Leading Off
● HI-02: Very interesting. A major reason—probably the major reason—that Hawaii Democrats have been reluctant to float any kind of primary challenge to Rep. Tulsi Gabbard so far is the fact that she's long been very popular. That may now be changing. According to a new poll for Honolulu Civil Beat conducted by Merriman River Group, Gabbard's statewide favorability rating dropped from 64-19 two years ago to 50-29 today. Gabbard fares better in her home district, but she's still taken a bit of a hit there, too, falling from 67-17 to 58-25.
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What matters most, though, is where Gabbard's support is—and isn't—coming from. Statewide, Gabbard earns positive marks from just 49 percent of Democrats, which is low given that we're talking about members of Gabbard's own party, while she gets a thumbs up from 48 percent of Republicans, a shockingly high score … ordinarily, at least. To put this in context, Hawaii's other member of the House, Democrat Colleen Hanabusa, has a similar 48-27 statewide favorability rating, but with 65 percent of Democrats viewing her positively and just 24 percent of Republicans doing so. That's a much more conventional split.
But Gabbard is anything but conventional. She's received tremendous scorn for cozying up to murderous Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, and until Donald Trump launched a few missiles Assad's way, she'd refused to publicly criticize the Great Orange Terror. In fact, she was one of the only Democrats to meet with him (at Trump Tower, of course) right after the election.
Gabbard's recent dalliances with autocrats didn't spring from nowhere, though: She's long put together a bizarre crypto-conservative record that includes refusing to support an assault weapons ban, introducing a bill to ban online gambling at the behest of casino magnate and Republican mega-donor Sheldon Adelson, and attacking Barack Obama for not using the phrase "radical Islamic terrorism." (Obviously the problem of terrorism has gotten much better since Trump started repeating these magic words, right?)
It's the Assad business, though, that's really incensed Democrats, both nationally and locally, particularly after Gabbard declared she was "skeptical" that Assad had used chemical weapons on his citizens in April, simply refusing to believe reports from the Pentagon and independent non-governmental organizations like Human Rights Watch. Someone this far out in nonsense land has no business representing a dark blue district that can and should elect a strong progressive—and has in the very recent past.
And while no prominent Democrat has yet to openly consider a bid against Gabbard, perhaps this latest poll data will start to change some minds. Hawaii unfortunately has open primaries, so GOP voters could cross over to support the woman the Washington Post accurately dubbed "the Democrat that Republicans love." But it would be quite the spectacle if Gabbard had to rely on Republicans to save her. And in this age of white-hot furor over Trump, is that something Gabbard really wants to count on?
Senate
● PA-Sen: On Wednesday, wealthy energy businessman Paul Addis announced that he would seek the GOP nomination to take on Democratic Sen. Bob Casey. But Addis, who says he'll "partially" fund his race, doesn't seem to fit the current mood of his party at all. Addis volunteers that he didn't vote against Trump and adds that "[t]he GOP has lost its way."
● TN-Sen, TN-Gov: Republican Marsha Blackburn is one of those House members who is always talked about for statewide office, but never runs. And it looks like 2018 won't be any different: While The Tennessean says that "political insiders had suggested" she might challenge Sen. Bob Corker in a primary, Blackburn announced that she would run for re-election. Notably, Blackburn didn't comment on whether she actually was thinking about trying to unseat Corker, which seems like a strong sign that she was considering it. Corker hasn't committed to running for re-election, so it's possible Blackburn could change course and run for an open seat. Blackburn has also been off-handedly mentioned as a potential gubernatorial candidate, but there was little sign she was interested.
However, a different Tennessee Republican did recently express interest in challenging Corker. State Rep. Andy Holt recently told The Tennessean that he's been approached, saying "countless people contact me. People I respect. People with resources." Last year, Holt made national news during the Bundy militia standoff in Oregon when he asked them on Twitter, "Where can I send support for your effort?," before he went on to scold liberals on the Constitution. Holt also has been an outspoken opponent of traffic cameras, and he notably once made a video where he burned a traffic camera ticket.
Another Republican is talking about running for governor, but he seems like a definite longshot. Rutherford County Property Assessor Rob Mitchell, who left the Democratic Party three years ago, says he'll decide by July 1. Mitchell starts with little name recognition, but he argues that while his potential rivals have "run private businesses," they "haven't administered a governmental office." That's … probably not going to excite many voters.
Gubernatorial
● AK-Gov: The GOP field for next year's race has been taking shape very slowly, but we recently got a better indication about who is serious about taking on independent Gov. Bill Walker. The conservative blog Must Read Alaska reports that six potential GOP candidates spoke to a gathering of influential state Republican activists, and each gave a half-hour presentation.
