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New polls: WI
Dem pickups: (None)
GOP pickups: GA PA
Four More States' Voters Head to the Polls
There were primaries in Kansas, Michigan, Missouri and Washington on Tuesday. We should have written them up yesterday, but we were too busy writing about Tim Walz. So, 24 hours late, here are the main storylines:
- Governor, Missouri: This one is largely about abortion access. From a field of three
Republicans, Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe emerged, taking 39.4% of the GOP vote. Kehoe was the most "moderate" of the trio, since
he favors allowing abortions in the cases of incest and rape. His opponent will be state Rep. Crystal Quade (D), who easily
outdistanced five other candidates with 50.2% of the vote. Missouri had a Democratic governor as recently as 2017, so a
win for Quade is not impossible. However, she will need two things to happen to have a chance: (1) that a proposed
abortion initiative qualifies for the November ballot, and (2) that the initiative draws a lot of left-leaning voters to
the polls.
- Governor, Washington: This was a battle royale, because Washington's jungle-style primary
meant that all the candidates—28 of them—were lumped together on the ballot. Despite the large field, AG Bob
Ferguson (D-WA) took 45% of the vote. He will face off against former representative Dave Reichert (R), who took 28% of
the vote. Although Reichert is running as a moderate, he would need to consolidate all of the Republican, independent
and third party vote from Tuesday and THEN win over roughly 10% of the people who voted Democratic. That's a very tall
hill to climb. Impossibly tall, really, so Ferguson is going to be the next governor.
- U.S. Senate, Michigan: Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) cruised, as expected, taking 76.3%
of the vote, and dispatching progressive candidate Hill Harper. Former representative Mike Rogers (R) also cruised,
as expected, taking 63.2% of the vote. He knocked off two rivals, most notably former representative Justin Amash.
Slotkin is a more talented politician, has less baggage than Rogers (see below), and Michigan is a blue-leaning
state. So, Slotkin is the solid favorite here.
- U.S. Senate, Missouri: No surprises here; Lucas Kunce (D) took 67.7% of the vote to easily
outpace three other Democratic candidates, and will now face off against Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO), who was unopposed.
Missouri is pretty red these days, but Hawley is pretty obnoxious, while Kunce is pretty close to the perfect Democratic
candidate—moderate, young, good looking, military veteran, etc. As with the governor's race, this one will be
affected by abortion rights; Kunce favors access while Hawley and his wife are closely associated with the militant
anti-abortion position. Hawley is the unquestionable favorite, but an upset here would be less surprising than one
in, say, Mississippi or Wyoming.
- U.S. Senate, Washington: There were only three people in this jungle-style race, and two
of them advanced. The two are Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA), who got 57.9% of the vote, and perennial candidate Raul
Garcia (R), who got 21.3%. Cantwell is even more of a sure thing in November than her fellow Washingtoninan
Ferguson; she's won four times before, and her most recent win was by 17 points.
- KS-02: There was a knock-down, drag-out primary in this R+11 district, which is open due
to the retirement of Rep. Jake LaTurner (R-KS). The fellow left standing, among five Republicans, is former Kansas AG
Derek Schmidt, who took 53.1% of the vote. He's very right-wing and very Trumpy, but so is Kansas, so he will knock off
his newly-minted Democratic opponent, former representative Nancy Boyda.
- KS-03: At R+1, this is Kansas' only competitive House district (the others are
double-digit red). Rep. Sharice Davids (D-KS) will try to defend the seat against physician Prasanth Reddy (R). Reddy
does not appear to be a particularly strong candidate; he outspent his only opponent, Karen Crnkovich, 8-to-1, and yet
took just 53.1% of the vote to Crnkovich's 46.9%. Further, the district is moving in a blue direction, according to the
Kansas City Star. So, Davids will likely keep her job.
- MI-03: Michigan has a number of competitive seats. Maaayyyybe that is because the district
maps are drawn by the Michigan Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission, as opposed to partisan legislators. In any
case, the first of the competitive districts is the D+1 MI-03. Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-MI), who took 90% of the vote in
her primary, learned on Tuesday that her opponent in November will be Paul Hudson (R), who took 54.7% in HIS primary.
His slogan is "Common sense for crazy times." Maybe that sounds good on paper, but those kinds of platitudes rarely lead
to victory. Scholten's a solid favorite here.
- MI-04: Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-MI) is gunning for an eighth term in this R+5 district. That
makes the district "competitive," but barely so. His opponent will be attorney Jessica Swartz (D), who is running on a platform
of—wait for it—common sense. She will try to leverage Huizenga's strongly anti-choice position, and his
election denial, but she's a longshot.
- MI-07: This R+2 district is the one Elissa Slotkin is departing in order to run for the
Senate. There was no drama on Tuesday as former state senators Curtis Hertel (D) and Tom Barrett (R) were both
unopposed. As with so many races this year, the largest area of daylight between the candidates is on the issue of
abortion. Hertel is strongly pro-choice, whereas Barrett says his anti-choice views don't matter because his opponent is
not a woman. We will see if women voters in the district feel the same way.
- MI-08: Rep. Dan Kildee (D-MI) is retiring from the R+1 district. It was a three-way race
on each side of the aisle. The Democrat will be Kristen McDonald Rivet, who took 53.4% of the vote, and who says she
wants to restore the "Michigan Dream." The Republican will be Paul Junge, who took 74.8%, and who has a considerably
more substantive platform. Both parties will dump money into this swingy race, but Junge appears to be the stronger
candidate.
- MI-10: This R+3 district is represented by Rep. John James (R-MI), who ran for statewide
office a couple of times and lost, and then decided to move down the ladder. His opponent will be judge and former
prosecutor Carl Marlinga, who could spend a decade at a Buddhist retreat in Tibet learning discipline and focus, and
still would be unable to be any more of a bland, middle-of-the-road Democrat than he already is. Because James is Black,
he makes the GOP "diverse," so the Party is going to do whatever it can to make sure he keeps this seat.
- MO-01: In contrast to Michigan, the district maps in Missouri are drawn by the highly
partisan state legislature, and there are no competitive districts in the state. Probably just a big coincidence, right?
As a result of this, the only really interesting primary was in MO-01, which is the state's only Democratic district,
with a whopping PVI of D+27. You've probably already heard that Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) was primaried by the much more
moderate St. Louis County DA Wesley Bell (D). That makes Bush the second Squad member to go down to defeat in the
primaries, following Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY). Both representatives are strongly pro-Palestinian, which resulted in big
AIPAC bucks for their Democratic challengers. Bell will lay waste to Republican Andrew Jones in November.
- MO-03: This district, which is R+16, won't be competitive in the general. However, it WAS
competitive in the primary, thanks to the retirement of Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO). Bob Onder (R), who is pretty
looney tunes, came out on top, with 47.4% of the vote in a seven-candidate field. His sacrificial lamb in November will
be scientist Bethany Mann (D).
- WA-03: Like Michigan, Washington uses a redistricting commission. And like Michigan,
several of Washington's districts are competitive. Funny how that works. The first of the competitive districts is
WA-03, which is R+5, but is represented by a Democrat, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez. She took 46.0% of the vote in her
jungle-style primary, with ultra-Trumpy Republican Joe Kent, a veteran and former CIA officer, in second with 39%. Kent
is a nutty conspiracy theorist, he lost to Gluesenkamp Perez once before, and the up-ballot races figure to bring a lot
of Democrats to the polls. So, despite the Republican lean of the district, bet on Gluesenkamp Perez to keep her seat.
- WA-04: Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-WA), who represents this R+11 district, is one of two
Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump and who are still in the House. The others either fell on their
swords or were swept out of office by Trumpy voters. Newhouse advanced to the general on Tuesday, with 24.5%
of the vote. However, he was outpaced by Jerrod Sessler (R), who is very Trumpy, and who took 31.2% of the vote.
We do not claim to have our fingers on the pulse of Washington politics, but we assume that the district's
Democrats will line up behind the less Trumpy Republican, and that Newhouse will keep his seat on the strength
of those votes.
- WA-06: This D+6 district is open, thanks to the retirement of Rep. Derek Kilmer (D-WA).
It had a real brawl between two Democrats, state Sen. Emily Randall and state Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz.
Randall came out ahead, with 33.9% of the vote, while Republican state Sen. Drew MacEwen squeezed in there with
30.3% of the vote, good enough for second place. So, Franz is out, and Randall will undoubtedly consolidate all or
most of the 60% of the vote that went Democratic, earning a trip to Washington.
- WA-08: At D+1, this is Washington's most competitive district. Rep. Kim Schrier (D-WA)
advanced to the general with ease, taking 51.2% of the vote. She will face banker Carmen Goers (R), who took 44.6%.
The main thing Goers is running on? You guessed it, common sense. Again, we do not claim to have keen insight into
Washington State politics. However, given that Schrier is incumbent, and given that 55.3% of the vote in WA-08
on Tuesday went Democratic, and given the potential coattails of Kamala Harris, Bob Ferguson, and Maria Cantwell, Schrier seems
to be a safe bet to keep her job.
- Trump: After the results were in, Donald Trump
took a victory lap
on his boutique, $25.72-a-share social media platform, crowing: "A BIG NIGHT IN AMERICA. I was 24 for 24 in
Endorsements, with numerous candidates that won being long shots. Very happy! Congratulations to All, do a great job for
America!"
This is true, but it also omits two important details. The first is that most of Trump's endorsees were slam dunks. The second is that, in several of the races that were not slam dunks, he endorsed multiple candidates. For example, in WA-04, he backed both Sessler and Tiffany Smiley (R). And in Missouri, he endorsed all three Republicans running for governor. It's rather easier to bat 1.000 if you get to swing at some pitches multiple times.
That's the latest. Next up is Hawaii, which will nominate a bunch of Democrats this weekend. Then, next Tuesday, it's Connecticut, Minnesota, Vermont and Wisconsin. All four will have both Senate and House races; Vermont will also add in a gubernatorial contest. (Z)
Harris and Walz Hit the Rest of the Blue Wall
The "Northern Route" (a.k.a., the "blue wall") consists of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan. On Tuesday, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz campaigned in Philadelphia, PA. Yesterday, they campaigned in Eau Claire, WI, and Detroit, MI.
Their whirlwind tour of the swing states, first in the North and later in the South, is intended to introduce both candidates to the voters. While Harris' name is well known, many people have no idea what she stands for. Walz is even more of a mystery to the general public. In a recent poll, 70% of the voters had never even heard of him. The tour is intended to rectify that, at least in the swing states.
In Eau Claire, both of them hit Donald Trump and Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) hard on abortion. They noted that now 20 states have now banned the procedure, often with no exceptions for rape or incest. Polls have shown that abortion bans are wildly unpopular with voters outside of the hard-core Republican base. Harris also talked about her time as a prosecutor who took on giant corporations for price gouging. Walz talked about his years as a teacher and his 24 years in the National Guard.
The campaign said it had raised $36 million from small donors in the 24 hours after Harris announced her running mate would be Walz.
The Republicans are not letting Harris and Walz get all the free PR. Vance is shadowing them wherever they go. Before Harris introduced Walz to the country on Tuesday in Philadelphia, Vance gave a lengthy press conference in that city. He said that Harris is a disaster and blamed her for the war in Europe, the war in Gaza, and Tuesday's stock market crash. And you thought the vice presidency wasn't worth a bucket of warm pi**. Silly you.
In Shelby Township, MI, yesterday, Vance continued calling Harris and Walz extreme leftists. This claim is so built into Republican ideology that he can't help it. But he should be careful. For many young Bernie fans, that is a plus, not a minus, and it may encourage people to get off their respective couches and vote in November.
