• FL-Sen: Charlie Crist barely survived another county-level GOP censure vote, this time in heavily-Democratic Palm Beach County, where one would expect the GOP faithful to be Chamber of Commerce types and not run-of-the-mill teabagging rageaholics. The censure bid failed on a 65-65 tie. The party member who led the bid referred to Crist as "nothing more than Arlen Specter with a tan."
• NV-Sen: Rep. Dean Heller, who recently declined to run for Senate, laid his cards on the table, confirming what many suspected, that the John Ensign scandal contributed to Heller's decision not to run against Harry Reid. Any Ensign support for Heller would have been a distraction rather than an asset. In the same interview, Heller also encouraged Ensign to answer remaining questions about payoffs to the former staffer he had the affair with. (One other interesting question raised here... does Heller calling out Ensign mean Heller is trying to help push Ensign out the door and then run for the open Senate seat in 2012? Because that would mean Heller wouldn't run in the primary against Jim Gibbons in 2010, making it likelier that Gibbons survives the primary -- and I know Democrats would rather face Gibbons than Heller in the governor's race.)
Also, CQ is reporting that, bolstered by an internal poll giving her a small edge over Harry Reid (and also by Heller's decision to stand down), state GOP party chair Sue Lowden is getting more interested in making the race, and she's testing the fundraising waters.
• PA-Gov: Rep. Jim Gerlach got another endorsement from Pennsylvania's GOP House delegation, Bill Shuster from PA-05 (coming on the heels of endorsements from Todd Platts and ex-Rep. Phil English). Of course, House colleagues tend to stick together, and their endorsements are of questionable value since they generally don't bring local machines along with them, but these endorsements are at least interesting to the extent that they're coming from the rural, most conservative parts of the "T," not from Gerlach's moderate southeastern suburban base.
• VA-Gov: There's been some shuffling of personnel on the Creigh Deeds campaign, which has seemed kind of listless for the last month. Larry Sabato reported that campaign manager Joe Abbey, who engineered the primary victory, had been shoved over in favor of Mark Warner ally Monica Dixon. Dixon, however, says that Abbey's still in charge but that she and some other new additions are there to bolster the ranks.
• KS-04: One more random wealthy Republican to add to the ever-expanding field in the open seat race in the Wichita-based 4th: oilman Willis "Wink" Hartman. State Sen. Dick Kelsey and RNC member Mike Pompeo are considered the GOP frontrunners.
• NY-23: GOP nominee for the special election, Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava, had temporarily put her campaign on hold to tend to her father, who is recovering from heart surgery. Without a John McHugh Senate confirmation or a set election date, though, this isn't likely to be much of a setback. (Stuart Rothenberg, as part of a good overview of the race, says it's likely it'll be held on Election Day in November, meaning that the significance of whatever happens may be subsumed by NJ-Gov and VA-Gov.)
• OH-SoS: The Secretary of State field for the Democrats may keep growing, with a potential new entrant with an impressive resume. Paul Gains is the Prosecutor in Mahoning County (where Youngstown is); he says he's leaning toward the race. (His biggest claim to fame is surviving a mob hit upon first taking office in 1996.) Ohio SoS is one of the most important lower-tier statewide offices in the country, given the state's narrow divide and the SoS's role on the legislative apportionment board. Franklin Co. Commissioner Marilyn Brown and State Rep. Jennifer Garrison are also likely to run for the Dems.
• NC-Sen: Republican pollster Civitas poked at the Senate race, not doing head-to-heads but looking at favorables for Richard Burr and two of his likeliest challengers, SoS Elaine Marshall and Rep. Mike McIntyre. Marshall and McIntyre are little-known, with 12/7 favorables for Marshall and 13/10 and McIntyre (although he was at 38/12 in his district). The bad news for Burr? He's barely doing better than them, with 31/19 favorables (meaning 50% don't know him or have no opinion).
• NY-Sen-B: Marist dribbles out the Senate half of its newest New York poll today (Gov was yesterday), and it finds a super-tight race in the Dem primary in wake of yesterday's sorta-kinda entry by Carolyn Maloney: Maloney leads Kirsten Gillibrand, 38-37 (compared with a 36-31 Gillibrand lead in May). Gillibrand wins against both George Pataki (46-42, up from a 46-38 deficit last time) and Peter King (48-32). Marist doesn't do general election head-to-heads with Maloney, although for some reason they poll a GOP primary between Pataki and King (51-36 for Pataki) despite the decreasing likelihood that either of them run.
Also of interest: Bill Clinton will be appearing at a Maloney fundraiser scheduled for July 20. Clinton isn't wading into the race with an endorsement at this point, though; this was in the works long before Maloney announced her run, as payback for Maloney's 2008 primary support for Hillary Clinton, and he also headlined a Gillibrand fundraiser in March.
• PA-Sen: Pat Toomey got another endorsement from one of the more conservative members of Pennsylvania's House GOP delegation: PA-09's Bill Shuster.
• AL-Gov: The Democratic field in the governor's race in Alabama seems to be solidifying; the last question mark, Supreme Court Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb, announced that she won't be running. With a lot of establishment figures waiting on the fence to see if an alternative to Rep. Artur Davis and Ag Comm. Ron Sparks shows up, expect them to start choosing sides soon. Davis, meanwhile, has been staffing up with some key political players, adding Joey Ceci and David Mowery to his team (who managed the successful campaigns of freshman Reps. Parker Griffith and Bobby Bright).