Three of those men were people we'd never heard mentioned for this race. Ex-state Sen. Charlie Huggins is a former Senate president who retired last year. Millionaire businessman Bob Gillam, who made an unsuccessful attempt to become Trump's secretary of the interior, has devoted most of his political activity toward stopping the development of the Pebble copper and gold mine. Ex-state Sen. John Binkley served in the legislature in the 1980s and ran in the 2006 gubernatorial primary. Binkley lost to none other than Sarah Palin 50-30, though he still did better than unpopular incumbent Frank Murkowski, who won just 19 percent of the vote. Binkley currently leads Cruise Lines International Association Alaska.
Additionally, ex-Lt. Gov. Loren Leman was in attendance. Back in February, there were reports that Leman, who left office in 2006, was assembling a campaign, but this is the first we've heard from him since then. Two Republicans who have previously expressed interest in running, state Sen. Mike Dunleavy and businessman Scott Hawkins, were also there; state Rep. Mike Chenault, a former speaker, has talked about running but was not at the event.
● CO-Gov: EMILY's List has been unveiling endorsements in several races recently, and on Wednesday, they threw their backing behind ex-state Treasurer Cary Kennedy. Kennedy is the only notable Democratic woman running for governor, so their move is no surprise.
● FL-Gov: We hadn't heard Miami-Dade County State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle mentioned as a possible Democratic contender before, but several Florida politicians tell Politico that they attended a Memorial Day weekend gathering at her home to strategize. According to state Rep. Joe Geller, who organized the meeting, Fernandez Rundle is also considering running for attorney general, but she's more interested in running for governor. Fernandez Rundle has yet to say anything publicly.
However, Fernandez Rundle seems like a really horrible fit for today's Democratic Party. Fernandez Rundle has served as Miami-Dade's chief prosecutor since 1993, but the Miami New Times says she'd never prosecuted an officer for an on-duty death until April. Most notably, her office spent years investigating the death of Darren Rainey, a schizophrenic African-American inmate whom witnesses say died in 2012 after prison guards forced him into a scalding-hot shower for more than 90 minutes. However, Fernandez Rundle eventually announced that there would be no charges because "[t]he evidence fails to show that any correctional officer acted in reckless disregard of Rainey's life."
According to ex-Miami Mayor Maurice Ferré, who was at the gathering at Fernandez Rundle's home, she is aware the Rainey case "could be a problem." Ferré tells Politico that she explained her reasoning and "[h]er explanation made sense. But the problem is that it took five minutes for her to explain it all." An unnamed attendee was a lot less charitable, saying, "She looks great on paper, but she couldn't even answer the basic questions clearly: Why do you want to run, what do you want to do? And her answer on Darren Rainey really shows she has no clue." According to Geller, Fernandez Rundle said she has no timeline for deciding whether she'll enter the crowded Democratic primary.
● IA-Gov: On Wednesday, ex-Iowa Department of Natural Resources Director Rich Leopold ended his bid for the Democratic nomination. Leopold explained that fundraising was difficult, as was competing with political insiders, stating that "the reality of an outsider mounting a winning campaign in Iowa is slim." While Leopold said he was "suspending operations," he added that "[f]or all practical purposes, we have shut down the campaign," so don't expect his bid to become un-suspended.
● MI-Gov: On behalf of the local Michigan political tipsheet MIRS News Service, Mitchell Research takes a look at a hypothetical GOP primary. The poll, which MIRS tells us was in the field May 31, gives Macomb County Public Works Commissioner Candice Miller a 21-18 lead over state Attorney General Bill Schuette. Lt. Gov. Brian Calley takes 15 while physician Jim Hines takes 1. Hines, who claims he's willing to self-fund "millions" of his own money, is the only one who has entered the race, though Calley and Schuette are very likely to get in. Miller, who left Congress this year, hasn't ruled out a bid, but there's no sign she's preparing to run.
● NJ-Gov: New Jersey held its gubernatorial primaries on Tuesday, and there were no surprises on either side. Democratic frontrunner Phil Murphy, a former Goldman Sachs executive who served as ambassador to Germany during the Obama administration, took first place with 48 percent of the vote, while ex-Treasury official Jim Johnson and Assemblyman John Wisniewski each took 22 percent; state Sen. Ray Lesniak, a longtime legislator who ran a disorganized campaign, took just 5 percent. On the GOP side, Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno defeated state Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli 47-31. Early polls give Murphy a huge lead over Guadagno in this fall's general election to succeed unpopular departing GOP Gov. Chris Christie.
A year ago, the Democratic primary looked like it would be a competitive three-way race between Murphy, Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop, and state Senate President Steve Sweeney. However, Murphy won over several early endorsements from influential Democratic Party leaders in voter-rich North Jersey, and in September, Fulop announced that he wouldn't run. Sweeney, an ally of South Jersey political bosses, had been hoping that Murphy and Fulop would split the northern vote, but one week after Fulop decided not to get in, Sweeney also announced that he would seek re-election.
