Cliff Schecter/BlueAmp:
Real Beats Fake: How Authentic Democrats Are Breaking Trump’s Spell
From New York to Virginia, candidates like Zohran Mamdani and Abigail Spanberger are proving that speaking human—and digital—wins elections.
Thankfully, many Democrats across the country, are no longer listening to the “we can return to pre-Trump times, but a little better” crowd of Democrats, who have no understanding of the moment, and how it will shape the next century.
We’re seeing more of our candidates talk like they’re hanging out on a livestream rather than reading off a prompter. They crash into cameras, riff live on social platforms, and let their personalities bleed through the script.
State Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani has utilized this strategy all the way to a likely blowout victory tomorrow, when he will become New York City’s next Mayor. The video at the top of this post gives you an idea how he’s done it.
New York Times:
Mamdani Wins N.Y.C. Mayor’s Race After Highest Turnout in Decades
Zohran Mamdani, whose triumphant campaign was built on progressive ideas and a relentless focus on affordability, will become the city’s youngest mayor in more than a century.
His victory, stretching from the gentrified corridors of Brooklyn to the working-class immigrant enclaves of Queens, completed one of the most remarkable political upsets in New York history and will soon put a democratic socialist in City Hall.
Mr. Mamdani defeated former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in a rematch of June’s Democratic primary, as New Yorkers soundly rejected a man who was once the state’s most powerful figure for the second time in five months. Curtis Sliwa, the Republican, was in a distant third place, and conceded earlier in the night.
Turnout surged past 2 million voters, the highest level of participation in one of the city’s municipal elections since 1969.
New York Times:
New Jersey Elects Sherrill Governor as Democrats Pick Up Key Wins
Representative Mikie Sherrill won a competitive contest in New Jersey while Abigail Spanberger’s victory will make her the first woman to serve as governor of Virginia. California, which will decide on a redistricting question, is still voting.
The main contests on Tuesday were mostly unfolding in states lost last year by Mr. Trump, who has kept his distance by not campaigning in person alongside the major Republican candidates. He still weighed in from the sidelines, though, writing on social media Tuesday that the vote in California was “RIGGED,” without offering any evidence. Gov. Gavin Newsom pushed back, accusing the president of trying to intimidate Californians and “doing everything he can to suppress the vote.”
The governors’ race in New Jersey was hard fought, particularly after Mr. Trump’s better-than-expected performance there in 2024. Jack Ciattarelli, the Republican, emulated aspects of the president’s rhetoric in an effort to recreate his coalition there, and the loss may reflect the challenge of getting Mr. Trump’s supporters out to vote when he’s not on the ballot.
New York Times:
Spanberger Wins Virginia Governor’s Race With Forceful Anti-Trump Campaign
Abigail Spanberger, a former congresswoman and C.I.A. officer, will be the first woman to serve as governor of Virginia, following a streak of 74 men.
Ms. Spanberger, a moderate Democrat who served three terms in Congress, defeated Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, a socially conservative Republican who pledged her allegiance to Mr. Trump even though he did little to help her cash-starved campaign.
The A.P. called the race for Ms. Spanberger around 8 p.m., an hour after Virginia’s polls closed Tuesday night.
At her election night party, Ms. Spanberger’s victory remarks took a strikingly bipartisan tone. She praised her vanquished rival and pledged to be a governor for the voters who opposed her. “My goal and my intent is to serve all Virginians,” she said, a departure from the with-me-or-against-me ethos of Mr. Trump.
Mamdani doesn’t win in VA, and Spanberger doesn’t win in NYC. That’s how it’s supposed to work.
Bolts:
Democrats Retain Control of Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court with Three-Seat Sweep
The GOP mounted an unusual push to oust three supreme court justices and erase Democrats’ majority on the court. All three prevailed easily in Tuesday’s retention elections.
Three Democratic justices on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court have defeated an unusually high-profile Republican bid to unseat them. They secured large statewide victories on Tuesday, following an historically expensive campaign centered largely on the court’s role in defending voting and abortion rights.
The results preserve Democratic control of this all-important court for at least two more years. Barring any unexpected retirements, Democrats will enjoy a 5-2 majority until the next Pennsylvania Supreme Court elections, which are slated for 2027.
And Tuesday’s results mean that Republicans are now unlikely to win an outright majority until 2029 at the earliest; the best they could hope for in two years is to force a tie on the court.
Love you, Tip O’Neill, but all politics is national. And these judges got 60%. There’s a message in all of these wins.
CBS News:
Democrat Jay Jones wins Virginia attorney general's race despite text message scandal, CBS News projects
Democrat Jay Jones will win the Virginia attorney general's race, CBS News projects, surviving a scandal that arose late in the race over violent text messages he had written in 2022 about a Republican legislator.
Jones defeated GOP incumbent Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares, who had tried to seize on the resurfaced text messages to portray him as unfit for the office. But Miyares, who was backed by President Trump, was confronted by the headwinds of the federal shutdown and the president's government cuts in a state with high numbers of government workers — over 147,000 — according to Office of Personnel Management data.
In his sole debate against Miyares, Jones apologized multiple times for the texts, but maintained Miyares' connections to Mr. Trump were worse.
Mikie Sherrill as well!
In honor of Jack Ciattarelli, who embraced the wrong president:
