Tag: Daily Digests

• AZ-Sen: Is Mike Lee hoping to turn into Jim DeMint 2.0? The Utah Republican and teabagger extraordinaire announced his second out-of-state endorsement, this time of Rep. Jeff Flake, running to succeed Jon Kyl. (Last week he endorsed Ted Cruz in TX-Sen.) Flake’s an interesting choice for Lee: his extreme anti-earmark rhetoric is probably appealing to teabaggers, but many of his other views are anathema to them. (In fact, he didn’t even show his face at a local teabagger convention a few weeks ago.) As for Lee, unless he starts backing up his words with real money (like DeMint does), then I’m going to stop caring about him very soon.

• CT-Sen: Rep. Chris Murphy just rolled out the Honeycomb™ of endorsements – as in, it’s not small, no no no. All four of his fellow members of Congress – Rosa DeLauro, John Larson, Joe Courtney, and Jim Himes – gave Murphy their backing yesterday. His opponent in the Democratic primary, Susan Bysiewicz, offered a weirdly churlish response, saying “There is no doubt that Congressman Chris Murphy has a lot of support in the inner hallways of Washington.” Uh, does she really want to be dissing well-regarded figures like caucus chair Larson et al.?

• FL-Sen: Jebus, this is really getting down into the weeds here: ex-Sen. George LeMieux is considering (considering!) hiring a pollster! WOW! Slow news day doesn’t begin to describe it.

• HI-Sen: Is there anyone other than Haley Barbour who doesn’t think that working as a lobbyist is now a huge 20-lb. goiter around the neck of anyone who wants to seek elective office? Well, Charles Djou seems to be hoping Barbour is right. A Bloomberg News report that he and ex-Rep. Walt Minnick of Idaho have started a lobbying firm is only “sort of” true, says Djou. He goes on to add that he’s not moving back to DC and that “I am only serving as an advisor with Congressman Minnick and really haven’t done much of anything other than give him occasional advice.” Uh huh. Well, look, I’d rather live in Hawaii, too, but this namby-pamby b.s. is not really going to cut it if Djou is actually staying home because he wants to run for the Senate this cycle.

On the other side of the aisle, here’s a new name in the mix: State Senate Vice President Donna Mercado Kim (D) says she’s forming an exploratory committee so that she can poll the race, explaining she’ll decide at that point whether she wants to get in. While no Democrat has taken the plunge yet, Kim would almost certainly face a field of serious heavyweights.

• MA-Sen: Guy Cecil alert! Okay, yeah, this is nothing like a Biden alert! – Cecil is the executive director of the DSCC, and he’s coming up to Boston to meet with party leaders and other Democratic bigwigs to discuss the race against Sen. Scott Brown. No word of any specific recruiting meetings, but I’d be surprised if some weren’t in the offing.

• MI-Sen (PDF): Unfortunately this EPIC•MRA poll got wedged beneath the couch cushions a couple of weeks ago, but I found it (along with Sid Leiken’s mom’s cell phone) when I went hunting for the remote. Anyhow, they showed Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D) inching out ex-Rep. (and 2010 GOP gubernatorial primary loser) Pete Hoekstra by a 44-42 margin. (Hoekstra has yet to announce a run.) When this poll first came out, a lot of folks pointed out that the sample composition seems whack. I’ll also observe that the pronunciation guides in the poll script for both names are wrong. They told their interviewers to pronounce them STAB-now and HOKE-struh. (Click links for proper pronunciation.)

• MO-Sen: No one must be more pleased at Republican Rep. Todd Akin’s evolving change of heart about a Senate run than Democrat Russ Carnahan. In The Fix’s words, Akin is now “actively considering” the race – which is, by my counting, his fourth different stance on whether he’s interested. As for Carnahan, if Akin’s House seat opens up, that may mean the Dem’s 3rd CD seat gets spared in redistricting.

• MT-Sen: I’ve been disappointed at how meekly the teabaggers seem to have reacted to Rep. Denny Rehberg’s coronation as the de facto Republican nominee in Montana, so even though this is purely a rumor, I’m at least pleased to see it. Blogger Don Pogreba says he’s heard that Rob Natelson, a hardcore conservative law professor who twice sought the GOP nomination for governor, is polling the race. The big red flag, though, is that Natelson moved to Colorado last year, as Pogreba acknowledges. Tea Party Express, Club for Growth – where are you?

• NV-Sen, NV-02: Well, that was quick. Everyone who thought Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki wouldn’t challenge Rep. Dean Heller in the GOP primary, you were right. Not only that, Krolicki offered his endorsement to Heller yesterday, just hours after Heller made his entry into the race official. Krolicki did say he’s considering a run for Heller’s NV-02 seat, though.

As for that 2nd CD race, Jon Ralston said he’s seen three different internal polls in recent days, all of which show Sharron Angle doing poorly in a one-on-one fight against Krolicki (and also against Heller for Senate). Ralston says he can’t divulge the numbers, but he now thinks that Angle – whom he had previously considered “the favorite” for NV-02 – would need a multi-way primary to have a chance at the nomination.

And finally, here’s some welcome – and rare – news about the Dem field: Dave Wasserman says that state Treasurer Kate Marshall, who had previously been talked about as a possible Senate candidate, is considering the race in the 2nd district. Wasserman also reports that state Dems are thinking about a plan to pack Republicans into 3rd CD Rep. Joe Heck’s district so as to make a more amenable 2nd CD for the likes of Marshall.

• PA-Sen: Another Republican Some Dude has entered the race against Sen. Bob Casey. As Philadelphia Weekly puts it: “Her name’s Laureen Cummings, she’s the head of the Scranton Tea Party and, like members of the Tea Party, she considers herself a ‘patriot.’ She also believes Congress needs more patriots and patriots her patriot every patriot morning.” And as our own Brian Valco puts it: “Because she’s the head of the Scranton Tea Party, expect a Wall Street Journal write-up and FNC primetime interview soon enough.”

• VA-Sen: This is looking really pathetic. After the DNC swore that Tim Kaine did not tell a class at the University of Richmond that he was running for Senate, the school’s newspaper is saying that it has “confirmed that he told the class that he had made his decision.” Whoever is telling the truth, this is just some small-time shit which really doesn’t seem like the kind of thing someone experienced in running professional campaigns would be engaged in. I mean, how many different times has Kaine uttered something that could be interpreted or mis-interpreted or re-interpreted or mal-interpreted? This is just not the sort of shtick I’d expect from someone supposedly steeped in the “No Drama Obama” ethos. Enough of the games.

• NC-Gov: Former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory (R), who has widely been expected to seek a rematch against Gov. Bev Perdue since forever, is kinda-sorta starting to staff up. Several political hands are “advising” him now (though only one is on payroll), including his 2008 campaign manager (who is working on a volunteer basis).

• ND-Gov: This is a nice – and to me, unexpected – piece of news: Former Rep. Earl Pomeroy, who lost a tough race last year, is apparently considering a run for governor this year, at least according to the chair of the North Dakota Democratic Party, Mark Schneider. Pomeroy recently took a job at the DC firm of Alston & Bird (erm, what was I saying about lobbyists earlier?), though Schneider says Pomeroy told him he’d rather live in his home state than Washington.

• UT-Gov: Utah has another gubernatorial election next year, despite having just held one last year. That’s because the 2010 election was a special, to fill the remaining years in ex-Gov. John Huntsman’s term. (Huntsman of course resigned to become Obama’s ambassador to China, and is now on the entertaining quest of winning the GOP’s presidential nomination.) Anyhow, Gary Herbert, who inherited the job when Huntsman stepped down and then won last November, faces voters again in 2012 – but predictably, he’s found a way to piss off the teabaggers. He’s planning to sign an immigration bill which creates a guest worker program, but the teanuts are calling it an “amnesty.” They want to boot Herbert, but we’ll see if their bark has any bite. (My guess: no.)

• CA-36: Rep. John Garamendi and former Rep. Diane Watson both endorsed fellow Dem Janice Hahn in the special election today. Watson used to represent a Los Angeles district (the 33rd) until her retirement last year. Garamendi hails from the Bay Area up north, but perhaps has a larger profile on account of being a former Lt. Gov. Meanwhile, Debra Bowen put out a press release touting the endorsement of former L.A. city controller and state inspector general Laura Chick. Chick, who has a reputation as reformer, originally endorsed Bowen via Twitter last month.

• FL-22: Some Dude “no not that” Patrick Murphy filed to run against lunatic Allen West as a Democrat. The only other time I mentioned this guy, the media account I linked described him as some kind of construction executive, so I thought, maybe rich dude? But The Hill says he’s a 28-year-old accountant, so I’m guessing probably not. (That prior piece also said Steve Israel was meeting with him on a recruiting trip, which is sorta surprising.)

• FL-25: Politico has another entry in the “David Rivera is doomed” file, but they bury the lede on the only really new information, which is a list of candidates that unnamed “Republicans have begun mentioning” as possible replacements. One of them has come up before on SSP: state Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla. The others are political consultant Carlos Curbelo, state Rep. J.C. Planas, and state Sen. Anitere Flores. Planas and Flores (the only woman in this group) both refused to rule out the possibility of a run.

• NY-26: This amuses me: Crazy Jack Davis is, as you know, petitioning his way on to the ballot as an independent. But if you do that in New York, you actually get to create your own (very temporary) party, complete with funny name. (Does anyone NOT think that Rent Is Too Damn High?) Davis’s choice? The Tea Party. Actual teabaggers are pissed that he’s ganking their good (lol) name. And actual teabagger David Bellavia, who is also petitioning, has been reduced to picking the “Federalist Party.” What’s next, the Whigs? Oh wait, we already had that.

• Wisconsin Recall: The complete results of Daily Kos’s polls of all eight recall target districts are out, and the numbers are at least somewhat promising – but go judge for yourself. Also of note, the tradmed is apparently confirming a story that started circulating on some blogs a few days ago – namely, that vulnerable Sen. Randy Hopper left his wife to move in with a 25-year-old mistress (a Republican consultant, of course) in Madison. In addition to the salacious angle, this is also potentially a problem because that means he may now be living outside his district, which would be against state law (depending on certain other circumstances). In any event, it don’t look good – and the kicker is that, according to Reid Wilson, Hopper’s estranged wife signed his recall petition!

• IL-St. Sen.: So sorry – no Scott Lee Cohen!

• Miami-Dade County: Just brutal: Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Alvarez and Commissioner Natacha Seijas were recalled from office last night with something like 88% voting to boot them. A Miami friend of mine summed it up thusly: Alvarez “raised taxes, then raised his staff’s salary, then got himself a luxury car at government expense when they already provide him two SUVs.” Smart thinking!

• Special Elections: Heeere’s Johnny (Longtorso):

Judy Schwank held Pennsylvania’s SD-11 pretty easily yesterday for the Democrats, ending up with a 58-42 margin over Republican Larry Medaglia.

• Elections: A number of states are trying to save money and do what’s only sensible: consolidate their presidential primaries with their congressional & state primaries. Proposals include making the former later (AL, CA), or making the former later and the latter earlier (MO). Other states are considering switching to caucuses (boo!): KS, MA & WA.

