Republicans have already started campaigning for the Nebraska Senate race. As someone who believes that Texas and Alaska can be flipped in 2026, Nebraska's fundamentals are just too Republican to be flipped imo but Osborn's entire 2024 campaign was antithesis to and about opposing the big, beautiful bill before th…
Republicans have already started campaigning for the Nebraska Senate race. As someone who believes that Texas and Alaska can be flipped in 2026, Nebraska's fundamentals are just too Republican to be flipped imo but Osborn's entire 2024 campaign was antithesis to and about opposing the big, beautiful bill before the bill itself so maybe there's an outside chance. He lost by 6.5 points, massively overperforming Democrats.
Nathan Sage was the only candidate who lead Ernst after the candidates' backgrounds were made known to potential voters. He's sought to emulate Osborn.
Note: Sharing an article from a site doesn't mean I share its polarizing opinions, I shared it because I found it the to be the first article about poll and the only one containing the candidate's own perspective.
No reason not to run strong candidates/campaigns in as many places as possible. Some of them just might win, and—even if they lose—running up the score at the top of the ticket helps downballot candidates to get over the finish line as well.
Realistically, there are some counties that are pointless, like the ones with populations of a few hundred in the Texas desert that vote 80% Republican or worse.
If I remember correctly, Democrats failed to challenge roughly a thousand state legislative seats in 2024. That is political malpractice! And it’s not a mitigating excuse that Republicans left even more races, 1300 or so, unchallenged.
Yes, there may well be some counties with further-downballlot races that seem pointless. But I still contend that Democrats’ cardinal rule should be: Run a candidate in every race!
Even in instances of near-certain loss, local candidates can win important arguments and tell voters what the Democratic Party stands for, strengthening our hand in the long term.
Maybe you could be more successful recruiting candidates for certain losses than the people who've done that until now, but everyone should recognize that it's not easy to get people to devote so much time, lost sleep, effort and probably money to such hopeless, highly intrusive to themselves and their families, and potentially dangerous endeavors. Especially now, we should be aware that Democratic candidates in highly Republican areas could be risking their lives.
I think there’s a happy medium between what both of you are saying. We should run in every race, we shouldn’t expect anyone to donate a lot of time or money to any campaign. I seriously don’t get why some Democratic voters or the party’s in these districts just file a name and do nothing else. It’s better than having only a Republican to vote for on their ballot. You can crowd fundraise any filing fee very easily if you can’t afford the cost.
There’s no actual requirement to spend a certain amount of time on a campaign. And then of course there’s the potential for a shock lightning strike win if another Republican files as a 3rd party to run or the GOP’er gets disqualified/has a massive scandal break (how many Republicans have been arrested on cp charges and how many more are out there yet to be exposed as only 1 example). Doug Jones won 3 years as a Democratic Senator for 1 of the reddest states.
We miss 100% of the shots we don’t take. Put a name up every cycle so at least voters there are given a choice (and there are Democrats in every town/district/county across the country, no matter how red it is) so our voters have something to turnout for and those not GOP partisan voters know we care about earning their potential vote.
Whether that person wants to devote their time and money towards running, whether they want to go knock on doors, run ads, make signs, create mailers is completely up to them.
You need someone's consent to run in a hopeless race and risk their life in order to put their name on the ballot. Of course, theoretically, someone should run in every race, and the closer we can get to that, the better, but this is the real world.
Of course, I’m not saying file any name without talking to that person (and I’m really not sure why you’re assuming I’m making that argument given what I wrote), but there has to be 1 person out of the thousands who live in each area who would at least file to run for office.
I don’t hold anything against candidates if those fears do hold them back from running, they’re real questions with real potential consequences that someone has to consider. But what I’m advocating for is a name on the ballot that a person has consented to and filed for, without any expectation to actually run a real campaign.
I know realistically that there will never be any election where every office has a Democrat running, but if we can start to get down to only a couple hundred races left uncontested, that’s a very worthy goal to try to aim for and a clear message that we want to give every voter a choice. Right now it’s in the thousands and far more than that further down ballot.
My theory about putting a name on the ballot without a campaign is just to make the barrier into running for these hopeless districts easier for people and less of a job for someone who’s also trying to live their life. That would mean more candidates would consider compared to how it currently is, trying to convince party stalwarts to run a real hard campaign they know they will lose. The only ones who can commit to that are those retired or without children/with children fully grown.
It’s a smaller pool to pull from and further entrenches the image of the party as old people or those who don’t understand what the average voter cares about in thousands of districts. What we’re doing isn’t working, so let’s try something different.
https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2025/05/23/ricketts-gets-early-ads-from-group-tied-to-senate-gop-in-potential-osborn-race/
Republicans have already started campaigning for the Nebraska Senate race. As someone who believes that Texas and Alaska can be flipped in 2026, Nebraska's fundamentals are just too Republican to be flipped imo but Osborn's entire 2024 campaign was antithesis to and about opposing the big, beautiful bill before the bill itself so maybe there's an outside chance. He lost by 6.5 points, massively overperforming Democrats.
https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/nathan-sage-democrats-iowa-senate
Nathan Sage was the only candidate who lead Ernst after the candidates' backgrounds were made known to potential voters. He's sought to emulate Osborn.
Note: Sharing an article from a site doesn't mean I share its polarizing opinions, I shared it because I found it the to be the first article about poll and the only one containing the candidate's own perspective.
No reason not to run strong candidates/campaigns in as many places as possible. Some of them just might win, and—even if they lose—running up the score at the top of the ticket helps downballot candidates to get over the finish line as well.
Hear, hear! Democrats need a 3143-County Strategy, which means never again leaving any Republican candidate unopposed. Never again, anywhere!
Yep, especially in places with cheap media and/or complacent incumbents. Even "entrenched" politicians can be caught napping!
Realistically, there are some counties that are pointless, like the ones with populations of a few hundred in the Texas desert that vote 80% Republican or worse.
If I remember correctly, Democrats failed to challenge roughly a thousand state legislative seats in 2024. That is political malpractice! And it’s not a mitigating excuse that Republicans left even more races, 1300 or so, unchallenged.
Yes, there may well be some counties with further-downballlot races that seem pointless. But I still contend that Democrats’ cardinal rule should be: Run a candidate in every race!
Even in instances of near-certain loss, local candidates can win important arguments and tell voters what the Democratic Party stands for, strengthening our hand in the long term.
Maybe you could be more successful recruiting candidates for certain losses than the people who've done that until now, but everyone should recognize that it's not easy to get people to devote so much time, lost sleep, effort and probably money to such hopeless, highly intrusive to themselves and their families, and potentially dangerous endeavors. Especially now, we should be aware that Democratic candidates in highly Republican areas could be risking their lives.
I think there’s a happy medium between what both of you are saying. We should run in every race, we shouldn’t expect anyone to donate a lot of time or money to any campaign. I seriously don’t get why some Democratic voters or the party’s in these districts just file a name and do nothing else. It’s better than having only a Republican to vote for on their ballot. You can crowd fundraise any filing fee very easily if you can’t afford the cost.
There’s no actual requirement to spend a certain amount of time on a campaign. And then of course there’s the potential for a shock lightning strike win if another Republican files as a 3rd party to run or the GOP’er gets disqualified/has a massive scandal break (how many Republicans have been arrested on cp charges and how many more are out there yet to be exposed as only 1 example). Doug Jones won 3 years as a Democratic Senator for 1 of the reddest states.
We miss 100% of the shots we don’t take. Put a name up every cycle so at least voters there are given a choice (and there are Democrats in every town/district/county across the country, no matter how red it is) so our voters have something to turnout for and those not GOP partisan voters know we care about earning their potential vote.
Whether that person wants to devote their time and money towards running, whether they want to go knock on doors, run ads, make signs, create mailers is completely up to them.
You need someone's consent to run in a hopeless race and risk their life in order to put their name on the ballot. Of course, theoretically, someone should run in every race, and the closer we can get to that, the better, but this is the real world.
Of course, I’m not saying file any name without talking to that person (and I’m really not sure why you’re assuming I’m making that argument given what I wrote), but there has to be 1 person out of the thousands who live in each area who would at least file to run for office.
I don’t hold anything against candidates if those fears do hold them back from running, they’re real questions with real potential consequences that someone has to consider. But what I’m advocating for is a name on the ballot that a person has consented to and filed for, without any expectation to actually run a real campaign.
I know realistically that there will never be any election where every office has a Democrat running, but if we can start to get down to only a couple hundred races left uncontested, that’s a very worthy goal to try to aim for and a clear message that we want to give every voter a choice. Right now it’s in the thousands and far more than that further down ballot.
My theory about putting a name on the ballot without a campaign is just to make the barrier into running for these hopeless districts easier for people and less of a job for someone who’s also trying to live their life. That would mean more candidates would consider compared to how it currently is, trying to convince party stalwarts to run a real hard campaign they know they will lose. The only ones who can commit to that are those retired or without children/with children fully grown.
It’s a smaller pool to pull from and further entrenches the image of the party as old people or those who don’t understand what the average voter cares about in thousands of districts. What we’re doing isn’t working, so let’s try something different.
I don't disagree. Maybe you can persuade more people to consent to having their names put on ballots.
Obviously, Republicans are concerned.
I would love for Susan Collins to be concerned while being out of office.
The moment a Democrat runs in the NE-SEN race, it’s on.
I don’t care if it’s a some guy candidate. Get him in the Senate!
Osborn is running, he's an Independent who'll probably vote with Democrat 70 percent of the time and never support an anti labor justice.
Fine with me if he takes over the race!