Campaign and Election News – Covering Key Races Around the Country
Weekly Open Thread: What Races Are You Interested In?
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26 thoughts on “Weekly Open Thread: What Races Are You Interested In?”
It looks like Jim Martin (D-GA) is going to jump into the U.S. Senate race against Saxby Chambliss (R-GA). He is expected to make the announcement on Monday. Martin met with Chuck Schumer & Harry Reid to talk about how much money are they willing to commit to his race if he wins the democratic primary. Martin is a vietnam war veteran, DHR Commissioner, & ex-State Representative who ran for Lt. Governor in 2006. He is going to have to beat Vernon Jones, Josh Lanier, Dale Cardwell, Rand Knight for the nomination. Lanier met with officials of the DSCC also back in november to talk about his run against Chambliss. He in my opinion would be the better candidate against chambliss because he can compete with chambliss for the rural vote in Georgia. Vernon Jones is no shoo in to win the nomination because 46% of the democratic party voters are black. His personal problems & run-ins with DeKalb Co. officials will not appeal to black voters even in the Metro Area. My prediction is that there is going to be a runoff between Josh Lanier & Jim Martin or Rand Knight & Josh Lanier.
I just took a look at the Maine Secretary of State’s website to see which candidates filed for what offices. The filing deadline is tomorrow. It appears no Republican has filed (yet) to run against incumbent Rep. Mike Michaud.
So- that means if no one files, Maine will have an unopposed congressional incumbent. As we know, incumbents up there almost never run unopposed. How cool would that be? Congressman Michaud must be popular enough in that huge 2nd District to not have anybody run against him.
Darcy Burner, Donna Edwards, Eric Massa, Chellie Pingree, Jared Polis, Tom Perriello, Larry Byrnes, George Fearing, Steve Harrison.
Why? Because they are doing a hugely innovative and awesome think. Darcy has more over at OpenLeft:
They had a primary on 3/11, I can’t find the results for the house races anywhere…..anyone have a link?
thanks
Steve Driehaus is a race to watch — and help. He is running against long-time incumbent, and long-time conservative Steve Chabot. Chabot recently spoke out against Net Neutrality, while Driehaus supports it. For many reasons, this is a race to win.
Preliminary filing results are available from the SoS website, finally. No Democrats filed for CA-19 (George Radanovich) or CA-22 (Kevin McCarthy). No Republicans filed for CA-18 (Dennis Cardoza), CA-28 (Howard Berman), CA-30 (Henry Waxman), CA-31 (Xavier Becerra), CA-32 (Hilda Solis), CA-37 (Laura Richardson), or CA-38 (Grace Napolitano). So, 2 uncontested Republican seats, versus 7 uncontested Democratic seats. Not bad.
Also, in CA-11, Dean Andal was the only Republican that filed to run against Jerry McNerney. Bodes well for McNerney holding the seat, as I’ve seen comments (from Republicans, no less) that Andal is too far-right to win the seat.
Only Republican who filed is Kim Schmett, who is a lawyer of some sort.
It’s going to be tough, regardless of whether Fallon or Boswell wins — Iowa is expected to lose a congressional district after the census, and they have some sort of nonpartisan redistricting, so who knows what the 3rd District will look like come 2012.
Bruce Braley in IA-1 almost got a free pass. Iowa’s deadline was March 14 and at 6:30 EDT (5:30 CDT) a search showed no opponent (the site was dated at 3:45 PM CDT). A last look and they dragged in somebody by the deadline. There is a bunch of people running against Loebsack for the GOPers so that is the seat they appear to be trying to win back (in Iowa at least).
So far this month, the GOPers have left 3 House seats in Arkansas and 1 in Oregon go unchallenged. The Secretary of State site in California has no listing at all even though the March 12 deadline is clearly past. I suspect a serious number of seats there went unchallenged. There is a real lack of enthusiasm in many states this year among Republicans (Utah filing is a huge exception).
Tom Allen and a left-leaning independent got a combined 70% in the 1st district as well.
let’s see.
First elected in 2002, he got 52%
In 2004, against a well-funded Brian Hamel, Michaud got 58%
In 2006, against a poorly-funded Laurence D’Amboise, Michaud got 71%.
and now? 100%
Maine is interesting:
district Urban Med.Inc Poverty Veterans White Black Latino Cook
ME01 49.4 42.0 8.8 15.8 96.3 0.5 0.8 6
ME02 31.0 32.6 13.3 15.9 96.7 0.4 0.7 4
thus, the demographics here say “Repub” but for the House and the Presidency, they go Democratic. Of course, there are (for now!) two Republican senators….
Would Michaud running unoppossed hurt Allen in the senate race? I fear it could lead to lower democratic turnout. Of course that knife cuts both ways and with no Republican in the race at all that would hurt R turnout too. Is there anyone from Maine that can comment on Michaud’s machine and whether this hurts or helps in the senate race.
