.
IL 2: Robert Peters' progressive support puts him into at least second or third, then if Yumeka Brown or Donna Miller allow support to go to Peters he as a shot to upset Jackson.
MN Sen: Probably Flanagan, considering her newest endorsements from the establishment and the fact that she has statewide recognition.
LA 3: I doubt Higgins will lose a primary - he seems to have local support.
NY: I doubt Meng, Jeffries and Espaillat will be primaried, but there is an easy path for Goldman and Jeffries to fall to Lander and Blake, respectively.
TN 9: The institutional support Cohen has received over his 20 years in Congress solidifies him as the frontrunner, though I do enjoy Pearson.
FL 7: Mills will win re-election. He isn't as scandal-plagued as Cherfilus-McCormick. Same situation with Fine - though you should never underestimate antisemitism with conservatives.
FL 20: Cherfilus-McCormick's potential resignation depends on the result of her trial. If she is convicted, she'll resign, if she is acquitted, she could probably continue in Congress and still win re-nomination.
MI Sen: McMorrow seems to be picking up steam and drowning out even Stevens. It might possibly be between her and El-Sayed, with Stevens coming in a disappointing third. I believe McMorrow is in the best position to win a general.
Chicago: If the establishment wants to oust Johnson, they need to dwindle down their number of candidates. Too many candidates are being speculated right now for any of them to have a chance.
Colorado: As this state continues to move further to the left, I expect there to be more of a progressive movement that comes with it.
Idk about Cohen tbh. He's got a lot of old school goodwill (many many folks in Memphis still call him "Senator Cohen" from 19yrs ago when he was in the state senate for 24yrs), but I think the energy of the moment for a generational turnover and strong fighters is perfect for Pearson. Add the congressional district with the highest number of Black residents that is represented by a white member, which can make Cohen's frankly patronizing comments against Pearson's age have a particularly distasteful racial dimension (I don't think Cohen is intentionally racist, I'm saying it can easily be read that way). If he wants another successor from the Memphian political set, he should retire and endorse them now. Otherwise, I think he's one of the most primed Dems to lose renomination (behind Thandear and above Goldman bc of the possible Lander/Aviles split challenge).
I'm not seeing how they can or would be read as racist.
Espaillat randomly fell to 59% of the vote in his 2020 primary over two paper candidates; he's held up better since but his local Squadriano machine seems like it may have reached its peak strength. He's definitely the favorite to start off but I'm interested to see what happens.
It continues to defy belief that Minnesota Republicans can't find even a C-lister to run for the open Senate seat. I could see Kendall Qualls or Scott Jensen giving up on the Gov race if they think Demuth has too much momentum and pivoting to the Senate race.
Maybe MN republicans are more cognizant of the reality of next year's likely environment? If I was a politician with any potential career ahead of me, I wouldn't want to run in a purple state in a year that by all accounts looks likely to be a drubbing for my party.
This gets magnified with gerrymandering, even just the unintentional gerrymandering of self-sorting. A lot of the potential field is going to be safe from waves in their districts. Why give up a sure thing for a very low chance shot at higher office?
I know that some continue to insist that Minnesota is on the verge of going the way of Iowa, and that might happen, but I highly, HIGHLY doubt that 2026 will be the year that it does.
Iowa doesn't have a superstar urban area to counter the rural areas like Minnesota.
I wouldn't expect any sort of red trend barring another realignment that scrambles the party coalitions. Minnesota has trended blue in the Trump era, like other states that are dominated by a single huge metro: Colorado, Georgia, Oregon, Washington, to a lesser extent Arizona. 5 of the 8 House districts are within the Twin Cities metro area, which consistently gains population while the rural areas lose it. IMO there's just nothing there for the Republicans.
Arizona's second city, Tucson, is still much more Democratic than Phoenix.
Per CNN, Marjorie Taylor Greene will resign.
IL-2: Teflon Toni will pull out all the stops to try to get Peters elected, but she has her own primary challenger this time, which will take her time and attention.
