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Senate:
• AZ-Sen: Former U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona says he's thinking about running for the Senate as a Democrat. Carmona served under George W. Bush but after his term ended, he became very critical of the Bush administration, particularly regarding their war on science.
• FL-Sen: More Allen West on a possible Senate bid:
West added that the only way he would change his plan to run for Senate rather than Congress would be “God would have to drop a manhole cover on my head."
Maybe god already did do that... would explain a lot. Meanwhile, GOP Rep. Vern Buchanan, who as far as I know never formally ruled out a Senate run, says he's "going to leave the door open" and will "make a decision towards the end of the year." Given how weak the Republican field is, I think Buchanan, powered by his movement conservative credentials and immense personal wealth, would be the frontrunner for the nomination if he got in. But beating Bill Nelson is something else altogether….
• MA-Sen: Former state Sen. Warren Tolman (previously mentioned here) says he won't run against Scott Brown for the Democrats.
• PA-Sen: Another teabagger says he's going to get into the Pennsylvania Senate race, and at least this one has a little bit of juice. Tom Smith is a former coal company owner, and according to PoliticsPA, he promises to "provide enough seed money to make a serious run." It turns out he's given some $185K to Republican interests over the last decade, so Smith just might mean it. Still, you know, he'd be running against Bob Casey.
• VA-Sen: I don't get this. Republican AG Ken Cuccinelli himself told the WaPo that he was thinking about a run for Senate in 2014… so now why is his political director busy insisting to the Washington Examiner that Cuccinelli is "not actively considering a run for any particular office at the moment"? Anyhow, one side-note is that Dem Mark Warner hasn't actually said whether he'll seek re-election three years from now, but is that in any way abnormal?
• VT-Sen: Former Republican Gov. Jim Douglas says he is "highly unlikely" to challenge Sen. Bernie Sanders this cycle. A recent PPP poll showed that Douglas, despite his popularity with Vermonters, would get crushed by Sanders, 56-38.
Gubernatorial:
• LA-Gov: Did you know that Edwin Edwards, 83 years young, was released from prison earlier this year? I didn't! And did you know that Edwin Edwards says he'd like to run for governor once again? Well, you do now! Apparently, an effort is underway (on Facebook, not in the halls of power) to secure a presidential pardon for Edwards, which sounds like a necessary (and never-gonna-happen) first step before he can ever run for office again. Of course, Democrats don't even have a gubernatorial candidate this year, even though election day is less than three months away, so I suppose we could do worse than Edwards (since presumably "zero" is worse). If you don't know much about him, check out his Wikipedia entry, though most of his career can be summed up with his 1991 campaign slogan: "Vote for the crook — it's important."
House:
• HI-01, HI-02: I guess he got tired of sitting around waiting for Linda Lingle to make up her mind: Republican ex-Rep. Charles Djou has decided to go ahead and run for his old House seat, as he suggested he might do last month. Djou had also been contemplating a Senate run, but said he'd defer to his fellow GOPer (and next-door neighbor) Lingle — so it's possible he already knows what she's decided. (This would suggest she's going for the Senate after all.)
Anyhow, it's an odd choice for Djou, since it sets him up to run against the woman who beat him last year, Colleen Hanabusa, in a blue state with a native son at the top of the ballot. It's also strange because there's an open seat waiting for him next door in HI-02 (seat-switching is common in Hawaii), and another top Republican, former LG Duke Aiona, just said he wouldn't run there. Aiona did say he might run for governor again in 2014, though.
• MI-14: Southfield City Treasurer Irv Lowenberg says he's forming an exploratory committee to look at a run in the redrawn 14th, one of just several Dems thinking about a bid here. The new 14th is nominally home to veteran Democrat John Conyers, but he may swap districts with 13th CD freshman Hansen Clarke.
• NV-02: The NRCC is spending another $116K on a new ad against Kate Marshall (you can watch it at the link), bringing their total TV outlay on the special election to some $345K. Overall, it looks like the NRCC has spent $411K on the race so far, while the DCCC has coughed up $0.
• MO-02: A Russ Carnahan internal poll made its way to Dave Catanese's hands, showing the de-districted Democrat with tiny leads over possible Republican opponents in the new 2nd CD. Carnahan leads teabagger extraordinaire Ed Martin 42-40 and former state party chair Ann Wagner 40-39 in the survey from Lake Research. I'm not so sanguine about these results, though, as MO-02 is very red territory and Carnahan would have to contend with Barack Obama at the top of the ticket.
• OR-01: Ruh-roh. Looks like Republican Rob Cornilles has a bit of a Meg Whitman problem: The Oregonian reports that he's failed to vote in a third of the state's elections going back to 1998. He has some cute excuses, like saying there were occasions where "I just didn't feel like I could cast an educated ballot." Voting is hard! Anyhow, this issue got scant attention when he ran last year, and I can only guess that David Wu and his endless issues are to blame.
Other Races:
• NJ-St. Sen.: Unsurprisingly, Republican LG/SoS Kim Guadagno has refused to certify Olympic champion (and Democrat) Carl Lewis's name for the November ballot, but a legal case is still pending in federal court. Check out our "Carl Lewis" tag for more on this long-running saga.
• Special Elections: Johnny Longtorso recaps Tuesday's lone non-Wisconsin race:
Maine HD-121: Kim Monaghan-Derrig held onto this seat for the Democrats, defeating Republican Nancy Thompson by a 7% margin.
Redistricting Roundup:
• NC Redistricting: The NAACP says it will sue over North Carolina's new legislative and congressional maps, which many observers (including right here at Daily Kos Elections) think contain some serious VRA issues.