The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, and Carolyn Fiddler, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
Leading Off
● PA-06, PA-09: No member of Pennsylvania's congressional delegation has behaved quite as badly in response to the state's new map as supposedly "moderate" Republican Rep. Ryan Costello. Costello not only called the lines "1,000 percent partisan," a Democratic gerrymander in "disguise," and "racist". Most disturbingly, he threw all pretense at believing in the rule of law out the porthole and declared, "It's just another reason why these Supreme Court justices should be impeached," joining a growing chorus of top-ranking state Republicans who have floated the idea.
Campaign Action
Costello is miserable, you see, because the new map shifted his 6th District from a seat that Hillary Clinton carried by barely half a point to one she won by a much heftier 53-43 margin. But Little Red Whining Hood does have a way to escape the clutches of Big Bad Governor Wolf: He could instead run in the new 9th District, which is solidly red (Trump won it 65-31), is home to no GOP incumbent, and is made up of about a quarter of his old seat.
About this possibility, Costello says, "I haven't done any political evaluation," but hey, we just did it for him. (No need to return the favor.) And the Democrat Costello was most likely to face in the old 6th District, former Air Force officer Chrissy Houlahan, also just gave Costello a nudge by announcing she'd already raised $340,000 at the halfway mark of this quarter, so Costello would be wise to take the hint—unless he wants to get eaten.
Senate
● HI-Sen: Democratic Sen. Mazie Hirono was diagnosed with kidney cancer last year, but she recently said she is "definitely" running for re-election this year. Hirono revealed on Tuesday that she is still undergoing immunotherapy after previously having had surgery last year, but she indicated that her prognosis for recovery was good.
● TN-Sen: Republican Sen. Bob Corker has been busy trying to imitate Mitt Romney in his effort to get back in Donald Trump's good graces as he considers un-retiring, but Rep. Marsha Blackburn has also been busy currying favor with the White House ahead of the primary. The Washington Examiner reports that unnamed GOP insiders described Blackburn's meetings with top administration officials as "encouraging," which could be a sign that Trump is inclined to support her even if Corker changes his tune and seeks re-election. But given how badly Corker has tarnished his reputation with Republicans thanks to his past denunciations of Trump, it's hard to see how he salvages things with primary voters at this point.
Gubernatorial
● CA-Gov: Amanda Renteria's campaign for governor—if you can call it that—sure seems to be an utter mystery. Renteria has never held public office, is completely unknown except to a handful of Democratic insiders (and longtime Daily Kos Elections readers), and badly lost the only race she ever ran, a 2014 bid for the House. She nevertheless joined a field of major heavyweights who've been running for years and have stockpiled the kind of enormous war chests that are a stark necessity in a state as huge as California.
Bizarrely, she filed (without any warning) just weeks ahead of the deadline, then went quiet for days after submitting her paperwork, lacking a website or even any staff. Indeed, her entry came so late that she won't even be permitted to speak at the party's annual convention this weekend. Renteria finally did announce on Tuesday that she was running after almost a week of radio silence, but the Los Angeles Times observes that her new kickoff video "sheds little light on who she is or why she is running." And to top it all off, in a new interview with the paper, "she offered no specifics about where she stood on the most pressing issues facing the state."
So why would we even care about such a seeming Some Dude? In large part it's because Renteria is a seasoned operative who's served as Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow's chief of staff, was national political director for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign, and just finished a stint as a top aide to state Attorney General Xavier Becerra. It's therefore almost inexplicable why someone with a background like this would launch a campaign that doesn't even rise to the level of "quixotic." As the Times notes, Renteria's decision was so odd that it's "stoked conspiracy theories," though the paper seems too polite to suggest what any of those theories might be.
Politico, however, was only too happy to oblige. In sum and substance, some backers of former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, one of the leading Democrats in the race, say they fear that Renteria is a "spoiler" or "stalking-horse" designed to peel Latino votes away from Villaraigosa in the Central Valley, where she's from and ran for Congress.
A spokesperson for Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who'd stand to benefit most from such a scheme, rejected the notion completely, of course, calling it a "tinfoil-covered grassy knoll" and "severely sexist." Renteria, however, didn't bother to deny the charge at first, telling Politico, "I'll be in touch next week." Only later, to the Times, did she object, calling such a notion "Trump conspiracy-like, based in zero fact."
The only other working theory is that Renteria is hoping to build up her personal brand for a future run of some sort, but this certainly isn't the way to go about doing so. Renteria told the Times that she has no plans to run a "traditional campaign where you are looking to raise $10 million" but rather intends to "get her message out through social media" and "grassroots campaigning." Now that sure sounds like a Some Dude.
● CO-Gov: Former state Sen. Mike Johnston has announced that he will submit his signatures to make the June primary ballot this week, which would make him the first Democrat to do so. As we've written before, petition gathering in Colorado is a very cutthroat, time consuming, and expensive process, and speed very much does matter here.