Johnson appears to be toast, but if for some reason he can get through 2026 without massive deficits, he might--might--survive. He won in '23 because he wasn't Vallas, but now he's got a record. The defeat of the head tax will hurt his effort to balance the budget, and if he doesn't figure out another way to do that, he can't make it. Someone else here said that the opposition has to coalesce around a candidate in '27, and they probably will--Conway appears to be popular with the 1%.
I’m going to be watching CO-04. Boebert only got a plurality in 2024, Douglas County is establishment GOP central, and I don’t think putting her name on the Epstein discharge petition is going to do her any favors with Trump.
Regarding IL-2, the leading candidates appear to be Robert Peters, Donna Miller, and Willie Preston, although the latter of the three is being attacked for having supported Trump in 2020 (there are enough centrist/conservative Democratic voters in IL-2 that someone like Preston could win a primary against a split field, but those voters are nowhere near a majority of the Democratic primary electorate). Peters is the candidate I'm strongly leaning towards voting for, although I don't know if he actually lives in or just outside of IL-2 (IIRC, his state senate district overlaps with a couple of Chicago-based congressional districts).
An interesting factor in IL-2, which is based in the Chicago Southland region but extends from Chicago in Cook County to Westville in Vermilion County, is that the primary could be decided by the rural southern portion of the district, as all of the Democratic primary candidates being either from the South or Southeast sides of Chicago or from the Chicago Southland (i.e., the southern Chicago suburbs). South of the Will/Kankakee county line, none of the candidates have a natural constituency, and, although there aren't a ton of Democratic primary voters south of the Will/Kankakee line, if the primary is decided by a handful of votes, you won't want to regret not doing some form of outreach to what few Democratic voters there are in places like Hoopeston, Watseka, and Tilton if you're a candidate.
Regarding PA-Sen, if Fetterman does resign for health or any other reasons, pretty much anyone Shapiro would appoint would be to the ideological left of Fetterman, although probably not as progressive as, for example, Summer Lee. Austin Davis, Conor Lamb, and Malcom Kenyatta immediately come to mind.
Interesting take. Sort of like Blagoyevich focusing on downstate counties to win the primary in '02. Peters lives just outside IL-2, but it's not a constitutional requirement nor an especially big deal. The fact that he's willing to ignore his constituents to do whatever TRP tells him to do is a big deal. We'll see if it matters.
TN-07:
I decided to repost this thread as it was better for me to do so by sharing more information.
Here's Steve Kornacki giving a breakdown as far as trends heading to 2026 based on what the Tennessee 7th Congressional District special election could reveal:
-NJ-GOV and VA-GOV election results compared to the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections, where Trump was on the ballot, show greater turnout by Democrats 2025 in percentage than the presidential election years.
-TN-07 did feature higher turnout in favor of Trump in 2024 vs 2020 but Kornacki has not ruled out there is a possibility turnout could be stronger than expected by Democrats in the special election.
-Just my own observations, when Mark Green was running for re-election in 2022 and 2024, Democrats got a 10% increase in margins compared to 2020. Could be change in demographics.
-Kornacki has mentioned that the Nashville suburbs could be key in increasing turnout for Democrats.
-Also, Kornacki has cited that TN-07 could show similar turnout trends as what has been observed in FL-01 and FL-06 special election results.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13ERPdxzzd4
Anything less than a 15 point loss is a good night for us and single digits is a great night imo. Anything closer than that and alarms will be ringing across our opponents party strategists and leaders. It’s best to keep expectations here realistic, but I’ll be more than happy to be wrong if something incredible happens.
I have a reason to believe we’re going to see a smaller-than-expected margin of loss by Democrats in the TN-07 race providing turnout holds.
Due to redistricting, in 2022 and 2024 Democrats were able to get close to 40% in both elections. If this were 2018 or 2020, I’d say it would have been much harder.
Getting close to 40% vs what Mark Green got in 2022 and 2024 makes it easier improve turnout.
Kind of funny how much the strategy changes for a special election. Behn wouldn't want Kamala Harris anywhere near her race in a general election, but for driving up Democratic turnout in a special election, it happened.....Kamala Harris campaigning in Tennessee.
Yeah, strange things happen post 2024.
Harris coming to campaign really means Democrats have nothing to lose here. It’s not like we are expecting to win TN-07 but it sure could help Democrats improve their Southern State strategy, especially in rural communities.
