The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Daniel Donner, and Cara Zelaya, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
Embedded Content
● AZ-Sen: Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego had been eyeing a primary challenge to Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema before she bolted the party Friday morning, and he's made it clear he's interested in taking on the newly minted independent now.
Gallego responded to Sinema's announcement hours later with a statement declaring, "Whether in the Marine Corps or in Congress, I have never backed down from fighting for Arizonans. And at a time when our nation needs leadership most, Arizona deserves a voice that won't back down in the face of a struggle." The congressman also told Punchbowl News' Jake Sherman that he was organizing a campaign team, and while he said he was still making up his mind, Sherman tweeted, "He certainly sounds like a candidate."
Politico also writes that Sinema's party switch meant that the congressman's launch was "essentially kicked into overdrive," though Gallego himself reiterated that "this is a 2023 decision." One person whose support he can count on if he seeks a promotion is Rep. Raul Grijalva, who tells Politico he's already told Gallego he's in his corner.
Gallego may not have the nomination contest to himself, though, as NBC reports that fellow Rep. Greg Stanton is considering. Stanton, a former Phoenix mayor who was elected in 2018 to replace Sinema herself in the House, has not directly confirmed his interest in a statewide bid. However, he did reveal Friday that he'd commissioned a statewide poll that showed him easily beating her in a primary.
On the Republican side, a spokesperson for Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb tells NBC that his boss is looking at it and will be "making a decision in early 2023." An unnamed ally of Kari Lake, who is continuing to spread lies about her loss last month to Democratic Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs, says she's encouraging Lamb to run but doesn't want to do it herself. "Kari is getting lots of calls but she's pretty disillusioned right now and she likes the sheriff and told him she wants to see him run for Senate," this source told NBC, predicting, "Lamb is beloved by the base and could really clear a primary field." Lamb, like Lake, is one of the far-right's more prominent figures in the state.
Politico, meanwhile, relays that some Republicans want outgoing Gov. Doug Ducey to campaign for the Senate. Ducey, though, turned down Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's overtures to run against Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly back in March after spending over a year on the receiving end of Donald Trump's abuse, and he didn't sound remotely interested in a future campaign for the upper chamber. "If you're going to run for public office, you have to really want the job," the governor told his donors as he explained why he did not want Kelly's job.
Party operatives also name-dropped two congressmen, Reps. Andy Biggs and David Schweikert, for Politico, though they both have huge liabilities. Biggs is the type of far-right extremist who did poorly statewide last month, and his decision to challenge Kevin McCarthy for the speakership shows he's not interested in making nice with party leaders. Biggs, whom Sinema has identified as a friend, himself said Friday that being an independent could be "a better home for her." Schweikert, for his part, only won re-election 50.4-49.6 after Democrat Jevin Hodge and his allies highlighted his ethics violations.
Finally, there's the question of what Sinema, who did not commit to running for re-election, will do in 2024. The senator's decision to go solo means that she no longer needs to worry about a primary challenge from Gallego or anyone else, but she would have a different issue to fret over if she wanted to make it to the general election ballot.
Former state elections director Eric Spencer tells KTAR News that he estimates that independent Senate candidates would need about 45,000 signatures to advance, compared to the 7,000-8,000 required to make it to a party primary. Sinema could collect these from Democrats, Republicans, or fellow independents, though Spencer says that, because every voter can only sign one petition, "She'd be well advised to start hitting the streets immediately."
Sinema may also need the head start because there may not be that many voters who want her to continue to represent them. The Democratic firm Civiqs released numbers Friday giving her a truly awful 18-61 favorable rating days before she became an independent. And while some Democrats like Grijalva have fretted that a Sinema campaign would "dilute" the blue vote in a general election, Civiqs found that Democrats already gave her a horrific 5-82 score even before she jumped ship. Republicans and independents, by contrast, gave her 25-45 and 25-56 ratings.
Sinema, though, will at least keep her Democratic committee assignments, including her chairmanship of two subcommittees, in the 118th Congress. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in his announcement that this will allow Democrats to "maintain our new majority on committees, exercise our subpoena power, and be able to clear nominees without discharge votes."
