Note: The Digest will be taking off on Monday—Jeff Singer is moving, and David Nir is recovering from reconstructive knee surgery. We’ll be back in your inboxes on Tuesday!

Leading Off

OK-Gov

Dueling drug tests have unexpectedly become a high-profile topic in next week’s Republican runoff for Oklahoma’s open governorship, yet another primary where Donald Trump is trying to avoid ending up on the losing side.

“I took the longer-window hair drug test. My results are clean,” Attorney General Gentner Drummond tweeted on Monday.

He continued by accusing former state Sen. Mike Mazzei, the candidate backed by both Trump and termed-out Gov. Kevin Stitt, of taking “a urine test with a much shorter detection window.” Drummond, who posted the results for his own test, added, “Take the test, Mike. Release the results. Give Oklahomans a straight answer.”

A spokesperson for Mazzei, who denies being on any medications as a result of a devastating 2008 car accident, maintained that a second test was not needed.

“Mike took the same standard drug test used by the NCAA and NFL, and passed,” his team told the Oklahoma Voice’s Barbara Hoberock. “Drummond won’t accept the result because the truth exposes his attack for exactly what it is, a lie.”

Drug tests emerged a campaign issue early this month after Drummond informed Hoberock that he would release one to show if he was taking any medications.

While insisting that he was not “suggesting one way or the other” if his rival was fit to serve as governor, the attorney general added, “The results will be available in three days and we’ll publish those and we’ll see if the other candidate feels confident enough in his physical stature to do that.”

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Mazzei responded by saying that his opponent was trying to falsely insinuate that he was “probably on some unhelpful medication” because of his 2008 crash.

Mazzei, who was in the state Senate at the time, suffered a serious back injury and missed many votes for years after the accident. A 2013 editorial in The Oklahoman noted that the legislator, despite winning reelection the previous year, had been absent for “slightly more than 77 percent of votes” in the most recent session, which it characterized as “hundreds more than any other lawmaker.”

Mazzei, who was termed out in 2016 and later served in Stitt’s administration, has said that he does not take prescriptions to deal with his injuries anymore, adding that the accident will not impact his performance in office.

“I’m back to my old self and I can do all the things I used to do, except swing a golf club, which might be a good thing,” he said in a May video. “It’s an expensive sport.”

Mazzei’s performance on the campaign trail, however, has led some observers to question his behavior.

“Most charitably, some of Mazzei’s public appearances have just felt awkward and uncomfortable when watching from afar,” Janelle Stecklein, the Oklahoma Voice’s editor, wrote in an essay for the site.

Stecklein drew attention to a debate on May 28 ahead of the first round of the primary when a moderator briefly tripped over his words while trying to ask a question. Mazzei responded mockingly with gibberish, a moment met with silence in the room.

One powerful Republican, though, was unbothered by that graceless moment. Trump took to Truth Social the very next day to endorse Mazzei in the busy primary, a move that stunned local Republicans.

“My phone is blowing up with Oklahoma officials and politicos absolutely SHOCKED at this endorsement,” NOTUS reporter Reese Gorman tweeted of Trump’s decision to support Mazzei, a candidate Gorman said “started the race as almost an after thought.”

But while Mazzei had already been rising in the polls before Trump took his side, the intervention by MAGA’s master elevated him into a frontrunner. Drummond, who had been the target of an expensive negative campaign by the far-right Club for Growth, took first place with 26.3%, while Mazzei finished just behind with 26.0%.

Stitt joined Trump by endorsing Mazzei in the second round, which state law mandated because neither candidate secured a majority of the vote in the primary. Drummond’s team, though, soon began unsubtly asking questions about the candidate’s capacities.

“As voters begin paying attention and realizing there is something not quite right about Mike Mazzei, he is withdrawing from forums, avoiding public scrutiny, and hiding from the very people whose votes he’s asking for,” Drummond’s campaign manager charged last month.

Matters escalated recently when a debate moderator asked whether candidates for governor should “voluntarily present tax returns and health information.”

Calling himself “an absolute open book,” Drummond said he “would be happy to take a drug test today” and was “happy to disclose” his tax returns. Mazzei likewise said he’d share financial and health records, though he didn’t mention anything about drug tests and balked at the idea in subsequent comments to the Voice.

But Mazzei later changed his mind. On Monday, he released a urine test and provided The Oklahoman with a letter from his doctor saying he was healthy.

His top ally, however, wants Republicans to pay attention to other topics.

Trump took to Truth Social on Tuesday to reaffirm his support for Mazzei and use his post to savage Drummond as a “FAKE Republican” who had “donated to SLEEPY Joe Biden.”

Drummond withstood attacks over that donation four years ago during his ultimately successful primary challenge against Attorney General John O’Connor, a Stitt ally. Drummond responded at the time by saying his wife had made the contribution from a joint account when she was “mad,” but that she’d “immediately asked for a refund and got the money back.”

That incident didn’t prevent Drummond from beating O’Connor, but his enemies have continued to highlight it during his campaign for governor. A Club for Growth affiliate ran commercials about it during the first round of the primary, and Trump this week labeled the couple “Radical Left Dumocrats.”

In the same social media post, Trump also hit Drummond for suing to block a proposed aluminum plant outside Tulsa. Drummond says the project’s owner, the Dubai-based Emirates Global Aluminium, needs to provide more details about how it will address pollution and waste before it can move forward.

Drummond’s backers have aired ads attacking Mazzei for supporting the plant, but those commercials don’t address any environmental concerns.

“Shocking: MAGA phony Mike Mazzei wants to hand $1 billion in taxpayer money to a Muslim country to build a smelter plant that area farmers and neighbors oppose,” says the narrator for a group called Make Oklahoma Great Again. “Taxpayer cash handouts to Muslim countries when times are already tough for Christian Oklahomans? Sorry Mike, that’s not America first. It’s America last, and it’s immoral.”

Limited polling has shown the two candidates locked in a close race.

Mazzei led 44-38 in an early August internal poll for the Club for Growth from Pulse Decision Science. But a survey conducted around that same time by Cole Hargrave Snodgrass & Associates, a firm that’s not affiliated with either candidate, found the candidates tied at 44 apiece.

Whoever wins the Republican nomination next week will face state House Minority Leader Cyndi Munson, who won the Democratic nod outright in June, in what’s long been one of the most conservative states in the nation.

The Downballot

Democrats claim another big special election victory

Democrat Brandon Dukes won the last special election before November and became the 31st Democrat to flip a legislative seat since the beginning of 2025—compared to zero for Republicans. On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, co-host David Beard and guest host Joe Sudbay discuss that race as well as the last big primary night of 2026, with a …

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Election Recaps

CA-14

State Sen. Aisha Wahab secured victory in the all-Democratic special election for California’s 14th Congressional District on Thursday when the Associated Press called the race.

Wahab holds a 53-47 advantage over Melissa Hernandez, the president of the board of Bay Area Rapid Transit, with the Associated Press estimating that 95% of the vote is in. Wahab, the daughter of refugees from Afghanistan, will be the first Afghan American member of Congress once she’s sworn in to succeed Democrat Eric Swalwell, who resigned in disgrace in April.

Wahab and Hernandez will face off again in the fall for a full term representing the southern East Bay in Northern California.

FL-09

Former Defense Department official Dan Green will be the Republican nominee against Democratic Rep. Darren Soto in Florida’s newly gerrymandered 9th District, the Associated Press projected on Thursday. Green, who loaned his campaign over $1 million, outpaced dairy farmer Ben Butler 25-24 in Tuesday’s primary.

Green and Soto will now square off for a seat in the Orlando area that Republicans radically transformed from a Democratic-leaning and predominantly Latino constituency into a conservative seat whose eligible voting population is majority-white. Donald Trump would have carried the new 9th 58-41 in 2024, though he would have won it by a smaller 53-46 spread four years earlier.

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Soto, though, is seeking a fifth term despite the odds.

“There’s a lot of Democrats and independents who did not show up the last couple elections,” he told Central Florida Public Media in May. “But I can tell you, in the … new proposed seat, Trump is actually underwater by 2, 3 points, according to new polls … because the economy is struggling in a lot of these areas, right? So it’s tough, but winnable.”

House

DCCC

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee finally added state Auditor Matt Dunlap to its Red to Blue list for top candidates on Thursday, two-and-a-half months after he defeated the committee’s pick in the Democratic primary for Maine’s open 2nd District.

In addition to Dunlap, the DCCC also elevated four other Democrats in competitive races, including retired Army Brig. Gen. Leela Gray in Florida’s 13th, former federal prosecutor Zach Dembo in Kentucky’s 6th, retired Vice Admiral Nancy Lacore in South Carolina’s 1st, and former Rep. Tom Perriello in Virginia’s 5th.

Just before Maine’s primary, the DCCC and the House Majority PAC intervened to help state Sen. Joe Baldacci, viewing him as the stronger option to defend the conservative 2nd District against former GOP Gov. Paul LePage. However, Dunlap defeated Baldacci 52-48 in a ranked-choice runoff, leading to a long standoff with the committee over whether it would embrace him.

Baldacci, though, immediately endorsed his former opponent, and Dunlap’s campaign repeatedly expressed its optimism that the DCCC would eventually bring him into the fold, as it did on Thursday. The 2nd District, which voted for Donald Trump by a 54-44 margin, remains one of Democrats’ most difficult defensive holds this year, but retiring Rep. Jared Golden was able to narrowly flip the seat in 2018, the last time Democrats felt similar winds at their backs.

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Dunlap’s ascension to Red to Blue, meanwhile, leaves just one notable Democrat out in the cold: climate activist William Lawrence, an outspoken progressive who defeated two more moderate candidates in Michigan’s swingy 7th District earlier this month.

However, on the same day the DCCC updated its list, HMP released a new poll from Global Strategy Group giving Lawrence a narrow 49-47 lead over Republican Rep. Tom Barrett. Combined with HMP’s hefty ad reservations targeted toward this race, it’s a sign that Lawrence, too, might earn the DCCC’s support as well.

Poll Pile

• AR-Sen: Hendrix College for Talk Business & Politics:

  • Hallie Shoffner (D): 47, Tom Cotton (R-inc): 44, Jeff Wadlin (L): 3.

• MI-Sen: Fabrizio Ward/Impact Research for AARP:

  • Abdul El-Sayed (D): 48, Mike Rogers (R): 47.

• MN-Sen: Deep Root Analytics for Michele Tafoya:

  • Peggy Flanagan (D): 50, Tafoya (R): 45.

• NH-Sen (D): Saint Anselm College:

  • Chris Pappas: 59, Karishma Manzur: 28.

  • June: 62-20 Pappas.

• NH-Sen (R): Saint Anselm:

  • John Sununu: 54, Scott Brown: 24.

  • June: 59-21 Sununu.

• NH-Sen: Saint Anselm:

  • Pappas (D): 48, Sununu (R): 41. (June: 47-41 Pappas)

  • Pappas (D): 49, Brown (R): 37. (June: 48-36 Pappas)

• AZ-Gov: Noble Predictive Insights:

  • Katie Hobbs (D-inc): 48, Andy Biggs (R): 35, all others 2% or less.

• AZ-Gov: NextGen Polling:

  • Hobbs (D-inc): 39, Biggs (R): 38, all others 1% or less.

• MI-Gov: Fabrizio/Impact:

  • Jocelyn Benson (D): 49, John James (R): 44.

• NH-Gov: Saint Anselm:

  • Kelly Ayotte (R-inc): 49, Cinde Warmington (D): 38.

  • June: 45-37 Ayotte.

• AR-02: Hendrix College:

  • Chris Jones (D): 48, French Hill (R-inc): 44.

• NH-01 (D): Saint Anselm:

  • Maura Sullivan: 26, Stefany Shaheen: 24, Carleigh Beriont: 12, Heath Howard: 7, all others 3% or less, undecided: 27.

  • June: Shaheen: 22, Sullivan: 15, Howard: 9, all others 3% or less.

• NH-01 (R): Saint Anselm:

  • Anthony DiLorenzo: 30, Hollie Noveletsky: 17, Brian Cole: 8, all others 1% or less, undecided: 44.

  • June: Noveletsky: 16, DiLorenzo: 13, Cole: 8.

• NH-02 (D): Saint Anselm:

  • Maggie Goodlander (inc): 66, Paige Beauchemin: 17.

  • June: 76-9 Goodlander.

• NH-02 (R): Saint Anselm:

  • Lily Tang Williams: 53, Victor Orlando: 7.

  • June: 56-7 Williams.

• NH-02: Saint Anselm:

  • Goodlander (D-inc): 50, Williams (R): 35.

  • June: 50-31 Goodlander.

• AZ-AG: NextGen:

  • Kris Mayes (D-inc): 37, Warren Peterson (R): 34.

• MN-SoS: SurveyUSA for KSTP:

  • Steve Simon (D-inc): 41, Tad Jude (R): 34.

• MN Auditor: SurveyUSA:

  • Zack Filipovich (D): 39, Scott Jensen (R): 39.

Leading Off

SC-Sen

Sen. Darline Graham drew the worst headlines of her month-old campaign on Tuesday night with a debate gaffe that sparked fresh questions about whether she’s about to become the latest Trump-backed candidate to lose in a primary.

“Senator, are Taiwan and the South China Sea national security issues for the United States? If so, why?” moderator Greta Van Susteren asked Graham during her faceoff with Rep. Ralph Norman.

“I’m just going to be honest here,” the senator responded. “I’m not on national security that—I’m not that informed on national security so … but I do support the military.”

Graham continued by talking about how her late brother and immediate predecessor, Lindsey Graham, had spent more than three decades in the Air Force before saying, “I’m not a polished politician up here. National security is not my thing, not my area of expertise, but I do support the military.”

Norman’s supporters quickly argued that Graham’s response showed that the senator, who’d never held elected office before Gov. Henry McMaster appointed her last month to replace her brother, was an unacceptable choice in next week’s runoff.

“Lindsey Graham was well informed on the United States’ national security. Darline Graham admits she’s not,” tweeted former Gov. Nikki Haley. “This is not something you inherit. And it’s critical in the U.S. Senate.”

Graham’s team had reason to feel wary about her prospects even before she delivered that response on Tuesday.

Journalist Jake Lahut, in his newsletter Straight from the Hut, wrote the following morning that while his sources still believe the incumbent has the advantage next week, they have become “increasingly worried about a highly scripted and buttoned up campaign from her.”

Lahut says Graham has done little campaigning and, when she has made appearances, an aide stands behind her “mouthing answers.”

Norman’s allies are also pressing their case that conservatives should be wary of Graham in a new round of ads.

“What if Darline Graham had any other last name?” asks the narrator in a commercial for Palmetto First PAC. “Do we really know where she stands? Darline won’t tell us.”

Graham’s backers, by contrast, argue Norman has already shown why he shouldn’t be trusted in their latest TV spots.

“Ralph Norman betrayed President Trump by endorsing against him in 2024,” declares the narrator for Invest in Tomorrow Coalition, a group funded by wealthy clean energy investors. The ad does not note that Norman backed Haley’s long-shot primary campaign against Trump that year before supporting him in the general election.

Invest in Tomorrow told Politico last week it wanted Norman to lose to punish him for leading the push to use Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” to repeal tax credits for wind and solar energy. Its ad, though, faults the congressman for initially opposing that legislation. Norman, who said he wanted more restrictions on Medicaid, ultimately fell into line.

Trump himself is also seeking to boost Graham during the final days of the campaign. The White House announced at the beginning of the week that Trump, who has largely used virtual “tele-rallies” to promote his preferred candidates this cycle, will hold an in-person event for her on Friday in Myrtle Beach.

Trump has additionally worked behind the scenes to help Graham, who led Norman 33-25 in the first round of voting last week, secure a win in the runoff.

Multiple media outlets report that Rep. Russell Fry, who took third with 20%, backed Graham on Friday after Trump pushed him to do so. The New York Times described the interaction with the headline, “Trump Pressured Russell Fry to Endorse Darline Graham for Senate. So He Did.”

Trump’s ardent support for Graham comes amidst a difficult stretch for him at the ballot box. On Tuesday, the same night as the senator’s debate, three of Trump’s picks lost high-profile primaries in Florida and Wyoming. Those defeats came just after similar failures to get his chosen candidates across the finish line in Michigan, Tennessee, and Minnesota.

And the South Carolina Senate race isn’t the only contest on Tuesday where Trump’s pick is in danger of losing.

Recent polls of the Republican primary runoff for Oklahoma’s open governorship show former state Sen. Mike Mazzei, who has Trump’s endorsement, locked in a close race against Attorney General Gentner Drummond. MAGA’s master has repeatedly made his disgust for Drummond known, including on Tuesday in a lengthy Truth Social post blasting the candidate and his wife as “Radical Left Dumocrats.”

The Downballot Podcast

Democrats claim another big special election victory

Democrat Brandon Dukes won the last special election before November and became the 31st Democrat to flip a legislative seat since the beginning of 2025—compared to zero for Republicans.

On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, co-host David Beard and guest host Joe Sudbay discuss that race as well as the last big primary night of 2026, with a big upset in Florida’s Democratic Senate primary.

Then in our deep dive, we talk to state Sen. Cindy Holscher, the Democratic nominee for governor of Kansas, about her race. She tells us how she got into politics during former Gov. Sam Brownback’s disastrous time in office and how Democrats have strengthened in Kansas during the Trump era. We also discuss her call for a data center moratorium in the state, why it’s become such a big issue for voters, and how to support economic growth while ensuring everyday people aren’t left out of the benefits.

Subscribe here on your favorite podcast app to make sure you never miss an episode.

Redistricting Roundup

MO Redistricting, MO Ballot

A state judge issued separate rulings Wednesday affirming that Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins had lawfully blocked proposals to repeal Missouri’s new congressional map and to restrict the legislature’s ability to interfere with citizen-backed ballot initiatives. The campaigns behind each plan immediately announced they would appeal.

House

CA-34

A woman has accused Democratic Rep. Jimmy Gomez of sexually harassing and assaulting her, her attorneys said Wednesday.

“We represent one of the women who was interviewed by the House Committee on Ethics about her experience of sexual harassment and assault by Representative Jimmy Gomez,” attorneys Lisa Banks and Sarah Nesbitt wrote in a statement shared on social media. “Contrary to Representative Gomez’s assertion in his statement, his actions were not ‘consensual in nature’ with respect to our client.”

The statement, which did not identify the client or detail the allegations, came two days after the Ethics Committee confirmed it was investigating “sexual misconduct” allegations against Gomez, including “inappropriate sexual contact with a House staffer.”

Gomez, in a statement similar to one he released in June, responded, “Although my actions were consensual in nature and haven’t violated the law or House Ethics rules, that doesn’t diminish the impact that these mistakes have made on those I care about the most.” He continued, “I take full responsibility and have committed myself to working through the pain privately with my wife and family.”

A spokesperson for Gomez responded to Politico’s questions about the new allegations by referring to a previous statement.

Gomez faces Angela Gonzales-Torres, a community activist and fellow Democrat, in the general election to represent California’s 34th District, a safely Democratic seat in Los Angeles.

NH-01

Former Portsmouth City Councilor Stefany Shaheen on Tuesday launched the first negative ad of the busy Sept. 8 Democratic primary for New Hampshire’s 1st District, a contest that has seen Shaheen lead in all available polling.

The new spot accuses Marine veteran Maura Sullivan, the only Democrat who has outraised Shaheen, of getting “90% of her campaign money” from outside the state. “$300,000 bundled from AIPAC donors,” charges the narrator, “$380,000 from Jeff Bezos’s PAC, even from Trump’s ICE contractor”

The New Hampshire Union Leader reported in March that Sullivan’s campaign had received $9,000 from two executives with the data surveillance giant Palantir. AIPAC, however, has not taken sides in this contest. Rather, according to a HuffPost story earlier this month, Sullivan has benefited from 150 contributions given by individuals who have also at some point contributed to AIPAC.

Sullivan’s campaign responded to the ad in a statement to the Union Leader saying the candidate “doesn’t take a dime from corporate PACs, ICE vendors, or AIPAC, and will fight to ban corporate PACs and abolish Trump’s ICE.” It continued, “Stefany clearly cannot win on her own, thin record, so she is making false and misleading attacks against a lifelong public servant and veteran.”

Sullivan and Shaheen, the daughter of retiring Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, are two of the nine Democrats running to replace Rep. Chris Pappas, the leading Democrat in the race for the elder Shaheen’s Senate seat.

Both women are also the only contenders who have benefited from outside spending so far. FEC reports show Shaheen’s allies have spent about $1.6 million to promote her, while Sullivan’s backers have deployed a comparable $1.4 million.

