Tag: Tom Suozzi

• CT-Sen: The Chris Murphy/Susan Bysiewicz primary still could turn into a chaotic battle royale, based on this week’s indications. Rep. Joe Courtney is “leaning toward” the run (although that’s not Courtney’s own words, just another insider’s interpretation), and says he’ll have a decision soon. Ted Kennedy Jr. also doesn’t have anything official to say, but he does seem to be stepping up his appearances around the state, including one in Bridgeport next week. One Dem we can probably rule out, though, is former state Treasurer and former Hartford deputy mayor Frank Borges, who disputed reports that he was looking into the race. Here’s also one other Republican who might make the race who seems to have access to big fundraising pools, although it seems like he’d be starting in a big name rec hole against, say, Linda McMahon: state Sen. L. Scott Frantz, who represents wealthy Greenwich in the state’s southwestern tip.

• MI-Sen: After sounding pretty thoroughly disinterested in his few public comments about the possibility of a Michigan Senate race, ex-Rep. and 2010 gubernatorial primary loser Peter Hoekstra is now publicly expressing some interest. He says that he’s “considering it” and will make a decision in a few months. There’s also a poll out of the GOP primary from GOP pollster Strategic National (no word on whose behalf the poll was taken) showing Hoekstra well in the lead, which may be prompting him to get more interested: he’s at 33, with Terry Lynn Land at 15 and Saul Anuzis at all of 1, with 50% still undecided.

• ND-Sen: Rep. Rick Berg has been mentioned often as a potential GOP candidate for the open seat being vacated by Kent Conrad, and chatter seems to indicate the local party seems to have him at the top of the list in terms of someone to unite behind to avoid a divisive primary. Moving from the House to the Senate after only one term is still a pretty unusual move (although it may be less momentous in an at-large state). (In fact, here’s a trivia question for you all, for which I don’t know the answer: who was the last person to successfully jump to the Senate after only one term in the House? I can’t even think of a one-termer getting his party’s nomination since 1994, when Dem Sam Coppersmith ran and lost an open seat race in Arizona to Jon Kyl.) There’s one other name bubbling up to add to the list of the ten-or-more Republicans already listed as possible candidates: Fargo-area state Sen. Tony Grindberg.

• NE-Sen: You might remember that the mysterious GOP dark money group American Future Fund ran some radio ads in North Dakota last month and Kent Conrad was announcing his retirement within a few weeks after that? Not that there’s likely a causal relationship there, but maybe they’re feeling like lightning might strike twice, and now they’re running a similar ad against Ben Nelson in Nebraska.

• TX-Sen: San Antonio mayor Julian Castro had already given some vague statements of not intending to run for the Democratic nomination for the open Senate seat, but put a finer point on that today by announcing that he’s kicking off his campaign for a second term as mayor. One Republican who has expressed some interest in the race but doesn’t seem likely to run is Rep. Mike McCaul from TX-10; the likelier scenario, at least according to one expert, is that McCaul plans to run for state Attorney General in 2014, which will probably be vacated by current occupant Greg Abbott moving up to the Lt. Governor slot, presuming that David Dewhurst either becomes Senator or doesn’t run again in ’14.

• UT-Sen: You thought that Hasselbeck vs. Cromartie Twitter fight was exciting? That’s got nothing on a good social media smackdown between rival right-wing astroturfers Club for Growth and Tea Party Express. In the wake of TPX head Sal Russo’s comments yesterday praising Orrin Hatch, CfG just dissed TPX, saying they seem “to like Hatch’s record in support of TARP, earmarks…” Roll Call has more on the Club’s plans to go aggressively after Hatch. Russo also seems like he’s getting undercut by his fellow TPX leader, Amy Kremer, who says that Hatch isn’t off the hook yet and will be under their microscope for the cycle.

• VA-Sen: Jamie Radtke, the only person in the race so far offering a challenge from the right to presumed GOP frontrunner George Allen, let everyone know yesterday where she’d stand, putting in an appearance at the initial unveiling of the Senate Tea Party caucus (and its four members… or five if you count Pat Toomey, who was willing to speak to them but not join). Other interesting reading regarding Virginia is this profile of Jim Webb which doesn’t offer many surprises but is a good overview of his ambivalence about the Senate race is pretty much in keeping with everything else about him. And buried in another boilerplate article is a pretty sharp smack at Allen from a fellow GOPer and the last person to successfully pivot from getting bounced out of the Senate to winning a later race (in 1988), Slade Gorton. Gorton says Allen, to win, will first need to apologize to voters, saying “I don’t see anything from him about how he screwed up, even though he did.”

• LA-Gov: See you later, Al Ater. After some semi-encouraging statements about a possible candidacy, the Democratic former Secretary of State now says he won’t run for Governor this year. That still leaves the Dems without any sort of candidate to go against Bobby Jindal, with the clock definitely starting to tick louder.

• WV-Gov: Don’t get too comfortable with the idea of a primary to pick the gubernatorial candidates in West Virginia (tentatively set for June 20); the legislature still has to enact that and there are some grumblings that it might not happen because of the expense involved, which would mean party conventions instead. That could give a boost to one of the less-known Democratic candidates who have stronger relations to organized labor, like House speaker Rick Thompson or treasurer John Perdue. The article also mentions a few other Republicans whose names are emerging in the race, most notably Putnam Co. Prosecutor Mark Sorasia (who’ll be participating in an upcoming candidate forum), also mentioning former state Sen. Steve Harrison and state Del. Troy Andes.

• CT-05: The dance cards in the 5th district are definitely filling up. On the Democratic side, Audrey Blondin is saying that she’ll run; she’s a former Selectwoman from Litchfield, a member of the state party committee, and briefly ran for SoS in 2005. Also considering the Democratic primary is J. Paul Vance, the former leader of the Waterbury board of aldermen and a narrow loser to Michael Jarjura in the 2009 Dem mayoral primary. On the Republican side, Mike Clark is in; he’s Farmington town council chair but he’s best known for leading the FBI team that took down corrupt Gov. John Rowland, and was on Tom Foley’s LG short-list. Several other possible names on the Republican field that are mentioned include state Sen. Kevin Witkos, Torrington mayor Ryan Bingham, and one possible heavyweight in the field (and the guy who actually was Foley’s running mate), Danbury mayor Mark Boughton.

• FL-25: Freshman Rep. David Rivera seems to be in a world of trouble, with an entirely new angle on his corruption arising courtesy of an AP investigation: he paid himself nearly $60K in “unexplained” campaign reimbursements during his eight years in the state legislature. Between that and the already mounting investigation by Florida authorities and the FEC into potential payoffs from a dog track, there’s apparently growing discontent with him behind the scenes in Republican leadership, who may be feeling pressure to make an example out of him as part of their “drain the swamp” promises (although Ethics Committee rules prevent them from using that vehicle, since they can’t take up matters that are already under criminal investigation). Rumors persist that both parties are already sounding out candidates for a potential special election. He isn’t getting much public support from John Boehner, whose only on-the-record comments are that he’s taking a wait-and-see attitude on how things unfold.

• WI-01: Is this just a bit of monkeying around with Paul Ryan now that he’s temporarily a celebrity, or are Dems seriously thinking about making a target out of him now that he’s more notorious? (He’s in what’s currently an R+2 district, certainly within reach in a Dem-friendly year with a good candidate, and leads veteran House Republicans in terms of ideological out-of-whackness with his district lean… though that may have changed with the newest crop of teabaggers) At any rate, mailers are being sent out to voters in his district, having a bit of sport with his Medicare-voucherization proposals.