• Virginia Redistricting: You may remember the redistricting contest between teams at various Virginia colleges from a few months ago; all of their finished projects are now on display, in case you need some inspiration for your own Dave’s App tinkerings. One other rumor that might scramble all those careful map-makings, though: Dave Wasserman is saying that the DOJ might force Virginia to junk its likely compromise map and proceed with two separate VRA seats, one based in Hampton Roads and the other in Richmond. That would probably cost the GOP an additional seat, most likely VA-04’s Randy Forbes, who already has one of the most African-American-heavy seats held by a GOPer.

• CT-Sen: Paulist gazillionaire (and very failed 2010 Senate candidate) Peter Schiff says he’s moving to Florida because a proposed increase in the state’s top income tax rate from 6.5% to 6.7% means, according to Schiff: “Basically, what they’re saying is, ‘If you stay in Connecticut, you’re going to get mugged. You’re going to get raped.'” THAT’S EXACTLY RIGHT. A TWO-TENTHS PERCENT TAX HIKE ON THE RICH IS EXACTLY LIKE RAPE. Schiff then asked out loud, “The question is, do I really have a political future in Connecticut?” NO YOU DO NOT.

Meanwhile, despite the presence of two very big names already in the race, another Democrat says he’s thinking about getting in: state Rep. William Tong, the first Asian American elected to CT’s General Assembly and also a former law student of Barack Obama’s, says he’ll decide “shortly.” This sounds more like a reputation/name rec-enhancing move that a serious bid, though, as Tong is only in his late 30s.

• DE-Sen: The Christine O’Donnell watch is on, with the key (the only) question being whether she’ll launch a hopeless challenge to Gov. Jack Markell next year, or whether she’ll wait to launch a hopeless rematch against Sen. Chris Coons in 2014.

• FL-Sen: So here’s how you work up to a Senate bid these days. First, get your name circulated in early, unsourced media reports about “potential” candidates – you know, the kind of spitballing pieces which just list out various names based on speculation. Then, have a surrogate (probably on a not-for-attribution basis – they can call `em “an individual close to” you) tell the press they know you’re thinking about the race. Then, do some interviews yourself where you admit to actually considering a run, but that you need to discuss it with your family first/wait until the legislative session is over/see how the field develops/get the results of a poll back, etc. Then, once you’ve finally done all of this, you can take the bold step of… forming an exploratory committee. That’s where we finally are with Republican state Rep. (and former Majority Leader) Adam Hasner. Exciting, isn’t it?

• IN-Sen: This probably means more for the endorser than the endorsee, but embattled Sen. Dick Lugar (he’ll be referred to as “embattled” for the next year-plus) just got the backing of his home-state governor, Mitch Daniels. While in a more civilized age, this might be done just as common courtesy, the threat of getting teabagged often has Republicans clamming up when they get near their wobblier comrades. (Fellow Hoosier Sen. and all-around loser Dan Coats (R) has refused to support Lugar.) But like I said, this is a bigger deal for Daniels, who has presidential aspirations (yet is probably as wobbly as Lugar himself): the teabaggers are already calling for his head.

• MA-Sen: More staffing emails in the MA-Sen race-is this going to be the next frontier in tea leaf-reading? Anyhow, consultant Dorie Clark of Sommerville sent a job posting out into the aether seeking a press secretary, but refused to tell the Globe who she’s working for. The Globe notes that Rep. Mike Capuano (who lost in the Dem special primary in 2009) is also from Sommervile-as is activist Bob Massie, but he says the posting wasn’t on his behalf.

• ME-Sen: The Hotline already did this for Dick Lugar, so now they do it for Olympia Snowe – that is, they take a look at what it would take for her to run as an independent. The answer:

If Snowe wishes to run as an independent, she must file a withdrawal from the Republican Party by March 1, 2012-more than 3 months before the June 10 primary. If she did withdraw, she would need between 4,000 and 6,000 petitions from registered voters by June 1 to get on the ballot as an independent candidate.

A Snowe spokesperson insists, though, that his boss is running as a Republican. In other Maine news, PPP has one of its scorecards out (PDF), finding Gov. Paul LePage already underwater with approvals of 43-48. A narrow 47-45 plurality supports gay marriage (which was narrowly rejected by voters in 2009).

• MT-Sen: All politics definitely is not local anymore (if it ever was), but sometimes it still is. A looming issue in the Montana Senate race? The status of the gray wolf, which is on the Endangered Species List but which Montanans want to start hunting. (Farmers complain the wolves kill livestock, while hunters complain the wolves kill elk – which they want to kill themselves.) Roll Call explains the fault line between Republican Denny Rehberg and Dem Jon Tester:

Rehberg’s proposal would eliminate wolves from the list forever, and not just in the Big Sky State but nationwide. Tester prefers allowing wolves to be hunted in Montana and Idaho, while placing hunting control in the hands of state officials with federal oversight.

• NV-Sen: The Fix’s Rachel Weiner says that that unnamed (and unquoted!) “Democratic strategists” are saying they might actually prefer someone like Ross Miller to Rep. Shelley Berkley, who has already been elected statewide and doesn’t have “strong ties” to Las Vegas, which I guess is a potential liability.

• VA-Sen: God, could the Tim Kaine watch get any more tedious? I can’t even bear to go into the details of yesterday’s silliness, but now a DNC spokesman is saying that Kaine is “increasingly likely” to run. Whatever. Kaine did say last weekend at that Rick Boucher dinner that “I think we’ll make the decision this week,” but “when we’ll announce it I’m not quite sure.” Groan. I have no problem with politicians taking their time, but this endless media shtick is really tiresome. My personal feeling is that the beltway bloviators are unsually interested in this bit of kremlinology because Kaine is “of” their world in a way that few potential candidates ever are.

• WI-Sen: Is this the best we can do? Really? An unnamed “Senate Democratic leadership aide” said of Herb Kohl’s re-election intentions: “We’re pretty confident he’s going to do it.” As I’ve said before, I think you either get the answer locked down early, before reporters start asking (and hell, it’s an obvious question, given Kohl’s extremely… shall we say understated approach to governance and his age) – or you go out and say, “We know Herb will make a decision when he’s ready.” Playing the guessing game makes you look like a chump.

• LA-Gov: Progressive blog Daily Kingfish is reporting, based on their own sources, that Democrat Caroline Fayard, contrary to other reports, is “seriously contemplating” (their words) a gubernatorial run. Fayard, who lost last year’s Lt. Gov. race, is also said to be considering a run for Secretary of State. Note that Fayard did link to the Kingfish story on her own website.

• OH-Gov: Ah, it warms my heart: The University of Cincinnati finds that Republican Gov. John Kasich’s job approval is just 40-47, with independents giving him an ugly 30-52 rating. Loves it.

• WA-Gov: The basic rule of thumb about Republicanism in Washington is that you can get elected statewide if and only if you’re moderate and technocratic enough that the “R” next to your name can get overlooked; that’s how Rob McKenna got elected AG twice. So McKenna’s decision to throw his lot in with the multi-state anti-HCR suit spearheaded by Ken Cuccinelli always seemed a baffling act of pulling the curtain away on his, well, Republicanism… and now he’s in full backpedal mode, with an explanation so contorted (something about how he actually likes everything in the bill except the individual mandate, and it’s all the Dems fault for forgetting to include the severability clause that led to the Vinson ruling) that it’s not going to win over any Dems and only going to make him look weaker to the local teabaggery.

The Seattle PI also points out how little room for error McKenna has with his needle-threading, in a state where the Republican base, as a percentage of the state’s population, is the smallest of any state not in the Northeast. The numbers are 41% Dem base, 31% swing voters, and 29% GOP base. In case you’re wondering, those numbers are from a Nate Silver post from last week, using Annenberg Election Survey data for every state; if you didn’t see the piece, please go back and take a look, as it’s remarkable even by Nate’s usual high standards. (Crisitunity)

• CA-36: Finally da herb come around: Gov. Jerry Brown announced that the special all-candidate top-two “primary” to fill Jane Harman’s seat will be held on May 17th. If no one can get 50%+1 that day, then the race goes to a run-off between the top two vote-getters-which seems very likely-regardless of party. (So yes, we could have a D vs. D second round.)

• FL-22: Looks like Ron Klein won’t be seeking a rematch against Allen West in 2012: Reid Wilson twitterizes that the former Dem congressman is taking a job with a Florida lobbying firm.

• MO-03: Is there a more talked-about likely redistricting victim than Russ Carnahan? I guess he has a somewhat odd combination of a famous name + junior status, so maybe that explains it. Anyhow, Carnahan says he’s “100% focused” on seeking re-election, regardless of what happens with redistricting, and that he isn’t thinking about a Lt. Gov. run (an idea which came up in the media recently).

• NY-13: We mentioned a very similar story a little while back, but here’s more confirmation that freshman Republican Mike Grimm actually wants to win re-election: He’s calling on his fellows GOPers to support another short-term government funding bill, though he manages to sneak some Pelosi-bashing in there as well. The wingnuts don’t want to play ball because (sayeth The Hill) the continuing resolution “does not contain riders defunding Planned Parenthood and the healthcare reform law.” Gooood luck with that. Anyhow, while I never want to rule anything out, I feel like teabaggers would have a hard time taking Grimm down. Hopefully I’m wrong!

• Wisconsin Recall: Greg Sargent says that the Wisconsin Democratic Party is telling him they’ve collected 45% of the signatures “necessary to hold recall elections.” Greg also notes that only a quarter of the time period for gathering petitions has elapsed. However, I put the exact phrase in quotes because it’s not clear from the piece whether Dems are benchmarking off the legal minimum, or whether they are using a higher target – which you need, because some signatures are invariably going to be found invalid. Still, this sounds like a pretty good pace to me.

Also today, look for full polling results a little later today from Daily Kos in each of the eight GOP-held recall targets.

• Special elections: Johnny Longtorso (who else?):

Just one seat is up today (the last special election for the month of March): Pennsylvania’s Reading-based SD-11, where the long-time incumbent recently passed away. The Democrat running is Judy Schwank, a former Berks County Commissioner, while the Republicans have Larry Medaglia, the Berks County Register of Wills. Trivia note: Register of Wills is an elected office in only three states, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Delaware. It’s a pretty Democratic district-it went about 60-40 for Obama-but of course these low-turnout elections can produce weird results.

It sounds like Republicans have given up, though: Medaglia’s paid media campaign has gone dark.

• WATN?: Blarggh….

Redistricting Roundup

• Arizona: This overview piece of Arizona’s redistricting situation is mostly speculation, but it does go into a discussion of where recent growth has been, per the newest census numbers.

• California: Crisitunity already said as much, but at least one expert agrees with us that the Bay Area is pretty much going to have to lose a seat: Tony Quinn, an editor of the California Target Book, a well-known Golden State political publication.

• Iowa: The Des Moines Register has a fun little Iowa redistricting tool you can play around with. Of course, the process is a lot easier in the Hawkeye State because state law requires that whole counties be kept intact. (Hat tip: Dave Wasserman)

• Mississippi: A big black eye for Lt. Gov., state Senate President, and gubernatorial hopeful Phil Bryant: The Republican-controlled Senate voted down his proposed map for that body and instead voted in favor of the the map that senators themselves originally drew. A key point of contention is the Hattiesburg area, which would get turned into a majority-minority district under the Senate plan but would remain cracked under Bryant’s.

