The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Carolyn Fiddler, and Matt Booker, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
Leading Off
● CA-50: This week, two well-established Republicans kicked off bids in California's 50th Congressional District against Rep. Duncan Hunter, a Republican who is scheduled to stand trial in January on corruption charges. First on Wednesday, state Sen. Brian Jones confirmed that he'd take on Hunter in the March top-two primary. However, he was immediately overshadowed by former Rep. Darrell Issa, who represented the neighboring 49th District until January and spent years topping Roll Call's list of wealthiest members of Congress.
Campaign Action
Two other notable Republican candidates, El Cajon Mayor Bill Wells and former Escondido Mayor Sam Abed, announced on Thursday that they were dropping out of the race and supporting Issa. However, fellow Republican Carl DeMaio, who became a prominent conservative radio host after two tight election losses earlier in the decade, quickly made it clear he was staying in the race. Democrat Ammar Campa-Najjar, who lost to Hunter 51.7-48.3 last year, is also running again. All the candidates will face off on one ballot, and the top-two vote-getters will advance to the November general election.
Progressives across the nation were delighted in January of 2018 when Issa, who spent years using his position as chair of the House Oversight Committee—and millions in taxpayer dollars—to launch bogus investigation after bogus investigation against the Obama administration, announced that he would retire from Congress. Issa's decision came just over a year after he'd narrowly won re-election in the 49th District, a once-safely red seat that had swung from 52-46 Romney to 51-43 Clinton; that fall, Democrat Mike Levin went on to decisively flip Issa's constituency.
However, while Issa was done with the 49th District, he wasn't actually done with Congress. Weeks after he announced he would retire, reports emerged that Issa was considering switching to the 50th District, an inland San Diego County seat that was still reliably red turf at 55-40 Trump, if Hunter resigned.
Hunter, who was under investigation at the time for allegedly misusing campaign money but had not yet been indicted, reacted by telling The Hill, "If I was to blow up in the air, then he would be running for it. If I was to blow up, then he would run for the seat." Hunter continued, "If I blow up, yes. Why wouldn't he run for my seat if I was to blow up in the air?"
Hunter did not blow up in the air in time for the candidate filing deadline, and Issa was not on the ballot anywhere in 2018. Later that year, Issa also got some good news when Donald Trump picked him to lead the U.S. Trade and Development Agency, but his nomination quickly stalled in the Senate. Over the summer, Issa once again began showing interest in seeking the 50th District, and this time, he was willing to face Hunter. However, not all of his former colleagues were onboard. In June, The Hill wrote that some GOP House members believed he had "rubbed colleagues the wrong way."
One unnamed member sounded particularly pissed at Issa for wanting to come back to Congress after abandoning the 49th District, declaring, "Issa had his time here," and added, "[Y]eah, we know California is a challenging political environment, but I don't think there's been a lot of calls made to have him come back." That skepticism didn't stop Issa from launching an exploratory committee in late August, which included a site with an issues section with that read "placeholder for 1st issues title" and "placeholder for 2nd issues title," with plenty of dummy text underneath.
A few weeks later, though, Issa's nomination to head the U.S. Trade and Development Agency briefly got a new lease on life after the Senate Foreign Relations Committee scheduled a confirmation hearing that would have taken place exactly a year after Trump first picked him. However, things quickly went off the rails last week after New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez, who is the committee's top Democrat, began the day by calling for the hearings to be delayed, saying that information in Issa's FBI background check was "problematic" and "potentially disqualifying."
Menendez didn't reveal what those bogeys were, but Republican Sen. Jim Risch, the committee's leader, agreed to postpone the hearings until the Trump administration gave Issa's file to the full panel (only the chair and ranking member have seen it).
Issa downplayed Menendez's objections and argued that the senator was simply rehashing public information about the former congressman's time in the Army nearly 50 years ago. Issa's military career included a demotion and an "unsatisfactory" conduct rating, as well as an allegation that he stole another soldier's car.
However, Menendez said there was more troubling information in Issa's file, adding, "If they were all public, then we wouldn't be having the difficulty that we have." Issa quickly seems to have decided this wasn't a battle worth fighting, and he said in his Thursday congressional kickoff that he'd informed Trump he was withdrawing his name from consideration.
Jones, the other GOP candidate who launched his campaign against Hunter this week, also has a long career in San Diego County politics. In 2008, Jones ran for a previous version of this seat (then numbered the 52nd District) in the GOP primary against Hunter, the son and namesake of longtime Rep. Duncan Hunter Sr. The younger Hunter won that race by a lopsided 72-16 margin, but Jones was elected to the state Assembly just two years later.
Last year, Jones won a promotion to a state Senate seat that takes up 87% of the 50th Congressional District, which could give him a good geographic base of support. Last week, the San Diego Union-Tribune columnist Michael Smolens also wrote that Jones "has strong ties to local faith-based organizations," which might come in handy in this crowded race.