• Chicago mayor: We Ask America is out with another poll of the Chicago mayoral race (taken during the brief period when it looked like Rahm Emanuel might have been off the ballot). It looks like, as speculated, the whole debacle may have actually increased sympathy for Emanuel (with 72% of respondents saying his name should stay on the ballot), as this is the first poll to show him over the magic 50% mark that would help him avoid a runoff. He’s at 52, with Gerry Chico at 14, Carol Mosely Braun at 11, and Miguel del Valle at 4. It also provides support for the theory that Chico, not Mosely Braun, would have been the chief beneficiary if Emanuel had gotten kicked off, as Chico led a Rahm-free option at 33, with Mosely Braun at 17 and del Valle at 7 (with 38 undecided).

• Nassau Co. Exec: This may pretty much spell doom for any future political efforts by Republican Nassau Co. Exec Ed Mangano, who was elected in a narrow upset over Tom Suozzi in 2009. Mangano has, since then, closely stuck to the teabagger/underpants gnome playbook of governance (step 1: cut taxes; step 2: ???; step 3: profit!), and lo and behold, found his county government insolvent. The state government has been forced to step in and seize control of the finance in the county on Long Island, one of the nation’s wealthiest.

• Redistricting: I can’t see this going anywhere legislatively even if Dems still held the majority (and I’m not sure it would pass constitutional muster anyway), but Heath Shuler and Jim Cooper are introducing legislation in the House that would switch every state away from partisan redistricting to requiring use of a five-person bipartisan commission. (They’re picking up the flag from fellow Blue Dog John Tanner, for whom this was a personal hobby horse for many years until he recently left the House, but they may also have some personal stake in wanting this to succeed, seeing as how they suddenly find themselves in states where the Republicans now control the trifecta.) Also, the public rumblings of worry from prominent Republicans about how the GOP isn’t financially or mentally prepared for this round of redistricting (something that seems dramatically out of character for them) seem to keep coming, this time from Ed Gillespie.

• Voting: Montana seems to be taking a cue from its nearby neighbors Oregon and Washington, and moving toward a vote-by-mail system. The measure cleared the House and will soon move to the state Senate. Despite the fact that the GOP controls that chamber and this was a Democratic bill, there was enough Republican support to move it forward. (Studies have shown that vote-by-mail tends to noticeably increase participation by traditionally-Democratic constituencies that ordinarily aren’t very likely voters.)

• Election results: There was a grab-bag of southern state runoffs and special elections last night; the main event was the Atlanta mayor’s race. It looks like Democratic African-American ex-state Sen. Kasim Reed defeated self-proclaimed-independent white city councilor Mary Norwood, but the margin is only around 620 votes (out of 83,000 cast). Reed has declared victory, but Norwood is talking recount.

There were also four legislative runoffs in Georgia; the only one that wasn’t an intra-party affair was in HD-141 (a previously Dem-held seat) where independent Rusty Kidd easily beat Democrat Russell Black. Kidd is staying mum on which party he’ll caucus with, although he’s the son of a prominent long-time Democratic legislator (Culver Kidd) and a stem-cell-research supporter. In HD-58 in Atlanta, community organizer Simone Bell becomes the first LGBT African-American elected to Georgia’s legislature. And in Tennessee, Republican state Rep. Brian Kelsey was elected easily in the vacant SD-31 in heavily Republican Memphis suburbs; he takes over for GOPer Paul Stanley, who resigned in disgrace after a sex scandal.

• IL-Sen: Former Chicago Inspector General David Hoffman is up with the first TV ad in the fast-approaching Senate primary. Hoffman lacks name rec, but uses the ad to highlight his corruption-fighting past (and take some implicit hits at Alexi Giannoulias’s banking background).

• NY-Sen-B: You may remember Michael Balboni, who was pried out of his Dem-leaning Long Island state Senate seat by Eliot Spitzer to become the state’s Homeland Security chief and paving the way for Democratic takeover of the state Senate. Now he’s reportedly considering a run against Kirsten Gillibrand for Senate, as the New York GOP starts casting its net wider for somebody.

• UT-Sen: A Deseret News poll has bad news for Bob Bennett, in the form of perilous re-elects: only 27% support his re-election, and 58% want someone new. Nevertheless, he has a big edge over the field of nobodies circling around him: he polls at 31%, with Democrat Sam Granato at 14, followed by a gaggle of right-wingers: Cherilyn Eagar at 5, Tim Bridgewater and Fred Lampropoulos at 4, Mike Lee at 3, and James Williams at 1. With the Republican nomination potentially to be decided at the state convention — dominated by hard-right activists — though, these numbers don’t help to project much of anything for next year.

• IA-Gov: Chet Culver’s campaign manager Andrew Roos is out, as Culver stares at double-digit deficits against ex-Gov. Terry Branstad. Culver mangled his Shakesperean shrug-off, saying it’s “much to do about nothing.”

• TX-Gov: Press releases are already going out saying that Houston mayor Bill White is announcing something big on Friday, and now leaks are confirming what most people have suspected, that he’s going to go ahead and jump into the Democratic field in the governor’s race.

• FL-10: Sorta-moderate GOP Rep. Bill Young has another challenger — this time from the right. Eric Forcade says he got interested in politics from participating in tea parties and the 9/12 movement. (In case you’re having trouble remembering where all these random teabagger primary challenges are popping up, Think Progress has a handy scorecard of all of them.)

• IL-10: Little-known rich guy Dick Green dipped into his self-provided funds and laid out $100K for a big TV ad buy, introducing himself to Republican voters in the 10th. While Democrat Julie Hamos already has hit the airwaves, Green beats out fellow GOPers Beth Coulson and Bob Dold.

• KY-03: Rep. John Yarmuth may not exactly be intimidated by the first Republican to show up to go against him in Kentucky’s lone Dem-leaning district. Jeffrey Reetz has never run for office before, but he does own 25 Pizza Hut franchises.

• MD-04: Rep. Donna Edwards, who got into office via primary challenge, is facing a big challenge of her own. Prince George’s County State’s Attorney Glenn Ivey has formed an exploratory committee to go up against Edwards for the Democratic nod. Ivey worked as a senior congressional staffer in the 1980s and 1990s; although he expresses enthusiasm for moving the “progressive agenda forward,” he’s probably running at least a bit to the right of Edwards, one of the leftmost House members.

• MN-01: This marks the third entry to the field against Democratic Rep. Tim Walz in about one week’s time. Today, it’s Republican Jim Hagedorn, a former congressional staffer and a one-time blogger under the name “Mr. Conservative.” He joins ex-state Rep. Allen Quist and state Rep. Randy Demmer, although the party seems to still be watching what more moderate state Sen. Julie Rosen does.

• PA-11: Hazleton mayor and 2008 loser Lou Barletta is doing his best to stay in the news, announcing that he’ll make another announcement on Dec. 9 as to whether or not he’ll seek a third faceoff against Democratic Rep. Paul Kanjorski.

• TN-08, TN-Gov: In case you missed our late update last night, Democratic state Sen. Roy Herron got out of the governor’s race where he was something of a longshot, and into the now-open TN-08 field, where he’s probably the favorite to get the Democratic nod. (Although open seats are theoretically harder to defend, Herron’s long district presence and lack of ties to Washington could conceivably help him to perform better next year than long-time Beltway creature Tanner might have.) Party officials (and outgoing Rep. John Tanner too, although he declined to endorse anyone yet) are moving quickly to keep a contested primary from happening, although state Rep. Philip Pinion has also been publicly letting his interest be known. Also, in discussing his sudden retirement decision, Tanner claims he wasn’t scared off by the fundraising success of out-of-nowhere GOP challenger Stephen Fincher; he’d already been eyeing retirement and the challenge “got his competitive juices flowing” but finally decided to call it a career.

• UT-02: Morgan Philpot, a former Republican state Representative, is considering a race against Rep. Jim Matheson next year. Philpot is currently the state party’s vice-chair, so he would bring some insider backing to the race.

• NY-Comptroller (pdf): With all the sudden talk of recruiting NYC comptroller William Thompson onto the Cuomo “ticket” to wage a primary fight against current state comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, it’s worth going back and noting that the most recent Siena poll from a few weeks ago actually polled this permutation. They found a 31-31 tie in the Clash of the Comptrollers. They also found that both would beat Republican John Faso in the general.

• TX-Comptroller: In fact, talking about comptrollers is so much fun I’m going to keep doing it. Ex-Rep. Nick Lampson, who couldn’t hold down dark-red TX-22 last year, says that’s he’s looking into next year’s comptroller’s race, which would bring top-tier Democratic talent to another statewide race in Texas.

• NY-St. Sen.: After a lot of optimistic predictions earlier in the day, the actual vote on gay marriage in the New York Senate today kind of fizzled. Eight Democrats voted against and no Republicans crossed the aisle, leaving it to go down 24-38. Ironically, Marist came out with a poll today showing public support in favor of gay marriage, 51-42.

• CA-St. Ass.: However, in the one-step-forward, one-step-back fight for LGBT equality, California looks like it’s poised to have its first-ever gay Assembly Speaker. Los Angeles Assemblyman John Perez apparently has the votes locked up to take over as Speaker from Karen Bass, who’s termed out.

• Nassau Co. Exec: Two-term incumbent Tom Suozzi, who was down by 377 votes to Republican challenger Ed Mangano after a recount, decided to concede rather than pursue legal options. Suozzi, who’d be considered a likely AG candidate next year, says he’ll be back in politics but he can’t “imagine it would be anytime soon.”

• Mayors: It looks like a premature end of the line for Baltimore mayor Sheila Dixon, who was just convicted of misdemeanor embezzlement for helping herself to $1,500 worth of gift cards that had been donated to give to poor families. Dixon is supposed to be suspended from office, but post-trial motions and a possible appeal may push that until later. City Council President Stephanie Rawlings-Blake is in line to succeed her.

• DGA: There’s new leadership at the Democratic Governor’s Association, as fast-rising Delaware governor Jack Markell (who’s been in office only for a year) takes over from Montana’s Brian Schweitzer. One of the DGA’s first orders of business as they prep for 2010: committing $1 million to the GOP Accountability Project, whose first ad target is Florida Republican candidate Bill McCollum.

• CT-Sen: It’s a rumor that’s been going around for a few weeks that seemed ridiculous, but it only seems to be getting louder, so it’s worth a mention: Ralph Nader is considering a run for the Senate in Connecticut under the Green Party’s banner, and is gauging grass-roots support for a race. The knee-jerk reaction is that this is one more piece of bad news Chris Dodd doesn’t need, but it’s worth considering that Nader may actually help Dodd more than hurt him, by diluting the pool of anti-Dodd votes, giving an option for Dems and indies who are specifically anti-Dodd and anti-bankster, other than voting for the Republican.

• IL-Sen: Freshman Rep. Aaron Schock gave his endorsement to Rep. Mark Kirk in his quest to win the GOP Senate nomination. People are treating this like it boosts Kirk’s conservative bona fides, but Schock has turned out to be more of a low-key, establishment player since getting into the House than his loose-lipped statements during his campaign would have suggested.

• KY-Sen: Rand Paul and the NRSC seem to be in a standoff, over the same old issue, whether or not the NRSC plans to endorse in the primary. Paul was spreading the word last week, based on conversations with the NRSC, that the NRSC would not endorse, but spokesperson Brian Walsh now says the NRSC doesn’t “anticipate” endorsing but reserves the right to do so.

• MA-Sen: Rep. Michael Capuano got an endorsement from one of the deans of Bay State politics, former Gov. (and presidential candidate) Mike Dukakis. However, he might be overshadowed a little by Alan Khazei, who’s attracted little attention so far but seems to be closing strong, if the last Rasmussen poll is any indication. Khazei snagged endorsements from both the Boston Globe and retired Gen. Wesley Clark.

• NC-Sen: Campaign Diaries managed to snag an internal polling memo for the Elaine Marshall campaign, which leads me to wonder why the DSCC is stiff-arming her and still pining for former state Sen. Cal Cunningham to get in the race. Marshall leads with 42% in the primary, with attorney Kenneth Lewis at 7 (including 14% of African-Americans) and Cunningham at 5. At some point, the DSCC’s tepidness about her, if it doesn’t change, is going to start affecting broader perceptions of her — likely to create a fundraising vicious circle of not being able to raise funds well because she’s not perceived as not being able to win because she can’t raise funds well. The poll was conducted by PPP, although Marshall has previously used Lake Research as her pollster.

• NY-Sen-B: Rasmussen took their first look at a Rudy-centric Senate race in New York, finding Rudy Giuliani beating Kirsten Gillibrand 53-40 (a very similar margin to last week’s Marist poll). Giuliani has 63/33 favorables, while Gillibrand is at 46/41 (this has to be the best-known Gillibrand has ever been, but one of Rasmussen’s many quirks is to show everyone as being well-known). The New York Post also has the scoop on a Republican who seems likelier to run (although it’s on the gossip page rather than the politics section!): Port Authority Commissioner Bruce Blakeman is considering a running for the Republicans. Blakeman lost the 1998 state Controller’s race to Carl McCall; also, his ex-wife is now dating Paul McCartney, which is apparently Page Six’s angle on all this.

• UT-Sen: Here’s an interesting ploy: Rep. Jason Chaffetz (rumored as a potential Senate candidate) is taking a highly visible stand against the Obama administration’s decision to deploy additional troops to Afghanistan, saying it’s time to bring them home and that he’s opposed to “nation building.” That puts him up against the party orthodoxy, but it also leads to the question of whether Chaffetz is a bit of an outlier here or if the movement conservatives are going to be moving in more of an isolationist direction heading into 2012 (and whether that’s because of their paranoid nativist worldview, or just because it gives them one more thing to oppose the President on).

• AL-Gov: Two endorsements in the Alabama governor’s race, where there are heated primaries on both sides. Mitt Romney has endorsed Treasurer Kay Ivey, perhaps as payback for chairing his Alabama campaign but also a potential thumb-in-the-eye to the religious right, who are naturally supporting Roy Moore in the race. On the Dem side, Sam Jones, the first African-American mayor of Mobile, endorsed Rep. Artur Davis.

• MA-Gov: Rasmussen threw in some gubernatorial numbers to their sample last week of the Senate special election primary, and they continue to find that incumbent Dem Deval Patrick has the edge. It’s a little narrower than their last poll or Suffolk’s recent poll — Patrick leads independent Tim Cahill and Republican Christy Mihos 32-28-26 and leads Republican Charlie Baker and Cahill 33-28-25 — but it still shows Patrick benefiting from Cahill splitting the anti-Patrick vote.

• MI-Gov: A poll of the Republican field in the Michigan gubernatorial race by Mitchell Research for the Detroit News finds a small lead for AG Mike Cox. Cox leads Rep. Peter Hoekstra 27-24, with 12 for Oakland Co. Sheriff Mike Bouchard and 3 each for state Sen. Tom George and businessman Rick Snyder. The poll also finds Cox beating Democratic Lt. Gov. John Cherry by 16 points in the general, although specific numbers aren’t reported for some reason.