Murphy still had primary opposition, but he had several huge advantages. Murphy had the support of every single one of New Jersey's 21 county Democratic organizations, which guaranteed him a favorable place on the primary ballot. As NorthJersey.com's Charles Stile explains, "Candidates who win the county organization's support are given the 'line,' or preferred placement on the ballot, and often bracketed in the same column with candidates for local office. In a primary, the county line is typically the default choice of partisan voters who haven't paid much attention to the race." And indeed, the only county Murphy appears to have lost is Salem, where Wisniewski holds a 3-vote lead as of Wednesday.
Murphy, who did some significant self-funding, also decisively outspent all his rivals on TV. In fact, Murphy ran his first TV ad in September of 2015. While Johnson and Wisniewski tried to use Murphy's Goldman Sachs past against him, they didn't have the resources or the support to get their message out, and the two divided whatever anti-Murphy vote existed. Murphy himself also ran commercials pledging to stand up to special interests on behalf of New Jerseyans.
There haven't been many polls of the general election, but they all show Murphy with huge leads against Guadagno. Christie, who is termed-out, consistently sports horrific approval ratings, and his problems are rubbing off on his lieutenant governor. While Guadagno and Christie have a strained relationship (though Christie revealed on Tuesday that he voted for her in the primary), most voters don't seem to know or care about that. It also doesn't help Guadagno that Donald Trump, who lost New Jersey 55-41, is also not at all liked here.
Murphy evidently feels confident enough about his chances that he's decided not to self-fund his general election campaign. Instead, Murphy announced shortly before the primary that he would instead accept public financing, which prevents him from spending more than $13.8 million for the general. Guadagno and her allies have already signaled that they intent to portray Murphy as the second coming of ex-Gov. Jon Corzine, another former Goldman Sachs executive who lost his 2009 re-election campaign to Christie. However, unless there's a massive sea change in New Jersey politics over the next five months, it's tough to see Team Red holding onto Drumthwacket.
● VA-Gov: Virginia's Democratic primary for governor is now less than a week away, and so far, we've seen two types of polls: those that show a tight race between ex-Rep. Tom Perriello and Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam, and those that show Northam ahead by double digits. Perriello himself has now produced one that, naturally, falls into the former category, a survey from HaystaqDNA that puts Perriello up 37-36 and claims that "9 of 10 undecideds" are "breaking to Perriello." No specific evidence is offered to support that argument, though (and note that we've never before seen a poll from this firm).
Previously unreleased trendlines included in Haystaq's memo also indicate that Northam held a 40-31 lead in mid-May. Back then, Northam released his own internal from Garin-Hart-Yang (a very well-known pollster) that found him ahead 50-33—and that, in fact, was the most recent poll of the race we'd seen until today. Indeed, despite the intense interest in this matchup in D.C., there's been shockingly little hard date: Wikipedia has only cataloged nine total polls. So either this race is going to be a barnburner or a blowout, but there's just no real way to tell.
Northam, though, has always held a major financial advantage, and he's using that to press a new ad on to the airwaves featuring a new endorsement from the Washington Post that dropped on Tuesday night. Interestingly, the spot barely quotes from the Post's editorial, which, as far as progressive voters might be concerned, makes a better case for Perriello! (In classic WaPo style, the paper praises Northam for his close working relationship with Republicans while sneering at Perriello's "soak-the-rich" tax plan.)
Newspaper endorsements, of course, seldom matter (even Hillary Clinton mordantly joked, "I want to be buried with my editorial endorsements"), though there's still a belief in some quarters that the Post's might still be meaningful. Democratic operative Jeff Puryear, for instance, says he believes the Post's support helped "legitimize" state Sen. Creigh Deeds in Northern Virginia, where he wasn't well-known, and helped him win the 2009 Democratic primary for governor. (Deeds went on to get crushed in the general election.)
But Deeds was also aided by the fact that two other candidates (Terry McAuliffe, who later won the governorship in 2013, and ex-state Rep. Brian Moran) directed most of their fire at one another, allowing Deeds to emerge relatively unscathed and, perhaps with the Washington Post's late blessing, ride to victory. A similar dynamic isn't in play in this one-on-one race, which by and large has remained positive, so the Post's seal of approval might simply not matter as much this time as perhaps it did eight years ago.
House
● CA-34: On Tuesday, Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez defeated ex-Los Angeles City Planning Commissioner Robert Lee Ahn, a fellow Democrat, 60-40 in the general election for this safely blue downtown Los Angeles seat (though late ballots could change the margin). Gomez had the support of the California Democratic establishment, but thanks to some self-funding, Ahn did outspend him.