Candidates are required to collect 1,500 valid signatures in each of the seven congressional districts, and if a voter signs petitions for multiple candidates, their signature only counts in favor of the candidate who turned in their petitions first. Democrats often find themselves fighting for the small pool of voters in conservative seats (Republicans end up searching far and wide for voters in very blue Denver), so by submitting his petitions first, Johnston has made it tougher for his rivals to get enough signatures from these districts.
Lt. Gov. Donna Lynne is also collecting signatures to reach the ballot, while former state Treasurer Cary Kennedy is trying to win enough support at the April party convention to reach the primary, a process that carries its own significant risks. Rep. Jared Polis and businessman Noel Ginsburg are trying both routes.
● FL-Gov: Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine has put $725,000 behind a 10-day ad buy that tackles the issue of gun safety in the wake of the Parkland school shooting massacre. Levine's spot features the candidate speaking in front of a school bus, where he bemoans how Florida has frequently seen school shootings thanks to "some of the weakest gun laws in the nation." Levine calls for "reasonable gun regulation," including better background checks and a permanent ban on assault rifles.
● IL-Gov: Wealthy venture capitalist J.B. Pritzker is out with a new Global Strategy Group poll of the Democratic primary for governor. The survey gives him a plurality of 37 percent, with businessman Chris Kennedy taking 23 percent and state Sen. Daniel Biss earning 21 percent. While Pritzker holds a relatively sizable lead, that's actually a drop from his pollster's late-January survey, where he beat Biss 41-22 while Kennedy took 16 percent. Pritzker has led practically every poll for ages, but it's hard to say whether his rivals have a chance to surge with one month left to go before the March 20 primary. Independently conducted polling has been infrequent in this primary, but a We Ask America survey from January had Pritzker up just 30-17 over Biss with Kennedy at 12 percent.
● KS-Gov: On Wednesday, wealthy businessman Wink Hartman dropped out of the GOP primary and endorsed Secretary of State Kris Kobach. Hartman, who had self-funded most of his campaign, ended December with $1.5 million in the bank, which was considerably more than anyone else in the race. However, Hartman says he realized at a debate last week "that I could be the spoiler in this race for the conservative values we hold so dear" if he stayed in. But while Hartman and Kobach were complementary to each other then, he said back in August that the secretary of state was "not doing his current job, he's not going to do his next job, and he keeps auditioning for new positions wherever he can find them."
● MS-Gov: Four-term state Attorney General Jim Hood has issued the biggest sign so far that he will seek the Democratic nomination for governor in 2019. Hood recently said he and his wife are still considering things, and that if she "comes around," Hood plans to run. Democrats have steadily seen their power erode in Mississippi over the last two decades, but Hood's status as the last Democrat left holding a statewide office likely makes him the top choice for Team Blue in this decidedly red-leaning state.
House
● AZ-08: The Feb. 27 GOP primary to succeed disgraced former Rep. Trent Franks in Arizona's conservative 8th District is coming up quickly and early voting has in fact been underway for weeks, but there's still time for at least one big development. On Tuesday evening, the local NBC affiliate got hold of a series of flirtatious text messages sent between a cell phone associated with one of the leading Republican candidates, former state Sen. Steve Montenegro, and a legislative staffer. The staffer sent Montenegro, who is married and a church minister, a picture of herself topless and said, "You have to delete these." Montenegro responded "SNAP," an apparent reference to Snapchat, an app where messages disappear after they're viewed.
In a later exchange that took place as news broke that Franks, who was Montenegro's old boss, was about to resign due to a sexual harassment scandal (though we didn't learn the full extent of his transgressions until later), Montenegro asked the staffer to call him. When she messaged back asking if "someone call[ed] you out," Montenegro said no. When asked if he's "afraid someone might," Montenegro responded, "Just lining my ducks in order." The staffer then texted, "Yeah, you would never have to worry about me. So I hope that puts you at some ease. I just saw the Trent Franks thing."
It's not clear how the texts emerged, but Montenegro quickly issued an angry statement calling the story "a despicable example of the tabloid trash that conservatives around this country have to deal with on a regular basis." He even claimed that the media has it in for him because he's a "Hispanic conservative." When the Arizona Republic asked Montenegro's campaign what was false or distorted, they did not respond. However, two people who say they know the staffer told the paper that she did in fact send those messages and the photo. The paper also notes that in the days before the report came out, Montenegro had begun skipping campaign events.
Despite its explosive nature, though, it's hard to say what impact this story might have on this contest, if any. A big reason why this scandal might not do much is because plenty of votes have already been cast. Roll Call's Bridget Bowman writes that as of Friday, about 74,000 people had voted early. Officials estimate a total turnout in both parties' primaries of 110,000 to 115,000, so somewhere around two-thirds of all votes have already been cast (depending on each side's propensity to vote early versus on Election Day).
