The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Daniel Donner, and Cara Zelaya, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
Leading Off
● Primaries: A grand total of 14 members of the House members—eight Republicans and six Democrats—have lost renomination this cycle, a figure that FiveThirtyEight’s Nathaniel Rakich notes is the highest since 1992.
This year’s unlucky bunch are:
- GA-07: Carolyn Bourdeaux (D)
- IL-06: Marie Newman (D)
- IL-15: Rodney Davis (R)
- MI-03: Peter Meijer (R)
- MI-11: Andy Levin (D)
- MS-04: Steven Palazzo (R)
- NC-11: Madison Cawthorn (R)
- NY-10: Mondaire Jones (D)
- NY-12: Carolyn Maloney (D)
- OR-05: Kurt Schrader (D)
- SC-07: Tom Rice (R)
- WA-03: Jaime Herrera Beutler (R)
- WV-02: David McKinley (R)
- WY-AL: Liz Cheney (R)
This list, as large as it is, almost certainly won't increase as the year's remaining primaries conclude, however. That's because none of the members of the all-Democratic House delegations in Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island have any primary opposition whatsoever.
The only other state that has yet to go to the polls is Louisiana, which holds its all-party primary on Nov. 8. The one member of the six-person delegation who faces any notable intra-party opposition at all is Republican Rep. Clay Higgins, whose main foe in the 3rd District is prosecutor Holden Hoggatt. It would still be a surprise, though, if Higgins fails to take the majority he needs to win outright, and it's even more unlikely that the congressman would fail to advance to a runoff if there is one.
While this cycle's 14-member casualty rate is the highest of the 21st century, it still falls well short of the 19 who went down in 1992. That year, just like 2022, saw many maps dramatically change during redistricting, especially since the number of majority Black and Hispanic seats nearly doubled thanks to amendments to the Voting Rights Act made a decade earlier.
Several House members also struggled after getting caught up in the House banking scandal, while a general anti-incumbent climate also placed more in danger. Not coincidentally, 1992 was the year that Ross Perot scored almost 20% of the vote as an independent presidential candidate, a figure no unaligned contender has ever come close to matching since.
Altogether, according to Bloomberg's Greg Giroux, 14 House Democrats and five Republicans lost renomination that year, with four falling to fellow incumbents. However, while continuing voter anger at the status quo helped propel Republicans to their first House majority in 40 years the next cycle under Newt Gingrich, each party's base didn't exactly take out their frustration on their representatives: Just four House members were unseated in the 1994 primaries, while even fewer got tossed during each of the next three elections.
The two redistricting cycles that followed were also their respective decade's high-water mark for incumbent primary defeats: Eight members fell in 2002, while another 13 went down in 2012. But the 2020 elections may well have represented the height of base anger in the 21st century because redistricting wasn't a factor that year, so any defeated members were rejected by the same electorate that had only recently sent them to D.C. That cycle saw eight House members (five Republicans and three Democrats) lose renomination to non-incumbents, the same number as this year.
Things will likely be calmer in 2024 as members get the chance to become acquainted with their new constituencies, though mid-decade redistricting will take place in North Carolina and possibly several more states. There's also no telling what kind of votes or events might provoke the particularly volatile GOP electorate.
Still, even a fairly quiet year could still result in some high-profile upsets. In 2014, for instance, only four House members lost renomination―but one of them was Majority Leader Eric Cantor.
The Downballot
● The end of Roe has returned the issue of abortion to the states, and that means few elections are more important than those for state legislature. On this week's episode of The Downballot, we're joined by Aaron Kleinman, director of research for the States Project, which works to flip targeted legislatures nationwide. Aaron reaches back to the notorious "Powell Memo" to explain why legislative power is so crucial; discusses how Pennsylvania's unusually high incumbent re-election rate poses an obstacle for Democrats; lays out the stakes for Democrats trying to keep Republicans from gaining supermajorities in North Carolina; and much more.
Co-hosts David Nir and David Beard also recap this week's elections, starting with the massive upset in New York's 19th—a race Republicans expected to win handily. There were also two colossal Democratic primaries for neighboring House seats in New York City that finally got resolved, plus a near-win by the very worst MAGA candidate of them all in a district near Orlando. And we update the ongoing vote tally in Alaska, where a Democrat is in surprising contention for the state's lone House seat.
Please subscribe to The Downballot on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts. You'll find a transcript of this week's episode right here by noon Eastern Time.
Senate
● FL-Sen: Republican incumbent Marco Rubio has launched a $1.3 million buy for the general election that once again claims Democratic Rep. Val Demings, who is a former Orlando police chief, "praised defunding the police" and "called violent riots 'beautiful.'"
The first charge twists comments the congresswoman made in 2020 when she didn't come out for or against the Minneapolis City Council's proposal to disband its police force: Demings instead said she believed it would come up with a plan "to keep Minneapolis safe but also bring the community and the police together in a much-needed and long overdue way." Demings herself has used her own commercials to call the idea of defunding the cops "just crazy."
Rubio's other attack goes after comments Demings made in 2017 when she called student protests at UC Berkeley against the Trump administration's Muslim ban "a beautiful thing." Fox 13 reported in July that, while there were other protests at the university that turned violent that year, there's no indication the congresswoman ever said anything favorable about them.