Ahn would have been the nation's first Korean-American member of Congress in decades, and that fact seems to have resonated with local Korean-American voters. While Koreans made up just 6 percent of registered voters in this heavily Hispanic seat, they voted in disproportionate numbers in both the primary and the general election, and Asian-Americans even cast more early votes than Hispanic voters. The early votes were counted and they gave Gomez a tiny lead, but Election Day support propelled him to a clear victory.
● CA-48: Last year, longtime GOP Rep. Dana Rohrabacher also indicated that he was planning to leave Congress very soon, but he said in December that he'd "probably" run again. Since then, Rohrabacher seems to have completely settled on seeking another term in this coastal Orange County seat, which flipped from 55-43 Romney to 48-46 Clinton.
The congressman, a well-known Putin supporter, channeled Trump and told the Huffington Post that, "Whoever my Democratic opponent is, that Democratic opponent can explain why he's for war with Russia. He can explain why we shouldn't be cooperating with Russia in defeating radical Islam. Why, when cooperation with Russia is so much better than belligerence for both of our countries, we would choose the path of belligerence." Holy straw man, Batman!
● MN-01: GOP businessman and two-time nominee Jim Hagedorn has had the primary to himself for months, but that may change before too long. State Rep. Nels Pierson tells the Post Bulletin that he'll "be spending some time over the next month or two talking to voters in the 1st District," though he says he's already taken the first steps towards setting up a campaign. Olmsted County Republican Party Chairman Aaron Miller, who lost the 2014 primary to Hagedorn, says he'll decide on a second bid in the next couple of weeks. State Sen. Carla Nelson also has talked about getting in, though she did not provide a timeline and also left the door open to a gubernatorial campaign. This open Democratic-held seat went from 50-48 Obama to 53-38 Trump.
● NY-19: On Wednesday, former Army intelligence officer Pat Ryan joined the crowded Democratic primary to take on freshman GOP Rep. John Faso. Ryan is originally from this Hudson Valley seat, but he currently lives in New York City.
● WA-05: Just days after he touted a poll arguing that he had a path to victory in this eastern Washington red seat, Spokane City Council President Ben Stuckart dropped his bid against GOP Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers. Stuckart cited "personal health issues with my closest family members." This seat backed Trump 52-39 and McMorris Rodgers has never had trouble winning here. However, ex-Washington State University Chancellor Lisa Brown, a former Democratic state Senate leader, is considering.
● WI-06: Sophomore Wisconsin Republican Rep. Glenn Grothman had a well-deserved reputation for extremism before he won his seat in 2014, and he's done nothing to shed that reputation since getting to D.C. This year alone, Grothman told a town hall that women could just get birth control from grocery stores so Planned Parenthood wasn't necessary. And right after Montana GOP Rep.-Greg Gianforte assaulted a journalist, Grothman told the Washington Post that Gianforte seemed "like a good guy." However, Grothman pulled off a decisive 57-41 victory during the 2014 GOP wave, and Democrats didn't seriously target him in 2016. It doesn't help that the 6th District, which includes Fond du Lac and Sheboygan, went from 53-46 Romney to 56-39 Trump.
However, Grothman may face a well-connected Democratic foe next year. Dan Kohl, the nephew of ex-Sen. Herb Kohl, announced that he would run on Wednesday. Kohl worked for the Milwaukee Bucks, which is owned by Herb Kohl, for 14 years, and he stepped down as assistant general manager recently. Kohl has only run for office once, taking a third place in a 2008 state Assembly primary. After his defeat, Kohl became a senior member of J Street, a left-leaning pro-Israel group. Kohl has also served as a senior advisor at a large D.C. law firm in a role that involved lobbying for Major League Baseball. Kohl has a very tough task ahead of him, but if 2018 is a good year for Democrats, local voters may be a whole lot less tolerant of Grothman's antics than they've been in the past.
Legislative
● NH State Senate: Last year, the GOP won control of the New Hampshire state Senate for the fourth cycle in a row, obtaining a 14 to 10 majority thanks in no small part to their gerrymander. Democrats will try to flip the chamber this year, but on July 25, they'll need to defend a competitive seat held by the late freshman Scott McGilvray. SD-16, which is located in the Manchester area, backed Clinton 47.7-47.4, a margin of 100 votes; four years before, Romney won it 50-49.
Republican David Boutin retired in 2016, and he's decided to run for his old seat in July's special election. Boutin decisively won re-election 56-44 in 2014 even as Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan and Sen. Jeanne Shaheen were narrowly carrying his seat, though he had a close call in 2012. Boutin also has the endorsement of the State Employees Association SEIU Local 1984. Team Blue had a primary on Tuesday, and Manchester Alderman Kevin Cavanaugh won with 69 percent of the vote.
The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, and Stephen Wolf, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, and James Lambert.