If you keep her presence very localized, there are some D areas where she could help boost turnout. In a low turnout election, that could be significant. You just keep the rest of the district from being aware of it, which granted is a lot more difficult in modern times.
Democrats for sure could use more focus in local elections in TN.
Could you explain this?
"NJ-GOV and VA-GOV election results compared to the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections, where Trump was on the ballot, show greater turnout by Democrats 2020 in percentage than the presidential election years."
"...greater turnout by Democrats 2020 in percentage than the presidential election years" is confusing. 2020 was a presidential election year. Did you mean "greater turnout by Democrats 2025"?
2025, not 2020. Corrected the typo.
since it is the weekend a little diversion from domestic elections; not one of USA's finer moments... https://www.cnn.com/videos/title-2573517
GA-14:
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2025/11/21/marjorie-taylor-greene-resign-trump-epstein-mtg.html
Marjorie Taylor Greene is resigning.
Wow.
Did she see what was in the Epstein files and said “I can’t do this shit anymore”? Or was it Trump kissing Mamdani’s ass?
Could have been the threats made against her.
yeah, that's how they operate...no decency or civility
Couldn't handle being on the receiving end of the vitriol she dished out up until five minutes ago.
So it goes with all these assholes
They are the epitome of "we can dish it out, but we can't take it."
House pension vests after 5 years. Maybe that was the plan all along?
Yeah, get the pension and this turn will allow her to get treated like a serious/respectable person on the cable news and podcast circuit. I hope it's a genuine epiphany, but it's also maximally convenient for the next phase of her career.
WHOA.
That's a rather dramatic turn of events. She likely had that seat as long as she wanted it, with the way the republican base is.
I wonder what her motivation to resign early is. Is she worried about her safety? Was she in fact a shockingly good actress and never a true believer, opting now to back out? Does she want to cash in on the grifter circuit?
Do we think she'll run statewide like she was planning to do earlier this year?
God, I really desperately hope so... Well, only if this doesn't give her enough cred to win lol. I've been dreaming of her running for governor and giving us an autowin to clear Ossoff/Warnock's run for President lol.
I hope Ossoff runs in 2028 and Warnock sits it out and opts for another term. Ossoff's opponent next year is no guarantee, while Warnock's likely opponent seems to be Rep. Rich McCormick so far, unless Kemp decides to run in 2028 against Warnock instead of for president.
Wasn't the story with Kemp just that he did not want to be in the Senate? 2028 is almost certainly going to be a better environment for him than 2026, but that doesn't really change the dynamic that kept him out against Ossoff.
There's enough footage of Empty G saying and doing horrible things that I highly doubt she has much of a future as a "moderate" politician.
I'm reminded of the veneration of Charlie Kirk abruptly ending as soon as people simply started quoting him verbatim.
It’s remarkable (and scary) how well Kirk laundered his reputation before his murder
Maybe I'm wrong on this, but it seems like he wasn't really well-known outside of the terminally online (and perhaps on college/university campuses, but he was rapidly aging out of that shtick).
Yeah I could see her pivoting to a run for Georgia Governor.
Holy shit.
My wife told me she wasn’t running again - I didn’t realize she was resigning
Her video makes it sounds like she wants to leave the Republican Party tbh. Maybe some future indy bid possible?
I have a good reason to believe that Marjorie Taylor Greene is resigning out of concern for her safety and with how Trump is treating her, especially with the Epstein investigation. She has softened up in recent months and apologized for her past QaNon rhetoric.
The jury is out as far as to whether MTG is being genuine about this but she has been vocal about improving the Affordable Care Act so small business owners (her and her family included) do not have to pay an arm and a leg to afford health insurance.
Shawn Harris, former brigadier general, has been running against her and will run in the special too.
https://x.com/ShawnForGeorgia/status/1930053839492624543?t=-BY8Slm0ckCal1UTrDexiA&s=19
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/11/21/texas-supreme-court-map-case-00665951
Alito allows Texas redrawn map to go forward.
It’s a temporary pause— for now.