But there may still be enough votes outstanding to swing a close race—and this one does in fact appear to be tight. The last poll we saw, an early February survey from a local GOP firm with no direct involvement in the race showed Montenegro tied with fellow former state Sen. Debbie Lesko at 21 apiece, while former state Rep. Phil Lovas and former state Corporation Commissioner Bob Stump took 12 and 10, respectively. If voters who've waited to make up their minds decide they don't want another Trent Franks on their hands, that might tilt the outcome against Montenegro.
And the former congressman's shadow still looms. Back in December, Franks abruptly resigned under very vague circumstances, but news soon broke that the congressman had, astonishingly, asked two female staffers to bear his children, and even offered to pay them $5 million to do so.
But—perhaps understandably, now—the scandal didn't seem to trouble Montenegro, who just days later proudly announced that he was running with his old boss' endorsement. And Montenegro has stuck with Franks on the campaign trail, too, even running a campaign ad that featured him with both Franks and Joe Arpaio.
Bizarre as it may seem, despite his stunning fall from grace, Franks may yet well be a net asset to Montenegro. Multiple GOP strategists told Bowman that they believe the former congressman is still popular here, and even a strategist for Lovas conceded Franks still has adherents, though he added plenty of people are embarrassed by his one-of-a-kind implosion. We'll see if there are enough left to make a difference.
● CA-39: Brea City Councilor Steve Vargas has filed to run for the open 39th District as a Republican, although he did not yet formally declare whether he was running or not to succeed retiring GOP Rep. Ed Royce. If Vargas jumps into the race, Democrats might actually breathe a sigh of relief that the Republican field of notable candidates would expand to five, since Democrats already have four candidates of their own in the race who have raised or self-funded a substantial amount of money. If more Republicans decide to run, it could reduce the risk of two of them taking the top-two spots in the primary and shutting Democrats out of the general election in this 51-43 Clinton seat anchored in Orange County.
● CA-50: More than a few Republicans are worried that Rep. Duncan Hunter's many woes will cost them this 55-40 Trump seat in inland San Diego County, but the congressman insists he's running again. El Cajon Mayor Bill Wells announced this week that he would challenge his fellow Republican in the June top-two primary, and a more familiar name is now making noises about getting in. Conservative radio host Carl DeMaio, a former San Diego city councilor who lost tight races in 2012 race for mayor and in 2014 for the neighboring 52nd District, has made noises about running for something again for a while. This week, he put out a statement saying that he "expect[s] to make a decision in the next week."
None of the city of San Diego is located in this seat, but if DeMaio runs, he probably won't lack name recognition or support. In addition to his show, DeMaio has been the face of the effort to repeal a gas tax the legislature passed last year to fund highway improvements, as well as to recall state Sen. Josh Newman in June. (The repeal has not qualified for the November ballot yet, but DeMaio insists they're close to getting the signatures.) DeMaio's name briefly surfaced last year as a possible candidate in the neighboring 49th District, and a Democratic strategist told Politico they felt his efforts to repeal the gas tax would make him a formidable general election candidate.
● IA-01: Might Republican Rep. Rod Blum land in trouble with the House Ethics Committee? A new AP report indicates that the northeastern Iowa congressman broke House ethics rules for failing to disclose a company he played a role in. While that could typically just turn into a mundane story, it gets much weirder from here.
Blum was one of two directors of Tin Moon Corp., which was incorporated in 2016. Tin Moon was an internet marketing firm whose services included saying they could help companies who violate federal food and drug safety laws to hide their warning letters below more favorable online search engine results. The company even had a fake online video testimony where Blum's congressional chief of staff John Ferland pretended to be a satisfied customer.
It's unclear yet whether this story will have legs and lead to a House Ethics Committee investigation against Blum and penalties for failing to disclose assets and potentially misusing House resources. He attempted to defend himself by saying he didn't include the company on his asset disclosure because it was "worth zero" and "not a functioning company in 2016," but that's a dubious claim. And if it wasn't a functioning company, then why have any involvement with such a shady outfit in the first place? Blum faces a competitive re-election battle in this 49-45 Trump seat, and Democrats will undoubtedly try to capitalize on his ethics troubles if there is more to this story.
● IL-03: The other day, we noted that a NARAL-linked super PAC called Citizens for a Better Illinois had just reported spending $413,000 on TV and digital ads to support Marie Newman's challenge to Rep. Dan Lipinski in next month's Democratic primary, and now we have copies of those spots. Both are sharply negative. The first begins: "He opposes marriage equality, and pushed to allow businesses to discriminate against gays and lesbians." But, says the narrator, "It's not Trump. It's your congressman, Dan Lipinski." After going into some more detail about Lipinski's anti-gay record, the ad concludes, "You can't fight Trump when you agree with him."
The second spot follows the exact same pattern, except this time, it's focused on Lipinski's opposition to abortion "even in cases of rape and incest" and his support for defunding Planned Parenthood. Likening Lipinski to the guy in the White House seems like the perfect message for activating furious anti-Trump progressives.