Other candidates, though, are aiming to pull off an upset in this busy race. The main alternatives are Hampton Selectwoman Carleigh Beriont, state Rep. Heath Howard, and attorney Christian Urrutia.

A late June poll from Saint Anselm College showed Shaheen leading Sullivan 22-15, with Howard at 9% and no one else taking more than 3%. No surveys, however, have been released since then.

Four Republicans are campaigning to flip the 1st District, a constituency in the eastern part of the state that Kamala Harris carried by a tight 51-49 spread.

Wealthy real estate developer Anthony DiLorenzo received Donald Trump’s endorsement last month, but there have been no recent polls to indicate if that’s propelled him to frontrunner status. DiLorenzo faces state Rep. Brian Cole, businesswoman Hollie Noveletsky, and a little-known contender named Lindsey Anderson.

Poll Pile

• MA-Sen (D): Public Policy Polling for The Majority Institute:

  • Ed Markey (inc): 59, Seth Moulton: 26.

• MI-Sen: Susquehanna Polling and Research:

  • Abdul El-Sayed (D): 46, Mike Rogers (R): 39.

• NY-21: J.L. Partners:

  • Anthony Constantino (R): 53, Blake Gendebien (D): 40.

• PA-01: Global Strategy Group for Bob Harvie:

  • Brian Fitzpatrick (R-inc): 47, Harvie (D): 43.

Then in our deep dive, we talk to state Sen. Cindy Holscher, the Democratic nominee for governor of Kansas, about her race. She tells us how she got into politics during former Gov. Sam Brownback’s disastrous time in office and how Democrats have strengthened in Kansas during the Trump era. We also discuss her call for a data center moratorium in the state, why it’s become such a big issue for voters, and how to support economic growth while ensuring everyday people aren’t left out of the benefits.

The final legislative special election before November brought the cycle to a close in dramatic fashion on Tuesday, with Democrat Brandon Dukes flipping Pennsylvania’s 12th House District while overperforming Kamala Harris’ margin in the district by 19 points.

It was also the 31st legislative flip of the cycle, all of them won by Democrats. The overall results since Donald Trump’s return to the White House show strong, consistent overperformance for Democrats similar to what we saw in 2018.

Across 110 special elections since January of 2025, Democrats have, on average, overperformed Harris by 12.5 points and Joe Biden by 8.4 points. Together, these figures suggest a calculated political environment in which Democrats would be favored by 12 points—slightly better, even, than what the same data was telling us in 2018.

However, the actual popular vote for the U.S. House eight years ago fell a few points shy of that mark. Indeed, the calculated political environment has exceeded the House popular vote in every cycle since 2018, as seen in the chart at the top of this piece.

One likely reason for this gap is the educational polarization of the electorate in the Trump era. Put simply, more highly educated voters—who are more likely to vote in special elections—have a much dimmer view of Trump and his Republican Party than less educated voters. This would mean that the typical electorate for special elections is consistently more Democratic-leaning than the electorate at large.

Special elections can also err in estimating the lean of the political environment if the environment changes mid-cycle. This happened in 2022 after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, and again in 2024, when there was a sharp difference in special election results before and after November of 2023.

However, we haven’t observed any comparable shifts this cycle. In fact, the calculated political environment has been remarkably steady throughout, as shown in the green line below.

The chart above shows the political environment calculated from special elections throughout the cycle, including all elections prior to the date plotted. Earlier in the cycle, the line often moves as there haven’t been many elections, meaning one outlier can move the average a fair amount. By the middle of the cycle, however, it takes real movement to change the line, as in 2024. The 2026 cycle shows some change from the first to second years of the cycle but is overall fairly stable.

Not only has the calculated environment been very steady, but the distribution of overperformances has also been surprisingly tight. All federal special elections (seven in total) fell within a 15-point band, while the state special elections were tightly clustered, too.

In fact, the distribution of overperformances produces a very neat and tidy pattern, possibly due to the nationalization of local politics in recent years, as the histogram below shows:

(That 90-point overperformance outlier this cycle, in case you’re wondering, was a New York Senate special election in the 22nd district with a large Orthodox Jewish community that tends to vote as a bloc; in this particular election, community leaders endorsed the Democrat.)

Compare the 2026 distribution of overperformances to the data from 2018:

This time we don’t see such a well-behaved curve. This may reflect genuine shifts in the political environment in the 2018 cycle, skewing the pattern.

So what does this all mean?

Based on the special election results, we would expect a political environment similar to what we saw in 2018. Educational polarization has likely increased somewhat since then, so we might see a slightly bigger gap between the special election estimate and the actual result.

On the other hand, Trump’s disapproval numbers are falling even among Republicans, something that was not the case in 2018; if Trump voters are demoralized enough, they might stay home in greater numbers than in the past, yielding a more Democratic electorate.

Also, in the 2026 cycle, we’re seeing Trump’s approval numbers continue to decline through the spring and summer of election year, when there have been few special elections to gauge the mood of the electorate. And that brings us to the biggest wild card of all: what Trump himself might do between now and Election Day.

Even if little changes, though, the special election data shows that Democrats remain in a strong position to reclaim the House in November.

Leading Off

FL-07

Former TV anchor Ryan Elijah decisively defeated Rep. Cory Mills, who had Donald Trump’s endorsement despite numerous scandals, by a 47-34 margin in Tuesday’s Republican primary for Florida’s 7th Congressional District.

Elijah will face former NASA chief of staff Bale Dalton, who had the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s endorsement. Dalton outpaced Navy veteran Marialana Kinter 45-36, while former Rep. Alan Grayson, who long ago morphed into a perennial candidate, took a distant third with 19%.

Elijah’s victory against Mills makes an already tough pickup opportunity for Democrats even tougher. The 7th District, based in the northern Orlando suburbs and part of the Daytona Beach area, favored Trump 56-43 in 2024 after supporting him 52-47 four years earlier.

But Dalton, who raised about $1.4 million through late July, could still put up a tough fight, and he could receive some high-powered support from the House Majority PAC, which has booked close to $4 million in ad time in the Orlando media market. (At least some of those reservations will likely go toward Democratic Rep. Darren Soto in the newly gerrymandered 9th District, however.)

Mills arrived in Congress four years ago after Republicans passed their last gerrymander, which transformed the 7th District from a Democratic-friendly constituency into a seat the GOP was favored to flip.

Those new lines led Democratic Rep. Stephanie Murphy to retire rather than seek a fourth term, and it quickly became clear that whoever won the eight-person Republican primary would replace her.

Mills, an Army veteran who co-founded a private security company, stood out in this packed race with ads bragging that his tear gas had been used on targets like “Hillary Clinton protesters” and “radical left protesters.”

Mills scored a convincing 38-24 victory over state Rep. Anthony Sabatini, a far-right agitator who was targeted by allies of then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, ahead of an easy general election win. The new congressman soon earned national notice the following spring when he announced he would support Trump over Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in the upcoming presidential primary.

But Mills, who was easily reelected in 2024, would soon become known for being at the center of a seemingly endless number of scandals.

Last year, the police in Washington, D.C., investigated Mills for allegedly assaulting a 27-year-old woman at his home. Separately, Lindsey Langston, a different former partner, successfully sought a restraining order last October, with the judge calling her a “victim of dating violence.”

The House Ethics Committee also revealed last year it was investigating allegations Mills may have illegally entered into contracts with the federal government, and it later began probing “allegations of sexual misconduct and/or dating violence.”

NOTUS further reported last May that five soldiers who served with Mills in Iraq disputed that he’d saved the lives of two troops who’d come under fire—acts for which he was awarded a Bronze Star.

But while Mills, who denied any wrongdoing, didn’t go through with his potential primary campaign against appointed Sen. Ashley Moody, he still sought a third term.

He got some backup in February of this year when Trump took to Truth Social to endorse the congressman, whom he called a “Successful Entrepreneur, and Brave U.S. Army Combat Veteran and Bronze Star recipient.” MAGA’s master remained in his corner even after MS Now reported last month that Trump’s own Justice Department was investigating Mills over an undisclosed matter.

For a time, though, it looked possible that Mills might not even be in office by the time of the primary. Axios reported in April that House members of both parties were frustrated by the unrelated allegations of misconduct surrounding Mills, Texas Republican Tony Gonzales, California Democrat Eric Swalwell, and Florida Democrat Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, and there was talk of expelling all four.

But that quadruple ejection never came to pass. Gonzales and Swalwell, who were both accused of sexual misconduct, wound up resigning on the same day.

Cherfilus-McCormick, who is under indictment for allegedly using stolen taxpayer funds to finance her victorious special election campaign in 2021, resigned later that month only to announce days later that she would run for her old seat. Cherfilus-McCormick’s comeback campaign, though, ended Tuesday when she took a distant fourth place in the 20th District.

Mills refused to go anywhere willingly, but his career will come to an end anyway following his loss. Mills’ defeat makes him the fourth House Republican to lose renomination in a year where seven incumbent Democrats have also lost their primaries.

The Downballot

What the hell just happened in Wisconsin?

Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor saw a shocking upset Tuesday night as David Crowley, who had dropped out of the race earlier this summer before jumping back in, defeated Francesca Hong, who’d been leading in polls by double digits…

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8 days ago · 4 likes · David Beard and Joe Sudbay

Election Recaps

All race calls and estimates of the proportion of the vote that’s been tabulated come from the Associated Press unless otherwise noted. You can also check out our cheat-sheet that summarizes the outcomes in every key race, as well as any contests that remain uncalled.

Special Elections

PA State House (special) (59-40 Trump)

Pennsylvania Democrat Brandon Dukes flipped a conservative seat north of Pittsburgh that Republicans have held for over 30 years. Dukes’ victory in this contest, the final legislative special election anywhere in the nation before November, gave Democrats their 13th special election pickup since Donald Trump returned to office.

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With almost all of the ballots tabulated, Dukes leads Republican Scott Timko 50.3 to 49.7, a margin of 88 votes. While the Associated Press has not called the race, Timko acknowledged to the news site TribLive that he’d fallen short on Tuesday and was preparing for his fall rematch with Dukes for a full two-year term.

Dukes’ win gives Democrats a 103-100 majority in the state House, a chamber they won with a one-seat majority in both 2022 and 2024. All 203 seats will be up in November.

Alaska

Election authorities have until Aug. 28 to tabulate mail-in ballots for Alaska’s top-four primary.

The four contenders with the most votes, regardless of party, advance to a fall general election that will be conducted using ranked-choice voting rules.

AK-Sen (55-41 Trump)

Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan and former Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola are waiting to learn which two minor candidates will join them in the fall general election.

With an estimated 80% of the vote tabulated statewide, Peltola leads with 48%, and Sullivan is in second with 43%. Republican Dan J. Sullivan, a teacher whom the GOP argues is only running to confuse voters who might otherwise support incumbent Dan S. Sullivan, is in third with 2.4%. (Dan J. Sullivan has denied he’s running for any reason other than his unhappiness with his namesake.)

Democrat David Leslie and Republican Gerald Heikes each have 1.1% of the vote in the contest for the fourth and final spot, with Leslie holding a 23-vote lead as of Wednesday morning.

Outside groups with Republican ties ran ads to boost Leslie and other Democratic and Green Party candidates with the apparent hope that some voters in the general election would cast ballots for them while failing to rank Peltola. Democrats appear to be behind a similar effort to benefit Heikes.

AK-Gov (55-41 Trump)

Democrats Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins and Tom Begich advanced to the general election, while seven Republicans are locked in a close race for the other two spots.

Kreiss-Tomkins, a former state representative, leads with 22%, while Begich, a former state senator, is just behind with 20%.

Both Democrats have discussed the possibility of one of them dropping out so their party can consolidate behind one contender for the general election. The deadline for candidates to remove their names from the general election ballot is Aug. 31.

Bernadette Wilson, a longtime Republican operative and former radio host, is the top Republican with 10.5% of the vote, but the AP has not projected if she’ll advance.

There’s a long line of Republicans behind Wilson:

• Former Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson: 8.4%

• Former Attorney General Treg Taylor: 7.5%.

• Former state Sen. Click Bishop: 7.1%.

• Former Revenue Commissioner Adam Crum: 5.7%.

• Former state Sen. Shelley Hughes: 5.6%.

Former Gov. Bill Walker, an independent, is in ninth place with just 4.4%.

AK-AL (top-four) (55-41 Trump)

Republican Rep. Nick Begich and independent Bill Hill are also waiting to learn which two candidates will move forward to the fall.

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Begich, the nephew of the aforementioned Tom Begich, leads with 46%, while Hill, a commercial fisherman, is in second with 31%. Democrat Matt Schultz, a pastor who dropped out last month and endorsed Hill, is in third with 8%.

Several minor candidates are clustered close together in the contest for the fourth spot. Eric Hafner leads fellow Democrat John Williams 3.8 to 2.6, followed by Republican Clay Strickland at 2.4%.

AK Ballot (55-41 Trump)

Alaskans voted overwhelmingly to reintroduce campaign contribution limits for races for state and local office, but it will not take effect until after the fall general election. Donors this year will still be allowed to contribute unlimited amounts to candidates competing for governor, the legislature, and other posts.

California

CA-14 (special) (66-30 Harris)

State Sen. Aisha Wahab holds a 51-49 lead over fellow Democrat Melissa Hernandez, the president of the board of Bay Area Rapid Transit, with an estimated 62% of the vote tabulated. Alameda County, which makes up the entire 14th District, anticipates counting more ballots on Friday.

The two Democrats will face off again in the fall for a full two-year term.

Florida

FL-Sen (D) (56-43 Trump)

In an upset, state Rep. Angie Nixon defeated former National Security Council advisor Alex Vindman 56-44 and will take on Republican Sen. Ashley Moody for the final two years of Marco Rubio’s term.

Vindman, who rose to prominence during Trump’s first impeachment, raised more than $16 million versus less than $1 million for Nixon, who would be the state’s first Black senator. Limited polling has shown Moody ahead by around 8 to 10 points.

FL-Gov (D & R) (56-43 Trump)

Republican Rep. Byron Donalds will face off against former Rep. David Jolly, a Republican-turned-independent-turned Democrat, in the race to replace term-limited Gov. Ron DeSantis after both men easily won their respective primaries.

As soon as both races were called, the Democratic Governors Association blasted out a recent survey from Hart Research showing Jolly ahead 46-45. While most other polling has been more favorable to Donalds, the release is a sign that national Democrats may invest in this contest.

FL-02 (R) (59-41 Trump)

Attorney Austin Rogers, a former general counsel for Sen. Rick Scott, won the GOP nod for north Florida’s open 2nd District by a 30-16 spread against wealthy businessman Keith Gross, his nearest opponent in the eight-way contest. An outside group ran ads calling attention to the fact that Gross, Rogers’ best-funded rival, is gay.

FL-06 (R) (65-35 Trump)

Rep. Randy Fine, Congress’ most infamous Islamophobe, turned back a challenge from social media influencer Dan Bilzerian, a notorious antisemite, by a wide margin in the Daytona Beach-based 6th District. However, Fine’s 57% of the vote was soft for an incumbent and could open the door for a stronger rival in two years’ time.

FL-09 (R) (58-41 Trump)

Dan Green, a Navy veteran and former Defense Department official during the first Trump administration, leads dairy farmer Ben Butler 25.4 to 24.4 with almost all of the votes tabulated, but the Associated Press has not called the race.

The Republican nominee will face Democratic Rep. Darren Soto in the 9th District, an Orlando area constituency the GOP radically transformed from a Democratic-leaning and predominantly Latino constituency into a conservative seat whose eligible voting population is majority-white.

FL-11 (R) (57-42 Trump)

Wealthy businessman Joe Strada holds a 33.5 to 33.0 advantage over Carey Baker, a former Lake County property appraiser backed by retiring Rep. Dan Webster. The Associated Press, which estimates 98% of the vote has been tabulated, has not called the GOP primary.

FL-12 (D) (57-42 Trump)

Former Hillsborough County Commissioner Kimberly Overman earned the right to take on GOP Rep. Gus Bilirakis in the Tampa-area 12th District after defeating Air Force veteran Darren McAuley by a 53-47 margin in the Democratic primary.

FL-14 (R) (55-44 Trump)

Former state Rep. Mike Beltran won the Republican nomination to take on Democratic Rep. Kathy Castor in a Tampa-area constituency the GOP dramatically overhauled as part of its new gerrymander.

Beltran, a wealthy ex-legislator who has called for the state to replace its six-week ban on abortions with a total ban, scored a decisive 45-30 victory over former state Rep. Kevin Steele. Both had self-funded their campaigns.

FL-16 (R) (56-43 Trump)

Former college development director Sydney Gruters, who is also the wife of Republican National Committee chair Joe Gruters, had no trouble winning the GOP nod in the open 16th District, which includes Tampa’s southern suburbs and the Bradenton area. She’ll go up against former Sarasota Mayor Kelly Kirschner, the Democratic nominee.

FL-19 (R) (65-35 Trump)

Wealthy businessman Jim Schwartzel scored a 29-22 victory over Catalina Lauf, a two-time congressional candidate in Illinois whom Trump endorsed Thursday, in a packed primary where four other candidates also began their political careers outside Florida.

Schwartzel, whose company owns several conservative radio and TV stations, used his ads to declare he was different from his main rivals because he’d “lived here his entire life.” Schwartzel is now on track to replace Rep. Byron Donalds, the GOP nominee for governor, as the congressman for the Cape Coral and Naples areas.

FL-20 (D) (68-31 Harris)

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz defeated four intraparty opponents in the Democratic primary for the new 20th District, a plurality Black constituency in Broward County that includes just 2% of Wasserman Schultz’s constituents in the 25th District.

Wasserman Schultz, the only non-Black candidate in the race, took first with 45%. Former Broward County Commissioner Dale Holness was a distant second with 23%.

FL-22 (R) (55-44 Trump)

Businessman Casey Askar, the owner of numerous fast food franchises, snagged the Republican nomination 31-19 over crypto businessman Michael Carbonara in a busy race in the overhauled 22nd District. Askar will go up against businesswoman Pia Dandiya, a strong fundraiser who easily won the Democratic primary.

The revamped district bears virtually no resemblance to its predecessor with the same number, which had been located along the Atlantic Ocean in Palm Beach County. The new iteration, by contrast, moves inland, stretching all the way to the Gulf Coast across deep-red turf, including sparsely populated parts of the Everglades.

Republicans deliberately redrew the lines to make it much easier to flip, but Democrats have taken some succor in the fact that Joe Biden would have narrowly carried the district in 2020.

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FL-23 (D) (56-43 Harris)

Rep. Lois Frankel turned back a challenge from retired attorney Victoria Doyle in a 75-23 landslide, making her the favorite to win an eighth term in the Palm Beach County-based 23rd District. Republicans largely left Frankel’s constituency unchanged under their new map.

FL-24 (D) (69-30 Harris)

Miami-Dade County Commissioner Oliver Gilbert narrowly defeated state Sen. Shev Jones 34-32 in the Democratic primary for the Miami-area 24th District. Gilbert had the endorsement of Rep. Frederica Wilson, who announced in May she would not seek reelection.

FL-25 (D & R) (54-45 Trump)

Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz turned aside union organizer Oliver Larkin, who’d been running with the support of the Democratic Socialists of America, 63-37. But Moskowitz will face a much tougher challenge in November against former Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer, who beat out former state Rep. George Moraitis 31-27 for the GOP nod.

That’s because Republicans redrew the South Florida-based 25th to make it considerably redder. It’s also now home to just half of Moskowitz’s current constituents. But as with the neighboring 22nd, it, too, narrowly would have gone for Biden six years ago.

FL-27 (D) (57-42 Trump)

Former local news anchor Eliott Rodriguez defeated attorney Robin Peguero 54-46 for the right to take on GOP Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, the rare Florida Republican who’s potentially vulnerable in the House this fall. While Trump won this southern Miami constituency comfortably in 2024, he carried it by just a fraction of a point in 2020.

​​Orange County Mayor (nonpartisan race) (56-42 Harris)

Democrat Tiffany Moore Russell and Republican Chris Messina will compete in November’s officially nonpartisan general election to lead Orange County, home to Orlando and many of its suburbs, while former Democratic Rep. Stephanie Murphy narrowly failed to secure a berth in the second round.

Moore Russell, who serves as the county’s clerk of courts, led with 32%. Messina, a businessman and the only Republican in the race, edged out Murphy, a prominent centrist during her three terms in Congress, 28-26.

The winner will replace Mayor Jerry Demings, a Democrat who cannot seek a third term.

St. Petersburg Mayor (nonpartisan race) (59-39 Harris)

Charlie Crist begins the November general election as the frontrunner against St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch, a fellow Democrat who came close to being eliminated in the first round.

Crist, a former governor and later congressman, led with 35%. Welch edged out Republican Jim Large, a former city fire chief, 21-18 for second place.