Maybe. With the clock ticking on a time sensitive issue, we are in a much better position if they are blocked from the new maps rather than being told they can carry on with planning.
My concern is if this Supreme Court can come up with any reason to allow Texas to use the new maps, at least for 2026, they will.
It's an administrative stay, it's only in effect until briefing. This isn't the status quo going forward or anything like that.
Easy to see this one coming. He'll sit on it right until the day after the filing deadlines.
The full court will consider the stay request before then.
Is that pretty much guaranteed?
In one form or another, yes.
NJ 11 special: Way is expected to announce Monday, Platkin has declined, no reports on Helmy yet. Those three then Mallinowski and Gill I'd argue are the biggest candidates.
I think it’ll end up between Malinowski and Gill.
Gill already seems to have the establishment endorsements locked up, but the fact that Mallinowski already served in Congress should be a boon to his chances.
I just don't see any way Way wins or makes much of a splash. She doesn't really have any name recognition, because she last appeared on a ballot in 2009, and she hasn't really been high profile as secretary of state or lieutenant governor. Passaic County is the smallest and reddest part of the district, and there is a current county commissioner (Bartlett) already running. NJ-11 is all of 6% Black, so being the only Black candidate running won't get her very far either.
I don’t know if it was discussed in the Friday thread, but Zohran singlehandedly neutered the GOP’s plan to make him a bogeyman in the midterms with that White House visit today. Masterclass.
If there’s one thing Mamdani is great at, it’s being on message and being effective in counter messaging.
One thing I really appreciate is when a progressive becomes a media lightning rod but manages to be a solid and consistent messenger. AOC and Mamdani both succeed at this consistently. Being a strong communicator is something we need more of in our party, even if the official never moves beyond their current office. It helps tell voters why they should agree with us, and it avoids political embarrassments.
Applies to the rest of the party too, but I can't think of a moderate or center-left equivalent to those two that gets outsized media attention.
Mamdani was laser focused on one thing and one thing only in his mayoral campaign:
Cost of living
He kept on talking about it again and again to show how focused he was on the topic. A lesser candidate running for political office would veer from one topic to the next, even a presidential candidate. That's not what Mamdani did.
I don't think I've ever seen Trump look as political weak as he did in the White House with Zohran Mamdani.
Trump has, for lack of a better term, a professional wrestling mindset to politics, and one thing that, prior to several hours ago, was consistent about Trump's style of politics is that, to use a professional wrestling insider expression, he never puts anyone else over, regardless of whether it's an ally or an adversary. In scripted professional wrestling (WWE, AEW, etc., not legitimate wrestling like Olympic or college wrestling), to be "put over" means to boost another wrestler's standing with the fans. Trump did the political equivalent of putting someone else over in regards to Mamdani.
Between Trump putting Zohran over in the White House and MTG rage-quitting Congress, the last twelve hours or so has broken my brain.
I have to say that I was perplexed by the whole Mamdani-Trump thing and thought it was a politically naïve move. But perhaps my instincts aren't as great as I thought...
Putting aside what Trump's decision making has been in this case, I'm thinking of Mamdani and how this meeting with him and Trump makes him look even better heading into office as mayor.
We have a fearless soon-to-be Mayor of NYC who is willing to confront anyone in the GOP as high up as Trump himself and isn't going to relent in his pursuit of getting things done.
Rumors abound that Tim Ryan was set to declare his run Monday but a big crypto client of his was getting pressure from the Trump administration to drop him if he did.
Tim Ryan is basically a paid crypto lobbyist currently, which I did not know. He is Co-chair of Bitcoin Policy Institute.
Shows you his confidence level in a Gov bid if he cares if a client would drop him or not.
Wait, hold on, time out.
Tim Ryan, who has been unabashedly pro-labor, pro union and in the 2022 senate campaign pushed for more vocational training is pro crypto. And he has a client?
At this point, he might as well kiss his ass goodbye for a future political campaign.
Here is a breakdown on his work post congress. He's a lobbyist for multiple special interests.
https://www.reviewonline.com/news/local-news/2024/12/making-big-money-as-a-lobbyist-tim-ryan-wont-rule-out-political-comeback/
Ryan: “Why are we fighting crypto now?”