• Nevada: Some Democrats are rooting for a Shelley Berkley Senate run for reasons other than what you might expect: If her 1st CD seat opens up, that makes redistricting a lot easier for Dems in the state legislature eager to carve her seat up. The piece also mentions two names who might succeed Berkley in the House if she makes the jump: Assembly Speaker John Oceguera and Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford.

• AZ-Sen: This is amusingly insane. I’m certainly all for it!

• CA-Sen: Our long national nightmare is finally over: Meg Whitman says she will “definitely not” run against Sen. Diane Feinstein (D) next year. Rather, she says she’s going to spend time campaigning for fellow rich guy Mitt Romney. (Also, here’s an amusing tidbit: Earlier this year, she joined the board of none other than Hewlett-Packard – the company her 2010 Republican ticket-mate Carly Fiorina nearly ran into the ground.)

• CT-Sen: In an interesting development, fans of magical realism have been making a push for Borges to enter the Connecticut Senate race. Ah, wait. What’s that? Fuck. So, um, former state Treasurer Frank Borges (D), who left office in 1993, says supporters are asking him to run, and while’s he’s thinking about it, he’s set no timetable for a decision. Borges is CEO of a private equity firm (so I’m guessing he’s pretty rich), and he’d be the state’s first black senator if successful.

• FL-Sen: Rep. Vern Buchanan (R) is starting to sound like a “no” for the Senate race. Now that he’s scored a spot on the Ways & Means Committee, he says he’s less likely to seek a promotion. In fact, he very explicitly said: “If this hadn’t happened, I would have been looking to do something else.” That sort of talk has to make you figure that the GOP’s takeover of the House has actually been bad news for one Republican: NRSC chair John Cornyn.

In much sillier (and related) news, Cornyn told The Hill that he had tried to recruit former congressman and current MSNBC host Joe Scarborough to run against Bill Nelson. Undoubtedly, this made make Rep. Connie Mack a little hot under the collar, because the NRSC wigged out and Cornyn weirdly tried to claim the story was “not true,” even though Scarborough confirmed it. Rather, said Cornyn, he had been asking Joescar about a potential Senate run in… New York. (The Atlanta-born, Alabama-educated, Florida-elected Scarborough’s tv show is based in NYC.) Then, the NRSC took a dump on Joe, saying: “There are already a number of far stronger candidates looking at the Florida Senate race….” Whoops!

Also, there’s a tenative Biden alert! – the VPOTUS supposedly will come down to Florida later this month to raise money for Bill Nelson.

• IA-Sen: Wingnut Bob Vander Plaats, who did surprisingly well against now-Gov. Terry Branstad in last year’s Republican gubernatorial primary (with an assist from some Democratic ratfuckers), was asked whether he’s contemplating a run against Sen. Tom Harkin in 2014. Said BVP: “I think about it daily. That doesn’t mean I’m going to run against him, Ok. I don’t know.”

• IN-Sen: Now this is fucking interesting. I’m just going to let SSP commenter Bob Bobson summarize the situation:

WISH-TV’s Jim Shella noted on his blog today that that there exists a hypothetical but plausible scenario in which state Democrats could sue to overturn the results of last year’s election for Secretary of State by arguing that Charlie White wasn’t a valid candidate for office. That’s not really anything new, and has been rumored in the Hoosier political press for a while.

What is new here is that Shella points out that such a lawsuit, were it ruled in favor of the Democrats, wouldn’t just remove White from office, but would also make the Republicans a “minor party” under state law. SSPers probably remember the whole [10]% threshold thing from the Colorado governor’s race last year where Dan Maes’ trainwreck candidacy nearly cost the Colorado Republicans their ballot position as a major party, and there’s a similar regulation at play here. The difference is that in Indiana, it’s the Secretary of State race that decides which parties are “major,” and the threshold is [also] 10%. If White’s candidacy is invalidated, though, that could mean that the Republicans, legally, received zero votes in the SoS race last year.

That outcome would also mean that their nominating process for statewide candidates for the next four years would be via convention and not primary. And that means Dick Lugar becomes the next Bob Bennett.

In related news, Sean Keefer, who as Deputy Secretary of State was no. 2 to Charlie White (and also served as his chief of staff, and before that, as his campaign manager) just resigned, and there’s a report that White’s spokesman will also quit. Even better: White staged a totally bizarro impromptu press conference on the courthouse steps after a hearing in which he pleaded not guilty to all charges. The presser only ended after White’s attorney told him to “shut up” and led him away by the elbow. Fun times!

• MA-Sen: Deborah Shah, a consultant to Newton Mayor Setti Warren, sent around an email (I’m guessing to some listservs) looking for college kids interested in working on a potential Warren Senate campaign, set to be staffing up at the end of April. (Aren’t most students stressing about finals at that point?) Shah says that “This is just the first step to make sure you’re prepared.”

• MI-Sen: Pete Hoekstra hasn’t yet said if one of these days a Congressman from Michigan’s gonna come back home and run a Senate race, but he expects to decide this spring. One tea leaf suggests he’s rather stay focused on his lame-ass-looking consulting firm: He just shuttered his House campaign account, which he could have instantly turned into a Senate fund.

• OH-Sen: In response to ex-Gov. Ted Strickland calling him “scurrilous,” “bigoted,” “reprehensible,” and “laughable,” the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports that Republican state Treasurer Josh Mandel “said Strickland is a good person.” Maybe that makes Mandel look big, I dunno, but does it also make him look like a wuss to his biggest supporters, the teabag contingent? At the same q-and-a with other GOP elected officials, SoS Jon Husted (who has declined a run) said he’d like to see Mandel take on Sherrod Brown, while AG (and ex-Sen.) Mike DeWine much more amusingly said that a Brown-Mandel matchup would be “fascinating.” Is that Mr. Spock fascinating, or a trainwreck fascinating?

• AZ-08: Rep. Gabby Giffords’ doctors gave an update on the congresswoman’s recovery on Friday, and they sounded very upbeat about her progress (though they noted that it’s not a sure thing whether she’ll attend her husband’s space shuttle launch next month, contra what a staffer said last week). Meanwhile, 2010 Republican candidate Jesse Kelly, who very nearly beat Giffords, set up a new campaign committee for a potential rematch.

• CA-37: Though Rep. Laura Richardson (D) previously denied it, a letter of resignation sent by her former district scheduler suggests that the congresswoman is indeed the subject of an ethics probe, pertaining to misuse of staff. Now Richardson’s office is simply refusing to comment. The staffer’s letter is really brutal, citing “constant verbal and emotional abuse” and requests that she perform tasks “on the ethical borderline.” I can’t imagine Richardson has a very long future in Congress (she originally won office in a 2007 special with just 37% of the primary vote in this very blue district), so who do you think could replace her?

• NM-01, NM-Sen: State Sen. Eric Griego (D), who is considering a run for the House if fellow Dem Martin Heinrich decides to go for the Senate race, says he expects “the smoke to clear” by April or May, in terms of people making decisions about what they’re gonna do.

• NV-02: Jon Ralston says that retired Navy Commander Kirk Lippold is “in” the race for Nevada’s 2nd congressional district, which ought to have a very interesting GOP primary, at the least. Lippold, who was captain of the USS Cole when it was bombed by Al Qaeda a decade ago, was touted as a possible challenger to Harry Reid last year.

• NV-03: Freshman Rep. Joe Heck was the only Republican to vote against defunding the Federal Housing Administration Refinance Program (designed to help homeowners with underwater mortgages). Anticipating criticism, he put out a video press release (an actual video press release, not a “tv ad with a tiny buy designed to get free media attention”) defending his vote. Could Heck be worried about getting teabagged?

• NY-26: Republican nominee Jane Corwin just received the Independence Party’s nomination for the special election as well, and ya know, this is a pretty darn good demonstration of why the Democrats’ dithering on selecting a candidate has been a pretty dumb move. I mean, even if the IP wanted to endorse a Dem, they couldn’t! (Or at least, couldn’t do so yet.)

Anyhow, 2010 NY-Sen-A GOP primary loser (in other words, the guy who couldn’t beat the guy who got vaporized by Chuck Schumer) Gary Bernsten sent out an email asking supporters to help teabagger David Bellavia petition his way on to the ballot as an independent. I’d be surprised if this effort is successful, though – Bellavia has only until March 19 to collection 3,500 signatures. Crazy Jack Davis is doing the same thing, but at least he has a shot, since he’s putting his millions to work for him.

• SD-AL: I linked this story in the Pete Hoekstra item above (see MI-Sen), but ex-Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin has also closed her campaign account, suggesting that Steve Israel’s efforts to woo her into a rematch with Republican Kristi Noem haven’t been successful. The Fix has a long list of other Dems (and a few Repubs) who have shut down their FEC committees – click the link for the rest.

• TX-LG: Texas Ag. Comm’r Todd Staples isn’t ruling out a run for Lt. Gov., a seat which could become open if the current occupant, David Dewhurst, wins Kay Bailey Hutchison’s Senate seat. Other possible aspirants include Comptroller Susan Combs and Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson. (And yes, since this is Texas and everyone I just mentioned holds statewide office, that means they’re all Republicans.) While you might be wondering why we’re going so far down into the weeds here, the LG job is considered one of the most powerful in Texas (some like to say even more powerful that the governor’s), because the LG is also President of the state Senate.

• Wisconsin Recall: The DLCC just launched a TV ad against GOP state Sen. Luther Olsen, attacking him for flip-flopping to support Scott Walker’s anti-union legislation – though it does not mention anything about the recall effort which Olsen is (among others) the subject of. The ad (which you can watch here) is running in Green Bay, and a spokesman tells me that the buy is “about 1000 points.”

Also, check out this piece from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Craig Gilbert, which begins:

Number of state lawmakers removed from office by recall in all of American history: 13.

Number of state lawmakers currently facing recall campaigns in Wisconsin: 16.

• Hawaii: In order to avoid another Charles Djou, the Hawaii House just passed a bill to institute instant runoff voting (aka IRV) for special Congressional elections. Of course, they could just hold primaries instead of jungle elections.

• WATN?: Scott Lee Cohen, the disastrous Lt. Gov. candidate whose utterly failed gubernatorial bid probably saved Pat Quinn’s ass, is hoping to replace ex-state Sen. Rickey Hendon, who resigned last month. Given that the replacement gets picked by a panel of Chicago Democratic Party committeemen, I’m guessing that Cohen’s chances are somewhere between zero and nil.

Redistricting Roundup:

• Idaho: At least one local expert is confirming what we observed last week: population shrinkage in the 2nd CD will likely require it to absorb the entire city of Boise, which is currently split between the state’s two districts.

• New Jersey: Richard Lee has some interesting historical details about the 1990 round of redistricting, focusing on two politicians who are still part of New Jersey’s congressional delegation today: Rep. Frank Pallone and Sen. Bob Menendez. Menendez’s federal career was launched when New Jersey’s loss of a seat led to the creation of an Hispanic-friendly district. Pallone, meanwhile, was targeted for elimination by his own party. Said one Republican: “I’d like to see Mr. Pallone defeated. But apparently I don’t want to see him defeated as much as the Democrats do.” Obviously, Pallone lived to fight another day.