Miami Ballot (50-49 Harris)

Miami voters approved a ballot measure to move elections for city-level offices like mayor and the City Council to even-numbered years starting in 2034.

Under Referendum 1, which passed 60-40, the next two mayor races will take place as scheduled in 2029 and 2033, respectively. The latter contest, however, will be for an abbreviated three-year term to realign the calendar.

Wyoming

WY-Sen (R) (72-26 Trump)

Rep. Harriet Hageman easily beat rancher Sam Mead, the nephew of former Gov. Matt Mead, 65-28 in the Republican primary for the Senate seat currently held by retiring incumbent Cynthia Lummis. Hageman, a prominent far-right politician who picked up Trump’s endorsement early in her campaign, is all but assured to win the general election in what’s long been the nation’s most Republican state.

WY-Gov (R) (72-26 Trump)

State Sen. Eric Barlow won the Republican nomination for the open governor’s office 45-30 against Superintendent of Public Instruction Megan Degenfelder, who had Trump and Rep. Harriet Hageman on her side.

Barlow, who, like outgoing Gov. Mark Gordon, has come into conflict with the state’s branch of the far-right Freedom Caucus, is now the fourth Republican to defeat Trump’s pick for governor this year.

WY-AL (R) (72-26 Trump)

Secretary of State Chuck Gray, a conspiracy theorist who has insisted the 2020 presidential election was “clearly rigged,” won a packed and expensive Republican primary for the statewide House seat that Rep. Harriet Hageman is giving up to run for the Senate.

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Gray scored a 25-20 victory over conservative activist Steve Friess, the son of the late Republican megadonor Foster Friess, in what proved to be a rare high-profile win for a candidate backed by the state Freedom Caucus. Army veteran Kevin Christensen, who brought in little money, was just behind with 18%.

WY State Legislature

The state Freedom Caucus suffered what Cowboy State Daily calls a “Near-Total Massacre” in Republican primaries for the state legislature and statewide offices.

The far-right bloc, which was aiming to expand its majority in the state House into a two-thirds supermajority and take control of the state Senate, instead saw many of its incumbents lose renomination. WyoFile writes that 13 of its members and allies in the state House are trailing on Wednesday morning, while state Sen. Bob Ide also lost his primary.

The Freedom Caucus’ attempts to gain new seats in both chambers also largely fell apart, including in a contest that attracted notice well outside Wyoming.

State Sen. Ogden Driskill, who last week told the New York Times, “I hate the Freedom Caucus and how they do business,” holds a 52-48 lead over state House Speaker Chip Neiman, the first Freedom Caucus member to hold that position. While the AP has not called the race, Neiman told his supporters he’d lost.

The group’s candidates also largely came up empty in statewide races. The list of losers includes caucus chair Rachel Williams, a state representative whose campaign for secretary of state ended with a 46-33 loss against Converse County Commissioner Robert Short. Short spoke last month at a “Buck The Freedom Caucus” rally organized by a group called the “Rational Republicans.”

Poll Pile

• AR-Sen: J.L. Partners:

  • Tom Cotton (R-inc): 51, Hallie Shoffner (D): 35.

• MA-Sen (D): Suffolk University for the Boston Globe:

  • Ed Markey (inc): 52, Seth Moulton: 38.

  • April: 47-30 Markey.

• MN-Sen: SurveyUSA for KSTP:

  • Peggy Flanagan (D): 46, Michele Tafoya (R): 41.

• RI-Sen (D): Embold Research for Salve Regina University:

  • Jack Reed (inc): 61, Connor Burbridge: 12.

• AR-Gov: Hendrix College for Talk Business & Politics:

  • Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R-inc): 45, Fredrick Love (D): 40, Colt Shelby (L): 7.

• MA-Gov: UMass Amherst/YouGov:

  • Maura Healey (D-inc): 51, Brian Shortsleeve (R): 32.

  • Healey (D-inc): 53, Michael Minogue (R): 33.

• MN-Gov: SurveyUSA:

  • Amy Klobuchar (D): 51, Lisa Demuth (R): 36.

  • Jan.: 49-34 Klobuchar.

• RI-Gov (D): Embold:

  • Helena Foulkes: 48, Dan McKee (inc): 28.

• RI-Gov (R): Embold:

  • Elaine Pelino: 37, Aaron Guckian: 17.

• VA-05: Expedition Strategies for Tom Perriello:

  • John McGuire (R-inc): 47, Perriello (D): 44.

• MN-AG: SurveyUSA:

  • Keith Ellison (D-inc): 43, Ron Schutz (R): 43.

  • Early Aug.: 44-36 Ellison.

• MA Ballot: Replace party primaries with top-two primary: Yes: 51, No: 32.

Leading Off

CA-34

The House Ethics Committee announced Monday that it was investigating “sexual misconduct” allegations against Rep. Jimmy Gomez of California, including allegations of “inappropriate sexual contact with a House staffer.”

The panel’s statement comes as Gomez faces a challenge from Angela Gonzales-Torres, a community activist and fellow Democrat, in the general election for the safely blue 34th District, which encompasses Downtown Los Angeles and nearby neighborhoods.

CNN first broke the news about the Ethics Committee’s probe into Gomez on the day of California’s June 2 top-two primary, though the panel did not say anything publicly over the ensuing two-and-a-half months.

Until this spring, Gomez appeared to be on track for an easy reelection contest against Gonzales-Torres, a challenger backed by the Justice Democrats who still struggled to raise money.

But things began to change in April when the New York Post ran a piece alleging that the married congressman was seen kissing a staffer for another representative at a 2023 party hosted by then-Rep. Eric Swalwell, who would later end his campaign for governor and resign in disgrace. Gomez’s team told the tabloid the encounter “didn’t happen.”

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That was the last word on the matter until early June, when CNN reported the Ethics Committee was looking into the New York Post story as well as unidentified “other allegations of sexual misconduct against Gomez.”

The congressman, in a seeming reversal from April, told the network, “Years ago, I made personal mistakes outside my marriage that have caused real pain to my wife and family.” He continued, “Although my actions were consensual in nature and haven’t violated the law or House ethics rules, that doesn’t diminish the impact that these mistakes have made on those I care about the most.” (Gomez released a similar statement on Monday.)

CNN’s story broke too late to impact many votes in the top-two primary, and Gomez had no trouble securing a spot in the general election. The congressman, though, soon learned he’d face a fellow Democrat in the fall instead of a Republican who would have stood little chance of victory in the 34th District.

Gomez secured 46% of the vote in the six-person contest, while Gonzales-Torres outpaced Republican Calvin Lee 31-14 for the crucial second-place spot.

Gonzales-Torres celebrated her win by laying out her case against the incumbent.

“He has accepted millions from AIPAC,” she tweeted after learning she’d earned a spot in the general election. “He was Eric Swalwell’s campaign chair and is now under investigation too for sexual misconduct. We’re done.”

But Gonzales-Torres, a former leader of the Historic Highland Park Neighborhood Council, still had trouble bringing in money against the newly embattled incumbent. She finished June with just over $40,000 in the bank, while Gomez had roughly $780,000 to spend.

The allegations against Gomez largely disappeared from the news since the top-two primary. Monday’s confirmation that the Ethics Committee is investigating him, however, brought the return of the national spotlight.

The Downballot

What the hell just happened in Wisconsin?

Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor saw a shocking upset Tuesday night as David Crowley, who had dropped out of the race earlier this summer before jumping back in, defeated Francesca Hong, who’d been leading in polls by double digits…

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8 days ago · 3 likes · David Beard and Joe Sudbay

Election Night

The final big primary night of 2026 is here, and The Downballot has a jam-packed preview of the races to watch in Alaska, Florida, and Wyoming, as well as key special elections in California and Pennsylvania.

But while Tuesday is by far the biggest election night from now until the Nov. 3 general election, it’s still not the end of the primary season.

Oklahoma hosts runoffs next week in primaries where no candidate won a majority of the vote on June 16. The main event is the Republican runoff for the state’s open governorship, where former state Sen. Mike Mazzei, Donald Trump’s pick, faces Attorney General Gentner Drummond.

South Carolina Republicans will return to the polls as well next Tuesday for their fourth and final primary night this year. Appointed Sen. Darline Graham, who also has Trump’s endorsement, is aiming to fend off Rep. Ralph Norman in the special primary runoff.

The same day there will be an all-Democratic special election in Georgia’s 13th Congressional District for the remaining months of the late Democratic Rep. David Scott’s term. Neither Activist Marcye Scott, the daughter of David Scott, nor former Gwinnett County Board of Education chair Everton Blair will be on the November ballot for a full term, but Democratic leaders will look forward to having this seat back in the closely divided House.

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The action continues on Sept. 1 in Massachusetts, where the big draw is the Democratic primary for Senate between incumbent Ed Markey and Rep. Seth Moulton.

There’s also a busy Democratic nomination contest in Moulton’s open 6th District in the North Shore region north of Boston. Longtime Democratic Rep. Stephen Lynch, meanwhile, is trying to fend off a challenge from the left from attorney Patrick Roath in the 8th District, which includes parts of Boston and its southern suburbs.

New Hampshire goes to the polls on Sept. 8, immediately after Labor Day, and the primaries for the open Senate and 1st Congressional District occupy center stage. This will also be the last time the Granite State holds primaries for state and congressional races in September thanks to a new law moving them to the second Tuesday in June starting in 2028.

Rhode Island, in order to avoid holding the election the day after Labor Day, will instead host its primary on Sept. 9 in a rare Wednesday election night in America. Democratic Gov. Dan McKee is the underdog in his rematch against Helena Foulkes, a former CVS executive who came close to beating him in 2022.

Delaware, finally, brings the 2026 primary season to a close on Sept. 15. Neither Sen. Chris Coons nor Rep. Sarah McBride face serious opposition in their respective Democratic primaries, though there’s more action in races further down the ballot.

House

CA-04

Democrat Eric Jones on Monday received an endorsement from Ray Riehle, a Republican who almost cost him a spot in the general election, for Jones’ general election challenge to longtime Democratic Rep. Mike Thompson.

Thompson, who is seeking a 15th term in California’s 4th District, took first place in the June top-two primary with 41%. Jones, a venture capitalist, narrowly edged out Riehle 22-21 for the second spot in the general election to represent part of the state’s wine country and other communities like the college town of Davis.

While Thompson would have had no trouble dispatching ​​Riehle in the 4th District, which Kamala Harris would have carried 56-41, a fellow Democrat like Jones presents a far tougher obstacle.

Jones, who at 35 is four decades younger than the 75-year-old incumbent, has framed his campaign as a rejection of the status quo. Jones’ side has also made the congressman’s age a key part of its pitch: A pro-Jones group aired an ad just before the primary comparing Thompson to a molding and forgotten jar of mayo in the fridge that may have “seemed fresh in the 90s” but is now “past his expiration date.”

Riehle, for his part, is also urging his fellow Republicans to back Jones to send a message to Democratic leaders.

“Now we face a clear choice: sit out the race because both candidates are Democrats, or vote for the Democrat who most shares our values and will stand up to the corrupt Democratic establishment in Sacramento and Washington,” Riehle said in a statement distributed by Jones’ campaign. “I choose to support Eric Jones.”

Thompson, for his part, has portrayed his opponent as the one backed by insiders. A commercial from the primary blasted Jones as “a lapdog for big corporations.”

Poll Pile

• AK-Sen: Data for Progress:

  • Mary Peltola (D): 47, Dan Sullivan (R-inc): 41, Dan J. Sullivan (R): 4, Gerald Heikes (R): 3.

  • After ranked-choice simulation: Peltola (D): 53, Sullivan (R-inc): 47.

• MA-Sen (D): UMass Amherst/YouGov for WCVB-TV:

  • Ed Markey (inc): 60, Seth Moulton: 32.

  • Oct.: 51-28 Markey.

• MA-Sen: UMass Amherst/YouGov:

  • Markey (D-inc): 51, John Deaton (R): 30.

  • Moulton (D): 49, Deaton (R): 25.

• AZ-Gov: Stealth Analytics:

  • Katie Hobbs (D-inc): 43, Andy Biggs (R): 38.

• AK-AL: Data for Progress:

  • Nick Begich (R-inc): 47, Bill Hill (I): 37.

• OH-15: Hart Research Associates for Don Leonard:

  • Mike Carey (R-inc): 41, Leonard (D): 37, Brennan Barrington (L): 10.

• AZ-AG: Stealth Analytics:

  • Kris Mayes (D-inc): 41, Warren Petersen (R): 38.

• AZ-SoS: Stealth Analytics:

  • Adrian Fontes (D-inc): 39, Alex Kolodin (R): 38.

Florida is once again at the center of the political universe on Tuesday on a packed primary night that spans from Key West to the Aleutian Islands.

This will be the first time that the new Republican congressional gerrymander, which Gov. Ron DeSantis rammed through this spring, will be used. The GOP drew up those boundaries to flip four Democratic-held seats, but Democrats are fighting to hold on—and go on the offensive on Republican turf.

One Democratic target has attracted particular attention. GOP Rep. Cory Mills is seeking reelection in the face of a myriad of scandals, and while members of his party fear he could cost them control of his seat, Donald Trump remains in his corner.

The Sunshine State, though, doesn’t have all the primary action to itself. Wyoming’s chapter of the far-right Freedom Caucus is aiming to capitalize on its breakthrough gains from two years ago, while Alaska’s unique top-four primary will winnow the field in the enormous 17-person race for governor.

Two states will also host closely watched special elections. Pennsylvania Democrats are looking to flip a conservative state House seat and boost their razor-thin majority going into the fall.

Voters in California’s 14th District, finally, will elect a representative to replace Eric Swalwell, a Democrat who resigned in disgrace in April after multiple women accused him of sexual assault.

What follows is our guide to the major primaries in Alaska, Florida, and Wyoming, as well as both of these special elections. You can bookmark our cheat-sheet listing all of these contests, which we’ll update as each race is called.

You can also find an interactive map of Florida’s new congressional boundaries from Dave’s Redistricting App, while the other two states have just one House seat apiece.

When it’s available, we’ll tell you about any reliable polling that exists for each contest, but if we don’t mention any numbers, it means no recent surveys have been made public.

The first polls close at 7 PM ET in most of Florida. Please join us on The Downballot’s private Discord server for what will be an exciting evening!

Florida

Polls close at 7 PM ET in the portion of the state located in the Eastern time zone, where most Floridians live. Polls close an hour later in the remainder of the state.

Elections for county and city offices require all the contenders to run on one ballot without any party affiliation. The top two vote-getters will advance to the Nov. 3 general election unless one candidate wins a majority of the vote on Tuesday.

FL-07 (R & D) (56-43 Trump)

Republican Rep. Cory Mills, whom two different women have accused of domestic abuse and who is reportedly under investigation by the Department of Justice for an undisclosed matter, is seeking a third term despite these and other scandals.

But while Mills has Trump’s endorsement for reelection in Florida’s 7th District, a constituency in the Orlando suburbs and Daytona Beach area that was untouched by redistricting, three of Mills’ fellow Republicans argue it’s time for change.

The best-funded challenger is Ryan Elijah, a former TV anchor for Fox’s Orlando affiliate. Elijah, who argues the incumbent could cost Republicans this seat, has the support of Reps. Anna Paulina Luna and Mike Haridopolos, two of Mills’ colleagues in the Sunshine State’s House delegation.

Elijah, though, isn’t Mills’ only intraparty foe. Real estate agent Sarah Ulrich and frequent candidate Michael Don Johnson are also on the ballot, and while they’ve each raised little money, they could divide the anti-Mills vote and make it easier for the congressman to win with just a plurality of the vote.

A pair of polls conducted in August both found Mills far from a majority, but they disagreed about whether Elijah was surpassing him.

A survey from St. Pete Polls early in the month found Mills ahead at just 30%, while Elijah was well behind at 14%; Ulrich and Johnson took 8% and 7%, respectively.

More recent numbers from Capital Strategic Partners, though, showed Elijah decisively beating Mills in a 44-27, with 10% opting for “another candidate.”

Democrats also have a contested primary to sort through. Bale Dalton, a former NASA chief of staff, has raised more money than any opponent from either party, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee added him to its Red to Blue list of top contenders in June.

Navy veteran Marialana Kinter, though, has also brought in a credible amount of money. The final candidate is former Rep. Alan Grayson, who was one of the most outspoken members of Congress during his two stints in office during the Obama era. But Grayson, who last won office in 2014, has since morphed into a perennial candidate.

FL-Sen (D) (56-43 Trump)

Alexander Vindman, the former National Security Council adviser whose testimony before Congress sparked Trump’s first impeachment, is the Democratic frontrunner to take on Republican Sen. Ashley Moody in this fall’s special election. Vindman, though, doesn’t have the field to himself.

Read more

Leading Off

WY State Legislature

Tuesday’s primaries could leave Wyoming’s branch of the Freedom Caucus in position to take control of the state Senate and win a supermajority in the House, which would give it the kind of power that none of the nihilistic group’s other 15 state affiliates have achieved anywhere.

Republicans opposed to the bloc, however, are trying to halt and reverse the Freedom Caucus’ recent gains in what’s long been the reddest state in the nation.

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This week’s nomination battles come two years after several candidates for the state House allied with the Freedom Caucus won primaries against contenders aligned with Gov. Mark Gordon and other members of the old GOP establishment.

That fall’s general election left Freedom Caucus members and other legislators aligned with its aims holding 36 out of the 62 seats in the lower chamber, which made it the first state chapter in the country to hold a majority in a legislative chamber. The House soon made Chip Neiman, whose 2020 primary victory over Majority Whip Tyler Lindholm represented an early breakthrough for the bloc, its new speaker.

But while the Freedom Caucus’ majority in the House gave it influence in state government, it has struggled to accomplish many of its goals.

The faction lacked the two-thirds supermajority necessary to introduce new bills during budget sessions, which take place in even-numbered years, or to override Gordon’s vetoes. The Senate, where more traditional Republicans held sway, has also limited the influence of Neiman and his allies.

The Freedom Caucus’ struggles were on display this winter when it tried to slash funding to many state entities and programs, including the University of Wyoming and the Wyoming Business Council. Those ambitious cuts, though, were abandoned in negotiation or vetoed by Gordon, who will leave office early next year.

“[The Freedom Caucus] went out of their way to cut the budget, and they showed what would happen if they truly got control,” Republican state Sen. Ogden Driskill, a former Senate president who is one of the group’s most ardent critics, told Wyoming Public Media in March. Those comments were part of a story headlined, “Of Wyoming Freedom Caucus’ 10 priorities, only 1 became law.”

Just one day after that piece ran, though, Neiman announced he would challenge Driskill for renomination. Driskill told Clair McFarland of Cowboy State Daily that same day he would seek reelection after initially planning to retire.

The contest between them for the 1st Senate District, a heavily Republican constituency in the northeastern corner of the state, home to Devils Tower, has drawn attention from well outside Wyoming.

“I hate the Freedom Caucus and how they do business,” Driskill informed the New York Times‘ David Chen last week.

The incumbent has used the campaign to attack Neiman over an incident that took place in the state capitol in February when a conservative activist named Rebecca Bextel handed out campaign checks from donor Don Grasso intended for Neiman and nine other Freedom Caucus-aligned candidates.

The episode, which observers quickly dubbed “Checkgate,” dominated the session and led both chambers to approve new ethics rules. A House Special Investigative Committee report said the matter was “undesirable and must never occur again,” but it concluded it didn’t amount to misconduct. The Laramie County Sheriff’s Office, though, launched an unresolved investigation into whether the contributions were bribes.

Neiman himself acknowledged his involvement the next week in a speech where he told his colleagues he’d seen nothing amiss at the time of Bextel hand-delivering a campaign check at his office in the legislature instead of by mail. The speaker, who denied doing anything wrong, groused that unnamed “folks couldn’t trust me to handle this correctly” and “went around that piece and went straight to the media.”

Driskill, though, was unmoved by Neiman’s account.

“For people that claim to be transparent and take the high ground, this scandal is anything but,” the senator told WyoFile’s Maggie Mullen in April.

The contest between Driskill and Neiman is one of many across both chambers that will help determine how much power the Freedom Caucus has in state government next year. A well-funded outside group, though, is giving the far-right contenders a boost.

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Campaign finance reports show a group called Make Liberty Win, which aided the Freedom Caucus’ candidates in 2024, has spent about $550,000 through Aug. 10. Mullen writes that this is considerably more than the roughly $290,000 Americans for Prosperity has deployed for the opposite goal.

While McFarland writes that AFP, a major part of the Koch family’s political network, said its opposition to the Freedom Caucus was “merely incidental to its support for business- and energy-friendly policies,” its state director didn’t hide his frustration with the bloc.