Is he a frickin idiot? Cryptocurrency is a damn Ponzi scheme and data centers supporting it suck up too much energy and damage the environment.
I have lost my respect for him. Liked his 2022 Senate campaign but I am done with Ryan.
It's the old saying: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."
If Ryan is working as a crypto-lobbyist, he has every incentive to not learn about the negatives of crypto.
And that excellent saying is attributed to the great progressive Upton Sinclair! If only we had more Sinclairs today.
He was a socialist, and therefore condemned by a bunch of Democratic politicians today...
Did Ryan start thinking that because JD Vance of all people having a history of being a VC that it gave him ideas?
Ryan: "If I can't beat him, I can become him or like him."
Screw him then.
Honestly maybe Acton was the better option if he’s that scared. At least she won’t have the lobbyist and career politician baggage that he would have had. And she worked for a Republican governor, which neturalizes the lockdown attacks that will inevitably be thrown her way.
I thought Acton was the best option to begin with. You don't just lose to JD Vance.
I think the bigger issue is that Ryan simply has no base anymore (most of the Western Reserve has gone the way of West Virginia politically). He waited far too long to go statewide.
The declining population in my home state of WV and much of Ohio is probably a leading factor to those states shifting to conservatism. The population grows smaller as the native born residents vote further to the right. I happen to live in a moderately blue WV city, which also happens to be growing/stagnating, unlike most of WV, which is declining outright.
Where do the people who leave WV tend to move to?
Overall, it's not as much of an exodus as it is that our resources are drying up and that people are not moving here. The ongoing economic situation in the state also forces younger generations to have to move to another state to afford their lifestyles and find better careers than those offered here (I eventually plan to move out of state as well). There isn't a specific place that people move to; the consensus is just that there isn't opportunity here.
I'm from Appalachian Ohio just across the river from WV. It's not just that large numbers of people are leaving that is making Appalachia so red. It's who is leaving. The people who leave tend to be younger and more educated than those who stay. Also, many LGBT people flee these areas for nearby large cities as well. There is a huge political divide among the people I know with the leavers being heavily blue and the ones that stayed being almost all full blown MAGA supporters.
So-called "deaths of despair" are a huge problem in these areas as well. (Mercer County, PA resident here.)
It's basically just, what? Morgantown and parts of the Eastern Panhandle (i.e., where Morrisey and Mooney carpetbagged) that fall under that category now?
It's such a gorgeous state, too. I had long held out hope that some of Virginia/Maryland's growth would spill over eventually.
Pretty much. I'm in the Morgantown category. The Charleston-Huntington corridor still has a relatively high population but doesn't have much of an economy other than Charleston being our capital city and Huntington containing Marshall University. Believe it or not, Fayetteville, a small town south of Charleston, is growing quite a bit due to the emergence of New River Gorge National Park.
Eventually is a long time. Maybe it will.
You do in Ohio.
It only partially neutralizes those.
Are lockdown attacks that potent now? Most people seem to have memory-holed the pandemic for better or worse, and those who haven't are highly unlikely to vote for any Democrat.
I have no idea. I agree that most Americans have forgotten about the pandemic from a force of will, probably suppressing a deep-seated trauma, but I don't know if that means they wouldn't punish people who restricted things then.
Americans hate thinking about the political past in general. We couldn’t make Dobbs a relevant campaign issue past the 2022 midterms. Republicans couldn’t make Obamacare an issue beyond 2010. Nobody cared to remember the financial crisis after it was over.
Maybe this is the exception, but I’d hazard a guess that no one will care about anything COVID-19 related in any future elections.
Points taken. But about 2014, don't you think that wave was partly about the still-weak economic conditions for individuals, not just the ridiculous fear-mongering about a few Ebola cases or "caravans" of immigrants or whatever?
Gretchen Whitmer was basically the lightning rod for the lockdown ire and yet she won by 11 points a year later. I can’t imagine it being determinative of Acton’s chances.
NY-Gov: Biggest loser today was Elise Stefanik
Lost in the twilight zone of highlights from the Trump/Mamdani press conference was this little nugget from Trump:
Q: Stefanik has called Mamdani a 'jihadist.' Do you think you're standing next to a jihadist right now?