Meanwhile, Rutgers Prof. (and state redistricting tiebreak vote) Alan Rosenthal supposedly put out a memo outlining his vision for a fair legislative map, reportedly leading state Dems to believe their vision is much more closely aligned with Rosenthal’s than is the Republicans’. But it doesn’t seem like this memo, if it exists, has been released online.

• AZ-Sen: I had sort of forgotten that J.D. Hayworth had said he was interested in running for Jon Kyl’s seat, but yeah, there he was, chatting up The Hill yesterday, and telling them that Jeff Flake has “delusions.” Jeff Flake is the one with the delusions? Anyhow, Hayworth refused to offer a timetable for his decision, and believe it or not, there’s actually one guy who cares: Joe Arpaio. As you’ll recall, the dipshit sheriff flip-flopped the other day and said that yeah, he’d like to continue pretending he’s interested in the race, but now he’s also saying that he’ll wait for Hayworth’s decision first. I’m not sure anyone has ever shown J.D. this much respect before!

• IN-Sen: Not only has Dick Lugar given no indication that he’s interested in running as an independent, but his flip-flopping cave on the House GOP budget bill is, to me, evidence that he plans to terminate his political life as a member of the Republican Party. Still, for fun, the National Journal looked at what it would take for Loogs to make the ballot as an indie. He’d need 35,000 signatures (2% of the vote cast in the most recent SoS election) – but he’d also have to drop out of the GOP primary, as Indiana has a so-called “sore loser” law which prevents someone who loses a primary from running in the general.

You might have also heard about newly-discovered issues Lugar’s voter registration. It came to light a few weeks ago that Lugar typically lives in a hotel in Indianapolis when he returns home (which reminds me a lot of Indiana’s other senator, Dan Coats, who preferred to spend his time in North Carolina). It also turns out that Lugar is registered to vote using the address of an old family home which was sold years ago. The senator’s spokesperson probably should have said something other than Lugar “remains a Hoosier in the eyes of the law.”

• MA-Sen: Newton Mayor Setti Warren told Wicked Local that he’ll make a decision on a Senate run “sometime in the spring.” (There words, not his.)

• MT-Sen: For those of you carping about the lack of Montana stories in the digest, here’s one: the Montana Retail Association and the Montana Convenience Store Association are running radio ads against Jon Tester, to, as Roll Call puts it, “dissuade him from delaying reforms to the debit card “swipe fees” that are scheduled to go into effect later this year.” NWOTSOTB (that’s No Word On The Size Of The Buy – remember it), but this ad seems much more genuinely issued-focused rather than some kind of attempt to bolster Tester’s opponent, Republican Rep. Denny Rehberg.

• MO-Sen: Ben Smith writes: “The questions around McCaskill’s flights are likely to be an issue in McCaskill’s re-election campaign next year.” Here, let me fix that for you: “The questions around McCaskill’s flights are likely to be made a fake non-issue by sensationalists like Ben Smith in McCaskill’s re-election campaign next year.” Hope that helps!

• NM-Sen: Well, someone at Roll Call is sleeping on concrete tonight: Lt. Gov. John Sanchez reportedly will not announce a decision about a Senate run until after the legislative session. That’s soon, though: March 19th.

• TX-Sen: John Cornyn says he won’t endorse in the very crowded field to replace Kay Bailey Hutchison. Local Republicans also say he isn’t engaging in any behind-the-scenes favoritism either.

• VA-Sen: Does anyone else remember the AP’s Charles Babington saying, back on Feb. 25th, that Tim Kaine would decide on a Senate run “within a week”? You should, because it was in the digest. But not, apparently, in real life, since the mind-numbingly painful Tim Kaine goes on (and on, and on). I think the Beltway media just have a particular fascination with this one, since Kaine is a DC figure and his next-door state always looms large. Annnyhow, Timmeh is attending a dinner in honor of ex-Rep. Rick Boucher in southwestern VA this weekend, but “an official who can speak for Kaine” tells Roll Call that her (his?) boss won’t be making any announcements this weekend. Just give us Tom Perriello already!

• AZ-Gov: Just watch the video and enjoy.

• LA-Gov: It’s from last week, but the New York Times had a good story on the dodgy campaign finance practices of the allegedly incorruptible (but obviously not) Bobby Jindal. If you are, say, a big telecommunications firm or an oil-and-gas giant and want to receive special treatment from the state of Louisiana, and you know contributions to the governor’s re-election campaign are capped at a measly five grand, you just make a plus-sized gift to Jindal’s wife’s charity and bam! there you go. Full details on this sordid practice at the link. Best ethics laws, my ass.

• OH-Gov, OH-17: Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan has been amping up his populist attacks on Gov. John Kasich and the Ohio GOP’s anti-labor and anti-middle class agenda (with the centerpiece being a the right-to-work piece of legislation known as SB5). Associates say he’s potentially gearing up for a run against Kasich in 2014, and notably, he’s being advised by ex-Gov. Ted Strickland. One Democratic operative speculates, though, that perhaps Ryan is trying to warn the GOP away from fucking with his district lines too much this year: if they forcibly turn him out of office in 2012, the 39-year-old Ryan will definitely be looking for a new job in 2014.

• WI-Gov: The Hotline asked Russ Feingold if he’d consider running against Scott Walker in a hypothetical recall election next year. An aide gave a typical non-answer, suggesting Feingold isn’t ruling it out, but noting that he’s teaching at Marquette Law School and writing a book at the moment.

• AZ-08: Hopefully this is a sign that Rep. Gabby Giffords’ recovery is going well: Not only will her husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, go up on the space shuttle next month (this long-planned mission is his last chance to do so before the shuttle fleet is retired), but she’ll be there to watch the launch.

• NV-02: Two scoops of plump juicy raisins for the Nevada News Bureau yesterday. First, they announced that Rep. Dean Heller (R) would be getting into the Senate race. Now they’re following up with a report that, according to their sources, state Sen. Mark Amodei (R) will run for the 2nd district seat. You may recall that Amodei, who is also the GOP state party chair, briefly ran for the Senate last year before realizing he didn’t stand a chance against Chicken Lady and Crazy Lady.

• PA-15: The conservative David Koch front group Americans for Prosperity is running radio ads (NWOTSOTB) in GOP Rep. Charlie Dent’s district, in the hopes of “encouraging” him not to stray from the Republican pack and start voting against signature agenda items in a bid to preserve his so-called “moderate” voting record. I like this, because pressure on GOP “moderates” in the 2005-08 timeframe helped deliver a number of seats to us. Hopefully the same pattern will pick up once again now that Republicans have the majority in the House and start acting recklessly.

• Wisconsin Recall: MoveOn has leaked some data from two Wisconsin polls SurveyUSA took for the group. MoveOn tested a generic recall question against two Republican state senators: Randy Hopper and Dan Kapanke. Only 43% said they’d vote for Hopper, while 54% said “someone else”; for Kapanke, it was 41-57. Since I know you’ve bookmarked SSP’s indispensible post that shows presidential election results by senate district, then you’re aware that Kapanke sits in the bluest district, while Hopper won by the narrowest margin in 2008 (just 0.2% – a result which was the subject of a recount).

Meanwhile, Dave Weigel notes that four liberal groups – MoveOn, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Democracy for America, and Daily Kos – have raised almost $2 million in support of the recall efforts.

• WI Sup. Ct.: As it happens, there’s another really important race going on in Wisconsin right now: a Democrat, JoAnne Kloppenburg, is challenging Republican state Supreme Court Justice David Prosser. The race is technically non-partisan, but Prosser used to be the Republican state House Majority Leader. More importantly, if Kloppenburg were to win, she’d shift the balance on the court from 3-4 to 4-3 in our favor, which could be crucial if the court is called upon to rule on any of Scott Walker’s legislative thuggery.

Redistricting Roundup:

• Mississippi: Yeah, this is definitely an example of saying the quiet part loud.

• Redistricting: While devoted Swingnuts will be familiar with much of this list, Aaron Blake has a good roundup of members of Congress who are potential redistricting victims – and who are deciding whether they’d rather jump (to another elective office) or get pushed (into oblivion).

• CA-Sen: We can probably rule out another Senate run by Chuck DeVore: he’s setting his sights lower… much, much lower. Chuck D is, in fact, forming an exploratory committee for Orange County’s Third District Board of Supervisors. An exploratory committee!

Somewhat related, yet another chart from Greg Giroux: The most recent Gov, Sen, and Pres numbers by CD in California, as well as key demographics highlights from the new census data.

• MA-Sen: And yet another Greg Giroux special. (If you’re not following this guy on Twitter, you are using Twitter wrong.) Alan Khazei (D) has formed a 527 exploratory committee “for a potential run for public office.” I’m not exactly clear, though, on why it’s a 527 rather than a normal FEC exploratory committee.

• MD-Sen: Remember when Dick Cheney ran the Republican operation to choose a vice presidential candidate in 2000… and picked himself? GOPer Eric Wargotz has managed to come up with an even more pathetic form of self-love: He’s created his own “Draft Eric Wargotz” page on Facebook. In case the name doesn’t ring a bell, he was 26-point roadkill for Barbara Mikulski last cycle, but now he wants the public to rapturously embrace a run against Maryland’s other Democratic senator, Ben Cardin. (By the way, this is my favorite comment so far.)

• ME-Sen: I meant to mention this in yesterday’s post on PPP’s poll, but in any event, state House Minority Leader Emily Cain (D), all of thirty years old and already on the verge of being term-limited out, isn’t ruling out a run against Olympia Snowe, but says it probably won’t happen. Even though she’s just barely eligible to run under the constitution, she’d has a bitchin’ campaign theme song just waiting to get rocked out.

• MO-Sen: I had a feeling things might wind up moving in this direction. Jan. 27:

However, the offices of Republican Reps. Blaine Luetkemeyer and Todd Akin told Roll Call that the Congressmen are not interested in running for the Senate.

Feb. 26:

“Some people want to draft me for Senate but you know engineers. It’s just one thing at a time,” said Akin, an engineer.

Mar. 9:

“I haven’t discounted it,” [Akin] told The Ballot Box on Tuesday night. “Some things you sort of put on your problem shelf and you know you’re going to deal with it at some time. It’s just one of those things that I’ve got to work through.

Todd Akin can’t resist the siren song of the Senate race – not with the field of damaged Republican B-listers gathering on the misty plains of Missouri. Just one question: Is “problem shelf” common engineer-speak, or is Akin just a special brand of dweeb?

As for this, it seems like classic Politico ginned-up b.s. So Claire McCaskill spends less taxpayer money on air travel than Kit Bond or Jim Talent, but because Politico makes a big deal out of her using a plane she co-owns with a group of investors, it becomes campaign fodder. Hopefully, with McCaskill saying she’ll reimburse Treasury for the costs, this’ll be a one-day story, unless Politico decides this move makes her look “guilty” (of what, I don’t know).

• NV-Sen: Rep. Shelley Berkley says she’s doing some polling right now and is still on track to make a decision in late spring/early summer. (I guess that’s somewhere between May 1 and August 1.) Berkley also reports that she’s been in contact with all the members of the B Team – Secretary of State Ross Miller, Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto and State Treasurer Kate Marshall – and: “They all said the exact same thing, ‘We’re waiting on you, we love you and then we’ll make our decision.'”