The senator herself spent Friday morning refusing to say whether she'd actually continue to caucus with her former party, though she was clearer about refusing to join a GOP coalition. However, Schumer almost certainly wouldn't allow her to keep her panel assignments if he felt she wouldn't at least be a nominal member of his caucus.
● CA-Sen: Rep. Ro Khanna tells Semafor he'd consider running for the Senate should his fellow Democrat, incumbent Dianne Feinstein, retire, though he added, "But the most likely scenario is that I will be running for re-election to the United States House of Representatives."
● NH-Gov: Republican Gov. Chris Sununu, writes Politico, has "been positioning himself for the 2024 presidential primaries for a while now," but for now he's keeping everyone guessing about his 2024 plans.
Sununu, who decisively won another two-year term as governor last month, says, "I haven't ruled anything in or out. I haven't ruled out a fifth term. I haven't ruled out running for higher office." The Granite State has long had one of the latest candidate filing deadlines in the nation for non-presidential offices, so he could turn around and seek re-election if his White House dreams were to falter.
● CO-03: Democrat Adam Frisch tells Jewish Insider that, while he's considering seeking a rematch against far-right Rep. Lauren Boebert following his shockingly small loss last month, he's not in a hurry to decide. "It's not even 2023, so I think we have some time," said Frisch. The Democrat trails by about 500 votes and has already conceded, though a mandatory recount that must conclude by Tuesday is underway.
● VA-04: State Sen. Jennifer McClellan and Del. Lamont Bagby have both filed with the FEC to run in the upcoming special election to succeed their fellow Democrat, the late Rep. Donald McEachin, and the Richmond Free Press reports that both have decided to run.
A spokesperson for McClellan, who unsuccessfully ran in the 2021 primary for governor, said that "she is very likely to run" and added that an announcement would occur early in the coming week. Bagby himself tweeted Thursday, "I have a major announcement coming soon!" An unnamed source told WRIC around that time that he'd launch in the week of Dec. 12.
Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin still has not scheduled the special to fill the safely blue seat last held by McEachin, whose funeral took place Wednesday. It remains to be seen just how the Democratic nominee will be picked because Virginia allows parties to choose nominees through three different means: Democrats could opt for a traditional primary; a convention; or a so-called firehouse primary, which is a small-scale nominating contest run by the party rather than the state.
● AK State House: Thursday's recount in Alaska's 15th House District reaffirmed Republican incumbent Tom McKay's tiny edge over Democrat Denny Wells, though control of the chamber still remains in doubt more than a month after Election Day.
McKay's lead ticked up from seven votes to nine as a result of the recount, though Wells has five days to appeal the outcome (he has not yet said if he will). A McKay win would leave Republicans with 21 members in this 40-person body, theoretically enough for a bare majority; Democrats won 13 constituencies, while independents took the other six.
One of those Republicans, though, is House Speaker Louise Stutes, a member of the shifting cross-party coalition of Democrats, Republicans, and independents known as the Majority Caucus that has run the chamber since 2017. (The other Republican, Kelly Merrick, successfully sought a promotion to the state Senate, which recently formed its own bipartisan majority coalition.)
Stutes sounds as though she'd like to keep the status quo intact in the lower chamber: She recently put out a joint statement with two fellow members of the Majority Caucus, independent Bryce Edgmon and Democrat Neal Foster, praising the group's efforts and adding, "Alaskans expect us to be ready to work in January and to get the job done on time."
However, the outcome of a trial concerning a very different Republican, far-right state Rep. David Eastman, could indirectly end up determining whether or not the Majority Caucus continues. There's no question that the obstructionist Eastman beat Wasilla City Councilman Stu Graham, who has a far better relationship with the GOP leadership, by a 52-28 margin in their November intra-party contest. One of Eastman's constituents, though, is suing over whether he can actually serve because of his membership in the Oath Keepers, an extreme right group that was involved in the Jan. 6 attack.
A judicial order has prevented election authorities from certifying Eastman as the winner, and if he's ultimately disqualified, the seat would go to Graham as the second-place finisher. That outcome could be very good for Republicans who want to control the chamber on their own: One state representative said of Eastman, "He's voted with us. He's voted against us. I can't say any more than that, other than he's got some issues."