Lindholm, who lost his seat to Neiman six years ago, told Chen that the Freedom Caucus’ members “weren’t willing to work with others to find a solution.”

The group hasn’t been directly involved in the race to replace Gordon, though some of its members are backing Superintendent of Public Instruction Megan Degenfelder, Donald Trump’s pick. Degenfelder also has the support of U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman, who championed the Freedom Caucus’ legislative candidates in 2024.

State Sen. Eric Barlow, Degenfelder’s main intraparty opponent, isn’t so well regarded by hardliners.

“[F]or those who know him, he’s a liberal Republican who loves big government,” state Rep. Rachel Williams, the chair of the state Freedom Caucus, told WyoFile last year after Barlow announced his campaign. Williams, who is now running for the open post of secretary of state, continued, “For those who begin to research him, his voting record, and his tenure in the Legislature, they’ll see he is a clone of Governor Gordon.”

While Williams hasn’t taken sides in a gubernatorial primary that also includes Brent Bien, a conservative activist who unsuccessfully challenged Gordon for renomination in 2022, she’s pushing for a dramatic transformation in state government.

“The left tends to be very loud in Wyoming,” Williams told Chen of a state where Democrats hold only a handful of seats in the legislature, “and our supporters tend to be the silent majority.”

The Downballot

What the hell just happened in Wisconsin?

Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor saw a shocking upset Tuesday night as David Crowley, who had dropped out of the race earlier this summer before jumping back in, defeated Francesca Hong, who’d been leading in polls by double digits…

Listen now

8 days ago · 2 likes · David Beard and Joe Sudbay

Senate

SC-Sen

Rep. Russell Fry endorsed appointed Sen. Darline Graham on Friday ahead of the Aug. 25 Republican primary runoff, a move that came three days after Fry came in a close third place in the first round.

Graham, who has Donald Trump’s endorsement, led Rep. Ralph Norman 33-25, with Fry finishing with 20%. Another 15% went to former Rep. Mark Sanford, who has yet to take sides in the runoff.

But Sanford, a longtime MAGA foe whose second and final stint in the House ended after he lost renomination to a Trump ally, is now in the unlikely position of having something that Trump wants.

The Washington Post’s Natalie Allison reports that Trump on Tuesday separately called Fry and Sanford, who waged a quixotic campaign to deny him the 2020 presidential nod, to ask them to endorse Graham. While Fry gave Trump what he asked for three days later, Allison writes that Sanford did not commit to anything during the “cordial” talk.

Norman, meanwhile, got a different piece of unwanted news later Friday when a group called Invest In Tomorrow Coalition told Politico it would spend at least $1 million against him. The group, funded by wealthy clean energy investors, made its new plans known the week after it helped deny renomination to Rep. Andy Ogles in Tennessee.

Spokesperson Tom Matzzie said it was now going after Norman, who co-founded the Congressional Solar Caucus in 2018, because he’d spearheaded the successful push to repeal the Biden administration’s tax credits for wind and solar energy.

Matzzie said that, while he didn’t know how Graham feels about such policies, Norman’s “traitorous” actions were what mattered. He declared, “It’s about stopping Norman, but it’s also about sending a message to other members of Congress that if they try to hurt the industry, we’re going to fight back.”

Governors

NE-Gov

Independent Brett Lindstrom failed to make the ballot Friday when Republican Secretary of State Bob Evnen’s office announced a “significant” number of the signatures he submitted were fraudulent. But Lindstrom, who denied knowing anything was amiss, is still looking for a way to continue his campaign.

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Lindstrom, a former Republican state senator, told the Omaha World-Herald the following day he wanted a third party to nominate him, an option he likened to a “pirate ship.” Lindstrom mentioned the Working People Party, a new group Democrats and the national Working Families Party claim is intended to siphon left-leaning voters, as a possible vehicle.

The WPP’s leaders did not respond to the paper’s inquiries about fielding Lindstrom. The deadline for new parties to pick their nominees is Sept. 1.

Lindstrom would face Republican Gov. Jim Pillen and former state Sen. Lynne Walz, who is hoping to become the first Cornhusker State Democrat to win a bid for governor since 1994.

House

AK-AL, AK-Sen

An obscure group is spending almost $600,000 to promote a little-known Republican and a Libertarian ahead of Tuesday’s top-four primary for Alaska’s sole House seat, but there’s reason to think the move is intended to benefit independent Bill Hill.

Punchbowl News’ Ally Mutnick, who first reported the ads, notes that now-deleted text on Hill’s website from late June encouraged his allies to make sure he “is the top non-incumbent vote getter in the Primary election and moves on to the general with no Democratic candidates.”

He got some welcome news the next month when pastor Matt Schultz, the leading Democrat in the race, announced he was dropping out and endorsing Hill. Schultz, who will still be listed on the ballot, highlighted how the NRCC was encouraging its allies to help boost him over Hill, presumably believing Hill to be the tougher opponent for Begich.

But while Schultz departed the race before any conservative third-party spending could promote him, a group called Cornerstone Founders PAC is up with commercials touting two other candidates: Republican Clay Strickland, whom the ad pledges “will back President Trump,” and Jim McDermott, a Libertarian Cornerstone promotes as someone who will “tell both parties to f*** off.”

Altogether there are three Republicans, four Democrats, and eight unaffiliated candidates on Tuesday’s ballot. The four contenders with the most votes, regardless of party, will move forward to a general election that will be conducted using ranked-choice rules.

While there’s little question both Begich and Hill will move forward, it could matter who else they face in the fall. Hill’s allies almost certainly want the third and fourth options to be conservatives in the hopes that some voters will cast ballots for them while failing to rank Begich, while the congressman’s allies would prefer the opposite.

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Cornerstone Founders PAC’s activities come as three other outside groups have spent roughly $2 million combined to promote five different minor candidates for U.S. Senate.

Republicans appear to be acting to get Green Party member Richard Grayson and Democrats Carol Hafner and David Leslie into the general election, while the other side seems to be taking action to boost Republican Jerry Heikes and Skip Southworth of the Alaskan Party.

One of these candidates, though, says he won’t be in the general election no matter what happens.

Grayson, a perennial candidate who lives outside the state, told the Alaska Daily News last week he supports former Rep. Mary Peltola, a Democrat who is Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan’s only serious opponent. Grayson, who declared he was only running “for fun,” said that if he advances, he would take advantage of a law allowing candidates to remove their names from the fall ballot.

FL-19

Donald Trump endorsed Catalina Lauf, who served in his first administration, on Thursday night ahead of this week’s packed Republican primary for Florida’s open 19th District.

Lauf, who unsuccessfully ran for Congress in Illinois in 2020 and 2022, is competing in a bizarre primary involving four other candidates who began their political careers in other states. One of these opponents is Jim Oberweis, a former state senator from the Land of Lincoln who beat Lauf in her first primary only to narrowly lose to Democratic Rep. Lauren Underwood in the fall.

OH-07

The House Majority PAC announced Friday it was reserving an additional $6 million in ad time to defeat Rep. Max Miller, an Ohio Republican who has remained in the race despite abuse allegations from his ex-wife.

HMP previously booked about $1 million this spring to target Miller in Ohio’s 7th District, a constituency in the Cleveland area that Donald Trump would have carried 55-44. Miller, who refused to drop out in time to remove his name from the general election ballot, will go up against Democrat Brian Poindexter, an ironworker.

Poll Pile

• ID-Sen: Peak Insights for Jim Risch:

  • Risch (R-inc): 52, Todd Achilles (I): 18, Natalie Fleming (I): 9, Matt Loesby (L): 2.

• LA-Sen: Public Policy Polling for Jamie Davis:

  • Julia Letlow (R): 41, Davis (D): 37.

• MI-Sen: GBAO for Senate Majority PAC:

  • Abdul El-Sayed (D): 50, Mike Rogers (R): 44.

• WI-Gov: Platform Communications:

  • David Crowley (D): 48, Tom Tiffany (R): 44.

  • CBS 58 identifies Platform as a “conservative firm” that “brought in Republican and Democratic advisors to oversee the polling.”

• AL-02: DCCC Analytics:

  • Shomari Figures (D-inc): 46, Rhett Marques (R): 46.

• FL-07 (R): Capital Strategic Partners:

  • Ryan Elijah: 44, Cory Mills (inc): 27, “another candidate”: 10.

  • The poll did not name the other two Republicans in the race, Michael Don Johnson and Sarah Ulrich.

• FL-13: GQR for Leela Gray:

  • Anna Paulina Luna (R-inc): 47, Gray (D): 44, Tony D’Arrigo (I): 4.

• FL-13: Fabrizio, Lee & Associates for Luna:

  • Luna (R-inc): 49, Gray (D): 41.

• MA-08 (D): Z to A Research for Leaders We Deserve (pro-Patrick Roath):

  • Stephen Lynch (inc): 50, Roath: 43.

  • Unreleased July poll: 54-32 Lynch.

• NY-18: Global Strategy Group for Pat Ryan:

  • Ryan (D-inc): 53, Jackie Auringer (R): 39.

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Leading Off

AK-Gov, AK Ballot

Alaska voters on Tuesday will both winnow the field in a race for governor where none of the 17 candidates are subject to campaign contribution limits—and decide whether to reintroduce caps on political donations.

A total of 12 Republicans, two Democrats, and three independents are competing to replace Republican Mike Dunleavy, who is set to become the first governor to leave office because of term limits since 2002.

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All candidates will compete on a single ballot, with the top four vote-getters, regardless of party, advancing to a general election that will be conducted using ranked-choice voting.

It’s anyone’s guess which foursome will move forward, but a few candidates have stood out by raising considerably more money than the rest.

Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, a former member of the state House of Representatives, has brought in more than $2 million through Aug. 8, the end of the state’s most recent reporting period.

Observers have noted that about $400,000 of Kreiss-Tomkins’ haul has come from six employees of the AI company Anthropic, something critics of the AI sector have highlighted.

“I am not opposed to JKT as a candidate, only unfamiliar with his intentions on AI safety and data centers,” Maxim Ishchuk, who leads the group PauseAI Anchorage, wrote in an opinion piece in the Alaska Daily News.

“On his site, he mentions that he supports ‘a moratorium on all new data centers, similar to New York state, until the legislature can pass comprehensive regulation,’” Ishchuk continued. “This I appreciate, but what would he define as ‘comprehensive?’ I worry that this money buys influence over how that question gets answered.”

Kreiss-Tomkins responded in an essay of his own, saying, “All of our campaign’s AI-affiliated supporters are some of the country’s leading AI safety and regulation advocates.”

The candidate went on, “I am the first — and I believe still the only — candidate in the governor’s race to call for a moratorium on data center development in Alaska until the state can pass comprehensive regulation that protects the public interest.”

Kreiss-Tomkins has also called for voters next week to prohibit unlimited donations in future races by passing Ballot Measure 1, an initiative that would impose contribution limits for the first time in five years.

Should a majority vote “yes,” individuals would be permitted to give $2,000 to a candidate for state and local office each election, while groups would be limited to $4,000. These limits, which would go into effect after this year’s general elections, would be readjusted for inflation every decade.

In 2006, voters overwhelmingly approved a plan that capped individual contributions at $500, which the Alaska Beacon’s James Brooks said remained “some of America’s lowest limits on financial donations” through 2021. That year, though, a federal appeals court sided with Republicans in a long-running legal battle and invalidated the state’s donation limits.

The legislature’s subsequent attempts to introduce new rules failed to become law, as Dunleavy vetoed a bill last month that would have put in the same caps as Ballot Measure 1.

Former state Sen. Tom Begich, the other Democrat in the race, is also urging voters to approve the proposal next week.

Begich brought in about $1.2 million, a little more than half as much as Kreiss-Tomkins, through Aug. 8. Two contributors were responsible for about half of his haul: Justin Weaver, who has donated to candidates opposed to Dunleavy’s agenda, and attorney Robin Brena, who has called for raising taxes on state oil companies.

Begich, the son of the late Rep. Nick Begich and younger brother of former Sen. Mark Begich, could also benefit as a member of perhaps the state’s most prominent political family—even though it’s no longer an exclusively Democratic one.

The candidate’s nephew, Republican Rep. Nick Begich III, is seeking his second term as the state’s sole congressman. Tom Begich has slammed his relative’s conservative positions, writing in ADN last year, “My nephew may share my father’s name, but he does not share his values.”

Kreiss-Tomkins and Begich are hoping to become the first Democrat to win this office since 1998, when incumbent Tony Knowles secured his second and final term. Knowles is also the last governor to complete two full terms in office. Three of the four governors between him and Dunleavy failed to win reelection, while Republican Sarah Palin resigned in 2009, just months after her failed bid for vice president.

A dozen Republicans, meanwhile, are vying for this post. The two best-financed contenders each took in about $1.6 million through Sunday: podiatrist Matt Heilala, who has self-funded most of his effort, and former Attorney General Treg Taylor, who is also responsible for a large portion of his campaign’s fundraising.

Several other notable Republicans are in the hunt, though. The lineup includes former state Sen. Click Bishop; former Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson; former Revenue Commissioner Adam Crum; Mat-Su Borough Mayor Edna DeVries; former state Sen. Shelley Hughes; former state Sen. Lesil McGuire; and conservative operative Bernadette Wilson.

A trio of independents is also hoping to gain a spot in the second round. The most prominent name belongs to former Gov. Bill Walker, whose upset 2014 victory makes him the only non-Republican to win since Knowles in 1998. Meda DeWitt, a leader in the unsuccessful effort to recall Dunleavy during his first term, and one little-known name round out the field.

The last publicly released survey of next week’s packed race was an internal poll conducted for Kreiss-Tomkins back in mid-July. Those numbers, from Change Research, showed Begich and Kreiss-Tomkins in front with 17% and 15%, respectively, while Wilson was the top Republican at 14%.

None of the other 14 contenders cracked double digits. Walker edged out Bronson 7-6 for fourth place, with Bishop and Crum at 4% each and the rest of the field further back.

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The Downballot

What the hell just happened in Wisconsin?

Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor saw a shocking upset Tuesday night as David Crowley, who had dropped out of the race earlier this summer before jumping back in, defeated Francesca Hong, who’d been leading in polls by double digits…

Listen now

8 days ago · 1 like · David Beard and Joe Sudbay

House

FL-24

The Democratic primary in Florida’s open 24th District has erupted into an expensive affair ahead of next week’s vote, with Miami-Dade County Commissioner Oliver Gilbert taking most of the incoming fire.

Protect Progress, a super PAC funded by the cryptocurrency industry, has spent almost $2 million to portray Gilbert as a MAGA-aligned supporter of ICE, sending out mailers that include made-up headlines falsely attributed to the Miami Herald.

One of Protect Progress’ top funders is the crypto firm Coinbase, whose Global Advisory Council, as the Herald notes, includes former Rep. Kendrick Meek Sr., the father of one of Gilbert’s opponents, attorney Kendrick Meek Jr.

A pro-Gilbert outfit called American Made PAC, however, is fighting back, with $1.1 million in spending, mostly on positive ads supporting the commissioner.

Meanwhile, a group called Save Democracy PAC, which has endorsed a large array of centrist Democrats, has spent $1.7 million to boost state Sen. Shevrin Jones. Save Democracy is also the parent of Crush MAGA PAC, which was most recently active in the Democratic primary in Michigan’s 7th District. There, it spent more than $900,000 in an unsuccessful attempt to stop William Lawrence, the most outspoken progressive in the race, from winning.

Poll Pile

• ID-Sen: The Bullfinch Group:

  • Jim Risch (R-inc): 34, Todd Achilles (I): 30, Matt Loesby (L): 4.

  • The poll did not include independent candidate Natalie Fleming as an option.

• ID-Sen: Change Research for John Stegner:

  • Risch (R-inc): 43, Achilles (I): 21, Fleming (I): 8, Loesby (L): 2.

  • John Stegner is an independent candidate for governor.

• MI-Sen: Beacon Research/Shaw & Company Research for Fox News:

  • Mike Rogers (R): 51, Abdul El-Sayed (D): 47.

• NC-Sen: Harper Polling for the Carolina Journal:

  • Roy Cooper (D): 52, Michael Whatley (R): 39.

  • May: Cooper 50-39.

  • The Carolina Journal is a conservative publication.

• OH-Sen: Beacon/Shaw:

  • Sherrod Brown (D): 53, Jon Husted (R-inc): 45.

  • June: 53-45 Brown.

• TX-Sen: Emerson College for Nexstar Media:

  • Ken Paxton (R): 47, James Talarico (D): 46.

• CA-Gov: UC Berkeley for the Los Angeles Times:

  • Xavier Becerra (D): 55, Steve Hilton (R): 37

• ID-Gov: Change for Stegner:

  • Brad Little (R-inc): 54, Terri Pickens (D): 33.

  • Little (R-inc): 48, Pickens (D): 27, Stegner (I): 11.

  • Little (R-inc): 47, Stegner (I): 34.

• MI-Gov: Beacon/Shaw:

  • Jocelyn Benson (D): 52, John James (R): 47.

• OH-Gov: Beacon/Shaw:

  • Vivek Ramaswamy (R): 50, Amy Acton (D): 48.

  • June: 50-49 Acton.

• TX-Gov: Emerson:

  • Greg Abbott (R-inc): 48, Gina Hinojosa (D): 45.

• TX-Gov: GBAO for Hinojosa:

  • Abbott (R-inc): 49, Hinojosa (D): 48.

• ID-01: Change for Stegner:

  • Russ Fulcher (R-inc): 48, Kaylee Peterson (D): 27, Sarah Zabel (I): 5.

  • Fulcher (R-inc): 46, Zabel (I): 26.

• NY-21: SurveyUSA for WNYT:

  • Blake Gendebien (D): 43, Anthony Constantino (R): 39, Chris Schmidt (I): 5.

• WI-01: Impact Research for Mitchell Berman:

  • Bryan Steil (R-inc): 49, Berman (D): 48.

• NC Supreme Court: Harper:

  • Anita Earls (D-inc): 43, Sarah Stevens (R): 40.

  • May: 41-36 Earls.

Leading Off

PA State House

The final legislative special election before November is taking place on Tuesday in western Pennsylvania, giving Democrats one last chance to flip a conservative district in the state House ahead of this fall’s battle for control of the legislature.

Democrat Brandon Dukes, who works as a construction loan administrator, will face Republican Scott Timko, an Air Force veteran, for the 12th House District in Butler County, just north of Pittsburgh.

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Calculations by The Downballot show that Donald Trump carried this constituency 59-40 in 2024 as Republican state Rep. Stephenie Scialabba won a second term by a wider 65-35 spread. Scialabba announced in February that she would not seek reelection so she could focus on caring for her child, then said the following month that she would resign from office early.

Republicans have held the 12th District since Democratic state Rep. Patricia Carone switched parties in 1993, but Dukes argues that strong showings by Democrats in special elections make this a race to watch.

“You saw all across the country this past year alone how many Republican-held legislative seats flipped to Democrats and cut well into Trump’s margins from 2024,” he told WESA in March.

Democrats, as The Downballot’s special elections Big Board shows, have flipped 12 Republican-controlled districts via special elections since Trump reclaimed that White House. One of those victories took place in Pennsylvania in March of last year when Democrat James Malone scored a stunning 50-49 victory in the 36th Senate District, a Lancaster County constituency Trump had carried 57-42 just months before.

Democrats also picked up an additional 18 seats in New Jersey and Virginia during those states’ regularly scheduled contests last November.

Republicans, despite some tantalizing opportunities, have failed to take a Democratic-held legislative seat anywhere in the nation.

But flips aren’t the only way to measure how strong Democratic candidates have been at the ballot box. Democrats have outperformed Kamala Harris’ margin by an average of 12.5% percentage points in 109 different legislative and congressional special elections since January of last year.

Dukes, however, will need to beat that if he’s to prevail. Such a win, though, would by no means be unprecedented. Democrats have run ahead of Harris by 19 points or more in 30% of special elections this cycle.

One such showing also occurred in Pennsylvania three months ago in a seat Trump carried 66-33. While Democrat Ron Ruman lost to Republican George Margetas 55-45 in the 196th District in York County, that represented a 23-point overperformance compared to the 2024 presidential election results.

With this backdrop in mind, both parties are treating the 12th District as competitive. WESA reports that House Democrats contributed $110,000 to Dukes earlier this month, while the state GOP has spent $50,000 on mailers to help Timko.

But no matter what happens on Tuesday, Dukes and Timko will face off again this fall for a full two-year term on the same night Democrats are defending the razor-thin majority they first won in 2022.

That year, Josh Shapiro’s landslide victory in the race for governor helped his party earn a 102-101 edge in the 203-member House (the second-largest state legislative chamber in the country), a stunning result that ended 12 years of GOP control.