TRUMP: No, I don't. I met with a man who's a very rational person
Kathy Hochul then went on to call Stefanik "Full of shit."
https://x.com/KathyHochul/status/1992053336158470411?t=cyravwsJ7_KZR0F0rVaKTA&s=19
Starting to like fiesty Hochul.
Elise Stefanik spent nearly a decade selling her soul to Trump only for him to dump her as UN Ambassador and end her campaign for governor.
I hope Elise Stefanik remains in the gubernatorial race. She’s making Kathy Hochul looking like she’ll get a much wider margin of victory than back in 2022 when Hochul faced Lee Zeldin.
Meanwhile, if Trump is getting along with Mamdani, who grew up in Queens just like him, this will only depress the GOP turnout in the midterms.
Keep it up Trump! You’re doing a great job for Democrats!
Even Zeldin would fare far worse in 2026.
True!
Even while Zeldin is awful as EPA Administrator, he still has the fortune of not running for another election.
He could likely still win NY-1 in the House.
Isn’t NY-01 a Lean GOP district?
Is Zeldin that popular in NY-01?
Yes and yes. I also doubt how much the nationwide move toward the Democrats will apply in Long Island.
To me Zeldin and Stefanik are basically interchangeable. Stefanik might have been an interesting candidate in 2022 if she hadn't gone full MAGA.
Both were elected as moderates in the GOP wave of 2014 flipping Democratic-held seats and then shifted far to the right after Trump's election - and now both get to say they ran against Kathy Hochul for governor in a midterm year.
"Moderates" have gone the way of the dodo, they were just standard conservatives.
Fair enough. The same applies to centrist Democrats. The likes of Golden and Suozzi are generally pretty conservative as well (and, infamously, West Virginia's not-so-favorite son, Manchin).
Following up on my post yesterday with some people wondering why Andy Beshear is polling so high among young people. It's this:
Andy Beshear has been growing a massive fanbase on TikTok (sustained entirely by small Gen Z fan accounts). He has actually, for a politician, had many viral posts.
That's news to me. Then again, I'm not on TikTok.
Me too. Stealth campaigning.
Beshear is bright and well-informed about the issues, especially as they apply to rural communities and healthcare.
But I too do not know much about his appeal with younger voters. Unless this has to do with his understanding of economics and cost of living.
It is usual for a Democratic politician from KY to have this kind of following.
If it's simply due to viral posts, why hasn't Chris Murphy grown in popularity? Is it because he is never included in polls?
I think he's a good person but Beshear simply feels like a younger version of Biden to me and is too establishment.
In what way is being a younger version of Biden bad?
Agree, a younger Biden might well have been reelected in 2024 even with inflation as bad as it was.
Also, in 2028 voters might be looking for 'establishment' after four years of this horror show. Even this year, Sherrill and Spanberger are about as establishment as you can get.
I'm talking irrespective of inflation being everything for a plurality of fucking idiotic American voters. Biden got a hell of a lot done in one term while having to depend on Manchin and Sinema. His failings had to do with some appointments and some communication issues, but inflation was not his fault at all, and the loss is not due to anything he was able to do and didn't do. A younger man who can communicate more effectively and is otherwise like the rather progressive Biden who served as president could be very good.
The only disagreement I’d make is that the highlighted failings were rather substantial and are consistent to his core political identity. I think on general policy and legislative leadership he was surprisingly great! But we need future leaders to not be the type to assume republican malfeasance can be swept under the rug and assumed dealt with after a single electoral victory.
Especially after a 2nd Trump term. The rest of the world is not going to treat the U.S. as a normal country it's reasonable to make long-term deals with after this, and they'd be fools if they did.
That is one idea. Another idea is that the pendulum will swing back and the liberals will want a Democratic Trump. They might have given up on "healing the soul of the nation" and "national unity" which used to be a big deal in 2019-2020 polls. Polls also changed from Democrats wanting to become more moderate in February to wanting to become more liberal or progressive in October.
A Democratic Trump would be a rapist, a massive fraudster, a habitual liar, a seditionist and borderline if not outright traitor, who has no respect for law or treaties but behaves erratically and inconsistently. And you think liberals might want that? Please express yourself clearly and don't make this kind of suggestion.
I should clarify what I meant. When I said "Democratic Trump," I wasn't referring to Trump's personal behavior, depravity, or moral conduct. I meant an imperial Democratic president who would use executive power very aggressively — pushing the limits of what's legally permissible, strong-arming Congress, primarying opponents, taking maximalist positions with the courts, and being willing to abolish the filibuster or pack the courts rather than compromise in order to advance a liberal agenda.
In other words, Trump's style of governance, not Trump’s personal qualities.
I understand why the phrase "Democratic Trump" sounded like I meant the full package, including the worst aspects of Trump. My point was just about political strategy and the possibility that liberals have become more open to hardball tactics since they believe the other side is already using them.
Appointing James Comey was a mistake, not pursuing impeachment just after J6 in the pursuit of national unity was a mistake too. I want a President who is willing to remake America in the image of liberalism.
Andy Beshear has something of an Andy Taylor (the character Andy Griffith played on The Andy Griffith Show) vibe to him, even though he's from Kentucky and not North Carolina.
I don't know if Andy Beshear was named after Andy Griffith, but that's interesting to think about.
I'm interested in who will replace Chrystia Freeland when she resigns from the House of Commons in the spring to take up a position in the UK. University-Rosedale is a downtown Toronto district, high income and high education (I mean, it's right in the name) and I expect a few people would like to run for the Liberals. It broke 64-24-10 for the Liberals in the general election, so unless Carney does something colossally stupid in the next six months, it should be a cakewalk.
I suspect Matt Jeneroux's seat of Edmonton-Riverbend might stay Conservative, although it was very competitive in the general election. If the federal government advances a pipeline project that might defuse some of the natural Albertan antipathy towards the Liberals, plus if anything comes out about why Jeneroux felt forced to resign that could damage the Tories, well, all bets are off.
"Tina Smith pledges neutrality while praising Flanagan
Endorsing Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan over Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) in the state’s Senate Democratic primary is quickly turning into a progressive litmus test."
https://punchbowl.news/article/senate/tina-smith-minnesota-flanagan/
Great. Angie Craig is an anti-police reform, anti-M4A, corporate Democrat to her bones who loves to vote for GOP messaging bills and resolutions.
Auchincloss' and Lis Smith's neoliberal DLC 2.0 /"Majority Democrats PAC" and AIPAC who are fundraising for her, need to be defeated in this race. Craig asserts everywhere she goes that the new resistance is all about fighters, not about ideology or positions, which is kind of funny because unlike the Resistance 1.0, left-liberals like Bernie, AOC, Mamdani, Khanna, Murphy and so on, have been getting a lot more attention. It's great that neoliberals have passed the task of coalition building and recruitment to out-of-touch elitists like Auchincloss.
"Center Forward launches pro-Craig buy
New: The super PAC Center Forward Committee is spending $630,000 on digital and direct mail ads backing Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) over Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan in the Minnesota Senate Democratic primary."
https://punchbowl.news/article/senate/pro-craig-buy/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_Forward
https://readsludge.com/2024/03/14/house-dems-donate-to-centrist-group-that-undermines-their-agenda/
When Republicans are pro-Craig, you know who to support. Another neoliberal GOP operated PAC which funds both Dems and Republicans has jumped in.
"Center Forward" can be great in Football (soccer) – Erling Haaland comes to mind.
In politics? Not so much!
Do we know when Babka winners will be announced? I actually did moderately well for once, though I understated the size of the legislative gains in Virginia.
"AOC built her own political machine. Now she’s deciding her next move.
Seven years after Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez leapt onto the national stage as an outsider, she’s learned an inside game and is considering a run for Senate or president."
WaPo: https://archive.ph/AQ8lM
Senate yes, POTUS no!
Agreed, but I shouldn't say why, as we are not supposed to discuss potential Democratic presidential candidacies.
to me it is obvious as to why :-)
In the future, it would be best not to express any opinion about whether a Democrat should run for president or not.
U.S. Senate! Get Schumer out in 3 years.
