May19

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Election News, Part II: State and Municipal Offices

With that (brief) reminder of the state-level offices that we, and others, will be watching closely over the next 18 months, let's do a rundown of the biggest news out of the various states in the last couple of weeks:

• Governor, Alabama: Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) may be the dumbest senator in American history. It's hard to know, because the dumb senators of, say, 150 years ago did not have nearly the opportunities to share their dumb words and their dumb ideas with a wide audience. Certainly, he's the dumbest senator currently serving. If you don't believe us, just google "dumbest U.S. Senator." EVERY hit (or, at least, every hit that references someone still in the Senate) is for Tuberville.
  
  The latest exhibit in support of the Senator's dunderhead status, at least in our view, is the news that he's planning to give up his Senate seat and run for governor of Alabama, to succeed the term-limited Kay Ivey (R). He hasn't formally announced yet, but he'll reportedly make it official in the next week or so. His explanation: "If you're the CEO of a state then you can help more in a certain amount of time."
  
  It's true that, as a junior senator, he has a limited amount of power. And undoubtedly, as a former football coach, he wants to be THE decider again. But what he apparently does not understand is that the Alabama governorship is relatively weak, and the state legislature is actually THE decider. A particularly skilled politician, like George Wallace, can work within those constraints. However, Tuberville is not a skilled politician. And he will discover that his every utterance will get much less attention when he is speaking as governor of Alabama, as opposed to when speaking as a member of the United States Senate.
  
  If and when Tuberville does jump in, he'll clear the field. And since Alabama is a one-party state, he'll win the election. At that point, he'll be Alabamians' problem.
  
  
• Governor, Arizona: As we note above, it looks like it's going to be a two-person race for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in Arizona, between Andy Biggs and Karrin Taylor Robson. And the MAGA base has already started closing ranks around Biggs, as the right-wing, anti-tax Club for Growth is leaning hard on Robson to drop out of the race.
  
  This is the kind of contest where Donald Trump's backing could have a big impact. And, indeed, he has already bestowed his endorsement, giving his support to... both Biggs AND Robson. He decreed: "Two fantastic candidates, two terrific people, two wonderful champions, and it is therefore my Great Honor TO GIVE MY COMPLETE AND TOTAL ENDORSEMENT TO BOTH." Apparently, he does not quite understand how endorsements work, although endorsing both candidates certainly improves his odds of being on the "right" side, and keeping up his batting average.
  
  
• Governor, California: California's election rules were written by a bunch of pinko farmers and activists over a century ago, and so it's really easy to get on the ballot for a governor's race. There are already nine Democrats who have declared, along with eight Republicans.
  
  Those two groups of candidates are pretty different, however. Consider what we might call the "Wikipedia test." Of the nine declared Democrats, eight are notable enough to have their own Wikipedia article. And that does not include Kamala Harris, who hasn't jumped in yet, but might. Many of the Democratic wannabes have wide name recognition, and would be familiar to many readers outside of California—former HHS secretary Xavier Becerra, for example, or former representative Katie Porter.
  
  On the other hand, of the eight Republicans, only two are notable enough to have their own Wikipedia article. One of those is Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, who has been in the race for many months now, and is running a fairly standard California Republican campaign (i.e., "I'm conservative, but I'm not THAT conservative.") He is less-known than probably seven of the declared Democrats, but the Republican bench in California is pretty thin, and any GOP politician with an actual career does not want to throw that away on a suicide mission.
  
  Recently, the Republican field got its second Wikipedia-article-worthy contender, as former Fox entertainer Steve Hilton formally entered the race, declaring "It's time to end the years of Democrat failure." He's even got a new book in which he lists everything California Democrats have done wrong in the last half-century.
  
  We are not sure exactly what Hilton's game is. We can certainly assure you that slamming Democrats, up to and including the use of the insulting adjective "Democrat" in place of "Democratic," is not the way to get elected as a Republican in California. Outside of very red cities/districts, every California Republican that's had success in the last 40-50 years, whether it's Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger or L.A. Mayor Dick Riordan or Senator Pete Wilson, ran on a "let's all work together" message, not a "the Democrats are the bad guys" message.
  