The suit argues that, because the state constitution prevents anyone from holding office who "advocates, or who aids or belongs to any party or association which advocates the overthrow by force or violence of the United States," an Oath Keeper like Eastman cannot serve in the state House.
Eastman attorney Joe Miller (yes, that Joe Miller) has pushed back, insisting that none of the federal charges say that "alleged Oath Keepers in any way attempted [to] overthrow the government." The trial is set to start Monday, and multiple people told reporter Nathaniel Herz that it's unlikely anyone will form a majority before the verdict is in. (The founder of the Oath Keepers, Stewart Rhodes, was convicted of seditious conspiracy last month by a jury in Washington, D.C., for his role in fomenting the Jan. 6 attacks.)
Eastman isn't the only problem for anyone looking to cobble together a 21-person majority, though. Herz writes in the Northern Journal that two independent members of the Majority Caucus, state Reps. Dan Ortiz and Josiah Patkotak, haven't closed the door on siding with most of the GOP.
Patkotak, who also kept everyone guessing about his plans two years ago, appears to be the more unpredictable of the two, saying, "All options are on the table." Patkotak won re-election without opposition, and represents a seat in the North Slope in the far northern corner of Alaska that, while Democratic-leaning, is in a major oil-producing region, which Herz says could make him an appealing ally for Republicans who favor the resource-extraction industry.
Ortiz, who won a close race against a Republican foe, also hedged, saying, "There's not much I can say other than time will work it out." However, a Democratic colleague, state Rep. Andy Josephsen, told Herz he wasn't concerned that Ortiz might side with the GOP.
It's also possible that the Majority Caucus could win over some additional GOP recruits, though two Republicans elected last month sounded unlikely to go for it. "I just don't think that an organization of 19 Democrats and independents, Stutes, and me is going to be in the best interests of the state," Jesse Sumner said to Herz, predicting, "They'd run circles around me." Will Stapp in turn said of partnering with the coalition, "I haven't seen or heard anything that would make me think that it's in the best interests of the Interior, or my town or community."
Whatever happens, we could be in for a long wait: Following both the 2018 and 2020 elections, alliances in the House weren't finalized until February, so it wouldn't be a surprise to see a similar delay this time.
● Where Are They Now?: A state judge has dismissed the criminal charges against former Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder over his alleged role in the Flint water crisis, which poisoned the majority-Black city with lead-tainted water and led to the outbreak of disease starting in 2014.
Snyder was indicted in early 2021 by a one-person grand jury, but the state Supreme Court in June ruled that indictments by this method weren't legal. State Judge F. Kay Behm, who was recently confirmed for a federal judgeship, dismissed the charges Wednesday after determining that they "were not properly brought."
Embedded Content
Leading Off
● AZ-Sen: Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego had been eyeing a primary challenge to Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema before she bolted the party Friday morning, and he's made it clear he's interested in taking on the newly minted independent now.
Gallego responded to Sinema's announcement hours later with a statement declaring, "Whether in the Marine Corps or in Congress, I have never backed down from fighting for Arizonans. And at a time when our nation needs leadership most, Arizona deserves a voice that won't back down in the face of a struggle." The congressman also told Punchbowl News' Jake Sherman that he was organizing a campaign team, and while he said he was still making up his mind, Sherman tweeted, "He certainly sounds like a candidate."
Politico also writes that Sinema's party switch meant that the congressman's launch was "essentially kicked into overdrive," though Gallego himself reiterated that "this is a 2023 decision." One person whose support he can count on if he seeks a promotion is Rep. Raul Grijalva, who tells Politico he's already told Gallego he's in his corner.
Gallego may not have the nomination contest to himself, though, as NBC reports that fellow Rep. Greg Stanton is considering. Stanton, a former Phoenix mayor who was elected in 2018 to replace Sinema herself in the House, has not directly confirmed his interest in a statewide bid. However, he did reveal Friday that he'd commissioned a statewide poll that showed him easily beating her in a primary.
On the Republican side, a spokesperson for Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb tells NBC that his boss is looking at it and will be "making a decision in early 2023." An unnamed ally of Kari Lake, who is continuing to spread lies about her loss last month to Democratic Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs, says she's encouraging Lamb to run but doesn't want to do it herself. "Kari is getting lots of calls but she's pretty disillusioned right now and she likes the sheriff and told him she wants to see him run for Senate," this source told NBC, predicting, "Lamb is beloved by the base and could really clear a primary field." Lamb, like Lake, is one of the far-right's more prominent figures in the state.