● IL-06: Barrington Hills Planning Commissioner Kelly Mazeski is out with her first ad ahead of next month's Democratic primary, and the segment focuses on health care. Mazeski speaks to the camera to talk about how she fought breast cancer with the help of her friends, but when it comes to health care, Trump "is nobody's friend." She promises she'll fight Trump's healthcare plan if elected to Congress, because everyone deserves real health care.
● MI-13: Westland Mayor Bill Wild is the latest Democrat to join the crowded primary to fill former Rep. John Conyers' vacant Detroit-area seat. Westland is home to about 82,000 people, or roughly 12 percent of this district's population, but Wild will have his work cut out for him. Wild has served as Westland's mayor since 2007, but the vast majority of this seat's Democratic voters live in Detroit, which is much bluer. The primary electorate here also usually has a substantial black majority, and a white candidate like Wild may struggle to make inroads against several black candidates if voting polarizes along racial lines, as it often does. However, if several Detroit-based candidates split the vote there, Wild could win with a simple plurality in a state that doesn't require runoffs.
This safely Democratic seat has predictably seen a large number of candidates interested in running after Conyers had been in office for 53 years. Wild joins a field that includes Detroit City Council President Brenda Jones; state Sen. Coleman Young II; state Sen. Ian Conyers, who is the former congressman's nephew; hedge fund partner John Conyers III, who is former Rep. Conyers' son; former state Rep. Shanelle Jackson; and former state Rep. Rashida Tlaib.
● ND-AL: State Sen. Kelly Armstrong has filed to run for Rep. Kevin Cramer's open at-large House seat, although he previously has only said publicly that he is still considering a campaign. Armstrong currently serves as state party chair, and he could have a strong chance of winning the GOP primary given his party connections in this very red state.
● NJ-02: National Democrats were ecstatic when state Sen. Jeff Van Drew jumped into the race for South Jersey's swingy 2nd District after longtime GOP Rep. Frank LoBiondo unexpectedly announced his retirement, and the DCCC soon added him to their Red to Blue program on Wednesday. However, Van Drew's record as one of the most conservative Democrats in the legislature could cause him trouble in a primary.
Notably, he's earned a perfect 100 percent rating from the NRA after repeatedly voting against gun-safety measures like banning high-capacity magazines. Van Drew even authored an unsuccessful 2010 bill to loosen permit requirements for handguns, which kill far more Americans than any other type of firearm. And to make matters worse, Van Drew has gone silent in the wake of the Parkland, FL, school massacre, failing to clarify any of his positions on guns.
Gun safety isn't the only issue on which Van Drew has backed the conservative position. Back in 2012, he was one of just two Senate Democrats to vote against legalizing same-sex marriage, another issue he has yet to address since launching his campaign. And until last month, Van Drew for years had co-sponsored a GOP-backed measure to require parental notification for minors to receive pregnancy-related medical care. Only in January did he pull his name from the bill.
Needless to say, these sorts of positions would usually be a major vulnerability in a Democratic primary, but Van Drew may nevertheless cruise to the nomination in spite of them. Upon entering the race in November, he immediately earned the support of powerful South Jersey political machine boss George Norcross, as well as every county party chair in the district. And in a state where political machines have survived long after losing their potency elsewhere, that support could make all the difference in a primary.
So far, Van Drew faces three opponents for the nomination, but none of them has generated much buzz. The most notable candidate is likely Will Cunningham, who was a former staffer to Sen. Cory Booker. However, he only joined the race last month, so we haven't had a chance to get a look at his fundraising skills yet. But even Van Drew's fundraising was relatively unimpressive for a candidate with such widespread establishment support. He took in only a modest $80,000 for his first month of the race and finished December with that same amount on-hand. But that's still more than ... well, anybody else running for this seat.
And while Republicans have held this district (which swung to 51-46 Trump from 54-44 Obama) for a more than two decades, so far, not a single GOP candidate worth speaking of has even joined the contest. And there's not a whole time left, as the filing deadline is April 2. So despite his many flaws, Van Drew may have a relatively easy campaign ahead of him.
● NJ-11: While GOP Assemblyman Anthony Bucco formed an exploratory committee a few weeks ago for a possible bid for this open 49-48 Trump seat, he announced this week that he would instead back fellow Assemblyman Jay Webber
But on Wednesday, Webber picked up a different opponent in the June primary when investment banker and Army Reserve JAG officer Antony Ghee jumped in. Ghee is new to GOP politics, and he only switched his party registration from unaffiliated to Republican on Tuesday, but he begins the race with some important endorsements. Ghee has the support of Essex County Republican Chairman Al Barlas and Passaic County power player Peter Murphy, who have been looking for a candidate to run against Webber for weeks. Ghee also has the support of state Sen. Kristin Corrado, who had shown some interest in running here weeks ago.