• NY-Gov: Another brave Republican is considering taking on the gubernatorial race: Emil Henry Jr. He’s got just the right resume for these troubled times: He was assistant Treasury Secretary in the Bush administration, and before that, an executive at Lehman Brothers. Ex-Rep. Rick Lazio is already in the GOP field.

• UT-Gov: Democratic Salt Lake County mayor Peter Corroon is sounding more like a candidate for governor, in next year’s special election against appointed GOP incumbent Gary Herbert. A recent Deseret News/KSL-TV poll finds Herbert leading Corroon 56-32. Corroon actually sounds encouraged by these numbers; considering it’s Utah, I suppose they could be much worse.

• CA-45: More Mitt Romney news, and it’s a tea leaf that the GOP is concerned about defending Mary Bono Mack in the 45th even as they go on the offense in swing districts elsewhere: Romney will be appearing at a Bono Mack fundraiser in the district on Jan. 9.

• FL-19: Charlie Crist moved the date on the general special election to replace resigning Rep. Robert Wexler, which had been originally scheduled Apr. 6. He moved it to Apr. 13, so it wouldn’t conflict with Passover (a problem in this heavily Jewish district).

• GA-08: Democrats dodged a bullet in the 8th, where Rep. Jim Marshall may get the easiest ride of any Dem in a dark-red southern district next year. Republican State Sen. Ross Tolleson said he’d like to run for Congress at some point, but this won’t be the year. Tolleson threw his support to Angela Hicks, a businesswoman who’s one of several little-known candidates in the hunt.

• GA-12: It’s official: former state Sen. Regina Thomas will be challenging Rep. John Barrow in the Democratic primary next year. Barrow is unusual among the most problematic Blue Dogs because he’s in a district with a Democratic-leaning PVI and thus one where a better Dem could still win a general election (although it’s one where African-American voting tends to fall off during off-year elections). Thomas piqued some netroots interest last year because of this unusual circumstance, but between a late start, a low-visibility strategy focused on word-of-mouth through black churches, and an Obama endorsement of Barrow, she only cleared 24% in last year’s primary. We’ll have to see if the earlier start helps this time.

• IA-02: Mariannette Miller-Meeks, who came within 18 points of Rep. David Loebsack last year thanks to a lot of help from those meddling Ophthalmologists, says she’ll try again in 2010. She’s not alone in the GOP field, though; interestingly, she’s up against two guys who both ran for Senate in 2008, businessman Christopher Reed (who made it through to the general against Tom Harkin, only to get flattened) and Steve Rathje (who lost the primary).

• NH-01: I don’t know if this is a case of once-highly-touted Manchester mayor Frank Guinta losing momentum, or just Some Dude with delusions of grandeur, but businessman Richard Ashooh is filing exploratory paperwork to run in the GOP primary. The winner faces Democratic Rep. Carol Shea-Porter in what’s likely to be a close race.

• TN-06: The GOP is trying to cajole a state Senator into getting into the race against long-time Democratic Rep. Bart Gordon in the once-swingy, now R+13 6th. Jim Tracy says he’s strongly considering the race. There’s one catch: Rutherford County Republican chair Lou Ann Zelenik is already in the race, and has the ability to self-fund.

• TX-17: Here’s a Dem in a dark-red district who caught a big-time break on the recruiting front, though: Rep. Chet Edwards won’t be facing state Sen. Steve Ogden, as had been rumored. Ogden announced that he’ll run for another term in the Senate instead. (Thanks to the small size of Texas’s Senate, Ogden actually has more constituents than Edwards.) 2008 candidate Rob Curnock, who came within single-digits of Edwards, is running again, though.

• GA-Super. of Education: Georgia’s Republican Superintendent of Education, Kathy Cox, is persisting in running for re-election next year despite having recently filed for bankruptcy to escape $3.5 million in debt. The story gets even weirder: this is despite Cox having won $1 million on “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?” — despite having pledged to give that money to charity, her creditors are now coming after that money. (Is there any precedent for a statewide elected official appearing on a game show?) Cox now faces opposition in a GOP primary from former state Rep. Roger Hines.

• Nassau Co. Exec: The counting of absentee ballots in Nassau County is finally winding down in this month’s most drawn-out election, and it looks like Republican challenger Ed Mangano may actually succeed in upsetting incumbent Dem Tom Suozzi. Mangano leads by 217 with few ballots remaining. Even if the count concludes today, it won’t be the last word, as legal challenges to a number of votes will still need to be resolved.

• Mayors: New Orleans mayoral candidate James Perry is getting a jump on political advertising, and his ad is certainly attention-grabbing too. It includes a variety of bleeped-out profanities as local residents (or actors portraying them) let everyone know how they feel about career politicians.

• NY-St. Ass.: Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava says she’s going to stay a Republican, despite losing her leadership position in the wake of her imploded House campaign. Despite her many impure thoughts, she says she’d still clock in at 7 out of 10 on the RNC’s new purity test.

• Redistricting: CQ Politics sits down with filmmaker Jeff Reichert, whose upcoming documentary on redistricting is slated for release next year. I’ve been emailing with Jeff about this project for a while now, and it looks very interesting. (D)

• NY-23: There was a brief moment of collective “Holy crap!” earlier today when people realized that the race in the 23rd wasn’t quite over. The Bill Owens lead over Doug Hoffman shrank considerably (down to 3,176 votes currently, compared to 5,335 at the end of election night) after recanvassing, including discovery of some errors in Hoffman-leaning Oswego County. There remain 5,600 absentee votes to be counted, so for the election results to actually change, Hoffman would need to win about 80% of those votes (many of which were sent in while Dede Scozzafava was still in the race). Hoffman’s camp is admitting that the results of the race aren’t about to change, but they say they might not have conceded so quickly on Election Night if they’d known it was going to be so close — meaning that the big story here is that they could have stopped Bill Owens from being sworn in and providing one of the decisive votes on health care reform in the House.

• FL-Sen: Every day now seems to bring a little more bad news for Charlie Crist, and today’s bit is that members of the Florida state GOP are demanding an “emergency closed door meeting” with the state chair, Jim Greer. The meeting-demanders seem to be Marco Rubio supporters, and they’re particularly exercised about Crist’s relationship with sketchy financial backer Scott Rothstein.

• IL-Sen: Rep. Mark Kirk’s pronounced turn to the right has been unsubtle enough that even NARAL is noticing, and calling him out on it. They’re no longer considering him “pro-choice” after his Stupak amendment vote, and say they’ll be working toward his defeat next year.

• ME-Sen: We weren’t the only ones to take notice of Olympia Snowe’s terrible approvals among Republicans according to PPP. The Family Research Council is now saying that if a conservative candidate shows up to run against Snowe in 2012, the FRC will back them.

• NC-Sen (pdf): PPP’s newest poll of North Carolina finds more of what they’ve been finding all year: people are lukewarm about Richard Burr (with an approval of 40/31) and he only narrowly leads a Generic Dem (44-40). However, Burr does better against named Democrats, including Rep. Bob Etheridge (45-35), SoS Elaine Marshall (45-34), and former Lt. Gov. Dennis Wicker (45-33).

• NV-Sen: There’s yet another hapless-seeming Republican entering the GOP Senate field: former Nevada Board of Education member Greg Dagani. Dagani is probably best known for resigning from the Board of Education after getting caught making out with his wife during a public meeting. Wait… his wife, and not a staffer (or someone he met in Argentina and/or the men’s room)? Are we sure he’s a Republican?

