In This Case, Red and Blue Do Not Make Purple

Among the 51 entities that are entitled to electoral votes, Washington, DC, is the bluest and Oklahoma is the reddest. It's an interesting coincidence that they both held primaries yesterday, along with runoffs in Alabama and Georgia. Here are the most notable results:

• Trump Wins Some...: We're not sure we love the idea of framing every contest in terms of Donald Trump's endorsements, but that's how everyone is reporting the two biggies from yesterday, so we'll briefly allow it. In the Georgia U.S. Senate runoff, the President got his candidate in Rep. Mike Collins (R), who took 55% of the vote as compared to 45% for football coach Derek Dooley (R), who had the backing of Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA).
  
  Trump is sort of a winner here, in that his horse came out on top. But he's not much of a winner, since he waited until the last second to endorse, by which time the outcome was not seriously in doubt. Kemp, meanwhile, comes out of the night a loser, a fellow who can't even influence Republican politics in his own state. That does not augur well for a presidential bid. And the Republican Party is another loser here. The more extreme Collins is clearly the weaker opponent for Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), whose primary was uncontested, who has been banking all kinds of money, and who has run a disciplined, centrist campaign. Preliminary polling has Ossoff as a 5-point favorite over Collins, which seems about right to us.
  
  
• ...And He Loses Some: Meanwhile, both Trump AND Kemp were backing Lt. Gov. Burt Jones (R) for the nomination to replace the term-limited Kemp. Jones took 47% of the vote, as compared to 53% for businessman Rick Jackson, who showed the world that you can overcome a non-endorsement from Trump for the bargain price of $100 million. Jackson, like Collins, is the more extreme candidate. He is also politically inexperienced, and politically inexperienced candidates in Georgia have a bad habit of saying impolitic things (see Walker, Herschel).
  
  Jackson's success is good news for the Democrats and their candidate, former Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms. The only recent poll of that matchup has Bottoms up by a whopping 15 points, 53% to 38%. Even if you question the poll's conclusions, it still makes clear that Jackson is the weaker candidate, as the same poll had Bottoms leading Jones by just 10 points.
  
  
• U.S. Senate, Alabama: Rep. Barry Moore (R) easily won his runoff over former Navy SEAL Jared Hudson, 56%-44%. Aren't there only something like a few hundred Navy SEALs? Seems like half of them are running for office as Republicans at any given time. In any case, the GOP does not have great luck with Alabama Senate candidates named "Moore," so maybe lawyer Everett Wess, winner of the Democratic runoff with 54% of the vote, will somehow triumph. But we wouldn't bet on it if we were you.
  
  
• U.S. Senate, Oklahoma: Rep. Kevin Hern (R) easily won the right to run in the special election to succeed Markwayne Mullin, taking 69.8% of the vote to 14% for runner-up Gary Ty England (R). On the Democratic side, nurse N'Kiyla Jasmine Thomas and lawyer and minister Jim Priest advanced to a runoff. The last time Oklahoma sent a Democrat to the U.S. Senate, Bill Clinton was just the yokel governor of Arkansas, best known for giving a long and boring speech at the 1988 Democratic National Convention.
  
  Though we really don't like making every contest about Trump, we are duty-bound to point out that he did endorse Hern and Moore; in both cases when the contest was no longer in doubt. So, the President was 3-1 in the big races yesterday, though it's a pretty flimsy 3-1.
  
  
• Governor, Oklahoma: In the only primary that matters in this race, AG Gentner Drummond (R) claimed a shade over 26% of the vote, former state Sen. Mike Mazzei (R) got a shade under 26%, and they will advance to a runoff. Can Drummond overcome the fact that Mazzei has Trump's endorsement? Probably depends on whether he has a spare $100 million laying around. State Rep. Cyndi Munson got the Democratic nomination, not that it matters.
  
  
• Mayor, Washington, DC: The District has ranked-choice voting, so it could be a little while before we know the result of the Democratic primary (which is the de facto election, in the D+44 DC). However, the leftier Democrat, Janeese Lewis George, had 52.8% of the vote with 64% reporting. Needless to say, if she can stay above 50%, there will be no need to process the ranked ballots. The less lefty Kenyan R. McDuffie is in second place right now, with 36.6% of the vote.
  