  Hilton may be California's answer to Tommy Tuberville, and so may not understand what kind of campaign he has to run to have even a faint chance of victory. Alternatively, his goal might just be to make it to the general election in the Republican lane (though note that there are no guarantees that a Republican advances), so he can boost his brand as "nominee for governor of California, 2026." That could sell some more books, or bump up his consulting fees, or get Fox to bring him back on a fatter contract, or maybe get Donald Trump to appoint him to some post in the administration. Whatever the plan is, he is not going to be the next governor of the Golden State.
  
  
• Governor, Florida: We decided to present these in alphabetical order, rather than try to rank them in order of importance. However, this is very possibly the biggest state-level news of the last few weeks. As readers will recall, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) is already in, and has the backing of Donald Trump. Meanwhile, the term-limited Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) would prefer to be succeeded by his wife, Casey DeSantis. Casey has not yet declared, but there is much work behind the scenes to see if the money and the polling are there.
  
  Or, at least, there WAS much work behind the scenes. The dream may well be over now, because Casey DeSantis has herself a rather serious corruption scandal. It's a little complicated, which is presumably why the DeSantises thought they would get away with it. However, she founded a charity devoted to reforming welfare. Somehow, that charity ended up with $10 million that was supposed to go to the state of Florida in a legal settlement. And somehow, a fair bit of that $10 million ended up in the hands of friends and allies of the DeSantises.
  
  The reason that this may be the biggest news in this list is that it's not just a blow to Casey DeSantis' gubernatorial hopes, it's really a blow to their whole would-be "dynasty." For a brief time, we thought Ron might have the right stuff to inherit the crown, but he quickly showed otherwise. Since then, we have consistently expressed the view that while Ron might try to sell himself as the heir to the MAGA throne, the MAGA faithful just aren't buying it. This grifting story is just the latest reminder of that. Donald Trump is on the take all the time, including ALSO having stolen money from his charity, and the MAGA base ignores it (or even sees it as a virtue). The DeSantises do the same thing, and even Republicans are repulsed. They love Trump, and so will forgive anything; they don't like the DeSantises, and so will forgive nothing.
  
  
• Governor, Maine: We would guess that more than one Democrat felt ill when they learned Angus King is running to replace term-limited Gov. Janet Mills (D-ME). However, the Angus King in question is not the independent senator who caucuses with the Democrats, it's actually his son, Angus King III.
  
  The younger King, who will run as a Democrat, has no experience in political office. However, his old man served as governor before being elected to the Senate, which certainly means name recognition, and probably means access to fundraising networks. The other Democrat currently in the race is state Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, while there are a dozen other members of the blue team who have expressed interest, most notably Rep. Jared Golden. The Republican bench is paper-thin, and so despite the fact that Maine is purple/purple-blue, this governorship is expected to remain in Democratic hands.
  
  
• Governor, New Jersey: New Jersey Republicans have much the same problem that Maine Republicans do: It's not impossible for them to win statewide, but they are not endowed with a lot of promising candidates at the moment. Five members of the GOP have jumped in, and all of them are either state legislators, small-town mayors, or people who already ran for office and lost. The candidate who will likely emerge from this side of the contest is former state assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli, who has already come up short twice in gubernatorial runs.
  
  On the Democratic side of the aisle, meanwhile, it's a real horse race. A recent Rutgers-Eagleton poll has Rep. Mikie Sherrill at 17%, Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop at 12%, New Jersey Education Association President Sean Spiller at 10%, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka and Rep. Josh Gottheimer at 9% each, and state Sen. Steve Sweeney at 7%. In other words, it is very close and probably all of them have at least some chance. The director of the Eagleton Poll, Ashley Koning, said: "All of these candidates are within striking distance from one another. It seems like a lot of the voters still aren't sure, still very undecided and can't coalesce around a single candidate."
  
  All of the Democratic candidates are clearly serious. Two are mayors of major cities in the state. Two are members of the House, and one is a state senator. The mayors have more executive experience than the legislators. But relevant experience isn't everything to all voters. If it were, Donald Trump wouldn't have been elected in 2016 and Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) wouldn't be the favorite for governor of Colorado.
  
  The issues won't actually play much of a role here, since the candidates aren't very far apart on them. One thing that differentiates the candidates a bit is on how much they emphasize fighting Trump vs. doing things for the people of New Jersey. Fulop, in particular, has a long list of things he wants to do for the residents of his state and wants to spend his time on that and not so much on fighting Trump. But some voters prioritize fighting Trump, so that is not necessarily some kind of magic formula.
  