Hopefully less than that but I will settle for 3 years. ;)
Random political trivia I learned from reading old political almanacs:
Sherrod Brown was 21 when he was elected to the Ohio House in 1974. When he was elected State Secretary of State in 1982, his brother Charlie Brown was elected West Virginia Attorney General that same year.
David Axelrod worked on the 1992 Senate campaign of businessman Al Hofeld. According to the 1994 political almanac, Hofeld and incumbent Alan Dixon spent much of the 1992 Dem primary attacking each other, helping Carol Moseley-Braun win the primary.
Also personal old campaign story: in 1998, the college democrats from my school took a road trip to Binghamton to help the reelection campaign of Rep Maurice Hinchey. He was opposed by an apple farmer, who was giving out apples as part of his campaign. At a meeting, some of the local democrats (I did not do this) were bragging about they were taking apples that they received and were throwing them at, or at least in the direction of, the candidate and his staff. No way to verify that it was true, but if so, the Democrats up there at the time are kind of crazy.
So Brown was much younger than President Biden when he was first elected to the US Senate.
Biden was 29 when he was elected to the Senate whereas Brown was 21 when elected to the OH House, just one year after Biden was elected!
He couldn't have been much younger when first elected to the Senate, as the minimum age to take office in the Senate is 30.
If memory is correct, Biden was 29 but just roughly a couple of weeks before he turned 30. Biden’s birthday is just 8 days before mine although I was born in the late 70’s.
Biden was born on November 20th, 1942.
Right. He was 30 by the time he took office, so he could run as a 29-year-old.
You are misreading something. Brown was first elected to the US Senate in 2006. He was over 50.
Charlie Brown also had a major scandal as AG around the same time James Manchin, uncle of Joe Manchin, had a scandal as Treasurer - which, in return, hurt his nephew Joe's 1996 campaign for Governor.
NJ 11:
In a writ of special election issued today, Murphy ordered that the primary election will be held on Thursday, February 5 and the general election will be held on Thursday, April 16. (Those were the latest dates available for him to choose under the state’s special election laws, presumably a choice made to give election officials and candidates more time to prepare.)
https://newjerseyglobe.com/congress/murphy-sets-february-5-primary-april-16-general-for-nj-11-special-election/
But that's problematic because the seat remains vacant longer. That seems like exactly the wrong approach for exigencies of today.
yes, what is the justification for leaving a likely blue seat vacant for 5 months? makes no sense.
Apparently, a consensus of election officials, county leaders and candidates.
In emergencies, people should be prepared to work harder and faster.
I’m sorry but that’s BS. It’s easy for you to say when you’re not involved in preparing and running an election. There’s so much that goes behinds the scenes. I say this as a previous election official. An earlier election would mean folks would have to work over the holidays. These folks are already underpaid and overworked. And they just finished working a major state election! Do you not believe they deserve rest and time with their families? As it stands, it’s gonna be an all out sprint to just get the primary election up and running.
This is the last legal date for the election. I'm a worker; I understand work. I also understand the times we're living in.
Speaking from the perspective of someone who runs a precinct on election day, there's a lot that goes into standing up an election. Aside from the paperwork, petition signature confirmations, etc. you also have to recruit poll workers (who wouldn't necessarily have set those dates aside like regularly scheduled elections), then train them, etc. All with a small staff that probably doesn't have overtime pay funding. Volunteers aren't likely to be available over the holidays. You need 4 (where I live) per precinct. It's not a small task.
That said, I understand the frustration. And the time between the primary and regular is too long, IMO.
It’s seriously as if an oversized part of our party’s officials are allergic to exercising or attaining power. Even when it’s clearly legal without any ethical issues.
Choosing the last dates available is pure political malpractice. It’s pathetic.
I wonder, would Sherrill be able to move the date up once she takes office? I imagine likely not, but seems worth asking
Since she takes office three weeks before the primary, even if she had the authority there would be no point. And I’m sure she was consulted before the dates were chosen.
Why are you sure? How is his relationship with her?
Neither election officials nor candidates in other countries need such absurdly long time. Heck, in Europe, even snap elections at the national level are held with much shorter time frames!