  
• CA-14: Between Alabama, Georgia and Oklahoma, there are only two House seats that are swingy (the D+5 AL-02 and the D+4 GA-02), and neither had runoffs yesterday. So, the only House race from yesterday that's really of interest is the special election in CA-14, where Aisha Wahab (D) is close to the promised land, with 43% of the vote, but is not likely to avoid a runoff, most probably against Melissa Hernandez (D). Note that CA-14 is D+28, so the contest there is not THAT interesting; the district's obviously going to end up in Democratic hands. Incidentally. yesterday's election was for the right to finish off disgraced former Rep. Eric Swalwell's (D) term; Wahab is also the favorite to win the seat in her own right in November.
  
  
• OK-01: Actually, we lied. There's one other House race that's sort of interesting, albeit in an indirect way. State rep. Mark Tedford (R) and fundamentalist pastor Jackson Lahmeyer (R) advanced to a runoff for the R+11 district being vacated by Kevin Hern. The reason this is somewhat interesting is that Lahmeyer got caught... sexting with a woman who is not his wife. When Maine U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner (D) got caught doing the same thing, many right-wing politicians and pundits were so scandalized they needed their fainting couches and their smelling salts. The lack of GOP commentary on Lahmeyer, who holds himself out as a model of Christian virtue, may just hint at the existence of a double standard.
  
  
• Nevada Secretary of State: Speaking of double standards, Nevada did not have a primary yesterday, but it DID finish counting the ballots from last week's contest for the Republican nomination for state secretary of state. The race was won by crazypants Trumper and election denier Jim Marchant (R), who will now face off against the incumbent, Francisco Aguilar (D).
  
  Despite the fact that Nevada is a much smaller state than California, and has somewhat less rigorous anti-fraud measures in place, nary a Republican, from Donald Trump on down, has had so much as a peep of complaint about how long it took for Marchant to be crowned the winner of his primary. Hm, what explains the difference here? We'll have to get the Electoral-Vote.com research staff on that right away.

Not as interesting as last week but, by politics junkie standards, not too bad. Next week, it's primaries in Maryland, New York and Utah, along with runoffs in South Carolina. That should be pretty good. (Z)

Nuts and Bolts, Part I: Thom Tillis

For anyone who is interested in how the legislative sausage gets made—and that includes everyone who reads this site, right?—you don't often get the sort of direct view of things that was afforded by Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) late last week.

Tillis did not intend to give people a look into the sausage grinder, mind you. Following the vote on the DHS funding bill, which included a Tillis-sponsored, slush-fund-killing amendment that went down in flames, the Senator wrote a somewhat heated letter to his colleagues. The letter leaked to Punchbowl News, and then found its way into the hands of a couple of right-wing talk show hosts. Because Punchbowl requires an expensive subscription, and because the letter has appeared and disappeared from several different Twitter accounts in the past couple of days, we're just going to reproduce it below, for anyone who wants to read it for themselves. After, we'll have a few thoughts that occurred to us while reading (which should make sense even if you choose not to read the letter):

Colleagues,

I hope you all have had an opportunity to get some rest after another vote-a-rama. I'm sure most of you would prefer to move forward, but I believe we will look back at this experience as yet another reason why we will have historic headwinds against us in November.

We missed an opportunity to remove a political albatross (the 1776 Fund) from around the necks of our colleagues who are in cycle. Instead, we added weight to that albatross by having 41 members vote to protect the program. In addition, we allowed two SAVE Act votes that had no place in vote-a-rama, which prompted a circular firing squad led by Tommy Tuberville and some of our republican colleagues.

I cannot understand why a supermajority of our conference voted against the side-by-side I offered. I went forward with offering the amendment at the request of members in cycle. The amendment simply ended the 1776 payout pot AND appropriated $1.7 BILLION to the DoJ fraud initiative.

I knew most democrats would not vote for my amendment because of the DoJ funding, but I thought it would be a good landing place for members to voice their concerns with the 1776 fund. How did I know democrats would vote AGAINST it? I asked them. They simply would not support the DoJ/Fraud funding, which is precisely why I had the provision in the amendment. The chance of this amendment passing and threatening the privilege of the underlying bill was ZERO.

If you voted against my amendment because you were afraid it would strip the reconciliation bill of privilege, you were misinformed or a victim of groupthink. If you did for that reason, you should have voted against the SAVE Act for the same reason. Had either version of the SAVE Act been adopted, the underlying bill would also have been at risk of losing privilege.