• UT-Sen: Here’s a little more information on the two new guys scoping out the GOP field in the wake of AG Mark Shurtleff’s departure, suggesting that they both have the potential to be formidable opponents to Bob Bennett. In fact, these two might do better at gaining the favor of the teabaggers, in that Shurtleff (who was running to the conservative Bennett’s right) was somehow considered not conservative enough in some circles (mostly owing to his immigration stance). Wealthy businessman Fred Lampropoulos was a gubernatorial candidate in 2004, almost forcing Jon Huntsman to a primary. And while lawyer Mike Lee hasn’t run for office before, he’s the son of Mormon leader and former BYU president Rex Lee, which means a lot in Utah (although Bennett’s family’s role in the Mormon church also looms large).

• CO-Gov: Is Scott McInnis about to get Scozzafavaed? The law of unintended consequences seems to point that direction. After ex-Rep. McInnis’s establishment moneybags supporters thought they were being smart by hounding state Senate minority leader Josh Penry out of the GOP primary, that just seemed to tick off the anti-establishment base. And now a much higher-profile (and much less palatable in the general) candidate with a national following to draw on is emerging to take Penry’s place. Yes, it’s ex-Rep. Tom Tancredo, who’s saying that he’ll file to create an exploratory committee in the next few days.

• MN-Gov: Another Republican fell by the wayside in the overstuffed Minnesota gubernatorial race. State Sen. Mike Jungbauer dropped out, citing fundraising troubles and a weak showing in a recent straw poll.

• WI-Gov: People have treated Republican Milwaukee Co. Exec Scott Walker as a strong contender in the Wisconsin gubernatorial race, but he seems to have a certain tone-deafness about him: he met with Sarah Palin during her Wisconsin visit to try to secure an endorsement from her… in a state where Barack Obama won 56-42.

• DE-AL: Republicans managed to lure somebody into the open seat race to replace Rep. Mike Castle, despite that this race may be the Republicans’ likeliest House loss in 2010. Fred Cullis, who owns an industrial sales company, said he’d be an “independent voice” for Delaware a la Castle.

• FL-08: I don’t know if this is an indicator of the NRCC having settled on Bruce O’Donoghue as its consensus pick, or a case of Rep. Alan Grayson having yet more success with his voodoo doll, but yet another prospective Republican challenger is turning tail and running. First-term state Rep. Eric Eisnaugle made public his decision not to run.

• FL-16: St. Lucie County Commissioner Chris Craft has previously sounded some moderate notes as he takes on freshman Republican Rep. Tom Rooney in this R+5 district, but he’s not playing it safe on health care. He came out yesterday saying that he’d have voted for the House health care reform bill and against the Stupak amendment.

• PA-17: Republican state Senator David Argall batted down rumors that he’d challenge long-time Rep. Tim Holden in this GOP-leaning Harrisburg-based seat, saying he was “99% sure” he wouldn’t run. Blue Dog Holden seems on track to receive his usual free pass.

• Nassau Co. Exec: Republican Ed Mangano’s lead over incumbent Dem Tom Suozzi expanded to 497 in the recount of the Nassau County Executive race on Long Island. Suozzi also waxed philosophical in an interesting interview with Ben Smith, pointing to a public exhaustion with civic engagement and a return to “self-interest” on tax issues.

• Mayors: Endorsements from the 3rd place finishers were handed out in the runoff elections in both the Atlanta and Houston mayoral races. In Houston, city controller Annise Parker got the endorsement of city councilor Peter Brown, who surprisingly finished behind Parker and former city attorney Gene Locke. (Locke is African-American, Parker is white and a lesbian, and Brown is a straight white guy.) And in Atlanta, city councilor Lisa Borders endorsed state Senator Kasim Reed, consolidating the African-American vote against white city councilor Mary Norwood, who finished first.

• Vote By Mail: Washingtonians are getting pretty tired of watching their elections drag on (the Seattle mayoral race this time). There’s a renewed move afoot in Washington to change election laws to match the mail-in ballot law in better-organized Oregon, where ballots must be received by Election Day instead of postmarked by Election Day. The movement is getting a boost with Gov. Chris Gregoire’s support.

• FL-Sen: There’s probably no good way to spin the firing of the head spinner: after weeks of unending bad press, Charlie Crist has decided the solution is to fire his long-time communication director, Erin Isaac. (Isaac contends that she left on her own, and the timing has nothing to do with Crist’s collapse.)

• IL-Sen, OH-Sen: Two little-known, never-been-elected rich guys are going on the air with TV spots in their respective Senate primaries: Democratic attorney Jacob Meister in Illinois, and Republican auto dealer Tom Ganley in Ohio. Meister may not have much hope in a field with three prominent candidates, but Ganley is trying to gain traction among the anti-establishment right against consummate insider pick Rob Portman in a two-way GOP primary fight. (Ganley’s buy is reportedly only for $60K, so it seems more oriented toward generating media buzz than actually reaching lots of eyeballs, though.)

• NC-Sen: Rep. Bob Etheridge still sounds genuinely undecided about whether to get into the Senate race or not, but he’s now promising a decision by the end of the week. The DSCC is actively courting Etheridge, despite the presence of SoS Elaine Marshall in the race. Meanwhile, two other possible contenders are circling, watching, and waiting: former Lt. Gov. Dennis Wicker says he may run if Etheridge doesn’t, and outgoing Chapel Hill mayor Kevin Foy is still considering the race, saying he’ll decide by the end of the month.

• SC-Sen: Ouch! Lindsey Graham just got a pretty strong repudiation from the local GOP in one of the state’s largest counties, Charleston County. They unanimously voted to censure Graham over his cooperation with Democrats and moderate GOPers. Graham isn’t up until 2014, but it certainly doesn’t bode well for his next primary.

• CO-Gov: Josh Penry’s jump out of the Colorado governor’s GOP primary may have been more of a push. Big-time GOP funder Phil Anschutz is reported to have personally contacted Penry to let him know that he’d be on the receiving end of the 501(c)(4) that he’d created to target anyone opposing establishment candidate ex-Rep. Scott McInnis. (Of course, with news of this having leaked out, that seems likely to just further enrage the teabaggy right and lead them to find a hard-right replacement who, unlike Penry, isn’t worried about having his brand besmirched for future runs. Could Tom Tancredo be that man?)

• CT-Gov: For about the zillionth time in his career, Democratic AG Richard Blumenthal decided not to run for a promotion; he says he won’t get involved in the newly-minted open seat gubernatorial race. However, Blumenthal did nothing to quash rumors that he’s waiting to take on Joe Lieberman in 2012, saying “stay tuned.” Meanwhile, Paulist financial guru Peter Schiff, currently running for the GOP Senate nod, confirmed that he won’t be leaping over to the gubernatorial race, either.

• SC-Gov: Fervently anti-tax state Rep. Nikki Haley has been a key Mark Sanford ally in the legislature, but she’s been lagging in the GOP gubernatorial primary race. A Mark Sanford endorsement would be poison at this point, though, so the Sanfords paid her back with a slightly-less-poisonous endorsement from Jenny Sanford instead. Still doesn’t really sound like the kind of endorsement you want to tout, though.

• FL-08: Republican leaders are increasingly sour on the candidacy of 28 year-old businessman Armando Gutierrez Jr., who is “pissing people off a lot” with his bare-knuckle style. The NRCC is still hoping to recruit a solid challenger to go up against “colorful” Dem Rep. Alan Grayson after months of recruitment mishaps, and the current batch of names being bandied about include businessman Bruce O’Donoghue, state Rep. Eric Eisnaugle, and state Rep. Kurt Kelly. Gutierrez, however, seems to be doing all he can to make the GOP primary an unpleasant proposition. (J)

• FL-19: The Democratic primary in the upcoming special election to replace Robert Wexler is shaping up to be a real snoozefest. Former State Rep. Irving Slosberg, who lost a bitter 2006 state Senate primary to Ted Deutsch, announced yesterday that he won’t be running and that he’s endorsing Deutch. (Slosberg probably has his eye on Deutch’s soon-to-be-vacant Senate seat.)