• OH-Sen: Usually I ignore politicians when they comment on races – most of what they say is clueless or canned. But I love Ted Strickland, and you’ll love his incredulous reaction when he was asked what he thought of the possibility of GOP state Treasurer Josh Mandel challenging Sen. Sherrod Brown. Said Teddy Ballgame: “Give me a break, that is laughable. I don’t think that would be a contest at all.” And he went on from there – click through for the rest. (Incidentally, I came across this amusing tidbit thanks to the Google: Back in 2006, when running for state Rep., Mandel refused to say whether he was supporting Republican gubernatorial nominee Ken Blackwell – or, yeah, Ted Strickland.)

• WI-Sen: This is just so mega-weird I won’t bother trying to summarize:

When questioned about his reelection plans by National Journal Tuesday, 76-year-old Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) asked, “Am I running?” He then shrugged, wordlessly. Kohl then asked “are you are a reporter?” Told “yes,” he walked away without a word.

In response to further media inquiries, an undoubtedly groaning staffer said that Kohl “will announce his decision later this year” as to whether he’ll run again. What worries me the most, honestly, is DSCC chair Patty Murray’s response to questions about Wisconsin’s very senior senator: “Herb’s just great.” Really, this is the kind of thing a committee leader needs to be on top of. There are ways to evade questions (“I know Herb is still making up his mind”), and then there are ways to just look evasive – and this is the latter.

• WV-Sen: Yep, like I said, long two years.

• CT-Gov, CT-Sen: Quinnipiac has approvals for Gov. Dan Malloy (35-40), Sen. Joe Lieberman (38-45), Sen. Richard Blumenthal (49-25), Barack Obama (49-47). That last number in particular seems rather low to me. I wonder what Quinnipiac’s sample composition is… but they ain’t sharin’.

• ME-Gov: A Republican state senator proposed a state constitutional amendment which would institute gubernatorial run-offs if no candidate got a majority of the vote on election day (something that has happened in four of the the last five gov races). The bill would have a high hurdle to become law, though – two-thirds of the legislature would have to vote for it, and it would also have to go before voters.

• NJ-01: Rep. Rob Andrews, as though dipped in the cranberry bogs of the Pine Barrens, has renewed his soul and emerged as that unlikeliest of legislators: a Nancy Pelosi ally. Andrews was best known for dodgy behavior and fratricidal tendencies, but a period in the wilderness after his humiliation at the hands of Frank Lautenberg has apparently turned him into a better man. Read the article for the complete picture.

• NM-01: Former state Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones, who gave up her House seat in a failed bid for the GOP gubernatorial nomination last year, says she’s forming an exploratory committee to look at a challenge to Rep. Martin Heinrich. Heinrich is considering a run for Senate (something Arnold-Jones was also looking at), so she may have an opportunity for an open-seat run if that happens. Arnold-Jones staged an abortive bid for this seat the last time it was open, in 2008.

• NY-26: Good news! We finally have a date for the special election to replace ex-Rep. Chris Lee: May 24th. Even better news! Democrats are finally getting their act together and will be interviewing short-listed candidates this week and next. Those names: Erie County Clerk Kathy Hochul; Amherst town council member Mark Manna; former Amherst Town supervisor Satish Mohan; and Some Dudes Robert Stall, Martin Minemier, Jane Bauch, and Diana Voit. Meanwhile, teabagger David Bellavia says he’s still considering petitioning his way on to the ballot as an independent, but the clock is fast running down.

• Wisconsin Recall: So the Republicans running the rump of the Wisconsin state Senate managed to pass (or think they’ve passed) their union-busting measures without the need for a quorum. (Read the link for the full procedural run-down.) The lone no vote was Dale Schultz, who isn’t elligible for recall this year but does sit in one of the two-bluest districts held by a Republican, according to SSP’s now-seminal analysis.

• NY-St. Sen: The frogs get marched out one by one, hurrah, hurrah! The frogs get marched out one by one, hurrah – hurrah! Scumdog state Sen. Carl Kruger (D, sadly) just turned himself in to the FBI on corruption charges. Among Kruger’s many sins, he threatened to caucus with the Republicans in after the Democrats won back the chamber for the first time in generations back in 2008. He also voted against the gay marriage bill that came up late in 2009. Unfortunately, Kruger holds the second-reddest seat in the entire state (amazingly enough, though, it’s 45% Obama, thanks to the GOP’s awesome gerrymander). If he steps down, it’ll be an exceptionally difficult hold, though, since Dems control very few seats where Obama did worse than 60%.

• Maps: The Atlantic has a cool interactive map featuring the “12 States of America” – the US, broken up at the county level into varying socio-economic groupings (with cutesy names, of course).

• Special Elections: Johnny Longtorso is now contributing special election results wrap-ups:

In Arkansas HD-24, Republican Bruce Cozart emerged victorious by a 60-40 margin. Tennessee’s SD-18 was no surprise, with a 2-1 margin for Republican Kerry Roberts. In California’s AD-04, the lone Democrat, Dennis Campanale, made it into first place, albeit with only around 32%, and will face Republican Beth Gaines, who squeaked past fellow Republican John Allard by a 1% margin (22.5 to 21.5), in the May runoff. [The first CA race to feature a run-off under the new top-two system. – David]

Also, a quick shout-out to the newest member of the Tennessee House (HD-98), Democrat Antonio “2 Shay” Parkinson, and the newest member of the Virginia House of Delegates (HD-91), Republican Gordon Helsel, both of whom were unopposed on Tuesday.

• State Leges: Louis Jacobson of Governing magazine has an interesting look at various proposals in several states to shrink the sizes of their respective legislatures. However, if history is any guide, most of these won’t go anywhere.

Redistricting Roundup:

• New Jersey: Patrick Murray, the director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute, has put together a couple of proposed legislative maps, one that he calls a “constitutional” map, the other, a “competitive” map.

• Virginia: This seems like a pretty good deal, if you ask me:

Senate Majority Leader Richard “Dick” Saslaw said on a Northern Virginia radio show the other day that he had reached a “gentleman’s agreement” with Republican leaders in the House on how to go about redistricting the state….

“I’m not gonna interfere with the lines the House draws for the House,” he said. “And they’re not gonna interfere with the lines I draw for the Senate.”

Dems hold the Senate, and the GOP holds the House and the governor’s mansion, so I’ll take it.

• Wisconsin: Aaron Blake has another good entry in his redistricting series, though the bottom line is that even though Republicans control the process, they don’t have a great deal of ability to improve life for themselves. One thought that I had: If the recall effort in the WI Senate is successful, then Dems could suddenly give themselves a seat at the redistricting table where they had none before. Verrry interesting.

An absolutely mammoth-sized digest for your enjoyment today. You can return the favor by following us on Twitter or liking us on Facebook!

• FL-Sen: Remember that beyond-pathetic non-book that Mike Haridopolos “wrote” for Brevard Community College – a work so bad that the school was too embarrassed to ever even publish it? (Sample observation: politicians should carry cell phones. Political GOLD.) Actually, I lied – it’s now available to anyone with a Kindle and enough ingrown stupidity to spent $9.99 on it. But none of this, believe it or not, is even the reason for this bullet. Rather, the Miami Herald points out that in 2006 and 2009, Haridopolos directed a total of $3.1 million in the state budget toward none other than Brevard Community College. Payback for that payback sure is turning out to be a bitch, huh?

• HI-Sen: KHON2 has a rundown of the federal bank accounts of potential contenders for Dan Akaka’s now-open Senate seat. Here’s one odd thing: Charles Djou still has a quarter million bucks left over. What on earth did he do that for?

• MA-Sen: Mutual fund executive Robert Pozen says he isn’t running for Senate – “unless the Democratic Party asks me to.” Considering he served as an advisor to Mitt Romney and worked on a George W. Bush Social Security panel which recommended privatization, I’m gonna guess that he’ll be waiting by the phone for quite a while.

• MI-Sen: In response to a Facebook page trying to draft him, a spokesman for uber-teabagger Justin Amash says that he “is not contemplating a Senate run.” This also confirms a pet theory of mine, which is that if you want to grab a candidate’s attention and get him or her on the record as to whether they’ll seek a higher office, all you need to do is create a Facebook page, sign up a few people (Amash’s has just 130 “likes”), and spread the word a bit (either to the media or the candidate directly) – and bam, you’ll get an answer.

• NJ-Sen: Several states to the east, another teabagger favorite – one with a lot less to lose – is steeping a different bag of darjeeling. Anna Little, who lost to Rep. Frank Pallone last year after upsetting a wealthy establishment-type candidate in the GOP primary, says she’s considering a run against Bob Menendez. She’s previously said she wants to take on Pallone in a rematch, so who knows what she’ll wind up doing.

• NM-Sen: Alright, it’s not quite the horse’s mouth, but politically speaking, it’s just as good: A spokesperson for Republican Lt. Gov. John Sanchez says his boss is “seriously considering” running for Senate. He’d provide a conservative alternative to Heather Wilson (who made her entry official today), and he’s also personally wealthy and has self-funded in the past.

• NV-Sen: This would make life a hell of a lot more interesting: Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki, who contemplated a Senate run last cycle, says he’s considering a bid to succeed John Ensign. The fact that Krolicki is openly declaring this suggests to me he’s not afraid of going head-to-head with Rep. Dean Heller in the GOP primary – and that perhaps the idea of Heller being some kind of Republican steamroller is a bit overblown.

• OH-Sen: We’ve mentioned this guy before, but the WaPo has a longish profile of 33-year-old Republican state Treasurer Josh Mandel, who won election just last year and hasn’t ruled out a Senate run. The piece claims that Mandel has cross-party appeal, but it also quotes a teabagger leader who says Mandel is “just great on the issues and has been right from the start.” Both of these things cannot be simultaneously true.

Somewhat related, Greg Giroux helpfully provides a breakdown of last year’s gubernatorial and senate results from Ohio by congressional district.

• RI-Sen, RI-01: Scott MacKay at WNRI (a local NPR station) has a helpful backgrounder on Brendan Doherty, the state police chief who abruptly announced his resignation the other day and is thought to be contemplating a run for federal office this cycle. MacKay makes the argument that Rep. David Cicilline may present a more tempting target than Sheldon Whitehouse, largely due to the fallout from Providence’s financial troubles (the city where Cicilline was mayor until getting elected to the House).

• TX-Sen: I don’t think it’ll move any votes, but it’s a signal: Sen. Mike Lee of Utah – who may represent the purest, most highly distilled strain of teabagger – just endorsed Ted Cruz for Senate. But note the item just below – Lee won’t endorse his fellow Utahn Orrin Hatch for re-election.

• UT-Sen: While we’re on the theme of Utah and teabaggers, I actually think Orrin Hatch is being pretty smart here, Lee’s non-endorsement non-withstanding. I mean, his attempts to prove fealty to the insane-o-philes are brutally embarrassing, but they may just save his hide – which is all he cares about. His latest effort involves trying to hire prominent teabaggers as organizers for his campaign (for $2,500 a month). The Salt Lake Tribune talked to two people Hatch had reached out to – one took the job, the other liked the offer to bribery. I would have expected Republicans to appreciate the virtues of selling out a little more, but then again, the true believers usually get left out in the cold. (An aside: The article also mentions another possible challenger to Hatch, state Sen. Dan Liljenquist.)