We took a major risk with the SAVE Act had democrats wanted to meddle. If I had been a democratic leader, I would have convinced a sufficient number of democrats to vote for it, and, immediately after it was adopted, I would have argued it was fatal to the privilege of the underlying bill.

But the real problem I have is that the President (and a few of our members?) forced us to take two more unsuccessful votes for the SAVE Act at the expense of our most vulnerable members in cycle. Susan Collins rightfully voted against it, representing her home state of Maine, which voted against it by nearly a 65/35 margin in a 2025 referendum. Rural state senators voted for it, but now they must explain why shutting down mail-in ballots, ending early voting, and complicating registration is a good thing for rural voters in big states. Other members will need to account for their past positions in support of the state laws that would be repealed or preempted if the SAVE Act passes. Even worse, Tommy Tuberville and others initiated a circular firing squad calling out Susan Collins and other republicans by name. Amazing: Members NOT in cycle attacking our most at-risk member because she supports the view of 65% of the voters in her state.

Tommy Tuberville said: "It was beyond EMBARRASSING that "Republicans" continue to block the SAVE America Act @SenThomTillis, @LisaMurkowski, @SenMcConnell, and @SenatorCollins have not only betrayed their constituents — they are ACCOMPLICES in Democrats' "Illegals First" agenda. The people of North Carolina, Alaska, Kentucky, and Maine deserve better."

I find this remarkable on several levels, but you would think a member of Tommy's comms team who has a spouse working on the NRSC's leadership team could see how this is only helpful to Susan's opponent. Do these people talk? Other members have referred to those who oppose nuking the filibuster and passing the SAVE Act as "traitors" and "defectors" on social media.

Everyone knew the SAVE Act votes would fail, yet we went ahead anyway because the President requested them at the expense of our members. This simply prompted more attacks on our own, which I assume was the President's goal.

Three of our most vulnerable members were already forced to vote on the first Schumer amendment, focused on the 1776 fund and the motion to commit. Cassidy and I voted against it to give our members room to vote for it.

After that vote, I informed the most vulnerable in-cycle members that I would vote however a majority of them wanted me to. If it meant voting with them or, like the Schumer amendment, against them, I offered them my proxy for the night. I am not suggesting that you give members your proxy, but I am suggesting forcing votes that have no upside for in-cycle members AND attacking them when they vote is not helpful to saving our majority. I get in Tuberville's case it was likely to help boost him in the Alabama governor's race, but was it really worth calling Susan Collins an "embarrassing accomplice who betrayed her constituents?"

Based on last week's reconciliation experience, I hope we have learned a lesson that will not be repeated if we choose to move another reconciliation bill in this congress. In my opinion, last week's vote was a net loss for in-cycle members. I am not diminishing the importance of funding DHS, but the "gain" from that will not offset the "pain" we've created in key races.

The road to holding our majority is already difficult. We cannot afford any more unforced errors like this between now and November.

Respectfully, Thom T.

And now, our thoughts:

1. Tillis is not MAGA, but he's still a Republican, and no matter how much he disdains Trump, he still views himself as a contributing member of Team GOP. He agreed to offer the amendment so that any blowback from Trump and/or right-wing media would end up hitting him, and not members who are up for reelection this year. In other words, he took one for the team. This is worth keeping in mind when wondering why Tillis, along with the other nothing-to-lose senators like Bill Cassidy (R-LA), John Cornyn (R-TX) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY) don't rebel nearly as often as you might think they would. They're still on Team Red.
   
   
2. It was hardly a secret, but this is black-and-white evidence that members coordinate their amendments and their votes to help out folks who are up for reelection and who are facing tough opponents. Indeed, it would not be too far wrong to say that everything Tillis did during the DHS bill vote-a-rama, he did with the idea of trying to help Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), the Republicans' most vulnerable member this cycle.
   
   
3. On that point, no matter what kind of brave face the Senate Republican Conference might put on this cycle, they know they're in a rough place, and they know Collins is at serious risk of losing her job (and see below for more).
   
   
4. Tillis and, by implication, many other members, know full well that the slush fund is politically poisonous. That said, only 15 of them were actually brave enough to vote for the amendment to kill it. We would guess that among the 38 or so cowards are some sizable number who are hoping that the beast somehow gets slain in some other way, without the senators having to be the ones who wield the steely knife.
   