● OH-Sen: Democrat Tim Ryan's latest commercial against J.D. Vance accuses the Republican of making the state's opioid crisis worse by using his nonprofit to bring a "big pharma-funded mouth piece to Ohio" who "called Oxy a 'godsend.'"
The ad cites a recent Associated Press report that detailed how Vance's now-defunct organization brought on an addiction specialist named Sally Satel: Satel, the story says, has cited studies funded by Purdue Pharma, which is the manufacturer of OxyContin, and also showed its officials advanced drafts of her opinion pieces. Satel said in response that she'd "never consulted with" or ever "took a cent from Purdue."
Vance's team also insisted the candidate didn't know about Satel's connections to Purdue "but remains proud of her work to treat patients, especially those in an area of Ohio who needed it most."
House
● AK-AL: Election officials on Tuesday tabulated an additional 25,000 ballots from the Aug. 16 instant-runoff general election, but we'll still be waiting until the end of the month to learn who won the race to succeed the late GOP Rep. Don Young.
With 175,000 votes in, which the Associated Press estimates represents 90% of the total vote, former Democratic state Rep. Mary Peltola leads with 39% as two Republicans, former reality TV show star Sarah Palin and businessman Nick Begich III, are at 31% and 28%, respectively. Peltola's total stood at 38% before this latest batch, while Palin and Begich were at 32% and 29%.
The Last Frontier allows mail-in ballots postmarked by election day to be counted if they're received through the end of the month: State election officials say they plan to have more updated results on Friday, with final numbers on Aug. 31. After all the votes are tabulated, officials will conduct an instant runoff to reallocate the third-place finisher's votes to the two remaining candidates.
All three candidates will face off again in the November race for a full term, but they won't be joined by former state Interior Department official Tara Sweeney after all. While the Republican appears to have done well enough in last week's top-four primary to advance, she said Tuesday evening she was dropping out after taking a mere 4% of the vote. Because Sweeney's departure is taking place more than 64 days ahead of the general election her spot will instead go to the fifth-place candidate: Right now that's Libertarian Chris Bye, who currently has all of 0.6%.
● NY-10: Political observers speculated even before Tuesday's Democratic primary that Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou could run in the general election as the Working Families Party's nominee, and the WFP isn't ruling out the idea following her 26-24 defeat to attorney Dan Goldman. The party's spokesperson instead merely told the Gotham Gazette's Ben Max, "Haven't made any decisions on that yet." Niou herself doesn't appear to have said anything about continuing her campaign in a constituency Biden would have taken 85-15.
● Polls: Each party has released a House internal:
- AZ-06: GQR (D) for Kirsten Engel: Kirsten Engel (D): 49, Juan Ciscomani (R): 47
- WI-03: Cygnal (R) for the Congressional Leadership Fund: Derrick Van Orden (R): 50, Brad Pfaff (D): 38
These are the first polls we've seen testing each matchup. Biden would have taken southeast Arizona's 6th by a tiny 49.3-49.2, while Trump would have carried the southwestern Wisconsin-based 3rd 51-47.
Prosecutors
● Suffolk County, MA District Attorney: The Boston Globe reported Tuesday that Boston City Councilor Ricardo Arroyo was twice investigated for sexual assault when he was in high school in 2005 and 2007, but that he was not charged in either case.
Arroyo, who is challenging appointed District Attorney Kevin Hayden in the Sept. 6 Democratic primary, responded by saying he'd only learned about the investigations when the paper contacted him, and that "I never did what has been alleged, then or ever." However, the Globe writes that police reports say that a detective spoke to both Arroyo and his attorney in 2005 even though the candidate maintained, "I know I would remember that."
The paper also contacted the woman who made the allegations in 2007, who went unnamed in the article. After initially writing to a reporter, "I have nothing to do with Ricardo Arroyo and do not want anything from when I was a minor associated with Ricardo arroyo [sic] thank you," she later said the counselor had contacted her after he spoke to the Globe. She informed the paper afterwards, "For clarity purposes. Ricardo arroyo did not assault me ever. I do not know who did or what happened."
Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, who endorsed Arroyo months ago, responded to the report on Wednesday by saying she was "to see how this story evolves" before deciding whether to maintain her support. Former Rep. Joe Kennedy III, Boston City Council President Ed Flynn, and Iron Workers Local 7, though, each announced that day that they were withdrawing their endorsements.
Other Races
● Montgomery County, MD Executive: County officials have finished their recount of the July 19 Democratic primary, and incumbent Marc Elrich has defeated self-funding businessman David Blair 39.2-39.18―a margin of 32 votes. Blair, who lost to Elrich by 77 ballots four years ago, conceded on Wednesday. Despite his very close call, Elrich should have no trouble in November in a dark blue suburban D.C. county that hasn't elected a Republican executive since the 1970s.
Blair, who spent around $5 million on his second campaign, argued that Elrich had done a poor job making the county more affordable or dealing with crime; the challenger also benefited from $900,000 in spending by a super PAC funded in part by Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz as well as developers and business groups. Bethesda Magazine wrote last month that Elrich, whose "political base among civic and neighborhood groups often made him an outlier in three terms on the County Council on planning and development issues," also clashed repeatedly with business groups.
The incumbent, for his part, focused on his work during the pandemic while also accusing Blair and County Council Member Hans Riemer, who took third with 20%, of supporting policies that were "very Koch brothers [and] Reaganesque—like let the private sector solve everything."
Ad Roundup
Dollar amounts reflect the reported size of ad buys and may be larger.