Vance was also asked about Trump's comments about how Harris "turned Black" for political gain. He said: "She pretends to be one thing when she's in front of one audience. She pretends to be something else when she's in front of a different audience."
The youngsters—Harris, Walz, and Vance—are running around the country like crazy. Trump has only one appearance this week, in Bozeman, MT, in support of Senate candidate Tim Sheehy. This schedule does not exactly exude youth and vitality.
Trump has long had a slogan: Make America Great Again. Harris seems to understand she needs a slogan, too, so she has been road testing one: "We're not going back." That is the exact opposite of Trump's. His implies America used to be better. Hers implies things are better now than they used to be. Both are ambiguous enough to allow all manner of interpretation, though.
One difference between the two teams is increasingly clear. Harris/Walz are going to run an upbeat campaign and talk about how great America is already and how they will fix a few remaining bugs. They are also talking about how they are having fun campaigning. Trump/Vance are going to campaign on American carnage and how America is a horrible dystopia that only they can fix. Fun couldn't be further from their minds. It will be interesting to see how this develops. Historically, optimistic has beaten pessimistic. (V)
Vance Is Getting Less Popular by the Week
J.D. Vance was never a popular pick as Donald Trump's running mate, and it is getting worse each week, sometimes significantly. Call it the Revenge of the Cat Ladies. It could be a horror movie. Vance's favorables are now 9 points underwater. Other recent running mates have usually been above water. Half a dozen polls confirm him dropping as follows:
| Pollster | First poll | Second poll | Net change |
| Reuters/Ipsos | July 16 | July 28 | -3 |
| Economist/YouGov | July 23 | July 30 | -5 |
| NPR+PBS/Marist Coll. | July 20 | July 27 | -6 |
| AP/NORC | July 15 | July 29 | -8 |
| (Not sponsored)/YouGov | July 15 | July 25 | -9 |
| ABC News/Ipsos | July 20 | July 27 | -9 |
The crosstabs give additional information. Vance dropped by 10 points among women. He dropped by double digits among independents in the Marist and YouGov polls that were not sponsored. He also dropped by 19 points among Black voters in the Marist and YouGov polls and double digits among voters under thirty in those polls. Vance is now as unpopular as Donald Trump. Trump wanted a clone and, well, he got a clone. (V)
Let the Swiftboating Begin
J.D. Vance has figured out that if he wants to make sure he remains Donald Trump's running mate, it will be necessary to take Gov. Tim Walz (DFL-MN) down a peg or six. In theory, if both VPs are unpopular, then Vance goes from "a liability" to "a wash." As part of his campaign of character assassination, Vance has dusted off a trick that is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year: Calling into question Walz' military service.
Most readers are old enough to remember how John Kerry got the same treatment in 2004, with a group called Swift Vets and POWs for Truth asserting that the then-Democratic nominee had misrepresented and exaggerated his service in the Vietnam War. Because, after all, anyone can luck into THREE Purple Hearts, right? The claims against Kerry came mostly from men who couldn't possibly have been witness to his service, and were eventually discredited, but the damage was done.
Walz' "swift boaters" are a pair of retired veterans of the National Guard, Thomas Behrends and Paul Herr. They have been flogging this for years, most obviously paying a local Minnesota newspaper to run an op-ed laying out their claims against Walz. It's taken 6 years, but Behrends and Herr have finally found someone willing to take the baton and run with it.
There are, in essence, three claims being made about Walz' service:
- That Walz improperly claimed the rank of Command Sergeant Major.
- That Walz improperly claimed that he carried "weapons" in "war."
- That Walz made a point of retiring shortly before his unit was shipped out to Iraq.
These things aren't entirely false. They also aren't entirely true, in that there is context for each of them. To wit:
- Walz was provisionally promoted to Command Sergeant Major, but retired before he could complete the 2 years'
training to make the rank permanent.
- What Walz said was: "We can make sure that those weapons of war that I carried in war is the only place where those
weapons are at." This is open to interpretation, but it seems to us that his point was not so much about his personal
résumé, and more about the point that high-powered guns are meant as tools for soldiers, not for
civilians.