It looks like Jim Martin (D-GA) is going to jump into the U.S. Senate race against Saxby Chambliss (R-GA). He is expected to make the announcement on Monday. Martin met with Chuck Schumer & Harry Reid to talk about how much money are they willing to commit to his race if he wins the democratic primary. Martin is a vietnam war veteran, DHR Commissioner, & ex-State Representative who ran for Lt. Governor in 2006. He is going to have to beat Vernon Jones, Josh Lanier, Dale Cardwell, Rand Knight for the nomination. Lanier met with officials of the DSCC also back in november to talk about his run against Chambliss. He in my opinion would be the better candidate against chambliss because he can compete with chambliss for the rural vote in Georgia. Vernon Jones is no shoo in to win the nomination because 46% of the democratic party voters are black. His personal problems & run-ins with DeKalb Co. officials will not appeal to black voters even in the Metro Area. My prediction is that there is going to be a runoff between Josh Lanier & Jim Martin or Rand Knight & Josh Lanier.
I just took a look at the Maine Secretary of State’s website to see which candidates filed for what offices. The filing deadline is tomorrow. It appears no Republican has filed (yet) to run against incumbent Rep. Mike Michaud.
So- that means if no one files, Maine will have an unopposed congressional incumbent. As we know, incumbents up there almost never run unopposed. How cool would that be? Congressman Michaud must be popular enough in that huge 2nd District to not have anybody run against him.
Darcy Burner, Donna Edwards, Eric Massa, Chellie Pingree, Jared Polis, Tom Perriello, Larry Byrnes, George Fearing, Steve Harrison.
Why? Because they are doing a hugely innovative and awesome think. Darcy has more over at OpenLeft:
http://www.openleft.com/showDi…
They had a primary on 3/11, I can’t find the results for the house races anywhere…..anyone have a link?
thanks
Steve Driehaus is a race to watch — and help. He is running against long-time incumbent, and long-time conservative Steve Chabot. Chabot recently spoke out against Net Neutrality, while Driehaus supports it. For many reasons, this is a race to win.
Check out Driehaus’ website here: http://www.driehaus2008.com
Preliminary filing results are available from the SoS website, finally. No Democrats filed for CA-19 (George Radanovich) or CA-22 (Kevin McCarthy). No Republicans filed for CA-18 (Dennis Cardoza), CA-28 (Howard Berman), CA-30 (Henry Waxman), CA-31 (Xavier Becerra), CA-32 (Hilda Solis), CA-37 (Laura Richardson), or CA-38 (Grace Napolitano). So, 2 uncontested Republican seats, versus 7 uncontested Democratic seats. Not bad.
Also, in CA-11, Dean Andal was the only Republican that filed to run against Jerry McNerney. Bodes well for McNerney holding the seat, as I’ve seen comments (from Republicans, no less) that Andal is too far-right to win the seat.
Only Republican who filed is Kim Schmett, who is a lawyer of some sort.
It’s going to be tough, regardless of whether Fallon or Boswell wins — Iowa is expected to lose a congressional district after the census, and they have some sort of nonpartisan redistricting, so who knows what the 3rd District will look like come 2012.
Bruce Braley in IA-1 almost got a free pass. Iowa’s deadline was March 14 and at 6:30 EDT (5:30 CDT) a search showed no opponent (the site was dated at 3:45 PM CDT). A last look and they dragged in somebody by the deadline. There is a bunch of people running against Loebsack for the GOPers so that is the seat they appear to be trying to win back (in Iowa at least).
So far this month, the GOPers have left 3 House seats in Arkansas and 1 in Oregon go unchallenged. The Secretary of State site in California has no listing at all even though the March 12 deadline is clearly past. I suspect a serious number of seats there went unchallenged. There is a real lack of enthusiasm in many states this year among Republicans (Utah filing is a huge exception).
Tom Allen and a left-leaning independent got a combined 70% in the 1st district as well.
let’s see.
First elected in 2002, he got 52%
In 2004, against a well-funded Brian Hamel, Michaud got 58%
In 2006, against a poorly-funded Laurence D’Amboise, Michaud got 71%.
and now? 100%
Maine is interesting:
district Urban Med.Inc Poverty Veterans White Black Latino Cook
ME01 49.4 42.0 8.8 15.8 96.3 0.5 0.8 6
ME02 31.0 32.6 13.3 15.9 96.7 0.4 0.7 4
thus, the demographics here say “Repub” but for the House and the Presidency, they go Democratic. Of course, there are (for now!) two Republican senators….
Would Michaud running unoppossed hurt Allen in the senate race? I fear it could lead to lower democratic turnout. Of course that knife cuts both ways and with no Republican in the race at all that would hurt R turnout too. Is there anyone from Maine that can comment on Michaud’s machine and whether this hurts or helps in the senate race.