• VA-Sen: PPP has some numbers out for the Democratic “primary” in Virginia – and I put that word in quotation marks because really, if Tim Kaine runs, no one else will, and if he doesn’t, it’s a totally different ballgame. Anyhow, Kaine is the wide favorite of Virginia Dems, to absolutely no one’s surprise. In related news, Mike Signer, a Democrat who got crushed in the primary for the party’s Lt. Gov. nomination in 2009, says he won’t run for Senate, either (or state Senate, but there’s talk he might run for AG in 2013).

• MO-Gov: Dave Catanese has some bits and pieces from a poll by Republican pollster Public Opinion Strategies, the most interesting one of which is Gov. Jay Nixon’s saintly 61-26 job approval rating. I’ve gotta believe the poll included head-to-heads with super-likely opponent Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder (R), but they don’t seem to have been made available.

• WV-Gov: The Democratic Executive Committee of Charleston (the state’s capital and largest city) hosted a gubernatorial straw poll over the weekend, and state Treasurer John Perdue came in first with 25% of the vote in a tight field. House Speaker Rick Thompson got 24, Acting Senate President Jeff Kessler 22, Secretary of State Natalie Tennant 21, and Acting Governor Earl Ray Tomblin just 6.

• CA-36: Yet another Republican has joined the field in the special election to replace Jane Harman: Hermosa Beach City Councilman (and attorney, and Air Force vet) Kit Bobko is now the third GOPer in the race. Is this all part of some super-genious plan? Anyway, at least one Republican is getting out of the way: former Rep. Steve Kuykendall (who beat Janice Hahn to serve a single term in 1998, when the seat was last open, only to lose when Jane Harman – the previous occupant – victoriously returned in 2000) says he won’t run because he’s convinced the district will be “gone” after redistricting.

• CA-41: Not long ago, we speculated that the mopey Jerry Lewis might be contemplating retirement, seeing how he got passed over for key leadership spots and had just a few rusty nickels in his campaign account. Well, thanks to the Sunlight Foundation’s cool new “Political Party Time” website, we know that Lewis is hosting a high-dollar DC fundraiser next week, so perhaps he’s gearing up again. Still, he ain’t comin’ off our watch list just yet.

• Iowa: It really sounds like former Iowa first lady Christie Vilsack is gearing up to run for the House. As the Des Moines Register notes, she quit her job at a non-profit last week, and has been meeting with political operatives and party regulars. As pretty much everyone has noted, though, where the heck will she run? Iowa’s losing a seat (going from five to four), and has three incumbent Democrats. This isn’t a game of musical chairs so much as it is Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots.

• MO-03, MO-LG: Missouri’s Lt. Gov. spot is expected to be open (see the MO-Gov item above w/r/t Peter Kinder), but even if it isn’t, Dems still need a candidate. One possibility is 3rd CD Rep. Russ Carnahan, who may get drawn into oblivion. Other possibilities include former State Sen. Wes Shoemyer (who lost his senate seat last year) and State Rep. Sara Lampe.

• NJ-02: Andrew McCrosson, treasurer to Rep. Frank LoBiondo (R) for fifteen years, just plead guilty to embezzling over $450,000 from his boss’s campaign accounts, going back at least half a decade. Reminds of a very similar thing which happened to ex-Rep. Chris Shays.

• NY-26: Gov. Andrew Cuomo says he’ll announce the date of the special election here “later this week.” That means we’ll have an election around two-and-a-half months from now. Some cat fud just got stuffed back into the tin, though (but it was expected): Conservative Party chair Mike Long just announced he’s backing Republican nominee Jane Corwin. That more-or-less means his party’s meeting to announce a formal endorsement next week is a foregone conclusion.

As a result, teabagging Iraq vet David Bellavia now says he’s not sure if he’ll make an independent bid, citing the daunting task of collecting 3,500 signatures in the twelve days after Cuomo announces. But wait! Crazy Jack Davis says he’ll spend $3 million of his own money pursuing an independent bid. Hopefully he’ll run wildly to the right, but regrettably, his three runs on the Democratic ticket might mean he’ll claw more votes from our side than theirs.

• IL Redistricting: Gov. Pat Quinn just signed a new law requiring that racial or language minority communities not get split up when drawing state legislative lines. This measure was pushed in part by leaders in Chicago’s Chinatown, who didn’t want their neighborhood chopped up between districts once again.

• Special Elections: Johnny-Longtorso-on-the-spot:

Another light week; there are technically four specials tonight, but two are unopposed: Tennessee’s HD-98, a Democratic hold, and Virginia’s HD-91, a Republican hold. The two contested elections are Tennessee’s SD-18, freshman Rep. Diane Black’s district, a safe Republican seat; and Arkansas’ HD-24, where the Republican candidate died before the 2010 election, but was elected posthumously, so the seat ended up vacant. The latter might be interesting, given the Democrats’ recent troubles – it was held by a Dem who was term-limited prior to the deceased Republican winning it last year.

That Arkansas special has gotten exceedingly vile: A member of the Garland County Republican Committee has been sending around emails attacking Dem Jerry Rephan as “a pro-abortion Jewish lawyer” and emphasizing the need to support Republican Bruce Cozart because he’s a “Christian.”

• Wisconsin Recall: In a really interesting article, Craig Gilbert of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel observes that recall efforts are now underway against 16 state senators – 8 Dems and 8 Republicans – something that appears to be unprecedented in scope, pretty much anywhere. The largest number of state legislator recalled at the same time for the same reason? Two, on three separate occasions in three different states. One other detail: The number of signatures required varies from 11,817 in Dem-held SD-06 to 20,973 in GOP-controlled SD-28. But the whole piece is worth a read.

• WATN?: Several entries in the “Where Are They Now?” Dept. today. Democratic ex-Rep. Brad Ellsworth (IN-08) will become president of Vectren Corp.’s Indiana gas utility division in May. Democratic ex-Rep. Paul Hodes (NH-02) says he’s starting a new firm to help New Hampshire companies “that need a better understanding of Washington.” Hodes is being very careful not to call himself a lobbyist, since he’s barred from that activity for a year; his comments (and his new choice of career) suggest he’s not planning a return to politics. And finally, Republican ex-Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite (FL-05), who announced her retirement last year on the day of the filing deadline, says her health has improved (that was, she says, her reason for stepping down in the first place) and that she wants to run for office again. She’s not sure exactly what office, though, and she won’t decide until the middle of this year.

• HI-Sen: I’m not sure where these rumors started – or if they’re just tradmed speculation – but Gov. Neil Abercrombie says he hasn’t tried to get retiring Sen. Dan Akaka to resign early in order to appoint a replacement (who could then run for a full term next year as an incumbent). Count me among those who thinks former Gov. Linda Lingle isn’t as intimidating in real life as she might seem on paper – particularly given the fact that Barack Obama is running for re-election, and that her exit poll approvals in 2010 were a sucky 41-56. So I’m not convinced there’d even really be any point in trying to push an Akaka resignation.

• ME-Sen: As we wait for the Great Teabagger Hope to deliver our dreams, the Hotline has word of another possible challenger to Sen. Olympia Snowe: former state legislator Carol Weston, who is now the state director of the Maine branch of the David Koch front group Americans for Prosperity. That could mean access to serious resources – something Weston acknowledges is a key factor in deciding on a run. Anyhow, she’s not ruling out a run, but claims she isn’t really considering it yet. But she also says that as part of her job with AfP, she sometimes has to “reign in” Snowe – pretty denigrating words, if you ask me!

• MI-Sen: We’ve mentioned him before, but now he’s making it official: Former juvenile court judge and all-around social conservative Randy Hekman says he’ll seek the GOP line to challenge Debbie Stabenow. Hekman sounds decidedly Some Dude-level, though.

• NV-Sen: This time, the joke comes pre-written. The ultra-wealthy Sue Lowden still has hundreds of thousands in campaign debts and has now been sued by her former polling company, Denver-based Vitale & Associates, for unpaid bills. The pollster’s attorney said Lowden is “probably driving around in her Bentley with a load of chickens in the back as barter to settle her campaign debts.”

• PA-Sen: Pretty sweet re-elects for Bob Casey (D) in this new Muhlenberg College poll of registered voters: 48% say yes, 24% no, and 25% are unsure. Against Generic R, Casey pulls 41 to 27, but Muhlenberg also allowed people to say “it depends on the candidate” (not sure that’s such a helpful choice), which scored 18. It’s not entirely clear what the sample looked like, though, since the Mule only gives the breakdowns for their larger “all adults” sample (36D, 36R, 11I). In 2008, it was 44D, 37R, 18I.

• RI-Sen, RI-01: The head of the Rhode Island state police, Brendan Doherty, just unexpectedly announced that he would resign in April, and that’s leading to talk he might be considering a run for office as a Republican. Though Doherty had originally been appointed by Republican Gov. Don Carcieri, he was re-appointed only last week by the new governor, Lincoln Chafee. Anyhow, Doherty supposedly is choosing between a challenge to Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse or to freshman Rep. David Cicilline in the first district. He says he’ll announce his plans at the end of May.

• VA-Sen, VA-11: Rep. Gerry Connolly (D) is opting out of a Senate run, saying instead he’ll seek re-election to a third term in the House. Like just about everyone else, he also declared that he wants to see Tim Kaine run. Speaking of which, Sen. Mark Warner said on the teevee this weekend that he thinks the odds of Kaine jumping in were “slim” but “are getting a lot better right now.” I have no idea if Warner has any special insight, or if maybe he’s just trying to pull a reverse-Inouye here (i.e., goad someone into running).

On a related note, PPP has a state-level report card out for VA politicians.

• NV-Gov: Jon Ralston calls it “one of the most brazen schemes in Nevada history” (not just electoral history! and this is Nevada!), while Rory Reid says everything he did was “fully disclosed and complied with the law.” Ralston describes this “scheme” as the formation of “91 shell political action committees that were used to funnel three quarters of a million dollars into his campaign.” Ralston’s had wall-to-wall coverage at his site. Among other things, Reid’s legal advisor wrote a letter to the campaign saying he thought the use of these PACs was legal – and, in a point that Ralston is seriously disputing, also said he got sign-off from the Secretary of State. I don’t really think Reid had much of a future in NV politics anyway, but if Ralston’s reading of the situation is right, this could spell a lot of trouble for him. If not, then it’s just some sketchy politics-as-usual. Even Ralston himself acknowledges that “the point here is less whether it actually was legal… but whether it should be.”

• CA-36: Finally some endorsements for Debra Bowen: She just announced the backing of state Sens. Alan Lowenthal and Fran Pavley, state Rep. Betsy Butler, and former state Sen. Sheila Kuehl.

• MN-08: This is from a couple of weeks ago, but still relevant: Duluth-area state Sen. Roger Reinert says he won’t challenge freshman GOPer Chip Cravaack next year, adding his name to the list of Dems who have declined to run. Others who have said no: Duluth Mayor Don Ness; former state House Majority Leader Tony Sertich; state Rep. Tom Rukavina; and state Senate Minority Leader Tom Bakk (whom we’d previously mentioned). Man, that’s a lot of dudes named Tom! (UPDATE: Just two – it’s Tony, not Tom, Sertich.) That’s most of the heaviest hitters, but another possible candidate is Duluth City Councilman Jeff Anderson, who told FOX 21 that he is “very interested” (their words) in the race.

