Some actual good news for once, and more in today's ELECTIONS NEWS:
PRIMARY RESULTS
Eight states plus DC held primary elections yesterday. Some results of note:
- IA-04: White nationalist Rep Steve King lost the GOP primary to challenger Randy Feenstra. Feenstra is about 90% as bad as King, but isn't, you know, explicitly calling for race war or anything. Seat should now be Safe R.
- NM-02: Dems got what they wanted in the GOP primary, having semi-covertly backed former Rep Yvette Herrell, widely seen as the weaker candidate. Seat is a Tossup.
- NM-03: Progressive Teresa Leger Fernandez won the primary for this open seat over ex-CIA agent/possible anti-Semite Valerie Plame. Safe D.
- IN-01: Moderate option Frank Mrvan beat a number of progressives (not great) as well as outright conservative Thomas McDermott (great) for this open seat. Safe D.
- For the first time, Ferguson, MO has a black mayor. As a bonus, for the first time the school board is majority black, too.
- SD House Majority Leader defeated in GOP primary after flirting with anti-vaxxers.
- Lots of good legislative results in PA:
- Sen Daylin Leach, who has a history of (alleged) sexual harassment was turfed out by Amanda Cappelletti.
- Corrupt conservaDem Sen Larry Farnese lost to Bernie-backed Nikil Saval in SD-01.
- Party hack Adam Ravenstahl lost to progressive Emily Kinkead in HD-20.
- Trump-y party-endorsed Heather Kass got crushed in the HD-36 primary, coming in third behind progressive Jessica Benham.
- Two of 2018's DSA winners went unchallenged, the other (Summer Lee in HD-34) won handily.
- In HD-188, okay-ish James Roebuck losing to criminal justice reformer Rick Krajewski.
- On DC City Council:
- Ward 4 - conservaDem Brandon Todd lost to progressive Janeese Lewis George.
- Ward 2 - corrupt former councilmember Jack Evans got crushed in a comeback effort.
- Big upsets happening in the New Mexico Senate, where a block of conservaDems have been blocking or watering down progressive legislation (basically, the NM equivalent of the old NY IDC). ConservaDems have lost in SD-05 (Martinez), SD-28 (Ramos), SD-30 (Sanchez), SD-35 (Smith), and SD-38 (Papen). This likely means that we'll be seeing a lot more good legislation in NM in 2021 (the Dem hold on the legislature is basically solid).
HOUSE
- NY-16: The Dem primary here is heating up. The field consolidated as Andom Ghebreghiorgis dropped out and endorsed challenger Jamaal Bowman. Meanwhile, incumbent Rep Eliot Engel, who has been under fire for spending basically the entire pandemic holed up in DC - early corona epicenter New Rochelle is in the district - has now been caught making stupid remarks on a hot mic. Progressive groups are jumping in with ad dollars to try and capitalize.
SENATE
- NC: Meeting Street Insights poll has Dem Cunningham up 46-44 on GOP incumbent Tillis. | Civitas poll has Tillis up 38-36. Those undecideds seem unusually high....
- AZ: HighGround Public Affairs poll has Dem Kelly up 51-41 on GOP incumbent McSally. | Fox poll has Kelly up 50-37.
- MI: PPP poll has Dem incumbent Peters up 48-39 on GOPer James.
- ME: Victory Geek poll has Dem Gideon up 51-42 on GOP incumbent Collins. This appears to be a new firm, so.
- SC: Civiqs poll has Dem Harrison tied 42-42 with GOP incumbent Graham. Before you get too excited, the undecideds strongly back Trump, meaning they're quite likely to come home for Graham in the voting booth.
- KS: Ending the longest will he/won't he saga since Moonlighting (it was a TV show, look it up, you whippersnappers!), the Senate filing deadline here passed without SecState Pompeo jumping in. The race also consolidated a bit when state Senate President Susan Wagle dropped out last week. | A Civiqs poll has Dem Bollier basically tied with any of the three GOP contenders. This is kind of an eyebrow-raiser, as Kris Kobach has generally polled weaker against Bollier.
- MT: The GOP-backed Green candidate won the primary (the other candidate had pledged to basically drop out, so as to support Dems). Green and Libertarian candidates often play a spoiler role in MT elections, so this is not great for Dem Bullock.
STATES & CITIES
- NC gov: Same Meeting Street poll has Dem incumbent Cooper up 55-37 on GOPer Forest. | Same Civitas poll has Cooper up 49-37.
- MO gov: We Ask America poll has GOP incumbent Parson up 47-39 on Dem Galloway.
- The "split roll" initiative to reform California's disastrous Prop 13 property tax law has officially made the ballot for November.
- Dems had another special election pickup in Massachusetts, flipping HD-3rd Bristol.
ODDS & ENDS
- Texas Dems to use online training to get around the state's onerous restrictions on voter registration drives.
I really appreciate the continued updates here. Thanks!
Posted by: mbrubeck | 06/04/2020 at 11:27 AM