The meddling is coming from inside the country
Primaries today in multiple states will determine candidates for the fall … providing they don’t end in runoffs. Since there is an elephant in my room, let’s look first at what experts who “ain’t from around here” have to say about North Carolina.
Big surprise, FiveThirtyEight ignores Madison Cawthorn (NC-11) altogether to focus instead on the U.S. Senate; 1st, 4th and 13th congressional districts:
In the state’s 1st Congressional District, Rep. G.K. Butterfield is retiring and has endorsed state Sen. Don Davis to succeed him, arguing that the moderate Davis would be Democrats’ strongest general-election candidate in a seat that will likely be competitive in 2022. (It has a FiveThirtyEight partisan lean2 of just D+5.)
However, progressive figures like the PCCC and Sen. Elizabeth Warren are backing former state Sen. Erica Smith, who has tried to make the race about Davis’s spotty support for abortion rights in the wake of the Supreme Court’s leaked draft decision overturning Roe v. Wade. Smith has outraised Davis $831,937 to $612,266, but Davis has benefited from more than $2.3 million in outside spending from the United Democracy Project, a pro-Israel super PAC funded by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). The primary still looks competitive, though: Despite the Davis campaign recently releasing a survey giving himself a 13-point lead, that isn’t very convincing since internal polls often overstate their sponsors’ positions by several percentage points.
I’ll admit I did not know Butterfield had endorsed Davis, a regular source of frustration for members of his caucus precisely because of his centrism.
Another race that has attracted attention and raised hackles on the left is in North Carolina’s 4th District:
Both Bankman-Fried (the cryptocurrency magnate) and AIPAC are also pouring money into the Democratic primary to replace retiring Rep. David Price in North Carolina’s safely blue 4th District, around Durham. Protect Our Future has spent more than $1 million and the United Democracy Project nearly $2.1 million to help state Sen. Valerie Foushee defeat Durham County Commissioner Nida Allam and singer Clay Aiken. (Yes, that Clay Aiken.) AIPAC has probably gotten involved here due to Allam’s history of anti-Israel activism, but its investment has rubbed some voters the wrong way given that it also supports Republicans and Allam is Muslim. (Her religion has also made her the target of Islamophobic push polls and death threats.) The Progressive Caucus of the North Carolina Democratic Party even revoked its endorsement of Foushee for accepting AIPAC’s money.
The three candidates have all embraced progressive policy platforms, but it’s Allam who has gained endorsements from the movement’s big names: Sen. Bernie Sanders, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the People’s Alliance, a local progressive group. Foushee’s backers include the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People and EMILY’s List, which are closer to the Democratic Party establishment but also reflect her identity as a Black woman. EMILY’s List also commissioned the only poll we’ve seen of the race, which put Foushee at 35 percent, Allam at 16 percent and Aiken at 10 percent. (Remember, though, EMILY’s List is not a neutral observer here.) If no candidate receives more than 30 percent of the vote, the race will go to a runoff on July 26.
Incumbent bomb-thrower Rep. Madison Cawthorn (NC-11) is seriously on the outs with his party after a series of missteps more worthy of a college frat boy than a congresssman. Voting here has been brisk among Republicans and UNAffiliated voters pulling R primary ballots. It’s not clear whether they are voting for Cawthorn or against him. State Senator Chuck Edwards is the likely beneficiary of NCGOP ire. I’ll be surprised if the two do not face each other in a runoff. At this point, Democrats would prefer to run against the wounded Cawthorn; his presence would energize their base. If Edwards wins the nomination, the race is not likely to be competitive in the fall.
New York Times on NC’s GOP Senate primary:
In the Senate race, for an open seat, Representative Ted Budd, also endorsed by Mr. Trump, has made a late surge, seeming to surpass former Gov. Pat McCrory.
Mr. McCrory, whose conservative credentials include signing the infamous 2016 “bathroom bill” that targeted transgender people — and drew a major backlash upon his state — is no longer conservative enough for some Republicans. The anti-tax Club for Growth has brought millions of dollars in TV attack ads down on his head, accusing him of being “a liberal faker.”
The presumptive Democratic nominee is Cheri Beasley, a former chief justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court.
FiveThirtyEight sees Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate Democratic primary as settled:
While the Republican primary for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania devolves into chaos, the Democratic one is likely to be a coronation. Despite recent news that he had suffered a stroke, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman is the clear front-runner, thanks to being an extremely active lieutenant governor and raising more money than any other candidate ($16.0 million). According to a recent poll from Franklin & Marshall College, Fetterman leads his closest competitor by 39 percentage points.
This is not to say that other candidates haven’t tried to take him down. Centrist Rep. Conor Lamb is running on the argument that he is more electable, but voters don’t seem to be buying it; Fetterman’s tough, outsider image (literally — he is 6′ 8″, is heavily tattooed and wore basketball shorts to meet President Biden) seems tailor-made to win back the white, working-class voters who have made Pennsylvania a slightly Republican-leaning state.
But hasn’t AIPAC been busy? In Pennsylvania, it’s pouring money into the Democratic primary for Pittsburgh’s 12th Congressional District:
Virtually every progressive influencer under the sun — Justice Democrats, Our Revolution, the PCCC, Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez, Warren — has lined up behind state Rep. Summer Lee. And as of a couple months ago at least, Lee looked like the front-runner: She led attorney Steve Irwin 38 percent to 13 percent in a March poll sponsored by EMILY’s List (which also supports Lee).
But AIPAC is trying to stop progressives here, too: The United Democracy Project has dropped $2.4 million to help Irwin, who has also outraised Lee $1.2 million to $707,344. (A third candidate, law professor Jerry Dickinson, has also raised a respectable $685,185.) Irwin also has the support of Rep. Mike Doyle, the district’s current congressman, and Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald, who has argued that Lee (who is Black) would join the “Squad” in obstructing Biden’s agenda. Without any more recent public polls, it’s tough to say if the spending has made an impact, but both sides are treating this like a competitive race.
Meanwhile, from his redoubt in Florida Donald Trump is trying to stop insurgent Pennsylvania Republican candidate for Senate, Kathy Barnette, from upsetting his endorsed candidate, TV pitchman Mehmet Oz. Barnette has signaled that MAGA does not need Trump, hurting the man-child’s feelings (Politico):
Trump has done everything he can to stop Barnette in the final days, but he may have muddied things — or perhaps hedged his bets — by endorsing DOUG MASTRIANO, the longtime frontrunner in the gubernatorial primary, just three days ago. Steve Shepard notes that Barnette and Mastriano, both of whom were in Washington to protest on Jan. 6, “have been running as a loosely joined ticket for months.”
Charlie adds that “Republican strategists and officials [are] nervous and despairing” over the “prospect that the party might blow its chances in a key industrial swing state this fall by nominating far-right election deniers.”
The GOP bred and fed the MAGA monster. Now it’s coming for them.
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