While DeMaio, Issa, and Jones each said they were running because Hunter could jeopardize the GOP's hold on this seat, they could end up splitting the anti-Hunter vote and sending the incumbent into another general election against Campa-Najjar. California's candidate filing deadline is in December and if Hunter runs for re-election as he's pledged to do, he'll remain on the March ballot no matter how his trial goes.
However, it's very possible that Hunter still won't have gone before a judge by the time voters get to weigh in on his future. The congressman's team has convinced a federal appeals court to hear their motion in December to dismiss the case, and one former federal prosecutor told San Diego's local NBC affiliate that these proceedings could delay his trial by as much as 18 months. Federal prosecutors allege that Hunter illegally used campaign money for personal matters, including video games, a flight for his family's pet rabbit, and financing his affairs with at least five different women.
Senate
● AL-Sen: The Alabama Farmers Federation, a group the Associated Press characterizes as an "agriculture powerhouse," this week endorsed former Auburn University football coach Tommy Tuberville in the crowded GOP primary.
● TX-Sen: On Thursday, investor and self-described "moderate Republican" Mark Yancey launched a primary bid against Sen. John Cornyn. Yancey, who is a former co-owner of the Women's National Basketball Association team the Dallas Wings, may have access to money, but he's going to have a very tough time getting traction with Texas' very conservative primary electorate.
Gubernatorial
● IN-Gov: State Superintendent of Public Education Jennifer McCormick, a Republican who has a terrible relationship with her party leadership, did not quite rule out a bid against GOP Gov. Eric Holcomb this week. McCormick, who has already announced that she will not seek re-election next year, told Howey Politics, "I don't want to be governor today," but she quickly added, "I would never rule anything out." It's not clear which party McCormick would run with, especially since she also explicitly didn't rule out serving as the lieutenant governor candidate on a Democratic ticket.
Back in July, McCormick caused a stir when she accompanied state Sen. Eddie Melton, a Democrat who is considering running for governor, on a statewide listening tour. The state GOP was furious, and party chair Kyle Hupfer accused her of auditioning to become Melton's running mate. McCormick responded by declaring that the Indiana GOP has "been nonexistent in support for me. I'm not sure I owe them anything." At the time McCormick didn't rule out eventually backing Melton, and she also didn't shoot down the idea of eventually becoming his candidate for lieutenant governor if he ran.
● LA-Gov: On Thursday, Rep. Ralph Abraham's own campaign released a new poll of the Oct. 12 all-party primary that confirmed that he's in serious danger of losing the crucial second-place spot to wealthy businessman Eddie Rispone, a fellow Republican. The Remington Research poll found Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards taking 47% of the vote, which is tantalizingly close to the majority he needs to avert a November runoff, while Abraham led Rispone just 22-20 for the second spot in a potential second round.
Abraham's team is releasing this survey to argue that he's still positioned to advance to a runoff despite the millions that Rispone has thrown into TV ads, but this poll is hardly encouraging news for the congressman. Just two weeks ago, Abraham released a different poll from Remington that had him beating Rispone by a larger 27-19 spread (Edwards was at 45%), so even his own team is acknowledging that he's losing altitude with just about two weeks to go before Election Day.
The new survey came days after the GOP firm JMC Analytics also found Rispone making gains at Abraham's expense in a short amount of time. In a poll completed Sept. 19 for the media company Nexstar, JMC found Edwards at 41% while Abraham led Rispone 27-19. However, in a second poll for the Louisiana Association of Health Plans that was was finished Sept. 21, JMC had Edwards taking 48%, while Rispone now led Abraham 22-20. Abraham's team responded to those unwelcome new numbers with a release proclaiming, "Don't believe fake polls and failing campaigns," but their newest survey found very similar numbers for all three of the main candidates.
Rispone, who has been self-funding his campaign, had a massive $6.3 million to $1.4 million cash-on-hand lead over Abraham at the beginning of September, so unless Abraham raised a lot more money over the last few weeks, he may have a tough time trying to staunch the bleeding. The next campaign finance reports are due Oct. 2, so we'll soon have a final look at each candidate's financial strength heading into Election Day.
House
● FL-13: On behalf of Florida Politics, St. Pete Polls is out with a survey giving Democratic Rep. Charlie Crist a 42-35 lead over former St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Baker in a hypothetical general election. This seat in the St. Petersburg area backed Hillary Clinton 52-48, and a few Republicans are already running against Crist.
Baker, a Republican who narrowly lost his 2017 campaign to regain the mayor's office, said in early August that he had "no present intention or plans to run for office again." However, Baker posted later that month on Facebook that he would "soon be posting upcoming plans," but we have yet to hear anything from him. Baker was recruited to run for the House in late 2013 and 2016 but said no both times, and he said after his second refusal that he believed he was "a better fit for an executive leadership position than a position in Congress."
