Joe Khan is running to become the first Democrat in decades elected district attorney of Bucks County, PA (credit: Joe Khan campaign Facebook)
Leading Off
Bucks County, PA
Pennsylvania Democrats are looking to bounce back from last year's dispiriting results by beating Republican incumbents this fall in Bucks County, a populous community outside of Philadelphia that has long been one of the top battlegrounds in this perennial swing state.
Donald Trump's slender victory in Bucks made him the first GOP presidential nominee to carry the county since 1988, but Democrats hope a backlash will give them a chance to reclaim—or even surpass—the historic gains they made during his first administration.
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Those gains began in 2017 when Democrats flipped four of the five positions elected countywide, which are known collectively as "row offices."
The GOP's stubborn strength further down the ballot had prevented Democrats from winning a single one of these offices in 32 years, but the party came away with victories for sheriff, controller, recorder of deeds, and prothonotary. (The latter office administers civil court documents.) The only GOP hold was for district attorney, where incumbent Matt Weintraub successfully defended the job he'd been appointed to the previous year.
Democrats achieved another breakthrough in 2019 when they took control of the county's Board of Commissioners for the first time since 1983, which left the party with more power than it had seen in generations. Joe Biden went on to carry Bucks County 52-47 the next year, an improvement from Hillary Clinton's narrow 48.4-47.6 victory in 2016 that also extended the Democratic presidential winning streak begun by Bill Clinton in 1992.
Local Republicans, though, bounced back in 2021 by sweeping all five row offices. Democrats were able to keep control of the Board of Commissioners in 2023, but that victory did not foreshadow successes for the following year. Trump carried Bucks County 49.4-49.3, a 291-vote win that helped him take Pennsylvania. Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick also easily won a fifth term representing the 1st Congressional District, which includes all of Bucks and a small slice of neighboring Montgomery.
Democrats are now hoping for another swing in the elections coming up this fall. The county's Democratic Committee endorsed a full slate of candidates last week just ahead of Tuesday's filing deadline, and none appear to have any opposition in the May 20 party primaries.
The most high-profile race is arguably the contest for district attorney, where former Bucks County Solicitor Joe Khan is trying to flip the one office that got away from Democrats in 2017. Khan, who lost last year's primary for state attorney general, will face Republican incumbent Jennifer Schorn, who was appointed to replace Weintraub after he won a judgeship in 2023.
The sheriff's contest between Republican incumbent Fred Harran and attorney Daniel Leo Ceisler is also likely to generate attention, while Republican Prothonotary Colleen Christian faces a challenge from real estate agent Donna Petrecco. The elections for the final two offices are rematches between the Republican incumbents and the Democrats they unseated in 2021: Controller Pamela Van Blunk faces Neale Dougherty, while Recorder of Deeds Dan McPhillips is trying to fend off Robin Robinson.
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Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell, an anti-immigration hardliner, has entered the Republican primary for Colorado's open governor's race, joining state Sen. Mark Baisley and state Rep. Scott Bottoms in the contest to succeed term-limited Democratic Gov. Jared Polis. Teller is a small county in the Colorado Springs area.
Republican Rep. Warren Davidson has endorsed businessman Vivek Ramaswamy's campaign for Ohio's open governorship, ending what little talk there'd been that the congressman might seek the post. Ramaswamy, who has Donald Trump's backing, still faces state Attorney General Dave Yost in the GOP primary.
House
AZ-07
Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs on Friday called a Sept. 23 special election to succeed Rep. Raul Grijalva, a fellow Democrat who died the previous day, in the reliably blue 7th District. The candidate filing deadline will be April 14, while the primary will take place July 15.
Obituaries
Alan Simpson
Former Wyoming Sen. Alan Simpson, a Republican who served from 1979 until his retirement in 1997, died Friday at the age of 93.
The one-time minority whip, who never struggled to win any of his three terms in office, was known for his support for abortion rights and for working with members of both parties, once joking, "I’m the original RINO."
Simpson's influence in national and state politics had its limits, however. In 1994, a much more conservative colleague, Mississippi's Trent Lott, beat him by a single vote to become the GOP's majority whip. While Simpson later brushed off that defeat as "no more than a sparrow fart compared with the cataclysmic events of our times," Lott would become the Senate's powerful majority leader less than two years later, while Simpson chose not to seek reelection in 1996.
Years later, though, he attracted renewed attention in 2010 as the co-chair of Barack Obama's bipartisan deficit reduction commission along with former Clinton administration official Erskine Bowles. The Simpson–Bowles recommendations, however, proved to be unpopular with politicians from both parties and were never adopted. Simpson's son, state House Speaker Colin Simpson, took fourth place in the primary for governor that same year.
WyoFile's Katie Klingsporn has much more on the former senator, including more of his signature snark, in her obituary.
An obituary is also due for Nita Lowey, , who served as a U.S. Representative from New York from 1989 to 2021, in what would eventually be called the 17th district. She was the first woman to chair the House Appropriations Committee. Lowey died on March 15 at age 87.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court race between Susan Crawford and Brad Schimel is, without a doubt, the most consequential item on the election calendar these next few weeks.
This conversation between historian Heather Cox Richardson and Ben Wikler, Chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, highlights the historical background and what is at stake, and underscores why it is imperative that we help Crawford win. The election is April 1st.
I cannot recommend this interview strongly enough!
An obituary is also due for Nita Lowey, , who served as a U.S. Representative from New York from 1989 to 2021, in what would eventually be called the 17th district. She was the first woman to chair the House Appropriations Committee. Lowey died on March 15 at age 87.
EYES ON WISCONSIN
The Wisconsin Supreme Court race between Susan Crawford and Brad Schimel is, without a doubt, the most consequential item on the election calendar these next few weeks.
This conversation between historian Heather Cox Richardson and Ben Wikler, Chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, highlights the historical background and what is at stake, and underscores why it is imperative that we help Crawford win. The election is April 1st.
I cannot recommend this interview strongly enough!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyXba-vx1sw