- Walz retired 2 months before his unit was deployed to Iraq and, crucially, at a time when he was commencing his first run for Congress. Certainly he could have read the writing on the wall and guessed that a deployment might happen, but he definitely did not know, and he had a pretty good non-war-related reason for concluding his service when he did. Also, because he has tinnitus, he might have been declared not fit for service, even if he'd tried to deploy.
To us, it looks like a politician putting the best possible spin on his military record, which politicians are wont to do. Walz did not make any claim that was patently false, like saying he has a military decoration he does not have.
Still, Vance is working mightily to squeeze some mileage out of this, characterizing it as "stolen valor." Will it work? Sure, it's possible. It worked against John Kerry, and there are some people for whom the mere mention of stolen valor gets their blood boiling. That said, it's not a slam dunk, for several reasons:
- Nobody disputes that Walz served his country for 24 years. People who care about these things may well decide that
is the "valor" that really matters. They might also take a dim view of Vance for presuming to pi** on someone's service
to their country.
- The distinction that Vance is trying to draw between Walz and himself is a pretty thin one. It is true that Vance
was deployed to a combat zone for one tour of duty (6 months), while Walz was not. It is also true that Vance was not a
combat soldier and never saw any combat action. To put it another way, (Z) has been shot at more times than Vance has.
- Because of the Kerry precedent, some people might roll their eyes and say "this again?"
- Maybe Vance wasn't briefed on this, but his running mate not only did not serve, but fraudulently avoided service by pretending to have an injury he did not have.
We'll also point out that because these attacks on Walz date back more than 6 years, you can be very certain that the Democrats' vetting team was well aware of all of this, and decided it wasn't a problem. We are inclined to agree with them, but we'll see what voters think. (Z)
Key House Democrats Lobbied for Walz
The key word in the headline above is "House" (as opposed to "Senate"). Many House Democrats have always felt that Joe Biden is still a senator at heart, just as he literally was for 30 years. When he wants legislation—or anything else—from Congress, his first call is to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and not to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), and not just because Schumer is a majority leader and Jeffries is a minority leader. Biden just intuitively feels the Senate is more important than the People's House. House Democrats have always chafed at this, but never dared to say this in public—and still don't.
But Congress leaks like a sieve and now it is coming out that top House Democrats pushed hard for Gov. Tim Walz (DFL-MN). These include Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC) and many more. For them, Walz' period as governor is not what they cared about. It was his 12 years in the House. If he becomes vice president, he gets to become president of the Senate, but he knows very well how the House works and will surely convey that to the other president often.
If Harris wins, Walz will also be an incredibly valuable liason to Congress. His deep experience in the House, combined with his new role as president of the Senate, will give him clout in both chambers. Plenty of vice presidents have been senators. Since World War II we have had Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, Al Gore, Dan Quayle, Walter Mondale, Hubert Humphrey, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Alben Barkley and Harry S. Truman. The only veeps since World War II who came directly from the House to Number One Observatory Circle are Dick Cheney and Gerald Ford, although some of the senators served in the House before making it to the Senate. Still, all of them thought of themselves as senators, not representatives. In any event, Walz would start his Senate career as president of the body. How much power that would give him could be largely determined on how much he tries to seize. The Constitution doesn't specify that. If the Democrats get the trifecta and are able to actually legislate, then Walz could play a huge role in being the intermediary between the president and Congress.
Also in the event of a Democratic trifecta: Since Walz never served in the Senate, he is far less respectful of archaic Senate rules than people who have served there (including Harris). For example, as president of the Senate, he could rule that when senators want to filibuster, they have to actually stand there and read the Bible or Hamlet or Heather Has Two Mommies or whatever they want. Vice presidents who have served in the Senate are generally respectful of hoary Senate traditions, but Walz might not be so respectful and the formal Senate rules don't actually say what the Senate president's powers are. Are they analogous to the House Speaker's powers, since both offices are mentioned in the Constitution and the Senate Majority Leader is not mentioned there? Walz might try to push the envelope here. (V)
There is No Joy in Mudville
Or in Harrisburg or in Sacramento or in Lansing or in Frankfort or in a number of other places where Democrats rule. Probably no Democratic office holders are rooting for Donald Trump, but there are probably a few who are rooting for the Harris/Walz ticket with a few tears in their eyes. They have to smile and campaign hard for the ticket to be seen as team players. No doubt they will, but with slightly heavy hearts.