• ID-01: With state Rep. Ken Robert’s dropout in the 1st, Vaughn Ward had the GOP field to himself for only a couple hours before another state Rep., Raul Labrador, said that he’ll get in instead. Meanwhile, ex-Rep. Bill Sali has been speaking before conservative groups and is still considering an attempt at a rematch with Democratic Rep. Walt Minnick, and says he’ll decide by the end of the month.

• NJ-03: Democratic freshman Rep. John Adler has been seemingly running scared despite the Republicans not having recruited anyone in this swingy R+1 district, probably helped along by Chris Christie’s huge numbers last week in Ocean County. Republicans think they have the right guy to flatten Adler: former Philadelphia Eagles lineman Jon Runyan. Runyan isn’t retired but not on any team’s roster either, and is “considering” the race.

• NY-24: He lost narrowly in 2008 to Democratic Rep. Mike Arcuri, and now businessman Richard Hanna is making candidate-type noises again, with a press release attacking Arcuri’s health care reform vote. Hanna is thinking about another run; Republicans don’t seem to have any other strong candidates on tap in this R+2 district.

• SD-AL: Republican State Rep. Shantel Krebs decided against a run against Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin in 2010. She was facing a cluttered field, with Secretary of State Chris Nelson and state Rep. Blake Curd already in the GOP primary.

• Nassau Co. Exec: So I was wrong about the Seattle mayor’s race being the last one to be called: the Nassau County Executive race is now in mid-recount, and Republican challenger Ed Mangano has a paper-thin (24 votes) lead over Democratic incumbent Tom Suozzi. Democratic Nassau County Legislator Dave Meijas (who you might remember from NY-03 in 2006) is also in a recount.

• VA-St. House: The last House of Delegates race in Virginia was finally called; Republican Ron Villaneuva was certified the victor in the Virginia Beach-based 21st over incumbent Dem Bobby Mathieson by a 13-vote margin, although the race is likely to go to a recount by Mathieson’s request.

• WA-St. Sen.: Democratic State Sen. Fred Jarrett was picked by new King Co. Executive Dow Constantine (who defeated Jarrett in the primary) to be the Deputy Executive. Jarrett will need to resign from the Senate to do so, creating a vacancy in this Bellevue-based, historically Republican but recently very Democratic seat. In Washington, though, legislative vacancies are filled by appointment by the county council (Democratic-controlled in King County, as you might expect), so there won’t be a special election, and the appointee will serve until (his or her probable re-election in) Nov. 2010.

• Generic Ballot: Everyone in the punditsphere seems abuzz today that Gallup suddenly shows a 4-pt GOP edge in the generic House ballot, a big swing from the previous D+2 edge. (Most other pollsters show a mid-single-digits Dem edge, like Pew at D+5 today.) Real Clear Politics points out an important caveat: the last time the GOP led the Gallup House ballot was September 2008, and you all remember how that election played out. Another poll today is perhaps more interesting: Winthrop University polled just the Old South states, and finds a 47-42 edge for the Republicans in the generic House ballot in the south. Initially that may not seem good, but remember that most of the state’s reddest districts are contained in the south, so, after accounting for the heavily-concentrated wingnuts, this probably extrapolates out to a Dem edge still present in southern swing districts.

• Public option: With the prospect of an opt-out public option looming large, the topic of whether to opt out is poised to become a hot issue in gubernatorial races in red states next year. Several states already have opt-out legislation proposed, although it remains to be seen whether any would actually go through with it (when considering how many states turned down stimulus funds in the end despite gubernatorial grandstanding… or how many states have decided to opt out of Medicaid, as they’re able to do).

• WATN?: Congratulations to Charlie Brown, who has accepted a position in the Dept. of Homeland Security. Unfortunately, this means Brown won’t be back for another kick at the football in CA-04.

New York: In NY-23, we lost, apparently because the conservatives won, because in their brave new world winning no longer means earning more votes than the other candidates, but rather defeating the candidate that will vote with you most of the time in order to pave the way for the candidate who would theoretically vote with you all the time but has no chance of getting elected in your swing district. I quake in fear of next November, when conservatives will enjoy the mightiest of all glorious historic victories, with the crushing general election losses of Marco Rubio, Chuck DeVore, Rand Paul, Ovide Lamontagne, Sharron Angle, Christine O’Donnell, Peter Schiff, Chuck Purgason, Ken Buck, and Patrick Hughes, thus purifying the soil for decades to come.

Uh, more specifically, in NY-23, Bill Owens (D) defeated Doug Hoffman (C) and Dede Scozzafava (R), 49-45-6, with about a 6,000 vote margin (out of 131,000) separating Owens and Hoffman.

Elsewhere in New York, two powerful incumbents got scares. New York City’s I/R mayor Michael Bloomberg beat Democratic comptroller William Thompson by a much narrower-than-expected margin: 51-46. And Democratic Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi is barely leading Republican Ed Mangano, 48-48 (with a 237-vote margin, which may change as absentees are counted). Republicans picked up two open New York City council seats in Queens (including the one vacated by new comptroller John Liu), bringing the Democrats’ control of that body down to a perilous 46-5.

New Jersey: Republican former US Attorney Chris Christie defeated Democratic incumbent Jon Corzine in the Republicans’ big score of the night, beating Corzine and independent Chris Daggett 49-44-6. The big story here may be the unexpected collapse in Daggett’s numbers (he had been polling near 20% several weeks ago); I’d guess that a swath of moderate but fervently anti-Corzine voters realized that they were planning to waste their votes on a spoiler (Daggett) and in the end held their noses and voted for Christie. The other big story: the robo-pollsters (PPP, SurveyUSA) not only getting the result right but coming close on the spread, while some of the more traditional pollsters saw a Corzine victory. Christie’s amply-cut jacket didn’t have much in the way of coattails, though: Republicans picked up a total of only one seat in the Assembly, with Domenick DiCicco poised to pick up an open seat in Gloucester County in Philly’s suburbs, leaving Dems in control of the chamber, 47-33.

Virginia: Here’s where the Democrats really stunk it up, although the handwriting on the wall could be clearly seen from months away. In the gubernatorial race, Republican Bob McDonnell defeated Creigh Deeds by a substantial margin, 59-41. Further down the ticket, Republican Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling was re-elected over Jody Wagner, 56-44, and Republican Ken Cuccinelli won the AG’s race over Steve Shannon, 58-42. Democrats also took some damage in the House of Delegates, although they seemed to stave off total wipeout: Republicans netted five seats, to move the total from 53 (and 2 GOP-caucusing indies)-45 (with 2 formerly Dem vacancies) to 58 (plus the 2 indies)-39 (with one Dem incumbent-held seat, the 21st, going to recount).

Maine: In what seemed to be the night’s biggest heartbreak for many in the netroots, Question 1, a vote to repeal gay marriage, passed by a 53-47 margin. Nevertheless, Mainers defeated an anti-tax initiative (Question 4, 40-60) and expanded medical marijuana access (Question 5, 59-41).