   
5. Similarly, some sizable number of Republican members know that the SAVE Act is some combination of poisonous, since it would motivate Democrats to get to the polls in droves, and a non-starter, since it will never overcome a filibuster.
   
   
6. We have often written that Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) is the dumbest current member of the Senate, and that he is in the running for the dumbest member ever. Clearly, the more savvy Republican senators are in agreement with us, and disdain him for his idiocy and his selfishness. In this case, Tillis is clearly annoyed that Tuberville does not seem to know or care that: (1) the SAVE Act is very bad for members who do not represent states as red as Alabama, (2) that trying to jam the SAVE Act into the DHS bill risked torpedoing the whole enterprise, since the SAVE Act clearly is not budget-related, and (3) that people who are NOT running for governor of Alabama—like, say, Collins—have a different calculus, and one that the Republican conference must respect.
   
   
7. The Republican members—at least, some of them—know that Trump not only does not have their best interests at heart, but suspect that he deliberately tries to inflict harm on many of them. Specifically, the President keeps pushing the SAVE Act, despite the obvious problems that it presents for the Senate.
   
   
8. The Senate's somewhat legendary collegiality still exists at some level, even if it excludes members who are jerks, as Tuberville is. Not only did Tillis try to help out Collins, but he also clearly has decent working relationships with many Democrats, who were willing to be honest with him about their thinking.
   
   
9. The whole process really is 3-D chess, at least among the members who aren't nitwits. Note Tillis' analysis that the Democrats could have pulled a double-cross, backed the SAVE Act stuff, and then used that to take down the whole bill. It is improbable that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) would have tried it, as his members don't want to be on record voting for the SAVE Act (even if for duplicitous reasons). Still, you can be 100% certain that Schumer, and the other intelligent senators of both parties, saw that such a move was there on the chessboard.
   
   
10. Though Tillis is still a member of Team GOP, he may be a shade less enthusiastic about that than he was last week, and he may be more prone to rebel during the balance of his term.

We do love some good sausage-making around here, and this is some of the best we've seen in quite a while. (Z)

Nuts and Bolts, Part II: Susan Collins

As long as we are on the general subject of sausage-making, let's also take a look at an excellent piece that Jim Newell wrote for Slate yesterday under the headline "The Legend of Susan Collins." It's a deep dive that endeavors to explain how Susan Collins manages to keep defying the political gravity that has otherwise turned Maine blue.

If you really like knowing about nuts and bolts, then it's worth reading the whole piece, even if it's something like 4,000 words. But Newell argues that the secret of Collins' success, in a word, is "pork." She is legendarily good at bringing home lots of bacon to Maine, even if that state is better known for a different non-kosher meat. The Senator has spent her entire career building her pork-producing operation, and now that she's chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, the operation has shifted from mere "light speed" into "ludicrous speed."

The Senator is not only very good at securing money for Maine, she's also good at distributing it effectively. That is to say, she's built relationships with key interest groups in the states—firefighters, scientists, small business owners—and made sure they know she's got their backs, financially. Similarly, Maine is the oldest state in the union, with a median age of 45. This being the case, it's no surprise that Collins' is the Senate's biggest fan of research money for diseases that disproportionately affect the elderly (in particular, Alzheimer's and diabetes). She's also mindful of geography, and makes sure that each of Maine's 16 counties benefits some from her largesse—a bridge here, a post office there, a small airport over there, etc.

Collins is also very good—or, at least, very shameless—when it comes to reminding Mainers about all that money, and where it's coming from. Pro-Collins super PAC commercials used to suggest that citizens call or write the Senator to thank her for her efforts. That's a little gauche, though, so now they suggest that citizens call or write her to urge her to keep fighting. Collins keeps careful track of exactly how much bacon she brings home, and makes sure everyone knows that number. For example, the press release she put out for FY 2025-26 puts the total at $428,643,000.

That total also speaks to why this approach to politics won't work for just any member. Again, it takes a lot of time and effort to build this kind of operation. Beyond that, however, $428,643,000 is an eye-popping number when talking about a state with a population of 1.41 million people. That's around $300 in federal spending for every man, woman and child. By contrast, in a very populous state like California, that kind of impact would require an outlay of $11,430,000,000. No senator can bring THAT much pork home.