• Milwaukee Co. Exec.: Huh – I’d managed to forget that Scott Walker didn’t just emerge fully-formed out of a rent in David Koch’s skull on January 1st, 2011. Until not that long ago, he was the Milwaukee County Executive, which means that his old seat is up in a special election next month. It should come as no surprise that Walker’s extremely unpopular attempts at union busting have become the issue in the race, and Republican state Rep. Jeff Stone is suffering badly for it. Stone voted for Walker’s budget bill, but now says he “would have preferred to leave the collective bargaining intact” – even though, as TPM notes, he voted against every Democratic amendment that would have done exactly that. Stone’s nominally independent but really Democratic opponent, philanthropist Chris Abele, has been hammering him on this front. The April 5th vote is actually a run-off; last month, Stone took 43% while Abele scored 25%, splitting the Democratic vote with the remaining candidates (all of whom were on the lefty side of the equation).

• PA-AG: Columnist Jan Ting, who took 29% against Tom Carper in DE-Sen in 2006 but later left the GOP, says he has heard that former Rep. Patrick Murphy is considering a run for Pennsylvania Attorney General. A source also informs me that this is true. Note that most of PA’s statewide positions other than governor are up in 2012, so this race would be coming on soon. Note, too, that it will be an open seat: Newly-elected Gov. Tom Corbett was himself AG, and he appointed Pittsburgh-area prosecutor Linda Kelly to take his place. Kelly, however, has said she won’t run for the post next year.

• Ohio Ballot: Though it’s gotten less attention than the fight in Wisconsin, Ohio is on the verge of passing legislation which strip collective bargaining rights from public workers. TPM reports that Ohio Dems are planning to put the law, known as SB 5, on the ballot (it’d take about 230,000 signatures), something which could happen either this November or next. This could wind up being a truly epic fight – though I’m also reminded of the last time Ohio Dems put up some lefty ballot measures in an odd-numbered year, and that didn’t turn out so well. (The 2005 effort was called Reform Ohio Now, and you can read all about it in the SSP Deep Archives.) Still, I think our chances would be a lot better this time.

• KS Redistricting: In 2002, state lawmakers split the rather blue Douglas County (home to the city of Lawrence) between two congressional districts, the 2nd and 3rd. Now, though, thanks to growth in Johnson County, the third has to shed population (as we informed you last week), and one Democratic legislator is suggesting that Douglas could be reunited in a single CD. This seems unlikely, though, as it’s manifestly in the Republican Party’s interest to keep Lawrence cracked.

• NE Redistricting: There’s a similar story playing out in neighboring Nebraska, where the now-famous 2nd CD (which gave Barack Obama a very narrow win – and a single electoral vote) also has to reduce its population. Light-blue Douglas County (no, I’m not losing it – different county, different state, same name as above) is currently entirely within the borders of NE-02, but it could potentially get cracked. The linked article discusses a number of different possible scenarios for the whole state, and even has some hypothetical maps.

• NJ Redistricting: No surprise here: Democrats and Republicans couldn’t agree on a new map for New Jersey’s state legislative districts, so the Chief Judge of the Supreme Court, Stuart Rabner, appointed Rutgers Prof. Alan Rosenthal as tiebreaker (click here for a detailed profile). That wasn’t a surprise, either, as the 78-year-old Rosenthal performed the same duties during the last two rounds of redistricting for the U.S. House. Rosenthal is a Democrat but has a very non-partisan reputation. Last time, Democrats convinced the appointed tiebreaker, Larry Bartels, that their proposed gerrymander would improve minority representation. A similar outcome is probably not so likely this time.

• OR Redistricting: As you can see from all the above links, now that redistricting data has been released, we’re starting to see a lot more redistricting-related stories with a little more meat to them. This piece outlines the issues facing Oregon and also explains some of the deadlines involved. If lawmakers don’t enact a state lege map by July 1 (or the governor vetoes it), then the task falls to Secretary of State Kate Brown, a Democrat. This is typically what’s happened in the past, though apparently there’s some hope that the evenly-divided state House (with its unusual dual Speakerships) will produce something both sides can agree on. Note that there is no similar deadline for congressional redistricting.

• PA Redistricting: Pennsylvania’s congressional Republicans are headed to the state capital of Harrisburg this week, to discuss how best to gerrymander their map with their state legislative colleagues. Given that the GOP has absolute control over the redistricting process in PA, Democrats are going to get pretty fucked here, and PoliticsPA has a rundown of several possible scenarios that Republicans are supposedly considering.

• New York: An issue which first came up nationwide last cycle is still percolating in New York. As we explained in September 2009, a new federal law (the MOVE Act) requires that absentee ballots be mailed to all overseas and military voters at least 45 days before the general election. That’s a problem in states with late primaries, like New York, where results can’t be certified and ballots can’t be printed in time to meet this deadline. A couple of states (I think just Vermont and Minnesota) moved their primaries up a bit to aide compliance, but others, like NY, had to get waivers from the Department of Justice that allowed them to send out ballots later. Despite getting such a waiver, many boards of election (including NYC’s) still failed to comply with even the later deadline – and now the DoJ (which had to sue NY last year) is unhappy with the state’s lack of further efforts to remedy these problems. An association of local election commissioners, at a meeting in January, voted to ask the state legislature to move the primary to June to avoid these issues altogether.

• Dave’s Redistricting App: Dave has more data and more fixes, so that you can get your fix of data.

• AZ-Sen: Sources are telling Roll Call that Rep. Trent Franks is planning to run for Sen. John Kyl’s open seat. I personally think Franks will get in – Jeff Flake definitely will not have this race to himself.

• HI-Sen: Former part-term Rep. Charles Djou (I’d say we hardly knew ye, but I think we got to know him pretty well) says he’s considering a senate bid, but it sounds like he wants to wait and see what his fellow Republican (and next-door neighbor) Linda Lingle does first.

• MO-Sen: Remember when Claire McCaskill said she’d co-sponsor Bob Corker’s CAP Act – the bill designed to take an axe to, among other things, Social Security? Now she’s telling her constituents in a letter that she’ll “vote against” any cuts to SS. So either she’s backtracking on her idiotic support of Corker’s bill, or she somehow thinks this pledge doesn’t conflict with that piece of legislation. In other words, she’s come to her senses – or she’s talking out of both sides of her mouth. We’ll see.

• NV-Sen: The committee investigating John Ensign’s affair-and-hush-money scandal just interviewed Sen. Tom Coburn, which Politico claims is a sign that the inquiry is “intensifying,” but who knows – the whole thing could be winding down, especially since the Justice Department pathetically dropped their entire case against Ensign. I’d be surprised if any serious punishment is meted out here.

• AZ-07: Some Dude Gabriela Saucedo Mercer announced a challenge to Rep. Raul Grijalva (D). Saucedo Mercer volunteered for fellow Republican Ruth McClung last time, who herself said after the election that she will “probably” run again.

• CA-36: This can’t be the sort of news Republicans were hoping for: Redondo Beach Mayor Mike Gin said he’s joining the field of candidates hoping to succeed the now-departed Jane Harman. Why is this a problem? Because Gin is now the second non-Some Dude Republican running – Redondo’s elected city attorney, Mike Webb, is already in the race. If the GOP ever had any, any chance whatsoever of sneaking out a win here, it could only have happened with a single candidate to unite behind. Now, it seems impossible for one of their own to make it into a runoff, unless the Democratic field gets absurdly fractured.

• MD-02: Huh. So it looks like fifth-term Dem Rep. Charles Albert Ruppersberger III – you know him as “Dutch” – already has a non-Some Dude opponent. Republican state Delegate Patrick McDonough (who is also a talk radio host) represents a reliably red district and has already managed to score Christine O’Donnell to headline a fundraiser for him. This district went 60% for Obama and 54% for Kerry, and I can’t imagine the Dem-held legislature would risk making this seat any redder if Ruppersberger looked genuinely threatened, so McDonough will have a hell of a challenge.

• MI-12: Rep. Sandy Levin became the latest veteran Michigan Dem (along with Johns Dingell & Conyers, and Dale Kildee) to confirm that he’ll seek another term.

• NY-26: Erie County Comptroller Mark Poloncarz has told Democratic leaders to drop his name from consideration as a possible candidate for the upcoming special election. Is it just me, or is it a little worrisome that we still seem to be so far away from choosing a nominee? Just another reason why we should have primaries for special elections in New York.

The legislature did just pass one small bit of elections reform: Once Gov. Cuomo signs the bill, special elections will now be held 70 to 80 days after their announcement by the governor (as opposed to 30 to 40 right now), to give county boards more time to handle military and overseas ballots. This was done to bring NY into better compliance with federal law, but still note that there is no specific timeframe in which a governor must actually call for a special – this law only applies to the time period after one has been called.

• OH-01: Cincinnati NAACP President Christopher Smitherman tells Dave Catanese that he thinks Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory is “floating the idea of a run” against Rep. Steve Chabot. Mallory is black, and Smitherman notes, of course, that President Obama will be at the top of the ticket. The current OH-01 is 29% black, as strong black turnout was responsible for Steve Chabot losing in 2008.

• IN-SoS: Republican Secretary of State Charlie White was just indicted on seven felony counts, “including voter fraud, perjury and theft.” White is accused of intentionally voting in a precinct he didn’t live in. Funny how after all their bogus charges of “voter fraud!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1111111111,” the one guy who actually gets hauled up on charges is nothing less than the guy responsible for ensuring the integrity of elections – and a Republican, to boot.

• Idaho: Due to a court challenge, which found Idaho’s system of open primaries unconstitutional under the First Amendment, Idaho looks like it will be moving toward closed primaries – or at least, a setup where you have to register with the Republican Party in order to vote in GOP primaries.

• MS Redistricting: So it looks like Mississippi may be the first state in the nation to adopt any sort of actual redistricting map – not a surprise, seeing as the state holds legislative elections later this year. The state House will vote on its own map as early as this Friday. (Click here for the map, and click here for the demographic breakdowns.) Believe it or not, the state House is actually still run by the Democrats, and predictably, Republicans don’t like their plan, calling it an incumbent protection plan for Dems. Still, it will likely pass – Dems insist all lawmakers have had a chance to give their input, and the GOP, which controls the state Senate, will need Democratic cooperation in the lower body to get their corresponding map approved.

• PA St. Sen.: Craziness – local Republicans are reportedly preparing for a special election in the 40th district to replace the seemingly-doomed state Sen. Jane Orie… whose corruption case just ended in a mistrial today. But it’s not the kind of bad trial thingy a defendant typically roots for (i.e., a hung jury). Rather, the judge dismissed the jury because documents entered into evidence by the defense contained forged signatures. Said the judge to Orie’s attorney: “Ray Charles could see that those signatures were doctored.” So it seems like Orie may live to fry another day.

• AZ-Sen: Arizona Dems could see a big name get into the senate race: 4th CD Rep. Ed Pastor says he’s considering the race, but wants to see how Rep. Gabby Giffords’s recovery goes before making any decisions. (He also says he hasn’t spoken to the DSCC yet.)

• CT-Sen: Chris Murphy just scored a trio of big fat endorsements: state Attorney General George Jepsen, Secretary of the State Denise Merrill, and Comptroller Kevin Lembo all just gave their backing to the 5th CD rep. Notably, Merrill succeeded Murphy’s primary opponent, Susan Bysiewicz, as SoS this year.