Of course, the grim reality for Govs. Josh Shapiro (D-PA), Gavin Newsom (D-CA), Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) and Andy Beshear (D-KY) is that a Harris/Walz victory potentially means giving up, or at least seriously delaying, their ambitions of sitting in the Big Chair. If Harris wins, she will almost certainly run for reelection in 2028, which means the four above-mentioned governors can't run until 2032, by which time they will all have hit term limits and won't be governors any more. And in 2032, Tim Walz will be 68, which is still young enough to run. If he decides to do that, which vice presidents often do, he will be the frontrunner. Challenging a frontrunner is certainly possible, but a former governor who has been out of office for many years is not starting from a position of strength. Of course, if any of them has become an incumbent senator by then, that would change the calculus, but Pennsylvania, California, and Michigan currently have two Democratic senators, and Kentucky is a steep hill for any Democrat to climb.
Meanwhile, if Trump wins, all four can attack him constantly and vie for the honor of being leader of the opposition. And all four can run in 2028, either as a sitting governor or a recently retired governor. That is clearly much better for them, but it would be uncouth to let on. Their best hope is to campaign like hell, impress Harris with their hard work, and then hope for a cabinet slot. If one or more of them is a cabinet officer for 8 years and does a good job, that could also be a springboard to a future campaign, especially if the cabinet slot (or slots) adds something valuable to their résumés.
Speaking of cabinet positions and historic firsts, what about the chances of being the first gay president (assuming you don't want to count James Buchanan)? Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg also has to secretly hope the Trump wins or that Harris can find a place for him in her cabinet. However, he could possibly run for governor of Michigan when Whitmer is term-limited in 2026. Being governor of a swing state for 6 years would be an excellent position to run for president in 2032.
The one governor who is in relatively good shape for a future presidential run is Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC). He is likely to challenge Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) in 2026. If he wins that, he will have to decide whether to run for reelection or run for president in 2032. If he can't beat Tillis, he is clearly not presidential material. And even if he does beat Tillis, he will be in his mid-70s, which could make voters leery. So, maybe a Senate career should be Cooper's only plan.
For one of the other veepables, not being chosen is probably a good thing. That would be Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ). He has never exhibited any fire in the belly for higher office and he probably has to spend some time taking care of his wife, who was almost assassinated. For him, being a senator is a fine job. You have to vote once in a while but it doesn't have to be a demanding job unless you want it to be. He is on the Armed Services Committee, which, as a veteran, he is certainly interested in. He is also on Energy, Environment, the Special Committee on Aging, and the Joint Economic Committee, so he has things to keep him busy and probably quite happy to be a senator for a few more terms. (V)
The DSCC Began a $79 Million Ad Blitz in Four Key States Yesterday
Even if Kamala Harris wins, she will be completely stymied if Republicans control the Senate. Not only will she not get any legislation passed, but the new Senate Majority Leader will surely demand veto power over every appointment from secretary of state down to deputy assistant janitor at Number One Observatory Circle. The DSCC knows this, of course, and has plenty of cash to try to prevent that from happening. Yesterday it began a blitz of exceedingly negative ads in four must-win states.