Looking at the Collins-Graham Platner (D) tilt through this lens does bring a certain clarity to the dynamics of this closely watched race. As a left-wing populist, Platner is arguing that the little guys are being left behind, and that he will go to Washington and try to fix that. Collins, by contrast, is arguing that a rising tide lifts all boats, and that the money she brings home will help everyone, including the folks who have been left behind. You might describe the choice facing voters as "$300 in the hand vs. way more than $300 in the bush." The election could be decided by folks who feel that $300 in the hand just isn't enough anymore.

There's one other useful, non-financial, observation that Newell makes in his piece. In 2014, Collins won reelection by 37 points, 68%-31%. In 2020, she won reelection by just 9 points, 51% to 42%. That election is somewhat legendary because Collins so thoroughly outperformed the polls, which generally had her losing handily. However, the election was actually much closer than it looks, because in 2020 Maine was using ranked-choice voting for the U.S. Senate. Third-place finisher Lisa Savage took 5% of the vote, and she had urged her supporters to rank Democrat Sara Gideon second. Since Collins cleared 50% in the first round, the ranked-choice ballots were never tabulated, but it's probable that Gideon would have picked up another 4.5% or so. If so, then Collins went from winning by 37 in 2014 to winning by something more like 4 points in 2020. Needless to say, that trendline should have the Senator feeling "concerned." (Z)

Democratic Presidential Candidate of the Week, #25: Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL)

It is finally time to restart this series.

To begin, we are going to re-christen the dozen candidates we'd already done as "runners-up." Here they are, in alphabetical order:

Runner-up: Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)
Runner-up: Gov. Katie Hobbs (D-AZ)
Runner-up: Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA)
Runner-up: Al Franken
Runner-up: Mitch Landrieu
Runner-up: Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT)
Runner-up: Gov. Phil Murphy (D-NJ)
Runner-up: Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA)
Runner-up: Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT)
Runner-up: Jon Stewart
Runner-up: Jon Tester
Runner-up: Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA)

We are going to start a new ranked list today; once we've worked our way through the whole list, we will add another five profiles, chosen by vote of the readers, that we will call "wild cards."

Up today is Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL):

• Full Name: Ladda Tammy Duckworth
  
  
• Age on January 20, 2029: 60 (though she'll only be a month or so away from her 61st birthday)
  
  
• Background: Duckworth is the child of Vietnam-veteran Marine, Franklin Duckworth, and a Thai-Chinese mother, Lamai Sompornpairin. After being discharged from the military, Franklin worked for many years for the United Nations helping refugees; it was during this time that he met Lamai, and that Tammy and her brother Thomas were born.
  
  The family moved around Asia during Tammy's childhood, and while she spoke only Thai until she was 10, she eventually acquired fluency in English and Indonesian, as well. During her teenage years, Franklin's work with refugees came to an end, and the family relocated from Singapore to Hawaii, because Hawaii was the only American state the Duckworths could afford to fly to. Several years of poverty followed, though the future senator maintained excellent grades while also working part-time to help make ends meet. She went on to earn a B.A. in political science from the University of Hawaii, Manoa, followed by a an M.A. in international affairs from George Washington University. Much later in life, she took a Ph.D. in human services from Capella University's School of Public Service Leadership.
  
  At various times during her educational career, Duckworth planned to follow in her father's footsteps and become a U.N. refugee worker, or else to join the U.S. Foreign Service. However, to pay her tuition, she joined ROTC, and through that program she met her husband of (now) 33 years, and she also developed a passion for military service. She spent stints in the Army and in the National Guard as a helicopter pilot. And on November 12, 2004, while serving on active duty in Iraq, her helicopter was hit by enemy fire, resulting in serious injury to Duckworth, including the loss of both of her legs. She ultimately spent over a year at Walter Reed Hospital, undergoing 20 surgeries.
  
  
• Political Experience: Walter Reed gets a lot of visits from politicians, for obvious reasons, and while she recuperated, Duckworth met two pretty important ones, namely Sens. Bob Dole (R-KS) and Dick Durbin (D-IL). Her interactions with that duo inspired her to start thinking about a career in politics.
  
  Duckworth tried for a seat in the U.S. House shorty after leaving the hospital, but lost to Peter Roskam (R) in IL-08 in a squeaker, coming up 4,810 votes short. So, she began her public career in appointed positions, first serving three years as Director of the Illinois Department of Veterans' Affairs, then serving another couple of years as Assistant Secretary of Public and Intergovernmental Affairs for the Department of Veterans Affairs in the Barack Obama administration. She announced a run for the House of Representatives in 2012, taking on then-incumbent Joe Walsh (R) in IL-08. This time, she won easily, 55%-45%, serving two terms.
  