Democrats protected that slender majority during a tumultuous two-year period that featured 10 special elections—plus two different speakers—but saw not one seat change hands.

Both parties went into the 2024 election hoping to make gains in a chamber where neither had any room for error, but not a single district flipped in either direction that fall. That state of affairs has held since then, but Dukes gives Democrats one last chance to break four years of stasis before November.

Democrats are also aiming to end 32 years of GOP rule in the state Senate, where Republicans are defending a 27-23 majority. But only half of the body’s seats, including the conservative constituency Malone flipped last year, are up for election this cycle, which limits the number of targets for the minority party.

Democrats need to net two seats and reelect the ticket of Shapiro and Lt. Gov. Austin Davis to deadlock the chamber and benefit from Davis’ tie-breaking vote. But because the state constitution places limits on how the lieutenant governor can resolve ties, a 25-25 split still wouldn’t give Davis’ party complete control. For that, they’d need to flip three seats.

Even a tie, though, would give Democrats the chance to wield more power in state government than they’ve enjoyed in generations, and they’re aiming to seize it. Shapiro has made the battle for the legislature a priority in a year where he enjoys a huge polling edge in his campaign for a second term.

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The Downballot Podcast

What the hell just happened in Wisconsin?

Wisconsin’s Democratic primary for governor saw a shocking upset Tuesday night as David Crowley, who had dropped out of the race earlier this summer before jumping back in, defeated Francesca Hong, who’d been leading in polls by double digits.

On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, co-host David Beard and guest host Joe Sudbay run through all the key election results from Tuesday night, including Minnesota’s races for governor and Senate, South Carolina’s special Senate primary to replace Lindsey Graham, and the defeat of another House incumbent, this time in Connecticut.

David and Joe then preview the last big primary night of the season, with key races in Alaska and Florida. The hosts explain how Alaska’s unique top-four primary has scrambled the governor’s race, leading to real uncertainty about which major candidates will advance. And in Florida, they discuss the battles for governor and Senate as well as several House races that got upended by the GOP’s extreme new gerrymander.

Subscribe here on your favorite podcast app to make sure you never miss an episode.

House

FL-22

The hardline Club for Growth endorsed wealthy crypto businessman Michael Carbonara on Tuesday, just ahead of next week’s Republican primary for South Florida’s revamped 22nd District. The deep-pocketed group tells The Hill it’s spending $700,000 as part of an ad buy going after Carbonara’s two main intraparty opponents.

One spot attacks Casey Askar, the owner of numerous fast food franchises, for suing now-Rep. Byron Donalds for defamation after Donalds defeated him in a packed 2020 primary for the old 19th District.

The dispute arose on the day of that primary after Donalds took to social media to accuse Askar of being behind a text message falsely claiming Donalds was dropping out.

Askar, who finished a close third, filed a lawsuit shortly after the general election claiming the congressman-elect had engaged in an “intentional and malicious campaign of lies” against him. A judge, though, in 2022 ruled in favor of Donalds, who is now the frontrunner in next week’s primary for governor.

The Club’s other commercial goes after university official Belinda Keiser, who, like Carbonara and Askar, has self-funded most of her campaign.

This spot, though, accuses Keiser of having used her wealth to contribute to Democrats like Hillary Clinton, Al Gore, and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. It also faults her for donating to unidentified “Never Trumpers who voted to impeach or convict President Trump.”

Keiser, a vice chancellor at the eponymous university her husband, Arthur Keiser, founded in the 1970s, is a former Democrat who narrowly lost a 2000 primary for a seat in the state House.

Keiser, who unsuccessfully sought the GOP nomination for state Senate in 2018, recently told CBS of her past, “Looking at some of the presidents I admired the most, presidents Trump, President Reagan, at one time in their life, they were Democrats.”

Trump has not taken sides in the GOP primary for the open 22nd District, which Republican mapmakers dramatically redrew this year as part of their effort to flip more Democratic-held seats.

The new 22nd, which sprawls from Palm Beach and Broward counties west to communities along the Gulf Coast, would have backed Trump 55-44 in 2024. Joe Biden, however, would have carried it 51-48 four years earlier.

Businesswoman Pia Dandiya, the only well-funded Democrat in the race, is testing whether voters are having second thoughts about the GOP in 2026. Last month, the DCCC added Dandiya to its “Red to Blue” list highlighting top candidates, though major groups have yet to make fall TV ad reservations that could be used here.

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Poll Pile

• KS-Sen: Public Policy Polling for Senate Majority PAC:

  • Roger Marshall (R-inc): 46, Adam Hamilton (D): 45.

• ME-Sen: Beacon Research/Shaw & Company Research for Fox News:

  • Troy Jackson (D): 48, Susan Collins (R-inc): 46.

• MT-Sen: Hart Research Associates for Forward Montana (pro-Seth Bodnar):

  • Kurt Alme (R): 45, Bodnar (I): 30, Alani Bankhead (D): 15, Kyle Austin (L): 6.

• NC-Sen: Elon University/YouGov:

  • Roy Cooper (D): 53, Michael Whatley (R): 42.

• MD-Gov: Zenith Research for Blended Public Affairs and Perry Jacobson:

  • Wes Moore (D-inc): 58, Dan Cox (R): 31.

• ME-Gov: Beacon/Shaw:

  • Hannah Pingree (D): 49, Bobby Charles (R): 38, Rick Bennett (I): 9.

• NY-Gov: Siena University:

  • Kathy Hochul (D-inc): 49, Bruce Blakeman (R): 39.

• WI-Gov: GBAO for Protect Our Wisconsin (pro-David Crowley):

  • Crowley (D): 47, Tom Tiffany (R): 44.

  • The poll was conducted July 30-Aug. 3. Crowley won the Democratic nomination on Aug. 11.

• AK-AL: GBAO for Bill Hill:

  • Nick Begich (R-inc): 46, Hill (I): 42.

• FL-02 (R): co/efficient for Panhandle Patriots (pro-Austin Rogers):

  • Rogers: 25, Evan Power: 15, Luke Murphy: 13, Keith Gross: 8, Jim Norton: 8, all others 4% or less, undecided: 26.

  • Unreleased July poll: Gross: 22, Rogers: 19.

• FL-19 (R): Cygnal for Catalina Lauf:

  • Lauf: 20, Jim Schwartzel: 16, Jim Oberweis: 15.

• OH-07: Bedrock Polling for The Next 50 and Iron Workers International (pro-Brian Poindexter):

  • Poindexter (D): 43, Max Miller (R-inc): 35.

• IA Secretary of Agriculture: Change Research for Chris Jones:

  • Mike Naig (R-inc): 42, Jones (D): 40.

On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, co-host David Beard and guest host Joe Sudbay run through all the key election results from Tuesday night, including Minnesota’s races for governor and Senate, South Carolina’s special Senate primary to replace Lindsey Graham, and the defeat of another House incumbent, this time in Connecticut.

David and Joe then preview the last big primary night of the season, with key races in Alaska and Florida. The hosts explain how Alaska’s unique top-four primary has scrambled the governor’s race, leading to real uncertainty about which major candidates will advance. And in Florida, they discuss the battles for governor and Senate as well as several House races that got upended by the GOP’s extreme new gerrymander.

Leading Off

AZ-Gov, AZ-LG

Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs tapped former Mesa Mayor John Giles, a one-time Republican who’s now a registered independent, as her running mate on Tuesday, ahead of Arizona’s first-ever election for the newly created post of lieutenant governor.

Late last month, Hobbs’ Republican rival, Rep. Andy Biggs, chose former state Sen. Sine Kerr to join his ticket. Giles and Kerr will now vie to become their respective partner’s second-in-command, a position that, most importantly, would put them first in the line of succession.

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Ever since Arizona achieved statehood in 1912, that role has been occupied by the secretary of state, who has taken over as governor on multiple occasions. It happened most recently in 2009, when Barack Obama nominated Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano as his Homeland Security secretary.

That move turned control of state government to the GOP as Republican Secretary of State Jan Brewer was elevated to the governorship. Brewer soon shepherded the passage of a notoriously strict anti-immigration law requiring police to ask anyone they might have a “reasonable suspicion” of being in the country without authorization to present paperwork proving their legal status during routine traffic stops.

A failure to carry such papers was also made a crime, though that provision was later struck down by the Supreme Court.

Obama never seemed to address the consequences of his fateful choice. At a commencement speech at Arizona State University in the spring of 2009, a few months after Napolitano joined his Cabinet, Obama said, “I also want to apologize to the entire state of Arizona for stealing away your wonderful former governor, Janet Napolitano,” before immediately adding of Brewer, “But you’ve got a fine governor here.”

As part of an oral history of the Obama presidency produced by Columbia University, Napolitano explained in a 2020 interview why she brushed aside concerns about Brewer succeeding her.

“But in my thinking, Arizona then had a Democratic attorney general named Terry Goddard, and there had already been polling out that he ran double digits ahead of any of the likely Republicans, including Brewer, in the election for governor that was scheduled for 2010,” she said. “And I thought, ‘After two years of Jan Brewer, Terry Goddard should be a shoo-in for governor.’ He lost that election.”

Brewer defeated Goddard 54-42, and Arizona would not elect another Democratic governor until Hobbs’ narrow victory in 2022. That same year, voters also approved a constitutional amendment to establish the office of lieutenant governor by a 55-45 margin after two previous attempts in 1994 and 2010 both failed.

The new law will help ward against another whiplash-inducing transfer of power, though Hobbs’ potential successor would not be a fellow Democrat. However, Giles, who served as mayor from 2014 to 2025, has been on a long migration away from the GOP, culminating in his change of party registration in May.

Four years ago, he endorsed Hobbs’s first bid for governor, and two years later, he not only backed Kamala Harris over Donald Trump but also spoke at the Democratic National Convention. He recently told the Associated Press that he still views himself as a conservative and remained a Republican in the hopes of rescuing his now-former party but no longer believes in that mission.

“A few months ago, I realized that it was time to give up that crusade,” he said.

But while Hobbs is seeking to burnish her bipartisan credentials with her selection of Giles, Biggs made a very different choice. In a statement announcing his pick, Biggs said that Kerr had “worked across the aisle” in the legislature, but she’s best known for her anti-abortion and anti-trans advocacy.

In 2021, she sponsored legislation that would have imposed a near-total ban on abortion in the state, though the measure ultimately died. The proposal would have also imposed a prison sentence of up to nine years on physicians who perform an abortion.

Three years later, she spearheaded a bill that would have replaced the word “gender” with the word “sex” in all Arizona laws because sex is “objective and fixed” and does not include any term “intended to convey a person’s subjective sense of self.” Hobbs vetoed that bill.

Whoever becomes Arizona’s first lieutenant governor won’t have much in the way of official duties, though the law creating the post specifies that the governor must also appoint their No. 2 as their chief of staff, director of the state Department of Administration, or “to any position for which the Governor is otherwise authorized by law to make an appointment.”

And unlike many of their counterparts in other states, they won’t be empowered to break ties in the 30-member state Senate, where the parties had to broker a power-sharing agreement after the 2000 elections produced an even split.

In swingy Arizona, such a deadlock always remains possible, though Democrats are hoping to finally erase the GOP’s 17-13 advantage in the upper chamber this fall. They’re also trying to win back the state House, where Republicans hold a similarly narrow 33-27 edge.

Should Hobbs also earn a second term, it would be the first election since 1964 to see Democrats win full control over Arizona’s government.

The Downballot

The pro-pipe bomb Republican running for secretary of state

Once again, Republicans are fielding an array of election deniers who nevertheless want to oversee their state’s elections, though this year’s crop might just take the cake. On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, Chelsey Wininger, the executive director of the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State, walks us through every competitive …

Listen now

15 days ago · 3 likes · 4 comments · David Nir and David Beard

Election Recaps

All race calls and estimates of the proportion of the vote that’s been tabulated come from the Associated Press. You can also check out our cheat-sheet that summarizes the outcomes in every key race.

Defeated House Incumbents

CT-01 (D) (61-38 Harris)

Former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin defeated 14-term Rep. John Larson in a 54-33 landslide in Tuesday’s primary for Connecticut’s safely blue 1st District, an outcome that makes the 78-year-old incumbent the seventh House Democrat to lose renomination this year.

Larson, who was first elected in 1998 after narrowly winning a fiercely contested battle for the Democratic nod, never faced any opposition on the ballot during any of his subsequent 13 primaries. The congressman, though, was the subject of unwanted attention last year when he was twice filmed freezing mid-sentence.

Larson dismissed speculation he might retire even after Bronin launched a well-funded campaign to defeat him. Bronin, 47, made his challenge about generational change rather than ideological differences and urged Larson to “pass the torch.”

Larson fought back with ads framing the race as a choice between a proven liberal and a challenger backed by “crypto bros” and data center builders. His appeal, though, failed to break through at a time when Democratic incumbents in their 70s and 80s have faced widespread pressure to step aside.

Alabama

AL-01 (R) (68-32 Trump)

Former Rep. Jerry Carl is almost certainly headed back to Congress after taking close to three-quarters of the vote against three opponents in Tuesday’s GOP primary for the open 1st District, which includes the Mobile area and communities to the east.

Two years ago, Carl lost a primary against a fellow incumbent, Rep. Barry Moore, after court-ordered redistricting left them both in the 1st. Moore won that faceoff, but he chose to run for Senate this year, giving Carl a chance to reclaim his old turf.

AL-02 (R) (57-42 Trump)

State Rep. Rhett Marques defeated his nearest rivals for the GOP nod in a 50-22 landslide on the strength of a Trump endorsement and will now face Democratic Rep. Shomari Figures for the radically redrawn 2nd District in southeastern Alabama.

Last cycle, a court imposed a new map after finding that Republicans had violated the Voting Rights Act by not drawing a second district where Black voters could elect their preferred candidates. That map featured a revamped 2nd District that was home to a Black majority and comfortably elected Figures.

But immediately after the Supreme Court gutted the VRA, the GOP set to work dismantling the 2nd and restoring it to its deeply conservative, majority-white status. Figures said he would seek reelection nonetheless, but the same racially polarized voting that prompted the previous redraw will make it very difficult for him to win, barring a huge surge in Black turnout and a commensurate dip in participation by white voters.

Connecticut

CT-Gov (D) (56-42 Harris)

Gov. Ned Lamont scored a 68-32 win against state Rep. Josh Elliott, a primary challenger three decades his junior who unsuccessfully argued the wealthy incumbent had failed to shake up the status quo.

In November, Lamont will face Republican state Sen. Ryan Fazio, who was unopposed in his primary, as he seeks a third term.

Minnesota

MN-Sen (D & R) (51-47 Harris)

Democratic Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan will face Republican Michele Tafoya, a former sportscaster, in the general election for Minnesota’s open U.S. Senate seat.

Flanagan, who campaigned as a progressive, turned in a decisive 59-39 victory against Rep. Angie Craig, who cultivated a more moderate image during her four terms in office.

AdImpact reports that the congresswoman and her allies spent close to $20 million on the airwaves, more than four times as much as Flanagan and her supporters. But Flanagan, who had the support of retiring Sen. Tina Smith and other prominent figures like Rep. Ilhan Omar, successfully went after Craig for voting for the Laken Riley Act last year, a vote Craig apologized for during the campaign.

Craig unsuccessfully pushed back by arguing that a long-running investigation into allegations of fraud in the state’s welfare system would hurt Flanagan in the general election, but Republicans are sure to test the potency of that attack. The NRSC, which backed Tafoya ahead of her easy primary win, even meddled in the Democratic nomination contest with digital ads boosting Flanagan.

Tafoya, though, remains the underdog in a state where Republicans, despite some close calls, haven’t won a statewide election since 2006. ICE’s operations this winter in and around Minneapolis have also energized Democratic voters, complicating Tafoya’s path in a state that Donald Trump lost in all three of his campaigns.

If Flanagan, a member of the White Earth Band of Ojibwe, prevails in the fall, she would make history as the first Native American woman to ever serve in the Senate. Flanagan often introduces herself at campaign events by explaining that her name in Ojibwe is Gizhiiwewidamookwe, which translates as Speaks in a Loud and Clear Voice Woman.

MN-Gov (R) (51-47 Harris)

State House Speaker Lisa Demuth convincingly defeated Mike Lindell, the election-denying pillow salesman backed by Donald Trump, 43-32 in the Republican primary for Minnesota’s open governorship.

In the fall, Demuth will go up against Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who easily bypassed her little-known intraparty opponents. Either nominee would be the first woman to lead Minnesota, while Demuth would also be the state’s first Black governor.

Demuth will test whether the state’s welfare fraud scandal, which spurred Democratic Gov. Tim Walz to end his reelection campaign in January, will give her an opening against Klobuchar. However, the same forces that make the state’s U.S. Senate race such a reach for the GOP, as well as Klobuchar’s history of success at the ballot box, make Demuth the underdog.

One prominent Republican, though, is happy to have Demuth leading the ticket rather than Trump’s pick.

State GOP chair Alex Plechash responded to Trump’s decision to endorse Lindell last month by warning that his nomination would make it easier for Democrats to win the governorship and both chambers of the narrowly divided legislature, returning them to full control of the state government. (The state House is currently split.)

Republican voters apparently agreed, making Lindell the third Trump-backed candidate for governor to lose his primary this year.

In May, Trump endorsed Rep. Randy Feenstra’s campaign to lead neighboring Iowa mere days before wealthy businessman Zach Lahn upset the perceived frontrunner. Later in June, Trump watched from the sidelines as Georgia Lt. Gov. Burt Jones fell to healthcare billionaire Rick Jackson.

MN-02 (D) (52-46 Harris)

Former state Sen. Matt Little outpaced state Sen. Matt Klein 47-30 in the Democratic primary for the House seat Democratic Rep. Angie Craig gave up to run for the Senate. Little, who campaigned as the most progressive option, will take on state Sen. Eric Pratt, who won the Republican nomination without opposition.

Minnesota’s 2nd District, based in the Twin Cities’ southern suburbs, has long been competitive turf, but it shifted left as suburbanites abandoned the Trump-era Republican Party. While political observers are watching to see whether the 2nd snaps back now that Craig isn’t around to defend it, no major outside groups from either party have reserved ad time here yet.

Hennepin County, MN Attorney (top two) (70-27 Harris)

State Rep. Cedrick Frazier and former acting U.S. Attorney Anders Folk will compete in the officially nonpartisan November general election to replace Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty, a fellow Democrat who is not seeking reelection as the top prosecutor for Minnesota’s most populous county.

Frazier, who last year told the Minnesota Star Tribune that he would be the first Black person elected to serve as a county prosecutor anywhere in the state, was far out in front with 36% of the vote in the five-way race. Folk outpaced former prosecutor Diane Krenz 23-19 for the second spot.

The two finalists have had very different things to say about Moriarty, who was elected as a criminal justice reformer in 2022.

Frazier, who co-chaired Moriarty’s transition team, told the Star Tribune in 2025 that he shares an outlook with the incumbent even as he declared he wasn’t “Mary 2.0.” He also has touted endorsements from well-known Democrats like Sen. Tina Smith, Rep. Ilhan Omar, and Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan.

Folk, for his part, has been critical of Moriarty, arguing that she’s done a poor job battling gang violence. He celebrated his win with a statement saying that voters were “uniting around a shared conviction that public safety, accountability, and the rule of law are now more important than ever.” Folk has the support of Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, who has clashed with progressive figures in local politics.

South Carolina

SC-Sen (R) (58-40 Trump)

Sen. Darline Graham and Rep. Ralph Norman will square off again in just two weeks after neither candidate managed to win a majority in the special GOP primary to pick a replacement for the senator’s late brother, Lindsey Graham.

The Trump-backed Graham led Norman 33-25, while Rep. Russell Fry finished out of the running with 20% of the vote. Former Rep. Mark Sanford took fourth place with just 15%, with another 6% going to wealthy businessman Mark Lynch.

The winner of the Aug. 25 runoff will face physician Annie Andrews, who won the Democratic nomination in June.

Vermont

VT-Gov (D) (64-32 Harris)

Economist Amanda Janoo defeated former nonprofit CEO Aly Richards by a tight 49-47 margin and will now face the challenging task of denying a sixth two-year term to Republican Gov. Phil Scott.

Scott has defied political gravity in this ordinarily blue state by distancing himself from the national GOP brand, but a poll last month from the University of New Hampshire put him up just 44-33 on Janoo. Given that Scott won his last race in a 73-22 demolition, he could potentially be vulnerable if his numbers have retreated as far as UNH suggests.

Wisconsin

WI-Gov (D) (50-49 Trump)

Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley defied the polls in extraordinary fashion to defeat state Rep. Francesca Hong in the Democratic primary for Wisconsin’s open governorship.