• CA-Gov: Sure, California's an expensive state, but Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman have reported gigantic hauls even by the Golden State's outsized standards. Brown raised $7.3 million in the year's first half, while Whitman raised $6.5 million. Steve Poizner and Gavin Newsom raised huge sums and are still far behind -- Poizner raised $1.3 million and loaned himself another $4 million, while Newsom raised $1.6 million, much of it online.
• MN-Gov: The tradmed seems to be intent today on talking up Norm Coleman's next logical step as being running for Governor of Minnesota, although Minnesota reporters and politicians in the know are trying to point out the sheer ridiculousness of that idea. (If Norm's going to be doing any running soon, it's running away from the FBI, as they investigate his links to Nasser Kazeminy.)
• RI-Gov: The Democratic primary for the open Rhode Island Governor's seat was looking to be a three-way slugfest, but Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts yesterday announced that she would run for re-election instead of for Gov. Although she had started staffing up for the race, she couldn't have been encouraged by poll numbers which showed her at a disadvantage with likely opponents Treasurer Frank Caprio and AG Patrick Lynch.
• SC-Gov: Gov. Mark Sanford seems to have taken a few steps backwards this week. A snap poll from yesterday by SUSA now finds 69% of South Carolinians saying resign, as opposed to 28% saying stay. 63% say they have "no trust" in Sanford. Here's an interesting red flag: only 20% say Lt. Gov/party boy Andre Bauer is "completely prepared" to become Governor, with 38% saying "somewhat prepared" and 34% saying "not prepared."
• WI-Gov: Real estate developer and ex-Rep. Mark Neumann, who held WI-01 from 1994 to 1998 before losing narrowly to Russ Feingold, announced his gubernatorial candidacy yesterday. Neumann's entry had been widely anticipated; he'll face off against Milwaukee Co. Executive Scott Walker in the GOP primary.
• CA-45: With Rep. Mary Bono Mack having defected on the cap-and-trade vote, the rightosphere has been calling for her head. Their favored replacement, term-limited state Senator Dennis Hollingsworth, quickly said "no" to a primary challenge, so their wish-list has turned to ex-state Sens. Jim Battin and Ray Haynes and ex-state Rep. Bonnie Garcia.
• IL-14: A second GOP challenger got into the race against Rep. Bill Foster, although this guy doesn't sound like he'll pose much of a threat to Ethan Hastert for the nom. Jeff Danklefsen hasn't run for office before and is "maintenance manager for a property management company."
• LA-03: The Hill reported last week that Democratic efforts to find a replacement to Rep. Charlie Melancon have focused on state Rep. Gary Smith, who was going to run for the open seat in 2004 but deferred to Melancon. State Rep. Fred Mills was also interested, but state Rep. Damon Baldone, who might be the highest-profile candidate, is about to run in a special election for a state Senate seat and is unlikely to follow that with a U.S. House run.
• PA-06: With the 2nd quarter just wrapped up, look for lots of financial reports to start getting leaked. Here's a nice place to start: Doug Pike, in the 6th, is looking at a haul of over $500K for the quarter, thanks a recent D.C. fundraiser starring Allyson Schwartz and Patrick Murphy.
• WI-08: We're building up a backlog of Republicans trying to take on Rep. Steve Kagen. Businessman Reid Ribble jumped into the field, joining Door Co. Supervisor Marc Savard and Brown Co. Supervisor Andy Williams.
• WV-02: With some prodding from the DCCC, Gov. Joe Manchin's former general counsel, Carte Goodwin, is looking into challenging Rep. Shelly Capito Moore in the Charleston-based 2nd.
(From the diaries with minor edits - promoted by DavidNYC)
As I'd promised in my diary on New Jersey, Pennsylvania would be the next state I'd tackle. This would have been done a lot sooner, but those things called work and exams kind of got in the way....
My goal, flat out, was to carve more Democratic districts. I'm all for compactness when it comes to suitcases and mp3's, but not when I'm gerrymandering states. Again, I kept Democratic Congresscritters in their homes.
Unlike New Jersey though, Pennsylvania is probably maxed-out when it comes to Democrats (save Gerlach and Dent, whose districts are certainly Democratic.) Pennsylvania is also losing one seat (most likely) in 2010, so I drew 18 seats on 2008 population estimates. I didn't "merge" two districts per se, but more like took the 16th, 17th, and 19th and produced two districts from them.
I had the following goals in mind:
Dislodge Gerlach (6th) and Dent (15th) by increasing Democratic performance in their districts.
Give Dahlkemper (3rd), Altmire (4th), Murtha (12th), and Holden (17th) more favorable territory. They represent McCain districts now, I wanted to change those to Obama districts.
Maintain strength for Sestak (7th), Patrick Murphy (8th), Kanjorski (11th), and Schwartz (13th). They have decently strongly Democratic districts, which I wanted to maintain at their current levels.
Keep Brady (1st), Fattah (2nd), and Doyle (14th) in strongly Democratic districts, but perhaps not as absurdly strong as before. Obama scored 88%, 90%, and 70% respectively, I felt this could afford to be lowered somewhat. A corollary to this goal is keeping Fattah's district majority Black. I didn't bother with Brady's currently plurality Black district, though it may still be.