  We will soon learn who the nominees will be, as the primary is on June 10, just over 3 weeks away.
  
  
• Governor, Ohio: Things are really jumping in Ohio. There is thus far one major Republican in the race to replace term-limited Gov. Mike DeWine (R), namely Vivek Ramaswamy. He's MAGA, and the people who run the Ohio GOP are MAGA and would like to avoid a messy primary. So, the Ohio GOP has already given its formal endorsement to the Silicon Valley loon tycoon.
  
  Despite this, they may have a messy primary anyhow. Lt. Gov. Jim Tressel, who has a lot of goodwill and name recognition from his time as head football coach at Ohio State, and who arguably has more relevant experience by virtue of his decade running Youngstown State University, and his brief tenure as lieutenant governor (he was appointed in January of this year), says he is seriously considering a bid. If he does get in, this primary will likely be a barnburner.
  
  Meanwhile, on the Democratic side, former director of the Ohio Department of Health Amy Acton is in, and she will almost certainly be joined by at least one big-name Democrat. Former representative Tim Ryan, who doesn't have anything better to do these days, said last week that he's considering a bid. He lost the last time he ran statewide, and to a weak opponent, so he's apparently hoping for a possible blue wave. Former senator Sherrod Brown, who also doesn't have anything better to do these days, is also thinking about a run. Brown would be the more formidable candidate, by virtue of having already won statewide five times. However, we list him second here because while we suspect Ryan will run, we think Brown is much more likely to try to return to the Senate.
  
  
• Lt. Governor, Virginia: As we note above, the gubernatorial race in Virginia is set. It's the #2 race that is up in the air. The Republican candidate is John Reid. He's gay, but that isn't the problem. At least, not exactly. The problem is his social media site full of lewd pictures of naked men. The blowback is so bad that Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) has asked Reid to drop out. Reid has refused, claiming the Virginia Republican establishment hates gay people, which is probably not too far off the mark. He is the only Republican candidate running now and the April 3 filing date has passed. In Virginia, the lieutenant governor is elected separately from the governor, meaning that there's a very real possibility of a mixed-party executive.
  
  The battle over Reid has split the Virginia Republican Party. Youngkin's political director, Matt Moran, quit over this and has refused to comment on it. Republicans were already going to have a tough time in November in a state with 150,000 federal workers. Those workers break down into two groups: those who have been fired by the DOGEys and those who are afraid they will soon be fired by the DOGEys. Even those folks who personally like Youngkin because he often wears a lovely fleece are not happy and they are likely to take it out on the Republican candidates in November. This fight doesn't make it any better, and Youngkin's inability to get Reid to drop out doesn't make him look like a strong leader. While his term as governor will be up in January, Youngkin is considering running for president in 2028 and this incident is surely going to come up then.
  
  
• Mayor, Cincinnati: Yet another vice-presidential brother has decided to try his hand at politics. That did not work out so well for Donald Nixon. It worked out just fine for Greg Pence, who served three terms in the House before standing down this year. Now, Cory Bowman is going to see if he can give it a go in this year's race for the mayoralty of Cincinnati.
  
  Bowman's odds here are... not good. Although mayoral elections in that city are officially nonpartisan, everyone knows that he's running as a Republican. And he's up against Aftab Pureval, who is both an incumbent and a Democrat. Incumbents are generally tough to knock off, and despite the fact that Ohio as a whole is pretty red these days, Cincinnati is quite blue. The last eight mayors in a row have been Democrats, and the last time a Republican won the mayoralty was in 1971. On top of that, Bowman is, by all accounts, running a lackadaisical and lazy campaign, and is not getting out there and introducing himself to people. Finally, he obviously has a different last name than his half-brother, and so low-information MAGA voters might not realize he's related to (and has the endorsement of) J.D. Vance.
  
  The jungle-style primary was held earlier this month, and Bowman did make the top two, meaning he'll be on the ballot in November. However, Pureval took 83% of the vote, while Bowman took just 13%. That's called "starting in a big, big hole."

That's the latest on the state and local fronts. Incidentally, we are always grateful for tips as to news stories about candidates for Congress/governor/etc. declaring a run, benefiting from some important positive development, suffering some setback, etc. We read a lot of political news, of course, but we don't catch everything and, in particular, we're likely to miss things from more localized news sources. Anyhow, any reader who has a heads-up, please send it to items@electoral-vote.com. (Z & V)