Washington: In the nation’s other corner, Referendum 71, a vote to approve legislation creating “marriage in all but name” expanded domestic partnerships, is passing 51-49. (Assuming it passes, this would be, by my reckoning, the first time gay rights have been expanded through statewide vote; since King County has reported disproportionately few of the state’s ballots, that margin is likely to grow.) Washington also rejected anti-tax I-1033, 44-56, and King County elected Dow Constantine as County Executive by a comfortable 57-43 over Susan Hutchison (in the first time this has been run as a nonpartisan race — unfortunately for Hutchison, somewhere in the last few weeks her Republican cover got blown). The Seattle mayor’s race will probably be the last race in the country to get resolved: with less than half reporting, anti-establishment progressive Mike McGinn leads establishment progressive Joe Mallahan 50-49.

California: In the night’s other House election, Democratic Lt. Gov. John Garamendi defeated Republican attorney David Harmer in CA-10, 53-43 (with the balance going to Green and Peace & Freedom candidates). That’s a bit underwhelming in a district where Barack Obama won 65-33, but in a low-turnout special, it’s not remarkable.

North Carolina: Charlotte got only its second African-American mayor and its first Democratic mayor in 22 years, as 38-year-old Anthony Foxx beat the polls en route to a 51-49 over Republican Andy Lassiter. Democrats also now have an 8-3 edge on the city council. College town Chapel Hill now has an openly gay mayor: Mark Kleinschmidt, who narrowly defeated conservative Matt Czajkowski, 49-47.

Ohio: Somehow I can’t see Cleveland becoming the next Las Vegas (maybe $pringfield, Ohio will), but Ohio voters just opted to legalize casino gambling in Issue 3, 53-47.

Pennsylvania: Republicans picked up a seat on the state Supreme Court; Jane Orie Melvin defeated Democrat Jack Panella 53-47. The GOP now controls the court 4-3, which has bad implications for state legislative redistricting next year.

Michigan: Another Dem screw-up that may bury the prospect of a pro-Democratic gerrymander in Michigan next year is a loss in the one hotly contested state Senate seat anywhere last night. In SD-19, Republican Mike Nofs won 61-34, picking up a seat formerly held by Democratic now-Rep. Mark Schauer. Republicans now control the Senate 22-16 (all seats are up in 2010, meaning Dems now need to flip four for control — of course, they’d also need to hold the gubernatorial race, which may not happen either). In Detroit, incumbent Dave Bing held on to win the mayor’s race, 58-42.

Georgia: We’re headed to a runoff in Atlanta, where city councilor Mary Norwood and state Senator Kasim Reed finished 1 and 2, with 46% and 36% respectively. Reed may be able to pull it out, though, if he consolidates African-American votes in the general (the 3rd place finisher, Lisa Borders with 14%, is also African-American). The most interesting legislative race seems to be the previously Dem-held HD-141, where it’s unclear whether Dem Darrell Black or GOPer Angela Gheesling-McCommon (each of whom got 23%, although Black has a 16-vote edge) will face off against independent Rusty Kidd (who got 44%) in the runoff.

Got any other races you want to share results from, or want to talk about? Let us know in the comments!

• PA-Sen: Ex-Rep. Pat Toomey says that he raised $1 million in 60 days toward his Senate run, with more than 11,000 donors. It’s still a drop in the bucket compared with the bankrolls of Arlen Specter and Joe Sestak, but it ought to help dissuade anyone else from jumping into the GOP primary. Another tidbit that ought to discourage any Republican line-crashers: $5,000 of that money came from John Cornyn‘s PAC, suggesting that he’s done looking for another candidate and is bringing establishment power to bear behind Toomey.

• FL-Sen: It’s not much of a surprise, considering they’re close neighbors, but Rep. Kendrick Meek nailed down the endorsements of two key members of Florida’s House delegation — Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Ron Klein — which will come in handy if he does wind up facing off against Corrine Brown in the primary.

• LA-Sen: Democratic New Orleans city councilor Arnie Fielkow decided, after some speculation, not to wade into the Louisiana Senate race. More plausible would be a challenge to Rep. Anh Cao in LA-02, as Fielkow is well-known in NoLa but has no statewide presence, but Fielkow also declined that, leading to speculation he may be eyeing the next mayor’s race instead.

• GA-Gov:  With an eye on Roy Barnes, Ed Kilgore takes aim at the claim that Georgia governors have a long track record of failure when it comes to comebacks. It turns out that past probably isn’t prologue. (D)

• TX-Gov: We’re reluctant to ascribe a whole lotta meaning to the phrasing of this particular letter, but Kay Bailey Hutchison seems to be moving pretty explicitly toward making official her run for Governor. Glenn Thrush points to a letter sent to potential donors saying “I am running for Governor.”

• AZ-05: Is Congress ready for its first gamer (or at least its first out-of-the-closet gamer)? Jim Ward, the former president of video game maker LucasArts, announced that he’ll be running for the GOP nomination to go up against Rep. Harry Mitchell. Ward brings a lot of wealth to the table, but he’ll have an uphill fight against former Maricopa County Treasurer David Schweikert, who lost the 2008 election to Mitchell by 9 points and is looking for a rematch.

• TX-32: Dems have landed a good candidate in TX-32 to go up against Rep. Pete Sessions: Grieg Raggio, an attorney and husband to Judge Lorraine Raggio. The 32nd, in north Dallas, is still a red district but has seen rapidly declining GOP numbers, both for Sessions and at the presidential level, and is down to R+8.

• NY-AG: Nassau Co. Exec Tom Suozzi published an editorial in the New York Times where he publicly discusses having changed his mind on the gay marriage issue (he’s now for it). With New York one of the few states where gay marriage has become an issue with majority support, Suozzi looks to be repositioning himself for, well, something (probably, as often rumored, Attorney General, but maybe Governor if Andrew Cuomo continues to dither).

• Redistricting: The Hill has an interesting piece about redistricting; while it doesn’t delve into too many specifics, it does shed some light on what districts the GOP is rushing to try to take back before they get strengthened for the Dems (like Bobby Bright’s AL-02), and what districts are unlikely to draw top tier challengers because everyone is willing to sit back and wait for new open districts to pop up in 2012 (like Dina Titus’s NV-03).

• Race Tracker: Benawu is already back doing what he does best: chronicling the Dems’ efforts to field candidates in all 435 districts. Right now, we’re still looking in 124 GOP-held districts (although, of course, it’s still early in the cycle). Check out the RaceTracker 2010 wiki for more.

• CT-Sen: Ex-Rep. Rob Simmons needs to look like one of those allegedly-not-quite-extinct moderate New England Republicans in order to get elected in Connecticut, but he’s not doing himself any favors by appearing with Newt Gingrich at the annual Prescott Bush Awards Dinner. With a large Puerto Rican population in Connecticut, Simmons probably doesn’t want to be anywhere near Sonia Sotomayor’s loudest and most toxic critic. Another problem for Simmons: businessman Tom Foley, the former ambassador to Ireland, made his official entry into the GOP primary field today. Foley, unlike Simmons, has deep pockets he can self-fund with.

• MN-Sen: Sources close to Norm Coleman are suggesting he won’t appeal at the federal level if he loses his case with the Minnesota Supreme Court. Republicans still publicly say they’ll try to stop any Dem efforts to seat Al Franken until Coleman has conceded or exhausted his appeals. John Cornyn has sent some mixed signals, though, saying it’s “entirely” Coleman’s decision whether to keep fighting and that he’s “amazed that Sen. Coleman’s been willing to persevere as long as he has.”