  In 2016, Duckworth announced that she'd try to knock of another Republican incumbent, namely Sen. Mark Kirk. In a development that is hardly surprising, giving who was heading the Republican ticket that year, Kirk decided to dabble in a little racism. After Duckworth claimed (correctly) during a debate that, "My family has served this nation in uniform going back to the Revolution," Kirk fired back with "I'd forgotten that your parents came all the way from Thailand to serve George Washington." He (Kirk, not Washington) had to apologize for that, but the damage was done, and numerous moderate and/or military groups pulled their endorsements. Benefiting from the blue-ing of the once-purple Illinois, Duckworth trounced Kirk 55% to 40%, and has been in the U.S. Senate ever since.
  
  
• Signature Issue(s): Veterans affairs, especially healthcare.
  
  
• What Would Her Pitch Be?: "Unlike some people, I know what war is like. And so, when I say I won't lead the U.S. into ill-conceived military conflicts, I mean it."
  
  
• Instructive Quote: "Lucky for me, he's an ass man." This is inscribed on a t-shirt that Duckworth likes to wear when appearing in public with her husband.
  
  
• Completely Trivial Fact: Duckworth sometimes uses her prosthetic limbs to sneak candy onto the Senate floor. And one time, when she and her colleagues were staging a sit-in, she hid her cell phone in there to keep it from being confiscated.
  
  
• Recent News: Duckworth, the first sitting U.S. Senator to give birth, has been fighting to add IVF treatments to veterans' healthcare benefits. Though the provision has broad, bipartisan support, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA)—who, remember, says he is pro-life—arranged to have it removed from next year's defense appropriations bill. The Senator, as you can imagine, is not happy.
  
  
• Strengths for the Democratic Primaries: (1) She checks many boxes, diversity-wise; (2); Many Democrats think nominating a veteran is the key to the holy land (despite the fact that the last Democrat-veteran to win the White House was Jimmy Carter and Republicans swiftboated John Kerry); (3) She is closely associated with the most popular Democrat in the land, Barack Obama, who would certainly help her campaign.
  
  
• Weaknesses for the Democratic Primaries: (1) She comes from a state that goes late in the primary process (usually, late March, well after Super Tuesday), and that is likely to have multiple presidential candidates fighting for its support; (2) She's got some baggage from her time at the Illinois VA; (3) She's not a particularly inspiring or charismatic public figure, which is a problem for would-be presidents today.
  
  
• Polls: Nobody is polling her as a presidential candidate. However, YouGov says she has a 54% approval rating, against 22% disapproval, for a net of +32.
  
  
• Rank, Initial Reader Poll: #29
  
  
• Rank, Readers' Preferred Candidates: #22
  
  
• How Does the Readership Feel?: We asked readers for their thoughts on Duckworth running for president; here are some of those responses:
  
  
  • N.B. in Beardstown, IL: Illinois resident and involved Democrat here.
    
    I like Tammy Duckworth. I've met her a few times and followed her career since she was a representative from a neighboring district. Gotta appreciate the war service and the massive sacrifices she has made. And she's a fine senator and represents me well.
    
    Unfortunately, Tammy is not very charismatic and, when speaking off the cuff, doesn't come across as the sharpest knife. This is probably unfair—I'm not aware of her educational achievements or general intelligence level. But in the TV age, it's the perception that matters, and I fear Tammy could be weak in this regard.
    
    All that said, perhaps a good VP pick.
    
    
  • R.H. in Guadalajara, Mexico: Tammy has received $561,821 from AIPAC, according to Track AIPAC. Given that we're witnessing one of the worst atrocities of the century happen in front of our eyes in Gaza (and certainly the worst that the U.S. has been directly involved in), clearing the low bar of not supporting a genocidal state should be a must for any candidate.
    
    Of course, the vast majority of 2028 candidates can't even clear that low bar of not supporting a genocide and not accepting corporate PAC money. Thus, this exercise really serves no purpose for The Left. But I know one major candidate who doesn't (Ro Khanna) and older, establishment voters are going to be flabbergasted soon about something they should have seen from a mile away.
    