Politico, meanwhile, relays that some Republicans want outgoing Gov. Doug Ducey to campaign for the Senate. Ducey, though, turned down Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's overtures to run against Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly back in March after spending over a year on the receiving end of Donald Trump's abuse, and he didn't sound remotely interested in a future campaign for the upper chamber. "If you're going to run for public office, you have to really want the job," the governor told his donors as he explained why he did not want Kelly's job.
Party operatives also name-dropped two congressmen, Reps. Andy Biggs and David Schweikert, for Politico, though they both have huge liabilities. Biggs is the type of far-right extremist who did poorly statewide last month, and his decision to challenge Kevin McCarthy for the speakership shows he's not interested in making nice with party leaders. Biggs, whom Sinema has identified as a friend, himself said Friday that being an independent could be "a better home for her." Schweikert, for his part, only won re-election 50.4-49.6 after Democrat Jevin Hodge and his allies highlighted his ethics violations.
Finally, there's the question of what Sinema, who did not commit to running for re-election, will do in 2024. The senator's decision to go solo means that she no longer needs to worry about a primary challenge from Gallego or anyone else, but she would have a different issue to fret over if she wanted to make it to the general election ballot.
Former state elections director Eric Spencer tells KTAR News that he estimates that independent Senate candidates would need about 45,000 signatures to advance, compared to the 7,000-8,000 required to make it to a party primary. Sinema could collect these from Democrats, Republicans, or fellow independents, though Spencer says that, because every voter can only sign one petition, "She'd be well advised to start hitting the streets immediately."
Sinema may also need the head start because there may not be that many voters who want her to continue to represent them. The Democratic firm Civiqs released numbers Friday giving her a truly awful 18-61 favorable rating days before she became an independent. And while some Democrats like Grijalva have fretted that a Sinema campaign would "dilute" the blue vote in a general election, Civiqs found that Democrats already gave her a horrific 5-82 score even before she jumped ship. Republicans and independents, by contrast, gave her 25-45 and 25-56 ratings.
Sinema, though, will at least keep her Democratic committee assignments, including her chairmanship of two subcommittees, in the 118th Congress. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in his announcement that this will allow Democrats to "maintain our new majority on committees, exercise our subpoena power, and be able to clear nominees without discharge votes."
The senator herself spent Friday morning refusing to say whether she'd actually continue to caucus with her former party, though she was clearer about refusing to join a GOP coalition. However, Schumer almost certainly wouldn't allow her to keep her panel assignments if he felt she wouldn't at least be a nominal member of his caucus.
Senate
● CA-Sen: Rep. Ro Khanna tells Semafor he'd consider running for the Senate should his fellow Democrat, incumbent Dianne Feinstein, retire, though he added, "But the most likely scenario is that I will be running for re-election to the United States House of Representatives."
Governors
● NH-Gov: Republican Gov. Chris Sununu, writes Politico, has "been positioning himself for the 2024 presidential primaries for a while now," but for now he's keeping everyone guessing about his 2024 plans.
Sununu, who decisively won another two-year term as governor last month, says, "I haven't ruled anything in or out. I haven't ruled out a fifth term. I haven't ruled out running for higher office." The Granite State has long had one of the latest candidate filing deadlines in the nation for non-presidential offices, so he could turn around and seek re-election if his White House dreams were to falter.
House
● CO-03: Democrat Adam Frisch tells Jewish Insider that, while he's considering seeking a rematch against far-right Rep. Lauren Boebert following his shockingly small loss last month, he's not in a hurry to decide. "It's not even 2023, so I think we have some time," said Frisch. The Democrat trails by about 500 votes and has already conceded, though a mandatory recount that must conclude by Tuesday is underway.
● VA-04: State Sen. Jennifer McClellan and Del. Lamont Bagby have both filed with the FEC to run in the upcoming special election to succeed their fellow Democrat, the late Rep. Donald McEachin, and the Richmond Free Press reports that both have decided to run.