• NV-Sen: Wondering why the GOP is having a hard time attracting a challenger to supposedly-vulnerable Harry Reid? Maybe it’s because of his deep levels of support among much of the state’s Republican establishment. The Reid camp released a list of 60 GOP endorsers, including, most prominently, soon-to-be-ex-First Lady (and former NV-02 candidate) Dawn Gibbons, Reno mayor Bob Cashell, and, in a move guaranteed to nail down the key 18-29 demographic, Wayne Newton.

• NH-Sen: Could it be that the NRSC could actually be stuck running Ovide Lamontagne against Rep. Paul Hodes? Just the very fact that the NRSC is talking to Lamontagne (a businessman whose one claim to fame is losing the 1996 governor’s race to Jeanne Shaheen) with an apparently straight face should be a red flag that their top-tier possibilities (ex-Sen. John Sununu, ex-Rep. Charlie Bass) aren’t looking likely.

• NY-Sen-B: Joe Biden reportedly had a sit-down earlier this week with Rep. Carolyn Maloney, who may or may not be running in the Senate primary against Kirsten Gillibrand. Presumably the meeting would contain some of the same content as Barack Obama’s now-famous phone call to Rep. Steve Israel.

• OH-Sen: If a candidate falls in the woods with no one around, does he make a sound? State Rep. Tyrone Yates has been exploring the Senate race for several months, and apparently found nothing that would help him overcome Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher and SoS Jennifer Brunner, as he bowed out of the race.

• NJ-Gov: Rasmussen has the first post-primary poll of the New Jersey governor’s race. Chris Christie may have gotten a bit of a brief unity bounce in the wake of his primary victory, as he’s up to a 51-38 edge over Jon Corzine now, as opposed to 47-38 last month. There’s one spot of ‘good’ news, as it were, for Corzine: his approval rating is back up to 42%.

• AZ-08: Construction company executive and ex-Marine Jesse Kelly seems to be the establishment GOP’s choice to go against Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in 2010. He announced endorsements from three House members: Trent Franks, Duncan Hunter, and Frank Wolf. (Not quite clear how endorsements from Hunter and Wolf help him in Arizona, though.)

• KS-01: State Senator Jim Barnett got into the race for the seat being vacated by Rep. Jerry Moran, who’s running for Senate. Barnett may quickly become front-runner, based on his name recognition from being the 2006 GOP gubernatorial candidate (where he lost the state as a whole to Kathleen Sebelius, but won the dark-red 1st). He’s up against a more conservative state Senator Tim Huelskamp, and Sam Brownback’s former chief of staff, Rob Wasinger. The primary is the whole shooting match in this R+23 district.

• KY-01: After the purchase of “whitfieldforsenate.com” got people’s attention yesterday, Rep. Ed Whitfield had to tamp that down, confirming that he’s running for re-election in his R+15 House seat.

• MN-06: Even if this goes nowhere, it’s great to have a GOPer doing our framing for us… attorney Chris Johnston is publicly mulling a primary challenge to (his words, on his website) “‘anti-American’ hurling, malaprop-spouting, ‘they took me out of context'” Rep. Michele Bachmann. He confirms that he and Bachmann share “strong conservative beliefs;” he just thinks the 6th would prefer someone “who thinks before they speak.”

• NH-02: Attorney Ann McLane Kuster is launching an exploratory committee to run for the open seat left behind by Rep. Paul Hodes. St. Rep. John DeJoie is already in the primary field, and they may soon be joined by Katrina Swett.

• NY-03: Dems are scoping out potential candidates in Long Island’s NY-03 (which fell to R+4 in the wake of 2008), thinking that even if Rep. Peter King doesn’t vacate to run for Senate he’s still vulnerable. The biggest fish would be Nassau Co. Exec Tom Suozzi, who seems to have bigger fish to fry (reportedly AG if Andrew Cuomo vacates). The next-biggest fish would Nassau Co. DA Kathleen Rice. Smaller fish listed include Isobel Coleman of the Council of Foreign Relations, and minor league baseball team owner Frank Boulton.

• NH-Legislature: It took a rewrite of a couple sentences that Gov. John Lynch didn’t like, but after a few weeks of back-and-forth New Hampshire finally enacted gay marriage. Both chambers passed the amended bill yesterday (clearing the House 198-176) and Lynch signed it into law on the same day.

• OH-Sen: Rob Portman’s great week continues: he just found himself admitting in an interview that Republicans have no position on health care, and that he reached this conclusion only by talking to GOP Senate leadership about that. However, he says, “There’s a task force, and I applaud them for that.”

• FL-Gov: Lakeland-area State Senator Paula Dockery, whose name has occasionally been bandied about for the GOP nomination for the open seat in FL-12, may be setting her sights higher: all the way to Governor. This would complicate things for the state party leadership, which got Ag Commissioner Charles Bronson to clear the path for AG Bill McCollum… but might secretly relieve some others in the Florida GOP, worried that McCollum has that warmed-over two-time-loser aroma. (I wonder, though, if she might really be angling for the still-vacant Lt. Gov. slot, as current Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp is heading over to the AG’s race, and Bronson said ‘no thanks’ to the idea. The GOP might need her there to avoid having an all-white-guy slate, what with state Senate President Jeff Atwater running for CFO and Howdy Doody Rep. Adam Putnam running for Ag Comm.)

• AZ-Gov: Another state legislator contemplating out loud about a Governor’s race is state Rep. David Bradley, who may resign this summer in order to explore the race. He has two disadvantages, though: his base is not Phoenix but the much-smaller Tucson, and he isn’t known statewide like other likely Dem candidates AG Terry Goddard and developer/former state party boss/2006 Senate candidate Jim Pederson.

• NY-Gov: Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand made some cryptic comments yesterday that have everyone scratching their heads: she believes there won’t be a Democratic primary for the 2010 Governor’s race. What she didn’t say is who she thinks will stand down, David Paterson or Andrew Cuomo?

• MD-01: The NRCC is up with another ad blitz, this time with freshman Rep. Frank Kratovil the prime target. The TV ad hits Kratovil for his ‘no’ vote against an investigation into Nancy Pelosi over whether she or the CIA is lying (not an issue I could ever see the public comprehending, let alone getting revved up about, but maybe that’s just me). The issue also merits radio spots in 6 more districts (those of Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, Suzanne Kosmas, Glenn Nye, Tom Perriello, Vic Snyder, and Harry Teague), and robocalls in 10 more (John Boccieri, Bobby Bright, John Hall, Steny Hoyer, Steve Kagen, Ann Kirkpatrick, Larry Kissell, Harry Mitchell, Walt Minnick, and Mark Schauer).

• CA-10: Running Some Guy is better than running No Guy, and the GOP has at least found Some Guy to run in the yet-to-be-scheduled special election to replace Ellen Tauscher: attorney David Harmer. Harmer once ran for Congress in UT-02 in 1996, and his father was California Lt. Gov under Ronald Reagan.

• NY-AG: The New York Times profiles half a dozen prominent Democrats who are jockeying to take over the Attorney General’s job if Andrew Cuomo follows through on the Governor’s race. Nassau County Exec Tom Suozzi is the best known, but two members of Paterson’s cabinet — insurance superintendent Eric Dinallo and criminal justice official Denise O’Donnell — are also looking. The article also cites Assemblyman Michael Gianaris, Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, and state Senator Eric Schneiderman.

• TX-House: Democrats in the state House in Texas used parliamentary procedures to run out the clock on a Republican voter suppression bill. The voter ID bill would have disenfranchised thousands. The bill was so important to Republicans that they wouldn’t let any other bills jump ahead of it in the queue, though, creating a standoff that torpedoed hundreds of other pieces of legislation (including the override of Gov. Rick Perry’s decision to turn down $555 million in federal stimulus funds).