• Idaho, Iowa, Maine, and Nevada: Candidate filing closed Friday on major parties in four different states on Friday. Idaho will hold its primary first on May 21, with Iowa to follow on June 4; Maine and Nevada are both on tap on June 11. You can find a list of who filed in each state at their respective links, though note that Nevada candidates who are seeking office in constituencies based entirely in Clark County, which is home to the entirety of the 1st and 3rd Congressional Districts, file there rather than with the state.
Every incumbent member of Congress in these four states who is up for reelection this cycle is running for reelection, and no major candidates in any of those contests either jumped in or dropped out just before filing closed. One Nevada hopeful we'd previously mentioned, businessman Ron Quince, filed to campaign against Democratic Rep. Dina Titus as an independent rather than continue his bid for the 1st District as a Republican, but Quince's minimal fundraising means his switch probably won't matter much.
Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen, however, did get some potentially good news when far-right candidate Janine Hansen filed to run under the Independent American Party banner. The Nevada Independent's Jon Ralston notes that Hansen has run for office both statewide and in northern Nevada numerous times, and while she's never come close to winning, "she can reliably be counted on to get about 2 percent of the vote." Rosen would be just fine with that as long as Hansen disproportionately takes support from her eventual Republican foe, who is most likely to be Army veteran Sam Brown.
• UT-Sen: Inside Elections' Jacob Rubashkin reports that Conservative Outsider PAC, which he says has ties to both the Club for Growth and conservative megadonor Richard Uihlein, has launched an opening $1.8 million buy to promote attorney Brent Orrin Hatch ahead of the June 25 GOP primary to replace retiring Sen. Mitt Romney. The first ad shows a photo of the candidate with his late father, seven-term Sen. Orrin Hatch, before the narrator pledges that he'll "take on power brokers in both parties."
This is far from the first major outside spending of the primary, however. Conservative Values for Utah, a super PAC almost entirely funded by wealthy North Carolina businessman Jay Faison, has already deployed at least $1.3 million to support Rep. John Curtis since November. It recently rolled out a new spot, which touts the congressman as someone who will stand up to Joe Biden to fight inflation.
There has been no notable outside spending in support of the third major GOP candidate, former state House Speaker Brad Wilson.
• AZ-03: Phoenix City Councilmember Yassamin Ansari, who is required to step down to run for Congress under Arizona's resign-to-run law, announced Monday that her last day in office will be March 28. Ansari and former state Sen. Raquel Terán are the main candidates competing in the July 30 primary in the 3rd District to replace Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego, who is running for Senate.
• CA-12: The Associated Press has projected that California State University East Bay professor Jennifer Tran has secured the second spot in the March 5 top-two primary. She'll face fellow Democrat Lateefah Simon, a member of the Bay Area Rapid Transit Board, in the general election to replace Rep. Barbara Lee, who unsuccessfully ran for the Senate.
With an estimated 92% of the vote tabulated as of Monday afternoon, Simon is firmly in first place with 56% as Tran holds a 15-12 edge over another Democrat, Alameda Vice Mayor Tony Daysog. Simon, who has the support of Lee and other prominent party members, already looked like the frontrunner for this dark blue East Bay constituency even before her dominant showing earlier this month.
• MN-03: State Sen. Kelly Morrison has publicized an endorsement from Rep. Angie Craig, who represents the neighboring 2nd District, ahead of the August Democratic primary. Morrison is the only serious Democratic candidate campaigning in the 3rd District to replace Rep. Dean Phillips, who decided not to seek reelection in order to wage a presidential bid that predictably crashed and burned.
• NJ-03: VoteVets has endorsed Assemblyman Herb Conaway, who served in the U.S. Air Force Medical Corps, ahead of the June primary to succeed fellow Democrat Andy Kim, who is running for Senate.
• OH-09: State Rep. Derek Merrin earned Donald Trump's endorsement just a day ahead of the Republican primary to take on Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur.
Trump also used his Truth Social post to savage Merrin's main intra-party opponent, former state Rep. Craig Riedel, as "no friend of MAGA." In December, Riedel blasted Trump as "arrogant" and called for the party to go "in a different direction," and though he quickly tried to repair the damage by endorsing his party's master, it didn't stop Trump allies from abandoning him. Trump himself, though, waited until Monday to retaliate.
• WA-06: Democratic state Sen. Emily Randall publicized an endorsement from Sen. Patty Murray on Monday for the August top-two primary for this open seat held by retiring Rep. Derek Kilmer. Randall's top rival for the nomination is Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz, who has Kilmer's backing.
• ND Ballot: GOP Secretary of State Michael Howe announced Friday that backers of a proposed state constitutional amendment to bar anyone older than 80 from representing North Dakota in Congress have collected enough signatures to place their measure on the June 11 primary ballot. This plan could have a tough time surviving a court challenge, however.
The problem for proponents, as we wrote last year, is a 1995 U.S. Supreme Court decision that concluded that the only restrictions states could impose on congressional candidates were those spelled out in the nation's governing document: namely, a minimum (but not maximum) age, a minimum period of U.S. citizenship, and residency in the state (but not congressional district) they're seeking to represent at the time of election. That decision specifically prevented states from imposing any sort of term limits on members of Congress.
Some conservatives, however, are hoping that the Supreme Court's hard shift to the right over the ensuing three decades will give them the chance to at least partly overturn that earlier decision and allow state governments to change the rules dictating just who can serve. Indeed, the one remaining member of the 1995 court is Clarence Thomas, who joined three fellow conservatives in a 5-4 dissent.
The North Dakota plan, however, does include one feature designed to go into effect in case the courts aren't so accommodating. The text of the amendment says that if the courts block its proposed maximum age limit, a "ballot advisory" would appear on the ballot next to the names of congressional candidates informing voters how old they'd be when their term would end.