Crowley leads 39.8 to 39.4, a difference of 3,211 votes, with an estimated 98% reporting. The AP called the contest for Crowley, who would be the state’s first Black governor, at 3:34 AM ET / 2:34 AM local time following a long and a suspenseful election night, and Hong’s campaign conceded a short time later.

Crowley will face Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany, a member of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, in the November race to succeed retiring Gov. Tony Evers.

The outcome cut sharply against what public polling had predicted. Hong, a member of the Democratic Socialist of America, led Crowley by an average of 20 points, according to FiftyPlusOne, and looked set to cruise to the nomination. Establishment Democrats, worried that Hong’s left-wing rhetoric and idiosyncratic views might deprive them of their first chance to take full control of state government since 2010, seemed unable to halt her rise.

Crowley ultimately emerged as their final hope after several other candidates dropped out late in the race—including Crowley himself. But after Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez’s bid imploded after she fired her campaign manager for alleged financial mismanagement, he re-entered the primary, this time with the endorsement of Evers.

Still, his chances looked grim, though his campaign argued otherwise. In a memo last week, Crowley’s campaign manager, Garren Randolph, pointed to polling in Michigan’s Senate primary, which overestimated another left-wing candidate, Abdul El-Sayed, as evidence that the numbers might be off in Wisconsin, too.

“The voter file, published survey crosstabs, and public ad tracking data all show a much closer race than the toplines suggest and that the election will be decided by a different electorate than the one those toplines assume,” Randolph wrote.

Against intense headwinds, that prediction proved to be right.

Now Crowley will go head-to-head with Tiffany, an election denier who joined the majority of his party in voting against recognizing Joe Biden’s win hours after the Jan. 6 riot. The congressman, though, has also taken some stances even further to the right of most of his fellow Republicans.

In 2020, for instance, he was one of only 18 members to oppose a resolution condemning QAnon, a move he said he made in protest to a bill he saw as “purely political posturing.”

The congressman’s biggest vulnerability, though, may be his longtime opposition to abortion rights. Tiffany, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel highlighted last year, backed unsuccessful bills in 2022 and 2023 that would have banned abortion after just six weeks with few exceptions.

Both sides are certain to spend heavily through Election Day, as Republicans fight to maintain their vulnerable majorities in both chambers of the legislature and reclaim the governor’s mansion. Democrats, meanwhile, are hoping that their long journey back to power in Wisconsin will finally reach its end with victories up and down the ballot in November.

WI-03 (D) (53-46 Trump)

Businesswoman Rebecca Cooke will face Republican Rep. Derrick Van Orden in a rematch two years after he narrowly defeated her in their first bout for the 3rd District in southwestern Wisconsin.

Cooke, whose long list of endorsements included Bernie Sanders, the DCCC, and the centrist Blue Dog Coalition, held off former Eau Claire City Council President Emily Berge 61-39.

The newly minted nominee, who also lost the 2022 primary in this district, has reason to be optimistic about her third try against Van Orden, who has spent his two terms in office making headlines by screaming at teenage Senate pages in the Capitol rotunda and spreading far-right conspiracy theories.

Cooke lost to Van Orden just 51-49 in 2024 as Donald Trump was carrying the 3rd District by a wider 53-46 spread. Trump’s cratering approval ratings, though, leave the congressman with even less room for error.

Both parties are preparing for another expensive race. The pro-Democratic House Majority PAC has reserved over $6 million in ad time in southern Wisconsin, while the Congressional Leadership Fund has booked $1.5 million to defend Van Orden.

WI-07 (R) (61-38 Trump)

Michael Alfonso, a podcast producer backed by Donald Trump, decisively defeated four other Republicans in the primary for the northwestern Wisconsin constituency GOP Rep. Tom Tiffany is giving up to run for governor. Alfonso led his nearest opponent, investment adviser Kevin Hermening, 49-27.

Alfonso, whose father-in-law, Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, is Tiffany’s immediate predecessor, was the target of ads branding him a “nepo baby.” Those spots, though, didn’t stop Alfonso, who benefited from heavy outside spending.

Governors

WY-Gov

Tuesday’s Republican primary for Wyoming’s open governorship has turned sharply negative during the homestretch, with state Sen. Eric Barlow and Superintendent of Public Instruction Megan Degenfelder both sustaining attacks from outside groups.

Barlow, an ardent conservative who has nonetheless come into conflict with the state’s chapter of the far-right Freedom Caucus, was the first to find himself on the defensive.

Last month, an outfit called Women for Responsible Government Action launched ads accusing Barlow of allowing gender affirming care “to be done on kids,” citing his vote against a 2023 bill that would have made it illegal for doctors and parents to allow such treatment. The group is run by allies of Rep. Harriet Hageman, the likely nominee for U.S. Senate and a supporter of the local Freedom Caucus.

Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland quoted Barlow three years ago saying he felt the legislation in question wasn’t written well enough to achieve its goals. He instead backed a similar bill he called “very precise,” which was later signed into law by GOP Gov. Mark Gordon.

Degenfelder, who has the backing of both Donald Trump and Hageman in the race to replace Gordon as leader of the nation’s most Republican state, was in the hot seat this month when a newly formed group called Keep Wyoming Working went on the offensive.

In an ad, the group claimed Degenfelder engaged in “dirty deals” when she worked for a coal company that later went bankrupt, with the narrator saying she was “paid thousands to lobby for loopholes that let her company dodge millions in local taxes.” The spot does not explain what sort of “loopholes” Degenfelder allegedly utilized.

Degenfelder’s allies were quick to condemn the messaging as a smear from Barlow’s camp.

“It was recently brought to my attention that Eric Barlow and his associates created a new ad villainizing the coal industry as ‘dirty jobs,’” Hageman wrote on Facebook.

Barlow, for his part, denied he had anything to do with the attacks.

“I’m Eric Barlow, and I do not approve of any negative campaigning against any individual who’s running for office,” he said in a video he posted to Facebook.

Marine veteran Brent Bien, the third and final notable candidate for governor, has been ignored by outside groups amid the imbroglio. An aide likewise told McFarland the campaign wasn’t involved with Keep Wyoming Working’s activities, saying, “We don’t have any money.”

Bien, who challenged Gordon in 2022 and lost 62-30, secured the Wyoming Republican Party’s endorsement last month for his new effort. That seal of approval, though, may not be worth all that much. GOP chair Bryan Miller, citing a state law prohibiting parties from using resources in contested primaries, told WyoFile, “We obviously can’t put ads in the papers and do all those different things.”

The only publicly available survey of the race was a July internal poll from Barlow’s campaign that showed him beating Degenfelder 42-19. That survey, from Pulse Decision Science, placed Bien just behind with 14% of the vote.

House

FL-02

Wealthy attorney Keith Gross said last week that a super PAC supporting former Senate aide Austin Rogers agreed to take down an ad attacking him ahead of Tuesday’s GOP primary for Florida’s open 2nd District after Gross sent a cease-and-desist letter.

Panhandle Patriots debuted a commercial earlier this month centered around Gross’ 2008 campaign for the Georgia House of Representatives as a Democrat, which ended after a court ruled that he failed to meet the state’s residency requirements. The spot emphasized Gross saying at the time he wanted to be the chamber’s “first openly gay” member.

“I haven’t been a Democrat since the same year President Trump himself was a Democrat and supporting Hillary Clinton,” Gross tweeted on Thursday. The candidate, who did not address his unsuccessful repeat bid for the Democratic nod two years later, continued his post, “To make it all worse, they stole my own campaign pictures for use in their deceitful ad.”

Gross attached a letter from an attorney for Panhandle Patriots, a group run by Rogers’ father and father-in-law, with the subject “Response to Unauthorized Use of Copyrighted Logos and Images in Campaign Advertisement.” The missive said that while the super PAC “does not concede the allegations and reserves all rights, claims, and defenses,” the ad in question was “no longer being disseminated on the airwaves.”

Limited polling shows Gross and Rogers, who stepped down as Sen. Rick Scott’s general counsel to run for the House, as the frontrunners in the primary for the reliably red north Florida constituency Republican Rep. Neal Dunn is giving up.

WA-05

Firefighter Nate Powell, an independent seeking to take on Republican Rep. Mike Baumgartner, conceded the second slot in the top-two primary for Washington’s conservative 5th District on Monday evening and endorsed Democrat Carmela Conroy.

Though Powell had received a significant infusion of outside help, Conroy, a retired diplomat, may have benefited from greater name recognition as Baumgartner’s previous general election opponent in 2024. With an estimated 90% of the vote counted shortly after Powell conceded, Baumgartner was in first with 47%, while Conroy led Powell 19-16.

Two years ago, when the 5th became open following Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers’ retirement, Baumgartner defeated Conroy 61-39, running well ahead of Donald Trump’s 54-43 margin. Evidently preferring to once again face his previous opponent rather than an independent, Baumgartner ran ads ahead of the primary designed to boost Conroy, which seem to have paid off.

DCCC

The DCCC has added two more Democrats to its Red to Blue program for top House candidates: ironworker Brian Poindexter, who’s challenging Republican Rep. Max Miller in Ohio’s 7th District, and former prosecutor Christina Hines, who’s running to flip Michigan’s open 10th.

Some notable names remain off the roster, though, including another contender who just won a primary in Michigan, climate activist William Lawrence. Lawrence, an outspoken progressive, defeated two more moderate rivals last week in the 7th District, where Republican Rep. Tom Barrett is seeking reelection.

Lawrence, until recently a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, told CNN last week that he let his membership lapse last month and sought to distance himself from the group.

“I’ve got a lot of respect for DSA and the work that they’re doing around the country,” he said. “But I felt the need to make it very clear that the platform we’re running on here is the one that has come up based on the conversations we’re having across the 7th District.”

State Auditor Matt Dunlap, who is running to defend Maine’s open 2nd District, also has yet to be embraced by the committee. At a press conference late last month, Dunlap told reporters, “We’re not officially in the Red to Blue program yet, but it’s going to happen.”

Legislatures

WA State Senate

Senate Majority Leader Jamie Pedersen and Hannah Sabio-Howell, a fellow Democrat backed by Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson, will face off again in the November general election, but the results of last week’s top-two primary underscore just how tough it will be for Sabio-Howell to unseat the chamber’s most powerful member.

With most votes tabulated from the Aug. 4 contest, Pedersen holds a 67-23 lead over Sabio-Howell, a former legislative aide who’s argued that the incumbent has done too little to bring about progressive change. (The balance went to an unaffiliated candidate.)

The two Democrats are competing for the 43rd Legislative District, a constituency around downtown Seattle where Kamala Harris won close to 90% of the vote.

Poll Pile

• OH-Sen: Tulchin Research for John Kulewicz:

  • Sherrod Brown (D): 47, Jon Husted (R-inc): 43, Bill Redpath (Libertarian): 4.

  • June: 46-42 Brown.

  • John Kulewicz is the Democratic nominee for Ohio attorney general.

• OH-Gov: Tulchin for Kulewicz.

  • Amy Acton (D): 46, Vivek Ramaswamy (R): 44, Don Kissick (L): 5.

  • June: 47-44 Acton.

• TX-Gov: Cygnal:

  • Greg Abbott (R-inc): 49, Gina Hinojosa (D): 46.

• OH-AG: Tulchin for Kulewicz:

  • Kulewicz (D): 36, Keith Faber (R): 32.

  • June: 34-34 tie.

Leading Off

NC-11

Local Republican leaders selected state Rep. Jennifer Balkcom on Monday evening to replace scandal-ridden Rep. Chuck Edwards, who ended his reelection campaign last week, as the party’s nominee for North Carolina’s 11th District.

Balkcom will go up against Democrat Jamie Ager, a farmer who has been waging a strong campaign to flip a constituency in the western part of the state that Donald Trump carried 54-45 in 2024.

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Balkcom enters the race free of the ethical baggage that sank Edwards, who dropped out shortly after the House Ethics Committee recommended he be censured after finding “substantial reason to believe” he had sexually harassed two young female aides and created a hostile workplace.

But Balkcom, who was first elected to the legislature in 2022, has just 84 days to put together a credible campaign for what remains a competitive general election. While Trump decisively carried this district, which is home to Asheville and surrounding rural areas, his mounting unpopularity has given Democrats across the country an opening in comparatively conservative seats.

Ager, whose grandfather, Jamie Clarke, represented the 11th District for three non-consecutive terms in the 1980s, has also been waging a serious effort to flip it.

“Farming’s a real job: You screw up, there are real consequences,” Ager said last summer in a launch video. “And even when you think this will be the year, sometimes mother nature has other plans,” he continued as the screen showed the devastating floods from Hurricane Helene in 2024.

A different sort of storm upended Ager’s race, too.

The 11th District appeared to be an unlikely Democratic target when he kicked off his campaign, but he began gaining traction even before the allegations against Edwards first started surfacing in April.

The House Majority PAC gave Ager a big vote of confidence earlier that month when it announced that it had reserved more than $4 million in ad time in western North Carolina. And though he’s a first-time candidate, Ager has been a potent fundraiser, ending June with more than $2 million in the bank.

If Ager defeats Balkcom this fall, he would be the first Democrat in 14 years to represent what had once been one of the most competitive House districts in the nation.

Indeed, Ager’s grandfather won and lost a string of five extremely close elections all decided by under 2 points. Clarke’s career finally came to an end after the 1990 election when Republican Charles Taylor, whom Clarke had narrowly fended off two years earlier, won their closely fought rematch.

Taylor would have little trouble holding the 11th for more than a decade, but his fortunes finally shifted in 2006 as Democrats looked to capitalize on President George W. Bush’s plunging approval ratings. That year, Democrats recruited Heath Shuler, who had achieved fame in the region as a high school quarterback before his ill-fated career in the NFL, to take on Taylor.

Shuler decisively flipped the seat, and he would spend his three terms in Congress as one of the most conservative members of the Democratic caucus. But while Shuler’s career survived the 2010 Republican wave, that election left the GOP with the power to ensure even he couldn’t win again.

Republicans quickly passed a new map that split the Democratic bastion of Asheville between the 10th and 11th Districts, a change that made it virtually impossible for any Democrat to prevail. Shuler opted not to seek reelection in 2012, and Republican Mark Meadows had no trouble winning the general election to replace him.

The 11th remained safe for the GOP as long as Asheville was divided. The League of Women Voters drew attention to the awkward lines in 2017 with a “Gerrymander 5K,” which saw runners jog along the bizarre border between the 10th and 11th.

Afterward, writer Jeremy Markovich described his experience running the course in a piece for Politico.

“As a race, the Gerrymander 5K was unsatisfying,” he wrote. “We had to run on the sidewalks; one poor woman nearly decapitated herself when she ran right into the guywire of a telephone pole.”

Asheville was reunified in time for the 2020 election after the state Supreme Court, which had a Democratic majority at the time, supervised the redrawing of the congressional lines.

Meadows, though, didn’t stick around to try his luck in what was still a Republican-leaning district. The congressman stunned just about everyone by announcing his retirement one day before the candidate filing deadline, and he later resigned early to become Trump’s chief of staff.

Meadows’ departure set off a new and volatile period in the 11th’s history. Out of the chaos, Madison Cawthorn, a 24-year-old real estate investor, emerged seemingly from nowhere to win the GOP nomination against a candidate backed by both Trump and Meadows.

Democrats believed that Cawthorn, whom three women had accused of unwanted sexual advances, could be defeated in a district that, while still challenging, no longer appeared unwinnable. The conservative Congressional Leadership Fund also worried that Cawthorn, who also described his visit to Adolf Hitler’s vacation home as an item on his “bucket list,” could lose the seat, and it spent $1 million to aid him.

The Republican, though, decisively prevailed 55-42 over Democrat Moe Davis in what would be the last hotly contested general election in the 11th for several years. But while Cawthorn, who became eligible to serve in the House when he turned 25 before Election Day, seemed set for a long career in North Carolina GOP politics, he would be gone in just two years.

Cawthorn’s sole term was defined by multiple scandals, embarrassing videos, unhinged rhetoric, and run-ins with the law. Edwards, then a member of the state Senate, pitched himself as a loyal conservative who, unlike the publicity-seeking congressman, wouldn’t be “Instagram famous.”

Edwards narrowly beat Cawthorn 34-32 ahead of what would be the first of two easy general elections. Cawthorn, for his part, bought a $1 million house in Florida shortly after his defeat, and he’s currently competing next week in a congressional primary in the Sunshine State’s 19th District that includes a multitude of other politicians from other states.

Any chance of Cawthorn and Edwards serving together in Congress, though, vanished last week when Edwards dropped out after his scandal also made him famous for all the wrong reasons.

The Downballot

The pro-pipe bomb Republican running for secretary of state

Once again, Republicans are fielding an array of election deniers who nevertheless want to oversee their state’s elections, though this year’s crop might just take the cake. On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, Chelsey Wininger, the executive director of the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State, walks us through every competitive …

Listen now

15 days ago · 3 likes · 4 comments · David Nir and David Beard

Senate

MT-Sen

Neither Democrat Alani Bankhead nor independent Seth Bodnar dropped their bids for Montana’s open U.S. Senate seat ahead of Monday’s deadline to remove their names from the ballot, ensuring a three-way race with Republican Kurt Alme in November.

Bodnar and his supporters had called on Bankhead to end her campaign in the belief that he would have a stronger chance of defeating Alme in the general election. Bankhead, however, vocally rejected any such demands and instead said Bodnar should quit.

Polling has shown Alme comfortably leading both of his opponents.

Ballot Measures

AK Ballot

Despite saying he would pull back from spending on political causes last year, Elon Musk donated $1.5 million last month to a group trying once again to repeal Alaska’s unique top-four primary system.

Voters narrowly approved that system in 2020 by just a 1 percentage point margin, then almost undid it in 2024, when it survived by just 0.2 percent of the vote. Opponents of the law, however, have qualified a second repeal proposal, known as Measure 2, that will appear on the ballot this fall.

Musk didn’t directly contribute to the campaign behind the repeal effort, though. Rather, he gave to a group called Aurora Action Network, which in turn donated $1 million to Repeal Now Alaska.

Even with Musk’s infusion, though, supporters of the top-four primary, under which general elections are conducted using ranked-choice voting, have outraised opponents. Recent fundraising disclosures show that No on 2 has brought in almost $5.8 million while Repeal Now Alaska has raised just over $1.5 million.

Legislatures

IN State Senate

More than three months after Indiana’s primary, election officials announced on Monday that challenger Paula Copenhaver had defeated state Sen. Spencer Deery by three votes after a previous tally showed Deery leading by that same margin. An attorney for the senator immediately said he would file a legal challenge.

Deery was one of seven Republican lawmakers targeted by Donald Trump for refusing to support a plan to eliminate the last two congressional districts in the state held by Democrats. Five were defeated while just one, Greg Goode, survived, though it had appeared that Deery had managed to hang on as well.

However, the Indiana Recount Commission rejected eight ballots, including six cast for Deery, over what the Indiana Capital Chronicle said were “technical” issues like clerks failing to sign ballots.

“This is unprecedented,” Deery’s attorney said after the announcement, according to the Chronicle. “Ballots don’t get tossed for a signature missing from a clerk.” She promised to appeal the decision to the state Court of Appeals.

Poll Pile

• NC-Sen: Change Research for Carolina Forward:

  • Roy Cooper (D): 50, Michael Whatley (R): 43.

  • May: 49-42 Cooper.

• OK-Gov (R): Pulse Decision Science for the Club for Growth (pro-Mike Mazzei)

  • Mazzei (R): 44, Gentner Drummond: 38.

• OK-Gov (R): Cole Hargrave Snodgrass & Associates:

• Drummond: 44, Mazzei: 44.

• FL-14 (R): Catalyst Research for Mike Beltran:

  • Beltran: 29, Kevin Steele: 26, Bea Valenti: 8, all others 4% or less, undecided: 29.

• IL-04: The Bullfinch Group for The Independent Center:

  • Patty Garcia (D): 34, Lupe Castillo (R): 15, Chris Getty (I): 9, Ed Hershey (Working Class Party): 4, undecided: 37.

Wisconsin will once again find itself at the center of the political universe on Tuesday as state Rep. Francesca Hong, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, appears poised to win the high-profile Democratic primary for governor.

Hong’s contest, though, is only one of many to watch across the nation on an evening that will see six states hold important primaries.

Democrats in neighboring Minnesota will also decide on a nominee in a competitive and expensive Senate battle. Democratic Rep. John Larson of Connecticut, meanwhile, is trying to avoid becoming the latest longtime incumbent to be tossed out by his own party. Further north in New England, Vermont Democrats will pick their nominee to take on Republican Gov. Phil Scott, a proven vote-getter who may finally be vulnerable.