In Pennsylvania, Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) is being challenged by Connecticut resident Dave McCormick. In 2022, McCormick tried to get the Republican nomination but lost to New Jersey resident and crudité gourmet Mehmet Oz, who then went on to be crushed by now-Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA). McCormick is back for another round because the NRSC couldn't find anyone in Pennsylvania who could self-finance the campaign. The DSCC is running two ads against McCormick. The first one highlights how he said he would love to ban all abortions, even in the cases of rape and incest. That dovetails well with Kamala Harris' plan to campaign hard on reproductive rights. The second ad talks about how McCormick's firm is now the #1 foreign hedge fund in China and how it has enabled the Chinese military to greatly expand. Here is the abortion ad:
Now onto Wisconsin. The DSCC ad attacks Eric Hovde, another multimillionaire, who is challenging Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI). It turns out Hovde lives in the good life in California. Not only that, but the Orange County, CA, Business Journal has voted him one of the county's most influential residents three years in a row. Now he wants to use his money to buy a Wisconsin Senate seat. Here is another example of an out-of-state millionaire who was recruited to run in a state to which he has tenuous ties because the NRSC is fixated on getting candidates who can pay their own way. Trouble is, voters in most states don't like out-of-staters parachuting in and trying to buy Senate seats:
In Michigan, there is an open Senate seat due to the retirement of Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI). The Democrats nominated Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI). Although Slotkin was born in New York City, she grew up on her family's farm in Michigan. She later worked for the CIA in Iraq as an intelligence analyst before coming home to the family's farm in Holly, MI. This time the NRSC found someone who was born in the state, went to school and college there, and served in the state legislature before being elected to the U.S. House. Clearly he is a local, so ads calling him a carpetbagger would never work. The NRSC's choice was former representative Mike Rogers and he just won his primary. The DSCC ad tells how Rogers took millions from Big Pharma and Wall Street while in Congress and voted their way. Then he used that money and bought a $2 million mansion in Florida. It is actually a serious mansion. In Florida mansions are really cheap like that. After he left Congress, he went to work for companies that helped Chinese and Saudi businesses that caused Michiganders and Michigeese to lose jobs to overseas workers. Now Rogers wants to be senator so he can cash in again. Here is that ad:
Moving from the Rust Belt to the Sun Belt, the DSCC is working to help elect Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) to the open Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ). She could have served another 30 or 40 years if she had just acted like a normal Democrat. She will be gone on Jan. 3, 2025, and her sense of fashion will be sorely missed. No one else in either chamber comes close, unless you happen to be a fan of flip-flops and hoodies. The Republican is Kari Lake, the pretend governor. She was born in Illinois and grew up in Iowa and went to college there. However, 30 years ago she moved to Arizona and became a television weather anchor. In Arizona, that is easy. Every day you just say: "Tomorrow will be sunny and hot." Later she became a news anchor, so she has a long history in the state and the DSCC ad couldn't accuse her of carpetbaggery. Instead the ad contains a clip from her failed gubernatorial race in which she tells supporters of the much-beloved late John McCain to get the hell out. Ouch. The ad also hits her for wanting to ban all abortions, even in cases of rape and abortion, and for accepting support from white supremacists and Holocaust deniers. Here is the DSCC ad against her:
Two states not included in the first batch of DSCC ads are Montana and Ohio. Expect them soon. In Montana, Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) is being challenged by a wealthy businessman from Minnesota who bought up a huge tract of land where the elk roam and allows in only hunters who pay him a goodly price to shoot elk. Elk hunting is a big deal in Montana. In Ohio, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) is being challenged by very Trumpy and very wealthy Mercedes Benz dealer Bernie Moreno. Moreno may have once placed an ad on a gay dating site looking for young men for fun, although he claims someone hacked his account and placed the ad in his name and without his knowledge. The Montana ad is surely going to follow the pattern of the Pennsylvania and Wisconsin ads. The Ohio ad may not because although Moreno was born in Colombia and grew up in Florida, he has lived in Ohio for many years now. (V)
One of the Fake Arizona Electors Has Pleaded Guilty
Arizona AG Kris Mayes is taking the fake electors case very seriously and working hard on it. Earlier this week she got one of Donald Trump's lawyers, Jenna Ellis, to flip in return for a very light sentence. Ellis knows a lot about who did what in arranging the fake electors scheme in Arizona.
Now Mayes has caught another fish. Fake elector Lorraine Pellegrino has now also officially flipped. She has pleaded guilty to one charge of filing a false instrument. She will get an extremely light sentence, namely unsupervised community service. She must have had quite a valuable story to get off so lightly. The next fake elector to flip won't get such a good deal, and the third one will get an even less favorable deal. Beyond that, Mayes might not be interested in making deals. She will have enough witnesses. This system puts a lot of pressure on the fake electors to go next and not miss the boat.
Pellegrino is in a position to rat on the 10 other fake electors, not to mention some of the higher-ups who arranged the whole matter. Chief among these is Rudy Giuliani, who has been indicted as well. Donald Trump is an unindicted coconspirator. By not indicting Trump, Mayes has made the case much easier to bring, as Giuliani and the fake electors have no chance of invoking executive privilege or being exempt because none of them used to be a king. If Giuliani is not quaking in his boots, it is probably because he already auctioned them off to the highest bidder. (V)
A "Balding Gay Jew" Is Now the Nation's Top Governor
When Reporters asked Gov. Jared Polis (D-CO) if he was being vetted for veep, he quipped that apparently Harris was not in the market for a 49-year-old balding gay Jew from Boulder. This is a riff on former congressman Barney Frank's oft-repeated remark "As a left-handed gay Jew, I am used to being in the minority." Someone even wrote a biography about him entitled Barney Frank: the Story of America's Only Left-Handed, Gay, Jewish Congressman.
But although Polis will not be vice president, he just got another important job. He was elected chair of the National Governors' Association. The fact that he was elected to run a bipartisan group to which all the governors, both Democratic and Republican, belong, speaks to his ability to work across the aisle. He is definitely someone to watch and could well be a presidential candidate in 2028 or 2032.
Polis has always done well in rural areas. For example, Polis carried the district that elected Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) last time. That means there were many Boebert-Polis voters. He undoubtedly will be talking to Tim Walz, who will also be aiming at rural voters. Maybe Walz can learn things about rural voters in other states. One thing that Polis will surely emphasize is Woody Allen's remark that 80% of success is just showing up. One of the reasons that Democrats do so poorly in rural areas is that they simply don't show up. The voters there (quite reasonably) interpret this as meaning the Democrats don't care about them. Polis will argue that showing up and listening really helps.
Some of the issues that Polis has dealt with are likely to surface in the national campaign as well. One of them is housing. Polis focused on removing barriers to home construction, which increased the housing supply. Housing is an issue everywhere, so the lessons from Colorado could help Harris and Walz. One of the lessons is making sure high-density housing can built near transit, for example. This required going after local zoning laws.
Another of Polis' issues is education. Colorado now has universal free pre-school for all 4-year-olds. This is enormously popular in Colorado and his advice could help the national ticket. Another issue Polis has worked on is gun control. Unlike senators, governors actually have to run something, so Polis may have other useful advice for the ticket.
While we are on the subject of governors, Walz also was a leading governor. He was chair of the Democratic Governors' Association. The day Harris picked him as her running mate, he resigned and was quickly replaced by Gov. Laura Kelly (D-KS), the vice chair. She is from a state even more rural than Colorado and can also no doubt give some insight to the ticket how to approach rural voters, since she was twice elected in a heavily Republican state. There is plenty of advice available. All Harris and Walz need to do is listen carefully. (V)
Today's Presidential Polls
We are now starting to get swing state polls. Hopefully there will be more soon. If Arizona goes blue, the score will be 268 to 270. If Harris also wins the Omaha district, NE-02, we will have 269-269 (assuming she can also win ME-01). Then we get the much elusive contingent election. Of course, if Harris can win any one of Pennsylvania, North Carolina, or Georgia, then it is a clean win.
| State | Kamala Harris | Donald Trump | Start | End | Pollster |
| Wisconsin | 50% | 49% | Jul 24 | Aug 01 | Marquette Law School |
Click on a state name for a graph of its polling history.
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