As we've written before, Essex and Passaic carry a great deal of weight in GOP politics in this seat. Candidates want county party endorsements (also known as the "organization line"), because endorsed candidates appear in a separate column on the ballot along with other party endorsees. Morris County, where Webber is from, makes up about 60 percent of the GOP primary vote here, but it has no organization line. But Essex and Passaic make up a combined one-third of the vote (the balance is in Sussex, which also had no line), and Barlas and Murphy essentially get to decide who gets their county's endorsement. This may not matter too much if Webber can run up the score at home in Morris County, but if Ghee can dominate in Essex and Passaic while the Morris vote is split, he can prevail in June.
So far, no other major candidates have entered the primary, and there isn't too much time left before the April 2 filing deadline. And if Webber makes it though the primary, it could be bad news for Republicans looking to hold this competitive seat. Webber has a reputation as an ardent conservative, especially on abortion and access to guns, and he hugged Trump tight in his campaign announcement. But Ghee could make for a more appealing candidate for general election voters. Ghee says he grew up without a father, and he was the first member of his family to go to college. Both local GOP leaders highlighted Ghee's life story in explaining their support for him.
● NY-12: Here's a huge surprise that emerged almost out of nowhere with 2017's fourth-quarter fundraising reports: Previously unknown businessman and attorney Suraj Patel raised a monster $526,000 in just eight weeks for a challenge to longtime Rep. Carolyn Maloney in the June Democratic primary. Maloney has represented what's traditionally been known as the "Silk Stocking District," which takes in Manhattan's wealthy Upper East Side, ever since defeating liberal Republican Rep. Bill Green in 1992. Believe it or not, this area was historically represented by Republicans for decades until Maloney's win, but now it's as blue as they come: Hillary Clinton beat Donald Trump (whose Trump Tower lair is in this seat) 83-14 here.
But despite the district's GOP past, Maloney's never faced a serious threat in all her years in office, and that includes primaries, too. Her stiffest fight came in 2010, when attorney Reshma Saujani spent $1.5 million in a vain attempt to unseat her. (The district at the time was numbered the 14th.) It wasn't all that stiff, though. Saujani ran on an openly pro-Wall Street platform in the immediate aftermath of the financial crisis—"If you go to Texas, you'll never hear a Congressional member speak poorly of the oil industry," she declared—but received an utter drubbing, losing by an 83-17 margin in the primary.
As Politico's Laura Nahmias notes, Patel's background is superficially similar to Saujani's: Like Saujani as was at the time, Patel's a "tech-savvy 34-year-old with fundraising skills." (The two also happen to share Indian ancestry.) But Patel's messaging couldn't be more different. Instead of worshipping at the altar of finance, he's talking about issues like legalizing marijuana, making it easier to vote, and Black Lives Matter.
In addition, as Nahmias notes, the 12th takes in some new areas that weren't part of the old 14th. Both the past and present versions of Maloney's district cover parts of Manhattan, including not just the Upper East Side but also Midtown, as well as Queens and chiefly its Astoria and Long Island City neighborhoods. However, the seat now also reaches into Brooklyn, including some younger areas like Greenpoint and parts of Williamsburg. Those neighborhoods might boost Patel, whose tagline is "New voices. New energy. New ideas," but the Brooklyn portions of the district make up less than 10 percent of the seat's overall population, while three-quarters is still in Manhattan.
And though Patel did exceed Maloney's $367,000 fundraising haul in the last quarter, she still has a monster $3 million in the bank, and during the Saujani race, the entire Democratic establishment rallied around her; Maloney even earned a rare endorsement from Barack Obama. And Saujani's tale is a cautionary one: After her poor performance against Maloney, she tried running for public advocate (a citywide position) in 2013, but took a distant third in the primary with just 15 percent of the vote. While she's not a prominent member of Congress, Maloney's never really done anything to alienate her constituents, so it's hard to see how Patel will give primary voters a reason to change course.
● NY-21: As expected, former MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan, who now runs a company that installs solar-powered hydroponic farm equipment, kicked off a bid against GOP Rep. Elise Stefanik on Wednesday. Ratigan joins a very crowded field of Democratic hopefuls, though none have his profile or name recognition. The primary is June 26.
● PA-04: Pennsylvania's new map created a brand new congressional district (numbered the 4th) that includes most of Montgomery County in the Philadelphia suburbs, and at 59-39 Clinton, the winner of the May Democratic primary should have little trouble winning in November. State Rep. Mary Jo Daley and Shira Goodman, a prominent local gun safety activist, have already announced that they're running here, and several other potential candidates are interested. Unfortunately, one of those potential candidates is state Sen. Daylin Leach, who says he'll decide over the weekend.
Last year, Leach entered the race to challenge GOP Rep. Pat Meehan in the old 7th District, and he soon emerged as the leading Democratic candidate. But in December, the Philadelphia Inquirer published a story in which a former Leach staffer accused him of sexually harassing her. Numerous other people also told the paper that they had witnessed similar behavior from Leach for years, saying he engaged in inappropriate touching and told jokes that made them feel objectified. Two officials from Pennsylvania's delegation to the 2012 Democratic National Convention even said that after Leach made sexualized comments towards an intern, they instructed interns to travel in pairs.