● IL-15: Republican Chris Quick, who previously served one term each as state's attorney for Wabash County and Lawrence County, has begun collecting signatures to appear on the primary ballot. Quick has not yet committed to running for this safely red open seat, though, and he said he was waiting to see if state Sen. Jason Plummer runs. Quick told the Belleville News-Democrat, "If some big name like that gets in, the rest of us should pack our bags and go home." The filing deadline is in early December.
● MI-13: Detroit City Council President Brenda Jones has not yet said anything publicly about a possible Democratic primary rematch against freshman Rep. Rashida Tlaib, but the Detroit Free Press writes that she is indeed considering it. However, while Jones' 2018 bid had the endorsement of Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, the paper predicts that a second campaign wouldn't attract much establishment support.
Last year, Tlaib narrowly beat Jones 31-30 in the six-way primary for the full term. However, there were only four candidates on the ballot in the special election primary held on that same day to succeed former Rep. John Conyers, and in that race, it was Jones who beat Tlaib 38-36. Jones ended up serving in the House during the final months of the GOP-controlled 115th Congress before returning to her job as leader of the Detroit City Council.
Other notable local Democrats don't seem keen to run against Tlaib, though. The paper says that 2018 candidates Coleman Young II and Ian Conyers have said no, while fellow primary contender Bill Wild also is not "expected to run again." They add that Wayne County Sheriff Benny Napoleon and former Detroit City Councilor Sharon McPhail "appear, for now, out of the running."
● MT-AL: EMILY's List has endorsed 2018 Democratic nominee Kathleen Williams' campaign for this open seat. Williams faces rancher Matt Rains and state Rep. Tom Winter in next year's Democratic primary to succeed GOP gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte.
● NY-22: The National Journal writes that former GOP Rep. Claudia Tenney is "very likely" to seek a rematch against freshman Democratic Rep. Anthony Brindisi next year, though there's no word from Tenney herself. The former congresswoman expressed interest in another bid almost immediately after her 51-49 defeat last year, and she said in July she was "leaning closer to running." Broome County District Attorney Steve Cornwell and a few underfunded candidates are already campaigning for the GOP nod for this 55-39 Trump seat.
● TX-22, TX-07: On Thursday morning, Fort Bend County Sheriff Troy Nehls announced that he'd formed an exploratory committee for a possible bid to succeed retiring Rep. Pete Olson, a fellow Republican. Nehls said in that announcement that he'd already raised $100,000 for his efforts, though as of Thursday evening, the FEC website doesn't display an active campaign account for him.
Back in February of 2017, Nehls also formed an exploratory committee for a possible primary bid against Olson, but he ultimately announced that December that he'd stay put. Click2Houston says that the sheriff decided not to run two years ago after he determined that Texas law would require him to resign his post. However, Nehls announced this July that he would not seek re-election, so he may not have as much of a problem quitting this time.
The National Journal also reports that another Republican, Big Brothers Big Sisters Lone Star CEO Pierce Bush, is considering running here, but he has not yet said anything publicly. Bush, who is a grandson of the late George H.W. Bush, expressed interest in April in running for the neighboring 7th District against freshman Democratic Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, though he also hasn't said anything about his plans since then.
However, national GOP leaders looking to beat Fletcher have consolidated behind Army veteran Westley Hunt. Hunt raised more money than any of the party's other House challengers in the entire nation during the second quarter of 2019, so Bush may want to avoid what would be a very expensive primary by running for Olson's open seat instead.
The 22nd District is also still a friendlier seat for Team Red than the 7th. While both Houston-area districts have moved dramatically to the left in recent years, Trump carried the 22nd 52-44 at the same time that he was losing Fletcher's seat 48.5-47.1. Last year, GOP Sen. Ted Cruz also narrowly beat Democrat Beto O'Rourke 50.0-49.3 in the 22nd while losing the 7th by a 53-46 margin.
● TX-32: On Tuesday, former GOP Rep. Pete Sessions told the Dallas Morning News that he'd decide "quickly" whether to seek a rematch against freshman Democratic Rep. Colin Allred.
Sessions, who voted to impeach Bill Clinton in 1998, took umbrage with Allred after the Democrat said he was considering voting to impeach Donald Trump. Sessions said of his old opponent, "He is definitely now back on my radar," and, "My interest is piquing towards reengaging him in that battle." Sessions ran an underwhelming campaign last cycle and lost to Allred 52-46, and some of his old allies reportedly don't want him campaigning here again.
Sessions hasn't been deterred, though, and since December, he's talked about running to regain the suburban North Dallas seat he held for 22 years. However, while the former congressman said two months ago, "There will be an opportunity for me to make a decision in mid-September," that timeframe has come and gone without him making a decision. Former Navy SEAL Floyd McLendon and businesswoman Genevieve Collins are already seeking the GOP nod here.
● WI-07: On Thursday, attorney Christine Bremer Muggli announced that she would not run in the Dec. 30 Democratic primary for the upcoming special election.