Donald Trump, who supported losing candidates on two different primary nights last week, will again have his picks tested in GOP primaries in the Midwest. Trump is backing a Wisconsin candidate whom detractors have branded a “nepo baby,” while he’s also urging Minnesota Republicans to nominate a pillow salesman whose love of election conspiracies rivals Trump’s own.

But Tuesday will be even beefier than it was supposed to be.

Republicans in Alabama responded to the Supreme Court’s decision to gut the Voting Rights Act by passing a new gerrymander transforming the plurality Black and Democratic-leaning 2nd Congressional District into a majority white and Republican-friendly constituency.

To ram that change through, the GOP postponed the primary for the 2nd, as well as three other districts impacted by the new lines, from May to August. (The primaries for Alabama’s other races, including the three untouched congressional districts, took place as planned this spring.)

The sudden death of Sen. Lindsey Graham last month, meanwhile, triggered a special primary to replace him on the ballot. And unless one of the 10 candidates on the ballot unexpectedly wins a majority of the vote on Tuesday, Republicans will go back to the polls in just two weeks.

Below is our guide to the major races in each state. When it’s available, we’ll tell you about any reliable polling that exists for each contest, but if we don’t mention any numbers, it means no recent surveys have been made public.

You can also find interactive congressional district maps from Dave’s Redistricting App for Alabama, Connecticut, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, linked to each state’s name. (Vermont has just a single congressional district.)

The first polls close at 7 PM ET in South Carolina and Vermont. Please join The Downballot on our private Discord server to watch and analyze the election returns with fellow community members as they come in!

Wisconsin

Polls close at 9 PM ET / 8 PM local time

WI-Gov (D) (50-49 Trump)

State Rep. Francesca Hong, who would be the first self-described socialist to lead any state, is the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination as Wisconsin’s volatile primary for governor comes to a close. The winner will take on Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany, who has only minimal intraparty opposition, in what will be an intensely watched general election.

Hong’s main intraparty rival is Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, who initially dropped out of the race in early July before reactivating his campaign 10 days later. Crowley, who returned to the race following Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez’s departure after she fired her campaign manager for alleged financial mismanagement, has the support of Gov. Tony Evers, who is not seeking a third term.

Evers has argued that Hong would have a difficult time against Tiffany in this perennial swing state. Evers has drawn attention to Hong’s old social media posts, including her 2020 calls for “defunding the police as a first step towards abolishing the police” and to “Cancel Thanksgiving,” to make his case to Fox 6 that she “has spent her entire campaign dealing not with the issues, but what’s on the Twitter.”

But Hong, who has sought to distance herself from those messages, has been hard to stop. Poll after poll has found the legislator far ahead of Crowley as the other two Democrats who are still running, state Sen. Kelda Roys and former state Cabinet member Joel Brennan, trail even further behind.

Crowley is hoping that last week’s Democratic Senate primary in neighboring Michigan, where progressive Abdul El-Sayed narrowly defeated Rep. Haley Stevens after polls showed him up by double digits, means that Hong’s lead is not as wide as surveys suggest. Crowley, though, would need the polling—including his campaign’s own numbers—to be off by even more than they were in Michigan.

Hong also has one big advantage that El-Sayed lacked. While El-Sayed had to overcome massive outside spending, Crowley’s allies waited until just about the last possible moment to begin attacking Hong on TV. WisPolitics reported the day before the primary that a pro-Crowley group was finally going on the air to argue that Hong’s “record is a distraction we can’t afford.”

Republicans, meanwhile, have spent weeks meddling in the Democratic primary to boost Hong.

The Republican Governors Association has spent over $3 million on commercials ostensibly attacking Hong as someone who “opposes President Trump’s deportation policies, and she wants to abolish ICE.” An obscure outfit called Middle Class Priorities, which Democrats have accused of being a Republican front, has also aired positive commercials for Hong.

WI-03 (D) (53-46 Trump)

Businesswoman Rebecca Cooke, who’s managed to secure endorsements from everyone from Bernie Sanders to the DCCC to the Blue Dog Coalition, looks like the heavy favorite to win the right for a rematch against Republican Rep. Derrick Van Orden in the competitive 3rd District based in southwestern Wisconsin.

Read more

Leading Off

NV-02

Two months after the state’s primaries, bitter feelings continue to linger in northern Nevada as retiring Republican Rep. Mark Amodei still won’t endorse the man who won the GOP nomination in the race to succeed him—and hasn’t ruled out voting for his Democratic opponent.

Repeatedly pressed by longtime Nevada journalist Sam Shad on his show Nevada Newsmakers, Amodei expressed nothing but contempt for Air Force veteran David Flippo, who defeated his preferred candidate, former state Sen. James Settelmeyer, 47-35.

“No. Not my cup of tea,” the congressman said in an interview flagged by the Nevada Independent. “Listen, go get him, Tiger. Good luck. But you pull out of [Congressional District] 4 72 hours after I say I’m not coming back. Oh, there’s a Republican seat. I’m going to go run for it. You run an absolutely scurrilous campaign against the guy who’s one of the nicest guys around.”

Amodei was referencing Flippo’s decision to jettison his second bid for the swingy 4th District in the Las Vegas area and instead seek the much redder 2nd District, even though he had no ties to the region.

“The voters are never wrong. But guess what? Mark Amodei’s not endorsing him,” he continued. “I wish him all the best. No way. No, thank you.”

Flippo managed to earn Donald Trump’s endorsement, but that move sparked rare dissent from Amodei, who wrote on social media that Trump had “made a mistake.”

“With all due respect Mr. President, Nevada already has five representatives who live in Clark County,” Amodei posted, referring to the populous county that’s home to Vegas. “Your endorsement if followed, would make it six out of six.”

There’s still a chance, though, that Amodei’s six-out-of-six prophecy might not come to pass.

The 2nd District, which voted for Trump by a 56-42 margin, has always been inhospitable for the Democratic Party ever since it was first created more than 40 years ago.

However, Flippo’s lack of roots in the region combined with a favorable political environment has Democrats hoping their nominee, former state Assembly Majority Leader Teresa Benitez-Thompson, might be able to pull off an upset.

Flippo himself hasn’t helped matters. After relocating earlier this year from Vegas to Reno—some 400 miles to the north—he told a group of supporters, “I’m from everywhere. I don’t have a hometown,” in remarks quoted by the Independent.

The ongoing GOP infighting could also play a role. Asked by Shad whether he might cast a ballot for Benitez-Thompson, Amodei noted that an independent is also on the ballot before saying, “So as we get closer to the start of early voting, I’ll make my mind up.”

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The Downballot

The pro-pipe bomb Republican running for secretary of state

Once again, Republicans are fielding an array of election deniers who nevertheless want to oversee their state’s elections, though this year’s crop might just take the cake. On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, Chelsey Wininger, the executive director of the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State, walks us through every competitive …

Listen now

15 days ago · 3 likes · 4 comments · David Nir and David Beard

Election Recaps

HI-01 (D) (62-37 Harris)

Rep. Ed Case turned back a challenge from state Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole in Saturday’s Democratic primary by a 58-37 margin, all but ensuring the moderate congressman will win another term representing Hawaii’s safely blue 1st District.

Keohokalole, who is three decades Case’s junior, had argued that the incumbent—who, among other things, voted for the SAVE Act—had failed to stand up to Donald Trump. A late internal poll for Keohokalole’s campaign from BluePrint Polling showed him up 47-38, but it proved to be far off the mark.

However, the 73-year-old congressman’s showing on Saturday was by far his weakest in a House primary while in office, suggesting he could be vulnerable in the future.

House

LA-06, LA-05

Republican state Sen. Blake Miguez announced Friday that he would seek Louisiana’s redrawn 6th District, an open seat that Miguez and his colleagues completely transformed in May, rather than pursue a bid for the neighboring 5th District.

But Miguez, who made his plans public just hours before candidate filing closed for the state’s all-party primaries on Nov. 3, began the race to represent the Baton Rouge area without the key endorsement he’d notched before he helped gerrymander the state’s congressional map.

In February, Donald Trump backed Miguez shortly after he ended his campaign for the U.S. Senate and began running in the 5th to replace Rep. Julia Letlow, Trump’s pick for the upper chamber. Trump stuck with him the next month after The Atlantic reported that Miguez’s former girlfriend accused him of rape in 2007, allegations Miguez has denied.

Trump, though, has said nothing about Miguez’s future in the more than two months since the GOP-dominated legislature implemented a new map after the U.S. Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in Louisiana v. Callais.

The new lines transformed Democratic Rep. Cleo Fields’ predominantly Black 6th District into a majority-white and safely Republican constituency that Trump, according to calculations by The Downballot, would have carried 64-34. Fields ultimately decided to campaign for the state Senate rather than seek reelection in a constituency Democrats are all but assured of losing.

Miguez, for his part, kept everyone guessing about whether he’d seek the new 6th, keep campaigning for the 5th—with Trump’s blessing—or simply not run for Congress anywhere. But while he finally made his plans known on Friday, Republican state Sen. Rick Edmonds, the most prominent candidate in the new 6th District, is arguing that Trump’s silence about Miguez speaks volumes.

“He and his out-of-state supporters have been panicked since losing President Trump’s endorsement,” Edmonds said in a statement on Friday.

Edmonds also took the opportunity to highlight that Miguez’s home in the Acadiana region remains well outside of either of the congressional districts he wanted to represent.

“He’s not from here, he can’t vote here, and he doesn’t understand the issues facing our communities,” Edmonds said.

But Miguez, who says he owns a home and a business in Baton Rouge, retorted that Edmonds, a pastor at a church in Mississippi, is the real outsider.

“I hope that if he were elected, you would actually move to Louisiana,” Miguez told reporters. “That pastor has to go back to Mississippi this weekend and preach to his congregation, and he’s going to have to face them. I hope he’ll repent and he’ll come back with a more positive attitude next week.”

The back-and-forth between Miguez and Edmonds, who reacted to his opponent’s broadside by saying he lives in Louisiana but commutes to Mississippi on Sundays, may continue through December, well after just about every other race is settled.

Republican Gov. Jeff Landry responded to the Callais decision by canceling the state’s May primaries that were to take place under the old map. Races for Louisiana’s six congressional districts this year will instead take place under the rules the state employed in most elections from 1975 onward. All candidates from all parties will run on a single ballot on Nov. 3, with the top two vote-getters advancing to a Dec. 2 runoff if no one wins a majority.

A total of six Republicans filed to run for the 6th District, but only Miguez and Edmonds have generated much notice. Three Democrats and one Libertarian round out the field.

Back in the 5th, six Republicans and three Democrats are running to replace Letlow, who secured the GOP nomination for Senate in June. (Party primaries for Senate and other offices were not impacted by Landry’s decision to cancel May’s House primaries.) Trump would have carried this constituency in the northeastern part of the state 66-32.

The GOP roster includes state Sen. Stewart Cathey; state Reps. Michael Echols and Gabe Firment; and Misti Cordell, the chair of the Louisiana Board of Regents. Two little-known Republicans are also on the ballot.

Three Democrats are running as well, including state Rep. Patricia Moore. While the GOP is all but assured to hold this seat, it’s possible one of the Democrats could win enough support to move forward and avert a Republican vs. Republican showdown in December.

P.S. Louisiana’s Friday filing deadline for House races marked the final day for major-party candidates to run for federal or state office anywhere in the country. It brought an end to a nine-month period that began all the way in November of last year, when the first deadline passed in Illinois.

OH-07

A key deadline came and went on Saturday without any action from Republican Rep. Max Miller, meaning that the embattled congressman will almost certainly remain on the ballot in Ohio’s competitive 7th District.

Under Ohio law, local party leaders have until 4 PM ET on Monday to name a replacement candidate, but they must give notice of any such meeting 48 hours in advance. One GOP official confirmed to the New York Times that no meeting had been called in a piece published after the Saturday cutoff.

A spokesperson for Miller also said the congressman would not drop out, despite the hopes of some Republicans—most of them unnamed—that he would step aside in the face of abuse allegations from his wife. GOP power brokers, however, took no overt steps to pressure Miller to quit, and Donald Trump himself refused to call on him to give up his bid for reelection.

Trump did, though, reportedly tell Miller that “things aren’t looking good” for his campaign for a third term, and for once, he’s not wrong. A poll conducted last week by co/efficient, a Republican firm, showed Miller trailing his Democratic opponent, ironworker Brian Poindexter, by a wide 47-33 margin.

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Mayors & County Leaders

Chicago, IL Mayor

Businessman Willie Wilson, a wealthy perennial candidate who has competed in the last three races for mayor of Chicago, announced Wednesday that he was entering next year’s busy contest. Wilson joins a busy field of candidates campaigning against Democratic Mayor Brandon Johnson, who has not yet announced if he’ll seek a second term.

Wilson, who also identifies as a Democrat despite his past support for Republicans like Donald Trump and then-Gov. Bruce Rauner, hovered around 10% of the vote during each of his prior mayoral bids.

He most recently secured 9% in the 2023 primary, which was good for fifth place. Wilson went on to endorse Paul Vallas, who ultimately lost a close general election to Johnson.

Poll Pile

• KS-Sen: GBAO for Adam Hamilton:

  • Roger Marshall (R-inc): 47, Hamilton (D): 43.

• TX-Sen: ReconMR and Siena University for Texas A&M University:

  • James Talarico (D): 47, Ken Paxton (R): 43.

  • June: 46-46 tie.

• WI-Gov (D): State Navigate:

  • Francesca Hong: 44, David Crowley: 22, Kelda Roys: 11, Mandela Barnes: 6, Joel Brennan: 5, all others 3% or less.

  • Mandela Barnes dropped out on July 30 but remains on the ballot.

• TX-Gov: ReconMR and Siena:

  • Greg Abbott (R-inc): 46, Gina Hinojosa (D): 45.

  • June: 49-43 Abbott.

• FL-25 (D): Center for Strategic Politics for Oliver Larkin:

  • Jared Moskowitz (inc): 40, Larkin: 38.

• TX-AG: ReconMR and Siena:

  • Mayes Middleton (R): 46, Nathan Johnson (D): 44.

  • June: 45-40 Middleton.

• TX-LG: ReconMR and Siena:

  • Vikki Goodwin (D): 48, Dan Patrick (R-inc): 46.

  • June: 49-44 Patrick.

In our last Digest, we incorrectly said when a special election for U.S. Senate in Tennessee would take place if Marsha Blackburn is elected governor. The special election would be in November of 2028, not November of 2026.

We also incorrectly stated the Maui wildfires were in 2021. They were in 2023.

If you enjoy participating in The Downballot’s comment section, we’d be extremely grateful if you’d consider upgrading to a paid subscription to support our work. Thank you so much!

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Leading Off

HI-01

Polling for state Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole shows him defeating veteran Rep. Ed Case 47-38 in Saturday’s Democratic primary for Hawaii’s 1st Congressional District, a high-profile contest where no other data has been released all year.

Matthew Kassel of Jewish Insider, who first reported Keohokalole’s July 24 survey from BluePrint Polling, writes that the firm found Case ahead 33-25 earlier in the month. The two are vying for a safely blue constituency that includes most of Honolulu.

Outside groups, however, never behaved as though they believed Case, long one of the more conservative members of his caucus, might be in danger of becoming the seventh House Democrat to lose a bid for renomination this year.

The only third-party spending reported to the FEC through Thursday was a $75,000 digital advertising buy from Keohokalole’s allies at an outfit called Future Progress. That’s almost a negligible sum for a competitive primary that has seen each candidate raise about $1 million apiece. However, it’s infinitely more than the $0 that Case’s backers have spent to help him.

But Kassel’s sources believe that the congressman, who returned to the House in 2019 after previously representing the 2nd District from 2002 to 2007, has not taken this contest seriously either.

“Ed is running a poor race,” said an unidentified former Case campaign staffer. This person and others criticized the incumbent for appearing at few events and refusing to debate his opponent.

A Hawaii-based strategist who isn’t working for either side, however, thinks Case is aware he’s in a fight. This unnamed source told Kassel that the congressman has expanded his digital advertising and texting efforts, “which he hasn’t ever done before.”

Case has largely centered his reelection argument on his seniority, including his position on the powerful House Appropriations Committee.

Last week, he told Hawaii Public Radio that he’d used his influence to secure vital money for the state during the COVID pandemic, the devastating 2021 Maui wildfires, and water contamination from leakage at the Navy’s Red Hill facility. Case added, “And what is the next crisis?”

Keohokalole, by contrast, used his interview with the station to argue Case is failing to combat the national crisis that began with Donald Trump’s return to the White House.

The challenger faulted the congressman for being one of just four Democrats to support the SAVE Act, which Keohokalole called “a voter suppression bill that’s going to disenfranchise millions of voters across the country” by requiring documentary proof of citizenship to be able to register to vote.

Case has defended the legislation, saying, “It had a variety of ways that you could demonstrate citizenship, up to and including simply attesting that you were a U.S. citizen.”

That, however, is untrue. The bill requires those without the necessary documentation to attest to their citizenship and provide “other evidence” to an election official, who must then assess its sufficiency. That official would in turn have to sign a sworn affidavit that the applicant had “sufficiently established” their citizenship.

Ideology, though, isn’t the only fault line in this race.

Keohokalole, who at 43 is three decades younger than the 73-year-old incumbent, says Case has failed to properly address the state’s problems during his long time in politics.

Keohokalole has even drafted his opponent to make his pro-change argument for him. One of his commercials features 2006 footage of Case, then 53, calling for Democratic primary voters to oust the 82-year-old Sen. Dan Akaka and nominate him instead.

“It is time for the next generation of leadership,” said Case during what would prove to be an ill-fated campaign. “We just need the courage to choose it.”

The Case-Keohokalole primary on Saturday—the third and final election night this week—has taken up most of the attention in this heavily Democratic state.

Gov. Josh Green and Rep. Jill Tokuda of the 2nd Congressional District face only minimal opposition in both the Democratic primary and the general election, while neither U.S. Senate seat is on the ballot this year. There is, however, a competitive statewide Democratic primary for the open post of lieutenant governor, and the winner will serve as Green’s running mate this fall.

Finally, there’s the question of why Hawaii is one of the rare states that holds primaries on Saturdays. Unlike Tennessee, which has Thursday all to itself, the Aloha State isn’t quite an outlier: Louisiana also regularly hosts statewide contests on that day, while municipal and special elections sometimes occur on Saturdays in other states, too.

The local news site Civil Beat wrote in 2019 that the answer seems to be that a weekend vote best accommodates schools, which have long been the location of most election precincts. Its editorial board, however, used that piece to call for Hawaii, where most votes are now cast by mail, to join almost every other state in holding primaries on Tuesday.

Over the ensuing seven years, however, no action has been taken to move the date, so Hawaii will once again hold its nomination contests on Saturday.

The Downballot

The pro-pipe bomb Republican running for secretary of state

Once again, Republicans are fielding an array of election deniers who nevertheless want to oversee their state’s elections, though this year’s crop might just take the cake. On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, Chelsey Wininger, the executive director of the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State, walks us through every competitive …

Listen now

15 days ago · 2 likes · 4 comments · David Nir and David Beard

Election Recaps

TN-Gov (R) (64-34 Trump)

Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn successfully executed the first step in her plan to escape from Congress, though her margin of victory in Thursday’s GOP primary for governor was much smaller than originally expected.

With an estimated 97% of the vote tallied, Blackburn was leading Rep. John Rose 43-33 when we put the Digest to bed, with a third candidate, state Rep. Monty Fritts, taking 23%. As recently as this spring, though, polls showed Blackburn cruising by more than 50 points, as the wealthy Rose plowed at least $13 million of his personal fortune into the race.

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The final surveys of the contest—including Blackburn’s own—indicated that the senator’s once dominant advantage had shrunk, but in the end, it wasn’t enough to sink her. She’ll be the heavy favorite over Memphis Councilwoman Jerri Green, who easily won the Democratic nomination, in the race to replace term-limited Republican Gov. Bill Lee.

Barring a major upset this fall, it will soon be up to Blackburn, who won reelection to the Senate in 2024, to appoint her successor in the upper chamber. A special election would then be held in November of 2026 for the final two years of Blackburn’s term.

TN-05 (R) (61-38 Trump)

For the second time this year—in fact, the second time this week—a Republican endorsed by Donald Trump lost a congressional primary.

The newest inductee into this tight-knit club is Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles, who fell to former state Agriculture Commissioner Charlie Hatcher on Thursday night. With 95% of the vote counted per the Associated Press, Hatcher, who had the support of Gov. Bill Lee and a super PAC funded by wealthy renewable energy investors, led Ogles 53-47.