Leach initially issued a statement denying he ever behaved inappropriately toward women and blaming a "whisper campaign" on supporters of an unnamed primary opponent. Leach also proceeded to savage his accusers, including Colleen Kennedy, who posted a pain-wracked essay about her experiences working for Leach in which she repeatedly called him a personal hero but said she felt she had to come forward because he'd "done things that have hurt other women I have cared about." In a since-deleted Facebook comment, Leach wrote:
"Nobody is blocking you Colleen. But you are a truly horrific monster. You fabricate insane attacks and laughable lies agains [sic] someone who was never anything but nice to you. To hell with what you do to my family, kids, the progressive movement, etc. I hope whatever it is that makes you such an unhappy person gets resolved. in a world where making progress is so freakin hard, you are just a human wrecking ball of hate."
Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf called for Leach to resign from the state Senate, but he did not do so. And while Leach's attorney later said the senator was "taking a step back" from his campaign against Meehan, he added that "it doesn't mean he's quitting the race." And indeed, it seems that Leach didn't stop running at all. City & State reports Leach accepted thousands in campaign donations in the weeks after the story broke, and at the end of December, he had $181,000 in the bank.
Meehan ended up retiring after his own sexual harassment scandal, but Leach is now talking about running in the new 4th. Leach insisted in an Inquirer op-ed last month that he was trying to learn and change, but understandably, plenty of Democrats remain unconvinced. Leach didn't assuage his doubters either when, weeks after his op-ed, he was the lone Democrat in the state Senate to miss the caucus' mandatory training regarding sexual harassment because he was at a resort in Key West for a meeting of the Pennsylvania Bar Association.
Some unnamed operatives also fear that if Leach captures the Democratic nomination, his weakness as a candidate could force the party to spend here—a seat Democrats truly shouldn't have to worry about. (And needless to say, an accused serial harasser is not the sort of person the DCCC would want to be seen supporting.) Consequently, the Inquirer reports that some Democrats are trying to persuade state Rep. Madeleine Dean to drop out of the primary for lieutenant governor and run here in part to stop Leach, and she's reportedly considering.
Other Democrats are also looking at the race, either publicly or privately. City & State writes that international development specialist Christina Hartman is floating her name here, though there's no quote from her. Hartman had been seeking a rematch with GOP Rep. Lloyd Smucker in what had been the old 16th District, but redistricting made his new seat (now the 11th) implacably red. Hartman didn't address the 4th District with the Huffington Post, though she said she'd decide what she'll do next week. Hartman ended December with $219,000 in the bank, but the 4th doesn't overlap at all with the district she was seeking.
The Inquirer also adds that local Democrats are wondering if Rep. Brendan Boyle will run here instead of in the new 2nd District. As we've written before, that's incredibly unlikely, since this seat contains none of Boyle's base in northeastern Philadelphia. Still, while the Wall Street Journal recently reported that Boyle would run for the 2nd, his office isn't saying anything. But one name we can cross off is Valerie Arkoosh, the chair of the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners, who ran in the primary in the old 13th against Boyle and Leach in 2014 but has decided against another bid for Congress.
● PA-07: Democrats were already planning to target this open Lehigh Valley seat, but it became a more appealing target after redistricting shifted it from 52-44 Trump to 49-48 Clinton. The major Democrats who were running for the old seat are still running for the new one, though it's possible more will join in. However, the GOP field has been scrambled quite a bit, with some candidates now finding themselves in other areas.
The one noteworthy Republican who seems to be determined to keep running here is Lehigh County Commissioner Marty Nothstein, whose entire county was in both the old 15th District and the new 7th District. Nothstein won a gold medal in cycling at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, but his opening fundraising quarter was pretty meh for a competitive race. He brought in $94,000 during the final three months of 2017 and self-funded another $20,000, leaving him with a $112,000 war chest.
The reason we know Nothstein is trying to claim the gold in the new 7th is that he just launched a digital ad aimed at state Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, who was also seeking the old 15th District. While Pennsylvania allows people to run for Congress and the legislature at the same time, Mackenzie announced last year that he was giving up his state House seat to concentrate on his bid to succeed retiring GOP Rep. Charlie Dent. But a week before the new congressional map was unveiled, Mackenzie began circulating petitions to run again for the state House, which Nothstein is hitting him for.
Mackenzie told The Morning Call that there are too many questions about which congressional districts will be used (even though legal experts pretty much universally agree the GOP's odds of blocking the new map are extremely slim), and he declined to say if he'd keep running for Congress or the legislature or if he would just pursue one race.
Mackenzie's home is in the new 7th, so he could keep running without being labeled a carpetbagger. Mackenzie raised $112,000 during the final months of 2017 and self-funded another $15,000, and while his $204,000 war chest wasn't massive, it was more than any other candidate on either side had at the time.
● PA-08, PA-09, PA-07: Democratic Rep. Matt Cartwright's new Scranton-area 8th District went from 55-44 Obama to 53-44 Trump, not much different from the 55-43 Obama to 53-43 Trump swing he experienced in his old 17th District, but a little more than half the seat is new to him. However, it's very unclear which Republicans will run against him.
While former state Revenue Secretary Dan Meuser didn't rule out a bid here earlier this week, he sounds a whole lot more interested in pursuing the safely red 9th District to the west. Meuser, who had been running for the old 11th District to succeed Senate candidate Lou Barletta, put out a statement Monday saying that "the court-drawn 9th Congressional District overlaps many areas in the 11th District where we have been campaigning hard for the past five months," and he would wait for the lines to be more definitive before commenting further.
Wealthy former JP Morgan managing director John Chrin had been running against Cartwright, but redistricting moved his home and the rest of Northampton County to the swingy 7th District, where GOP Rep. Charlie Dent is retiring. Chrin's campaign said they wouldn't comment because of the GOP's upcoming legal challenge to the new map. But Chrin kicked off his campaign against Cartwright while still living in New Jersey, and the Pennsylvania home he owned in Fountain Hill (the community where he also grew up) in was also in Dent's old 15th District then, so he may not care about what district he's wound up in. Still, Chrin's families have ties to Northampton County (his step-grandfather's company, Charles Chrin Co., owns a landfill and several real estate holdings there), so he may want to run in the new 7th anyway.
One Republican who may run against Cartwright is Joe Peters, a former state prosecutor and Scranton police officer. Like Meuser, Peters had been running for the old 11th District. Peters' home is in the new 12th District, but his political consultant made it clear that Peters wouldn't run against GOP Rep. Tom Marino. However, he didn't rule out the possibility that Peters would challenge Cartwright. Peters himself also expressed interest in the new 9th District.
● PA-09: The new map created a new safely red seat in coal country that has little in common with any of Pennsylvania's old districts, and it's unlikely any incumbent will be running here. As we wrote in our item above, state Revenue Secretary Dan Meuser and former state prosecutor Joe Peters are considering in the GOP primary here. Democrats would also be enthusiastic if Rep. Ryan Costello decided to run here instead of for the more competitive 6th District (Costello represents about 23 percent of the new 9th, though his Chester County base is entirely in the 6th). Former CIA officer Scott Uehlinger, who had been running to succeed retiring GOP Rep. Charlie Dent, wound up in the new 9th, and he says he'll run here, but he ended 2017 with very little money.
● PA-10, PA-07: Dauphin County Commissioner Mike Pries was running for retiring Rep. Charlie Dent's old 15th District, but his entire county was pushed into the new 10th District, where Rep. and fellow Republican Scott Perry is likely to run. Pries says he'll wait to see how court challenges go before deciding if he'll seek a new seat. Pries had just $72,000 in the bank at the end of December, so if he does decide to go up against Perry, he won't exactly be starting with many resources.
● PA-15: State House Majority Leader Dave Reed had been seeking the GOP nomination for retiring Rep. Bill Schuster's safely red 9th District, but redistricting threw his entire Indiana County seat into the new 15th District. GOP Rep. Glenn Thompson represents the safely red seat in the rural northwest part of the state, and he doesn't appear to have done much to anger GOP primary voters. However, Thompson's old 5th District only makes up about 57 percent of the new 15th, and he had only $373,000 on-hand at the end of 2017, so Reed may not be crazy to take his chances against him.
Reed initially declared that the new congressional districts are illegal and he was still running for Congress, but he sounded a whole lot less sure of himself on Tuesday, and he admitted he didn't know what he was going to do. But Reed didn't rule out challenging Thompson, saying that many had asked him if he'd run for the new 15th or for re-election, and these were "[a]ll legitimate questions, none of which I have an answer to at the moment."
● PA-17: No one knows who will win the March 13 special election for the old 18th District, but Democrat Conor Lamb may have already decided what he's doing next.
Lamb told the Wall Street Journal that he "will be running later no matter where they draw the lines.” However, just under 60 percent of the old 18th District is in the new 14th, a seat that backed Trump by an imposing 63-34, and it probably wouldn't make sense for Lamb to try here. But after the new map was unveiled on Monday, speculation immediately began that whether Lamb wins or loses next month, he could challenge GOP Rep. Keith Rothfus in the new 17th. Lamb lives in this suburban Pittsburgh seat, which backed Trump just 49-47. Rep. Mike Doyle, a Lamb ally who represents most of Pittsburgh, told the paper that it was a "virtual certainty" that Lamb would run for the new 17th, which includes about 20 percent of the old 18th District.
