Dem
47
GOP
53
There is an episode of Family Ties where the character Ned Donnelly, played by guest star Tom Hanks, has become a hopeless alcoholic. Unable to lay hands on actual liquor, he drinks a bottle of vanilla. We are not sure if that actually works, but we were reminded of that subplot yesterday, thanks to the elections in Nebraska and West Virginia. Not a whole lot of drama, but when you're a politics junkie, you'll take what you can get.
The one contest that is actually of interest, as we noted on Monday, is the Democratic primary in NE-02, the D+3 district being vacated by Rep. Don Bacon (R). A victory for state Sen. John Cavanaugh over businesswoman Denise Powell would leave an open seat in the unicameral Nebraska legislature. That seat would be filled by an appointed Republican, and then the legislature would likely change the allocation of the state's EVs, such that it would be winner-take-all like all the other states (except Maine). If Maine was not able to answer back, then that would mean +1 EV for the GOP presidential candidate in 2028.
As of 1:00 a.m. PT this morning, the result in NE-02 is... still up in the air. With 89% of the ballots counted, Powell has 38.9% of the vote while Cavanaugh has 36.8%. So, the race isn't going to be called until... sometime today or tomorrow, presumably. That said, you have to guess Powell is going to triumph. It's possible to overcome a 2-point (or so) gap with 10% (or so) of the vote outstanding, but the outstanding votes have to come from voters who might skew aggressively in one direction or the other. For example, if Cavanaugh was much more liberal than Powell, then... maybe. But they're very similar politically, and the main issue in the election was whether Cavanaugh was being selfish in trying for a promotion. We have a hard time imagining that there are heavily "Cavanaugh unselfish" precincts, or towns, or whatever. So, we expect the "Blue Dot" will be safe.
Meanwhile, everything else went exactly as expected. Gov. Jim Pillen (R-NE) easily won the right to run for reelection; his victim will be Lynne Walz (D), a former state legislator who is running on good governance and libertarianism lite. Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-NE) also won that right in a landslide. His opponent is nominally Cindy Burbank (D), but she was only running to take one for the team. She's going to drop out, so that it is abundantly clear that the "Democratic" candidate is independent Dan Osborn. This one could get very interesting; polling suggests it's a coin flip, as Ricketts and Osborn have been within one point of each other in 4 of 5 polls of the race (with Osborn up 47%-42% in the fifth, and most recent).
Over in West Virginia, things also went according to plan. Sen. Shelly Moore Capito (R) will officially run for a third term in this very red state, having demolished the two Republicans foolish enough to challenge her. She will now move on to slaughter Rachel Fetty Anderson (D), whose positions on the issues are a little squishy. She makes clear what ends she desires (e.g., less corruption, support for the American farmer, free speech), but the devil is in the details, and it's not clear how she wants to achieve those goals. Not that her lack of specific policy ideas is going to matter.
There was one other election worth noting yesterday. It may be a "throw the bums out" year in general, but not in Newark, where Mayor Res Baraka (officially nonpartisan, but everyone knows he's a Democrat) won a fourth term in a laugher, taking three-quarters of the vote. Baraka is something of a Cory Booker clone—up to and including the fact that Booker once held that mayoralty—and is best known for being arrested while protesting at an ICE detention center. The Mayor could be someone you hear from again in the future, particularly if one of the state's two Senate seats comes open anytime soon.
Next week, we can toss the bottle of vanilla in the trash, because there's going to be some smooth sippin' whiskey in Kentucky, Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Oregon and Pennsylvania. (Z)