• NM-Sen: Couple of developments in the open-seat New Mexico race. First, Dave Catanese says that Heather Wilson is starting to staff up for a potential run. Second, Steve Pearce says that he’s spoken to Republican Lt. Gov. John Sanchez and says that Sanchez is “thinking about” running. Pearce, who earlier was urging NM Republicans to reach a consensus pick, is sounding more and more like he’s interesting in playing the role of fixer rather than running himself – not too surprising, given that he’s 63 and just ran tough campaigns two cycles in a row.

• OH-Sen: Actual retail value of a Drew Carey senate run? $0, apparently. The Price Is Right host’s publicist says that Carey “does not plan to run for office,” despite a movement trying to draft him to run against Sen. Sherrod Brown. Does this remind anyone else of talk about recruiting Jerry Springer on our behalf in the 2005 timeframe? God that was sad.

• VA-Sen: Ex-Rep. Rick Boucher tells the National Journal that while he isn’t ruling out a senate run, he isn’t “giving any active thought” to one, either. Based on the linked NJ item, it sure sounds like Boucher is heading for a second career as a lobbyist. Anyhow, Boucher also says that Tim Kaine is the “obvious Democratic candidate.”

• WI-Gov: So now the RNC, like the RGA, is putting up an ad in support of Darth Walker. No Word On The Size Of The Buy (in case you aren’t familiar with that phrase, it means “NWOTSOTB”), or whether it’s cable or broadcast, but The Hill does say it will run “in Milwaukee and Madison through the end of this week.”

• NY-26: Though he met with teabagger David Bellavia for over an hour, Conservative Party chair Mike Long says he “made it very clear” that Republican nominee Jane Corwin has “a leg up on” Bellavia in terms of getting the Con endorsement. Long said his party’s executive committee may meet later this week or early next week to make a final decision. With any luck, Bellavia will pursue his plan to petition on to the ballot if he gets passed over.

• Tampa Mayor: The city of Tampa, FL had a mayoral election the other night, and Republican Rose Ferlita (26%) and Dem Bob Buckhorn (24%) will proceed to a run-off. All of the other candidates in the first round were Dems, though former Mayor Dick Greco (who was trying to return to office) was definitely more of a DINO.

• MS-Gov: Four Democrats filed for the gubernatorial race: Hattiesburg Mayor Johnny DuPree, attorney Bill Luckett (who seems to have some money), and  Some Dudes Guy Shaw and William Compton, who also ran in 2007 and took just 12% in the Dem primary. But the rest of the picture is pretty brutal. Not a single Dem will be on the ballot for the positions of lieutenant governor, secretary of state, or auditor. As for the Republicans, five candidates qualified for the gubernatorial race: Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant, businessman Dave Dennis, Pearl River County Supervisor Hudson Holiday, Some Dude Ron Williams, and teabagger James Broadwater.

• Special Elections: Unsurprisingly, in Florida’s SD-33, Dem Oscar Braynon routed his Republican opposition in his bid to succeed Frederica Wilson (who replaced Kendrick Meek in the House). Dems also lost a very Republican state house district in Maine, HD-11, where the GOP candidate got all of 697 votes to the Democrat’s 557.

• WI-St. Sen.: The Wisconsin Democratic Party is launching an effort to recall the eight Republican state senators who are legally subject to the recall process. (As you probably know, WI elects half its senators every two years, so only those who won in 2008 can be recalled right now.) The SEIU has also announced that they are backing the effort.

• FL-Sen: A group of Holocaust survivors – now very elderly, of course – plan to protest Sen. Bill Nelson’s fundraiser with Barack Obama this week. The survivors say that Nelson promised to push legislation which would allow them to directly sue insurance companies who have withheld payments on life insurance policies sold before World War II. Nelson claims he only promised to hold a hearing on such a bill (which has been introduced in the House in the past).

• MA-Sen: I really have to believe Deval Patrick just shot his mouth off in that National Journal interview, and has probably earned himself a few glares from would-be Democratic challengers to Sen. Scott Brown the next time they see him. Now Alan Khazei, whom Patrick said was “for sure” in the race, is – like Newton Mayor Setti Warren – saying that he’s merely “looking at it carefully” but hasn’t made a decision yet. Meanwhile, Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll tells the Boston Phoenix that she is at least several weeks away from a decision, and that a Warren entry wouldn’t impact her.

And speaking of another Warren, some top Republicans have been saying kinder things about Elizabeth Warren’s chances of becoming the permanent director of the Consumer Financial Protection Board. Of course, House Financial Services chair Spencer Bachus doesn’t get a vote, but he thinks that “the Senate may approve” a Warren nomination (if one were to be made). If this came to pass, it would almost certainly remove Warren from any possibility of running for the senate.

• ND-Sen, ND-AL:  Freshman Rep. Rick Berg hasn’t ruled out a run for Kent Conrad’s now-open senate seat, and Eric Cantor seems to think he might make the leap. The House’s no. 2 Republican said of Berg: ” “I’m trying to convince him to make sure he stays in the House right now.”

• NM-Sen: From the horse’s mouth – which is where I prefer to get my news: Dem state Auditor Hector Balderas confirmed reports that he is looking at Jeff Bingaman’s open senate seat, saying he’s been talking to the DSCC and is “strongly considering entering” the race.

• VA-Sen: Prince William County Board of Supervisors Chairman Corey Stewart (god that is a mouthful) sounds like he’s dialing himself out of any possible senate run. He says he’s going to seek re-election to his current post this fall, and will “possibly” make a decision on whether to seek Jim Webb’s open seat “early next year.” He’s seriously going to enter a competitive primary against Felix Allen no earlier than January of 2012? Shah.

• NC-Gov: Tom Jensen tells me something I always love to hear: an establishment Republican might have tea-related problems. In particular, PPP’s latest poll has 43% of GOPers saying they’d prefer someone more conservative than former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory, while 29% firmly support him. Of course, I think probably 20% of Republicans would say they want someone more conservative than Republican Jesus. But McCrory does have something of a libruhl track record (like I’ve said, it’s hard to be a super-conservative mayor), including support for socialist, freedom-destroying light rail for his hometown. Tom points out that McCrory won his 2008 primary with less than 50% of the vote “against a weak field” – but this time around, no one’s really emerged from the woodwork to challenge him. Yet.

• WI-Gov: Tom also has the rest of the goods on PPP’s WI-Gov poll, which consistently shows small pro-labor margins on a variety of unions vs. Walker questions (and larger margins on questions of general collective bargaining rights). On the question of recall, it’s an exact 48-48 split.

• AZ-06: We missed the news a couple of weeks ago that former GOP state senate majority leader Chuck Gray said he was entering the race to succeed Jeff Flake (who of course is running to succeed Jon Kyl). One other Republican name considering the race is the current Speaker of the state House, Kirk Adams.

• CA-36: AFSCME’s California political arm, called “California PEOPLE,” is endorsing Janice Hahn, making them the latest in a string of labor unions to do so. Meanwhile, Debra Bowen tweeted that she could fit into her daughter’s jeans.

• IL-01: Roll Call takes a detailed look at the personal finances of Rep. Bobby Rush, who has been the defendant in nearly two dozen mostly debt-related lawsuits since the 1980s – and who has somewhat questionably left off all of these cases and debts from the financial disclosure forms he’s obligated to file as a member of Congress. While this isn’t the first time the media has examined Rush’s finances, this strikes me as the sort of thing that could make the incumbent vulnerable to a primary challenge, especially since his district will have to take on a bunch of new territory to compensate for population loss.

• NY-10: The New York Observer offers an interesting profile of Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries, who hasn’t ruled out a primary challenge to Rep. Ed Towns (D), and who apparently has been ramping up his political activity of late.

• OR-01: Steny Hoyer (still the no. 2 Dem in the House) says it’s “premature” to talk about a David Wu resignation. But surely he wants this problem to go away, right? Also of note, The Hill observes that Wu only had $7,500 in campaign cash at the start of the year, versus $61K in debt. Can’t imagine he’s finding a lot of willing donors these days.

• PA-04: PA state Dem chair Jim Burn says he thinks Rep. Jason Altmire could face a primary challenge from the left next year, but admits he hasn’t heard of any actual, you know, names being circulated. Anyhow, who even knows what this district will look like.

• Las Vegas Mayor: Jon Ralston has obtained a poll taken for a group of realtors showing Carolyn Goodman (I) at 30%, Larry Brown (D) at 17%, and Chris Giuchigliani (D) at 11%, with other candidates in the single digits. Note that this poll asked a TON of issue-y questions before finally getting to the horserace in Q15. Also, as Ralston pointed out on the Tweeter, this poll was taken a few weeks ago, before the TV air wars were joined.

Census: Couple of cool census-related mapping widgets. The Journal Star of Nebraska lets you drill down to see population change by county for each state where data’s been released so far. The Chicago Tribune offers a Google Maps-based interface which lets you drill down to see individual census blocks across the entire state of Illinois.

• Crossroads: Announcing fundraising goals is easy, which is why I usually don’t remark on them. But when Crossroads GPS/American Crossroads, the satanic spawn of Karl Rove, says it plans to raise $120 million to destroy America, I pay attention – and I worry, because they probably really, really mean it.

Votes: There’ve been a couple of interesting votes with Republican outliers in the House recently. One was the stopgap spending bill that cut $4 billion in spending over the next two weeks; six Republicans defected on that one, including freshman teabagger Justin Amash, Michele Bachmann, and a few other true believers. (Walter Jones was probably the exception there.) On the flipside, seven GOPers voted against denying funding for Planned Parenthood – click the link for the list.

On the same topic, Politico has an interesting-looking vote study out on the GOP freshman, seeing how often they vote together as a group. Unfortunately, as per usual with the likes of Politico and similar organizations, I can’t see that they’ve posted the full list anywhere – they just offer a few tidbits. (Why go to all that trouble if you don’t even want to share all your numbers?) Anyhow, the aforementioned Justin Amash, who I guess really wants to take teabagging to new heights, has voted against his class more often than anyone else, 30% of the time. But the next three guys on the list are all semi-moderate New Yorkers – Chris Gibson, Mike Grimm, and Richard Hanna.

• WATN?: Sometimes I just need to channel my inner Holden Caulfield and declare: what a phony. After flatly saying the one thing he wouldn’t be doing after retiring from the senate was lobbying, ex-Sen. Chris Dodd just took a job as… a lobbyist, for everyone’s second-favorite intellectual property goliath, the MPAA. (I’m gonna assume the RIAA is still first.) Anyhow, check out the amusing Twitter hashtag #ChrisDoddMovies for some lulz.

• Polltopia: Go tell PPP where to poll. Don’t let the Paultards win!

• Redistricting: A Columbia Law School class is trying to create “an internet depository for nonpartisan congressional maps for the entire country.” I thought the SSP diaries section already was one! Anyhow, click the link if you are interested in submitting your work.

• NJ-12: I have seen the last, best hope of mankind, and his name is Rush Holt. In a major blow against Skynet Watson, the rocket scientist-turned-congressman defeated the Jeopardy-playing robot by a score of $8,600 to $6,200. The losing contestant, Rep. Jim Himes, was seen being turned into fuel to power the Matrix.