● TX-29: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer made a rare House endorsement outside of his home state of New York on Wednesday when he threw his support behind wealthy healthcare executive Tahir Javed, who is a longtime Democratic donor. It seems unlikely that Schumer will move many voters towards Javed, but the Texas Tribune's Abby Livingston writes that Schumer very much has pissed off local Democrats, who have largely consolidated behind state Sen. Sylvia Garcia in the March 6 primary for this safely blue open seat.
Livingston relays that "a plugged-in Texas delegation source" sent her an unsolicited email declaring that "Hispanic folks in Houston and DC are hot about it..You have heard of red hot...this is white hot." This seat is almost 75 percent Hispanic, and Garcia would be the first Hispanic House member from the Houston area, as well as the first Latina to represent Texas in the House (though a few other Latina candidates in other seats are also on the ballot this year). Javed, who immigrated to the United States from Pakistan, would be the state's first Asian-American representative.
● DCCC: The DCCC has added six more candidates to its "Red to Blue" program highlighting top challengers, its third wave so far. As per usual, it's mostly tilted toward names and races you'd expect, with a couple of surprises. Among the more predictable choices are Lauren Baer (FL-18), Jeff Van Drew (NJ-02), Andy Kim (NJ-03), and Elaine Luria (VA-02), who are all running in fairly swingy seats and are either the only notable Democrats in their races or are the strong frontrunners.
Two, however, don't quite fit this mold. One is former state legislator Lisa Brown, who is running against Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a senior member of House GOP leadership, in Washington's 5th District. This decidedly conservative-leaning seat went 52-39 for Trump and last voted Democratic for president when Bill Clinton narrowly carried it in 1996, but the D-Trip recently showed its hand by releasing an internal poll that put McMorris Rodgers up just 47-43 on Brown. Notably, Republicans offered no response.
The most interesting Red to Blue candidate of all, though, is attorney Xochitl Torres-Small, who is seeking New Mexico's open 2nd District. This is also a traditionally conservative seat at 50-40 Trump, but its large Latino population could make it ripe for a takeover. Torres-Small only entered the race last month, and there are several other Democrats also running, but she's politically well-connected (her husband is a state senator), and she launched her campaign with a slew of endorsements from local leaders.
● House: The Democratic group Patriot Majority USA has just published a third round of House race polling from PPP, and we've summarized the results below:
| District |
Democrat |
%age |
Republican |
%age |
Margin |
| CA-25 |
Generic D |
44 |
Steve Knight |
42 |
2 |
| CA-39 |
Generic D |
45 |
Generic R |
43 |
2 |
| CA-49 |
Generic D |
50 |
Generic R |
41 |
9 |
| FL-27 |
Generic D |
54 |
Generic R |
39 |
15 |
| IA-01 |
Abby Finkenauer |
43 |
Rod Blum |
42 |
1 |
| KS-02 |
Paul Davis |
44 |
Generic R |
42 |
2 |
| KY-06 |
Generic D |
44 |
Andy Barr |
43 |
1 |
| ME-02 |
Generic D |
45 |
Bruce Poliquin |
44 |
1 |
| MI-11 |
Generic D |
45 |
Generic R |
42 |
3 |
| MN-03 |
Dean Phillips |
46 |
Erik Paulsen |
43 |
3 |
| NJ-11 |
Mikie Sherrill |
40 |
Generic R |
42 |
-2 |
| NY-19 |
Generic D |
42 |
John Faso |
42 |
0 |
| TX-23 |
Generic D |
43 |
Will Hurd |
44 |
-1 |
| WA-08 |
Generic D |
44 |
Dino Rossi |
43 |
1 |
Only two of these matchups feature named candidates on both sides, and in both cases, they show small leads for Democrats in Iowa's 1st District and Minnesota's 3rd. All the rest feature a generic Democrat, a generic Republican, or both—an approach that has important limitations. Still, you'd always rather be in front than behind, and Democrats are ahead in 12 of these 14 surveys.
Patriot Majority's prior batches of House polls can be found here and here.
● Special Elections: Just wow!
Kentucky HD-49: Holy cow! Democrats picked this up in a landslide, with Linda Belcher defeating Republican Rebecca Johnson by a 68-32 margin. This represents a gargantuan swing from 2016, when Donald Trump won 72-23 here.
Not only was this a monster 86-point swing (the likes of which we've never seen before), this was also the 37th red-to-blue legislative flip of the cycle. Carolyn Fiddler has much, much more on this remarkable race right here.
Grab Bag
● Elections Data: We've collected all of our spreadsheets in one post so everybody can find them easily. Open seat trackers for the House and state legislatures, presidential numbers by congressional district and legislative district, demographic data for House seats, special elections results compared to presidential numbers and previous legislative elections, media markets, redistricting data, median legislative districts, primaries to watch, map templates for downloading, fundraising numbers, and more! All in one spot, and it will be kept updated as we create new spreadsheets. It's sure to be a favorite bookmark for the discerning elections geek in your family.