Ogles’ short career was marked by a series of scandals, making Democrats hopeful they could oust him in November despite the 5th District’s deep red hue—made even redder by the GOP’s recent gerrymander. Now the newly minted Democratic nominee, Columbia Mayor Chaz Molder, will face an even more difficult task against Hatcher, though he’s enjoyed a hefty fundraising advantage over his Republican opponent.

Ogles can at least console himself, though, that unlike Trump’s other unhappy pick this week—Michigan’s Amir Hassan—he did not lose to a candidate who dropped out a month before the primary.

TN-06 (63-36 Trump)

State Rep. Johnny Garrett rang up a 44-30 win over former Rep. Van Hilleary, who was trying to return to Congress after nearly a quarter century away, in the primary to replace GOP Rep. John Rose. Both campaigned as ardent conservatives, but Garrett stood out by making transphobia a key part of his pitch to Middle Tennessee Republicans.

TN-09 (R) (60-39 Trump)

State Sen. Brent Taylor easily beat state Rep. Todd Warner 46-26 in the Republican primary for the open 9th District, a once-Democratic and majority-Black constituency that the GOP legislature radically transformed with its new gerrymander.

Taylor, who had Donald Trump and Sens. Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty in his corner, is the favorite to replace Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen, who did not run for reelection after his district became all but unwinnable. Taylor will go up against state Rep. Justin Pearson, who was challenging Cohen for renomination and remained in the race despite the long odds for any Democrat.

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Governors

MS-Gov

A spokesperson for state Auditor Shad White said in a statement Tuesday that White will have “plenty to say about” next year’s open race for governor sometime “after the midterms.”

Political observers have long regarded White, who is currently deployed to the Middle East with the Mississippi National Guard, as an all-but-certain contender to succeed termed-out Gov. Tate Reeves, a fellow Republican. One outlet even said in a headline last December that White had announced a campaign.

While White has yet to launch a bid, his looming candidacy may have already had an impact on the GOP primary. State Agriculture Commissioner Andy Gipson announced his own campaign in June of last year, an early start that the Magnolia Tribune suggested was necessary because of White’s “relentless” drive to win over backers and donors.

Gipson is not the only hopeful who beat White to the punch. Former state House Speaker Philip Gunn jumped in last April, and state Attorney General Lynn Fitch joined the field on Tuesday.

Poll Pile

• AR-Sen: 2040 Strategy Group for Hallie Shoffner:

  • Tom Cotton (R-inc): 46, Shoffner (D): 43.

• IA-Sen: Emerson College for Nexstar Media:

  • Ashley Hinson (R): 48, Josh Turek (D): 45.

• ME-Sen: Hart Research for Senate Majority PAC:

  • Troy Jackson (D): 49, Susan Collins (R-inc): 45.

• MN-Sen (D): SurveyUSA for KSTP:

  • Angie Craig: 42, Peggy Flanagan: 40.

  • July: 40-40 tie.

• MN-Sen (R): SurveyUSA:

  • Michele Tafoya: 48, Royce White: 13, Adam Schwarze: 5, Tom Weiler: 3.

  • July: Tafoya: 41, White: 10.

• MN-Sen (R): Deep Root Analysis for Minnesota Forward (pro-Tafoya):

  • Tafoya: 47, Schwarze: 18, White: 15.

• NC-Sen: Change Research for Talking About Politics:

  • Roy Cooper (D): 50, Michael Whatley (R): 41.

  • Feb.: 50-40 Cooper.

• AZ-Gov: Fabrizio Ward and Impact Research for AARP:

  • Katie Hobbs (D-inc): 52, Andy Biggs (R): 44.

• IA-Gov: Emerson:

  • Rob Sand (D): 48, Zach Lahn (R): 43.

• MN-Gov (R): SurveyUSA:

  • Mike Lindell: 34, Lisa Demuth: 28, Kendall Qualls: 17.

  • July: Lindell: 35, Demuth: 26, Qualls: 11.

• WI-Gov (D): Public Policy Polling for David Crowley:

  • Francesca Hong: 42, Crowley: 24.

• IA-02: Global Strategy Group for House Majority PAC:

  • Lindsay James (D): 46, Joe Mitchell (R): 45.

• KY-06: DCCC Analytics:

  • Zach Dembo (D): 47, Ralph Alvarado (R): 47.

• OH-07: co/efficient:

  • Brian Poindexter (D): 47, Max Miller (R-inc): 33.

  • Unreleased late July poll: 44-39 Poindexter.

• AZ-AG: Fabrizio and Impact:

  • Kris Mayes (D-inc): 48, Warren Petersen (R): 43.

• MN-AG: SurveyUSA:

  • Keith Ellison (D-inc): 44, Ron Schutz (R): 36.

  • July: 42-38 Ellison.

• NC Supreme Court: Change Research:

  • Anita Earls (D-inc): 45, Sarah Stevens (R): 39.

  • Feb.: 45-43 Earls.

When I began building the site that would become The Downballot two years ago, there was a lot I didn’t know. What platform should we use? Should we put up a paywall? How do you run payroll, anyway? And so many more questions, including plenty that I’m still puzzling out.

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With that in mind, I’ve come to the conclusion that, for The Downballot to achieve sustainability, we have to raise our prices.

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Leading Off

MI-08

Former General Motors engineer Tom Smith said Wednesday he would accept the Republican nomination to take on Democratic Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet, a declaration that came one day after he became the only person we know of to ever beat a Donald Trump-endorsed primary opponent without actually being a candidate.

But though both parties were startled on Tuesday evening when Smith, an unknown who dropped out of the race last month, scored a 50-33 victory against Navy veteran Amir Hassan in Michigan’s swingy 8th District, only one side is responsible for the outcome.

Republicans this year have aggressively meddled in Democratic primaries across the country—conservatives publicly bragged Wednesday that they’d successfully boosted environmental William Lawrence in the neighboring 7th District—but Democrats took no action to hinder Hassan.

The GOP base, however, was quite eager to tear down Trump’s pick in the 8th District, a constituency in the Flint and the Tri-Cities areas that he’d carried by a narrow 50-48 margin in 2024. MAGA fans didn’t seem to care that Hassan was the only contender waging a serious effort against McDonald Rivet, even as he came nowhere close to matching her gigantic fundraising hauls.

Hassan, as The New Republic reported the week before the primary, was the target of Islamophobic attacks on Truth Social following Trump’s endorsement. One user responded to Trump, “Have you lost your mind, endorsing Muslim candidates?”

Hassan, however, has publicly talked about his conversion from Islam to Christianity during the campaign.

The erstwhile frontrunner told the Midland Daily News in April that he’d been raised Christian and had become a Muslim during his time in the armed forces. But while his campaign website initially identified him as a “proud Muslim,” Hassan informed the paper he’d “rededicated myself to Christ” on Easter.

That didn’t deter Smith, however, from firing off an Islamophobic attack on Hassan in mid-July, calling on Republicans to reject “possible Trojan Horse candidate and lifelong Democrat Amir Haneef Hassan.”

Smith, though, didn’t plan to be the one to benefit from Hassan’s fall. Instead, Smith used that missive to urge his supporters to back Al Lemmo, a retired civilian mechanical engineer with the Army.

At the time, though, almost no one cared about what an obscure now-former contender like Smith had to say.

Just days earlier, Smith had sent a handwritten note to the FEC saying he would not be filing a fundraising report for the just-completed second quarter because he’d brought in a mere $1,850. (Candidates only need to file disclosures after they’ve raised or spent more than $5,000.)

In a plaintive postscript, he added, “I could not file this form electronically because I have had no success logging in and have not been able to get a response from the help desk.”

But Smith’s technical challenges were the least of anyone’s concerns going into Tuesday’s primary, a contest in which the Trump-endorsed Hassan seemed poised for an easy win. Lemmo, though, still believed Islamophobia could carry him to victory. He told the New York Times on Wednesday that his ads “didn’t so much appeal to bigotry against Muslims as kind of counted on it.”

Just about everyone, therefore, was stunned on Tuesday evening when Smith emerged seemingly out of nowhere to defeat Hassan by 17 points, with Lemmo taking a distant third place.

The improbable new nominee, whom Politico notes is the first person to score a primary win against a Trump-backed congressional candidate this cycle, told the site the following morning he would return to the campaign trail.

He soon made an appearance at a GOP unity rally alongside luminaries like Mike Rogers, the party’s nominee for U.S. Senate. Smith, though, had little to say during his first moments in the spotlight.

“I’m Tom Smith. I’m running for the 8th congressional district to unseat Communist comrade Rivet, and I’ll need your help to do it,” he told his audience. Gongwer Michigan’s Liz Nass, who attended the event, describes these two sentences as Smith’s “full remarks.”

The NRCC, for its part, put out a statement predicting voters would reject McDonald Rivet, who won her first term 51-45 two years ago, in favor of “commonsense conservative Thomas Smith.” But it remains to be seen if the committee will devote serious resources to go after the congresswoman, who had over $4 million banked in mid-July, at a time when far more serious campaign operations need the support.

It’s also an open question as to what other major groups will do now that Smith is the Republican standard-bearer.

This spring, the pro-Democratic House Majority PAC reserved $4.2 million in ad reservations in Flint to aid McDonald Rivet, while the conservative Congressional Leadership Fund booked $2.5 million to attack her. Ad reservations, though, can be scaled back or canceled if the parties decide the race is no longer competitive—something both sides may well do here.

We know that a small, independent media site like ours is competing with a lot of other causes for your attention and your hard-earned dollars—including political campaigns. But unlike a campaign, The Downballot won’t vanish come Election Day. Instead, we’ll immediately shift our focus to races coming up in the next election cycle, because we’re building for the long term.

If you’d like to support our mission of covering critical elections that nearly everyone else overlooks, then know that your subscription will help fund an operation that’s been around for more than two decades and will stick around for many, many more years to come.

Help us build for the long term

The Downballot Podcast

The pro-pipe bomb Republican running for secretary of state

Once again, Republicans are fielding an array of election deniers who nevertheless want to oversee their state’s elections, though this year’s crop might just take the cake. On this week’s episode of The Downballot podcast, Chelsey Wininger, the executive director of the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State, walks us through every competitive race her shop is focused on—including the showdown in Arizona, where the GOP nominee wants to repeal the state’s ban on pipe bombs. And no, we’re not kidding.

Co-hosts David Nir and David Beard also recap all of this week’s high-profile primaries, including Michigan’s Democratic Senate battle, an extraordinary GOP botch in a swingy House district, and some very good news for an endangered Democrat in Washington state. They wrap up with the latest on two scandal-plagued House Republicans, including one who just bailed on his bid for reelection and another whom fellow Republicans would like to see vamoose as well.

Election Recaps

MI-Sen

Just before 10 AM ET on Wednesday morning, the Associated Press called Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary for former Wayne County health director Abdul El-Sayed, prompting Democrats across the state and country to rally behind his candidacy.

They included Rep. Haley Stevens, who issued a statement congratulating her opponent after losing by a narrower-than-expected 48.5 to 47.5 margin.

“I want to congratulate Abdul El-Sayed on winning the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate,” Stevens said. “He is a doctor, a community health official, a Rhodes Scholar, and a dedicated Michigander. I am proud to offer my support as he takes on Mike Rogers in the general election.”

MI-13

The AP called the Democratic primary for Michigan’s 13th District for state Rep. Donavan McKinney on Wednesday morning, making Rep. Shri Thanedar the sixth House Democrat to lose a bid for renomination this year.

McKinney defeated Thanedar by a 52-48 margin and will be the overwhelming favorite to win this safely blue constituency in the fall. A victory in November would make McKinney the first Black person to represent Detroit, the largest Black-majority city in America, since Thanedar’s predecessor, former Democratic Rep. Brenda Lawrence, left office in 2023.

Senate

MT-Sen

After Democrat Alani Bankhead and independent Seth Bodnar reportedly failed to reach an agreement for one of them to withdraw from Montana’s Senate race in recent meetings between the two candidates, a group supporting Bodnar is now running ads attacking Bankhead.

A new spot from the Montana Freedom Fund features clips of Bankhead offering up a series of comments, including, “So if you’re poor right now, it’s because you decided you wanted to be poor.” “You know, I voted for John McCain,” and “I personally would not get an abortion.”

A narrator also accuses her of having been a member of “a far-right church that’s against choice and gay marriage” and says she “promoted antisemitic rapper Yeezy over Clinton.” It adds that she “told the Washington Post she doesn’t care if her campaign helps Republicans,” referencing a recent interview she did with the paper.

Candidates have until Monday to remove their names from the November ballot.

NE-Sen

Former union official Mike Marvin, who won the Legal Marijuana Now Party’s Senate primary in May, did not file paperwork to remove his name from the November ballot ahead of Monday’s deadline as many Nebraska political observers thought he might.

Others in the small party had accused Marvin of being a “plant” whose goal was to drop out to benefit independent Dan Osborn, a charge Marvin always denied. Now he’ll appear alongside independent Dan Osborn and Republican incumbent Pete Ricketts, though two new parties that Democrats have accused of trying to serve as spoilers could also potentially qualify candidates.

SC-Sen

A super PAC that has spent $1 million on positive ads and mailers boosting Sen. Darline Graham has pivoted to attacking one of her opponents, Rep. Russell Fry, ahead of next week’s Republican primary.

A new spot from Security is Strength blasts the congressman for “voting for increasing the gas tax by 70 percent and a nearly $1 billion taxpayer-funded bailout,” but it reserves special scorn for the possibility that a Fry victory in the Senate race could leave his House seat vacant at the start of next year.

“His empty seat could hand AOC and the woke liberals in DC power,” warns the narrator. Republican leaders in South Carolina’s legislature have suggested they might seek to change the law to mitigate this potential problem but have not yet taken any action.

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House

CA-14

Supporters of Melissa Hernandez are spending heavily on her behalf ahead of her Aug. 18 runoff against fellow Democrat Aisha Wahab in the special election for California’s vacant 14th District.

Bold America, a super PAC affiliated with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, has so far put almost $1.5 million into the race, both for ads supporting Hernandez, the president of the board of Bay Area Rapid Transit, and attacking Wahab, a state senator.

AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project, also just jumped in with another $1.2 million in advertising. In all, Hernandez has gotten more than $3 million in outside help while Wahab has received just under $275,000 in third-party support.

But Hernandez has a very steep hill to climb. In the first round of voting on June 16, Wahab led 43-17, though Hernandez later received the endorsement of the third-place Democrat, businesswoman Rakhi Israni, who took 13%. Wahab and Hernandez will also face off in the November general election for a full term.

FL-07

A new poll shows scandal-plagued Rep. Cory Mills in danger of losing renomination on Aug. 18, but he’s still ahead by double digits as Republican primary voters have yet to consolidate behind a single alternative.

St. Pete Polls’ new survey for Florida Politics, which is the first of the contest, shows Mills winning just 30% of GOP voters in the 7th District in Central Florida. That’s a weak share for any incumbent, and especially so for a Republican backed by Donald Trump.

But Mills, who, among many other things, has been accused of abusing two different women and is reportedly under investigation by the Department of Justice for an undisclosed matter, only needs to win a plurality of the vote in the four-person primary. Currently, at least, St. Pete has him in first.

Ryan Elijah, a former TV anchor with Orlando’s Fox affiliate, is well behind with 14%. Two underfunded contenders, real estate agent Sarah Ulrich and frequent candidate Michael Don Johnson, take 8% and 7%, respectively. But 41% of respondents are undecided in this poll, a greater proportion than say they’re supporting Mills.

Two of Mills’ colleagues in the Sunshine State’s House delegation are taking action to encourage Republicans who are tired of the incumbent to consolidate behind Elijah.

“We need leaders in Congress who serve with integrity, energy, and an unwavering commitment to the people who sent them there,” Reps. Anna Paulina Luna and Mike Haridopolos wrote Wednesday in a joint statement. “Ryan Elijah is that leader.”

Democrats, by contrast, would prefer GOP voters to listen to MAGA’s master and renominate the damaged Mills. Such an outcome would give them a bigger opening to flip the 7th District, a constituency Trump carried by a 56-43 spread in 2024.

One powerful Democratic group is ready to move if Republicans pick Mills again. This spring, the House Majority PAC booked close to $4 million in the Orlando media market, which could be used on this race.

Bale Dalton, a former NASA chief of staff, has decisively outraised Mills, and he has the DCCC’s support going into the primary. Dalton, though, still needs to get past former Rep. Alan Grayson, who has waged numerous failed campaigns since his last victory in 2014, and Navy veteran Marialana Kinter.

NC-11

Local GOP leaders will convene Monday to begin the process of selecting a replacement for scandal-tarred Rep. Chuck Edwards, who dropped his bid for reelection in the wee hours on Wednesday morning. The choice will be made by the party’s executive committee in North Carolina’s 11th District.

Jason Simmons, who chairs the state GOP, said in a statement that Republicans were “prepared to move through this process quickly and efficiently,” though he didn’t indicate how long he anticipated it would take.

The new nominee will face Democrat Jamie Ager, who finished June with over $2 million banked in his campaign to flip this constituency in the western part of the state.

Ager was already waging a strong effort to flip the 11th District, which Donald Trump carried 54-45 in 2024, even before the House Ethics Committee began investigating allegations that the congressman had sexually harassed his aides. The seat is likely to remain a battleground following the departure of Edwards, whom the panel said Monday should be censured.

Ballot Measures

CO Ballot

A longshot conservative effort to repeal a constitutional amendment ensuring the right to an abortion will not appear on the ballot after proponents failed to submit signatures ahead of Monday’s deadline.

Two years ago, Coloradans voted 62-38 to place language into the constitution that guarantees abortion rights, as well as repeal a 40-year-old amendment that prohibited the state from using public funds to pay for abortions.

As recently as last week, organizers said they were still collecting signatures for their amendment to excise that language and said they were “so close” to their goal. However, the secretary of state’s website lists the proposal as “expired,” meaning signatures were not filed.

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MO Ballot

At the same Tuesday press conference where he announced that he would not allow a referendum to repeal Missouri’s new congressional map to appear on the November ballot, Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins also refused to certify a separate proposal that would sharply restrict the legislature’s ability to interfere with citizen-backed ballot initiatives. Advocates said they would challenge Hoskins’ determination in court.

Their plan, spearheaded by a group called Respect Missouri Voters, would amend the state constitution to make the ability to bring initiatives and referendums a “fundamental right” and bar lawmakers from weakening either of these powers.

It would further prevent the legislature from repealing or modifying laws passed by initiative, or repassing laws rejected via referendum, unless a four-fifths supermajority in both chambers agrees.

In addition, it would enshrine the current requirements for the signatures necessary to place a measure on the ballot and would also affirm that only a simple statewide majority is required to approve an initiative or referendum. Lastly, it would allow the courts to rewrite misleading summary statements drafted by elected officials.

Republicans in Missouri have long sought to tamper with the initiative process to make proposals they dislike harder if not impossible to enact, and they’ve sometimes been successful. But their most recent effort went down in flames earlier this week, as voters rejected an amendment that would have required initiatives to win a majority in all eight congressional districts by an eye-popping 80-20 margin.

Reformers, though, are wary of future GOP attempts to clamp down on direct democracy, prompting a bipartisan effort to place Respect Missouri Voters’ plan on the ballot. (Prominent backers include former Republican Sen. John Danforth and former Democratic Secretary of State Jason Kander.)

Hoskins, though, said that the proposal violates the state constitution’s prohibition on amendments that address more than a single subject. In a statement, Respect Missouri Voters rejected that contention, saying its plan “is limited to one subject and one article.” The group also said it “intend[s] to take every necessary legal action to ensure the people of Missouri will be heard.”

Poll Pile

• NV-Gov: The Tarrance Group for the Republican Governors Association and Better Nevada PAC:

  • Joe Lombardo (R-inc): 50, Aaron Ford (D): 43.

• FL-25 (R): 1892 Polling for Scott Singer:

  • Singer: 21, Dan Franzese: 14, George Moraitis: 13, Joe Kaufman: 7, Raven Harrison: 3.

• IN-05: Impact Research for J.D. Ford:

  • Victoria Spartz (R-inc): 48, Ford (D): 46.

• SC-07: Blueprint Polling for John Vincent:

  • Russell Fry (R-inc): 41, Vincent (D): 37.

Editor’s note: In the previous Digest, we incorrectly stated that Michigan Republican Amir Hassan is Muslim. Hassan has said he was raised Christian and later converted to Islam but told the Midland Daily News he’d “rededicated myself to Christ” in April.

We also incorrectly stated the Kansas City Chiefs are moving to Missouri from Kansas. The team is currently based in Missouri and relocating to Kansas.

In addition, we incorrectly stated the date for a potential Republican primary runoff in South Carolina. That contest would take place on Aug. 25, not Aug. 28.