    
  • D.W. in Manhattan, MT: As a fellow Iraq War veteran, I've been waiting for Tammy Duckworth to run for president since she was first elected to the Senate in 2016. Legitimate war-hero, solid Democratic bona-fides, scandal-free (except for breastfeeding in the Senate chamber; what a boss). What a dynamite candidate for the blue team, which undoubtedly means she won't get the pick. The establishment won't choose a woman again for a while, but pair her up with astronaut-senator Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and I think you'd really have a shot at not only winning but actually governing, too. History shows two terms as VP lead to one term as president, so I'll take it.
    
    
  • M.J.F. in Upper Deerfield, NJ: So, let me get this straight. First lady, Secretary of State, and literally the most qualified person who ever ran can't be president. Uniquely qualified vice-president also can't win. Yet, we should pin our hopes on Tammy Duckworth? God love her, but... no. And you know why.
    
    
  • A.G. in Los Angeles, CA: The biggest issue for Tammy is that nobody really knows anything about her despite being a senator for almost a decade. I follow politics more than probably 90% of the USA. All I can really say about her is she is a senator from Illinois and a combat veteran who lost both her legs. In our attention economy. I don't know if she can get her voice out there enough to succeed.
    
    
  • M.M. in San Diego, CA: Doesn't have a high enough national profile to run for president, though running would raise it sufficiently for 2032, or she could contend for the 2028 VP slot.
    
    
  • D.C. in Bowie, MD: I would say that she is the complete opposite of Donald Trump in every way I can think of, and there just can't be higher praise than that.
    
    
  • J.M. in Chicago, IL: As a long time Chicagoan who has worked in all three branches of the Federal Govt, I have some thoughts.
    
    Sen. Duckworth is a good, solid senator, but a president? No. While her military service and sacrifice is highly admirable, I can't think of anything she has done while in office, other than "voting right." It's true that she is the junior senator to Dick Durbin, but other junior senators have accomplished much in the Senate. Heck, in Chicago and Illinois, we're just happy that she is not an indicted felon.
    
    
  • S.P. in Harrisburg, PA: The Senator has a solid biography, but seems to keep a fairly low profile in the Senate. If she ran, she would be running for a Cabinet position at best, possibly Secretary of Defense.
  
  
• The Bottom Line: We don't really think she'll run for president, or that she'll get anywhere if she does try. However, this series is also a backdoor preview of potential VP candidates, and that is certainly not out of the realm of possibility.

Next week, it's #24, Gov. Tony Evers (D-WI). If readers have comments about Evers running for president in 2028, please send them to comments@electoral-vote.com.

Never Forget: Not Every Rosie Was a Riveter

Today's reminiscence is courtesy of J.M. in Portland, OR:

My father served honorably in the USMC, 1st Marine Division, in the South Pacific. This story isn't about him, however, but about the other half of the Greatest Generation.

At the age of 20, my mother took a train from Boston to Washington, DC, to marry a handsome Marine she had met on a blind date. I doubt she had ever been out of Massachusetts before. She was one of 11 children from an old, if humble, Boston family. Her ancestors had come over on the Mayflower. My father was first generation American out of the Azores.

They had just enough time to get married and get my mother pregnant, though neither could have known that before he shipped out.

She returned to Boston, lived with her Aunt Eunice, and, I believe, did secretarial work. I know nothing about those days or how her pregnancy affected her. I believe she fell somewhere in the middle of those 11 kids, so she was no doubt familiar with birth and child care. That said, how could she not have been terrified, carrying a child with no reason to believe she would ever see the father again? All she had was hope and faith.

My oldest sister, Pat, tells me she was born during a blizzard. When my mother went into labor, she had to get a ride in a neighbor's pickup truck, accompanied by her cousin Marjorie. They drove to the Naval hospital in Chelsea (I think). One of the memories my sister passed to me was these big sailors carrying tiny babies around the natal ward. I don't know if anyone else was there.

I have no idea how much or how little my father knew about what was happening back home. He wouldn't see his first-born daughter until she was 18 months old. He must have gotten a letter some weeks after the birth.

My father did return from the Pacific and they lived for a time in New York, while my dad served at the Brooklyn Naval Yard. I only recently learned that he was preparing to return to action in the pending invasion of Japan. We all know how that turned out. Hard to feel good about our dropping the bomb(s), but with the war over they were able to settle down in the Boston area, have 2 more daughters and me, their only son. They remained married 50+ years until my dad's passing in 1998:



The incredible courage they both showed in persevering through such a difficult and terrifying time just amazes me.

Thanks, J.M. (Z)

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