A spokesperson for McClellan, who unsuccessfully ran in the 2021 primary for governor, said that "she is very likely to run" and added that an announcement would occur early in the coming week. Bagby himself tweeted Thursday, "I have a major announcement coming soon!" An unnamed source told WRIC around that time that he'd launch in the week of Dec. 12.
Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin still has not scheduled the special to fill the safely blue seat last held by McEachin, whose funeral took place Wednesday. It remains to be seen just how the Democratic nominee will be picked because Virginia allows parties to choose nominees through three different means: Democrats could opt for a traditional primary; a convention; or a so-called firehouse primary, which is a small-scale nominating contest run by the party rather than the state.
Legislatures
● AK State House: Thursday's recount in Alaska's 15th House District reaffirmed Republican incumbent Tom McKay's tiny edge over Democrat Denny Wells, though control of the chamber still remains in doubt more than a month after Election Day.
McKay's lead ticked up from seven votes to nine as a result of the recount, though Wells has five days to appeal the outcome (he has not yet said if he will). A McKay win would leave Republicans with 21 members in this 40-person body, theoretically enough for a bare majority; Democrats won 13 constituencies, while independents took the other six.
One of those Republicans, though, is House Speaker Louise Stutes, a member of the shifting cross-party coalition of Democrats, Republicans, and independents known as the Majority Caucus that has run the chamber since 2017. (The other Republican, Kelly Merrick, successfully sought a promotion to the state Senate, which recently formed its own bipartisan majority coalition.)
Stutes sounds as though she'd like to keep the status quo intact in the lower chamber: She recently put out a joint statement with two fellow members of the Majority Caucus, independent Bryce Edgmon and Democrat Neal Foster, praising the group's efforts and adding, "Alaskans expect us to be ready to work in January and to get the job done on time."
However, the outcome of a trial concerning a very different Republican, far-right state Rep. David Eastman, could indirectly end up determining whether or not the Majority Caucus continues. There's no question that the obstructionist Eastman beat Wasilla City Councilman Stu Graham, who has a far better relationship with the GOP leadership, by a 52-28 margin in their November intra-party contest. One of Eastman's constituents, though, is suing over whether he can actually serve because of his membership in the Oath Keepers, an extreme right group that was involved in the Jan. 6 attack.
A judicial order has prevented election authorities from certifying Eastman as the winner, and if he's ultimately disqualified, the seat would go to Graham as the second-place finisher. That outcome could be very good for Republicans who want to control the chamber on their own: One state representative said of Eastman, "He's voted with us. He's voted against us. I can't say any more than that, other than he's got some issues."
The suit argues that, because the state constitution prevents anyone from holding office who "advocates, or who aids or belongs to any party or association which advocates the overthrow by force or violence of the United States," an Oath Keeper like Eastman cannot serve in the state House.
Eastman attorney Joe Miller (yes, that Joe Miller) has pushed back, insisting that none of the federal charges say that "alleged Oath Keepers in any way attempted [to] overthrow the government." The trial is set to start Monday, and multiple people told reporter Nathaniel Herz that it's unlikely anyone will form a majority before the verdict is in. (The founder of the Oath Keepers, Stewart Rhodes, was convicted of seditious conspiracy last month by a jury in Washington, D.C., for his role in fomenting the Jan. 6 attacks.)
Eastman isn't the only problem for anyone looking to cobble together a 21-person majority, though. Herz writes in the Northern Journal that two independent members of the Majority Caucus, state Reps. Dan Ortiz and Josiah Patkotak, haven't closed the door on siding with most of the GOP.
Patkotak, who also kept everyone guessing about his plans two years ago, appears to be the more unpredictable of the two, saying, "All options are on the table." Patkotak won re-election without opposition, and represents a seat in the North Slope in the far northern corner of Alaska that, while Democratic-leaning, is in a major oil-producing region, which Herz says could make him an appealing ally for Republicans who favor the resource-extraction industry.
Ortiz, who won a close race against a Republican foe, also hedged, saying, "There's not much I can say other than time will work it out." However, a Democratic colleague, state Rep. Andy Josephsen, told Herz he wasn't concerned that Ortiz might side with the GOP.
It's also possible that the Majority Caucus could win over some additional GOP recruits, though two Republicans elected last month sounded unlikely to go for it. "I just don't think that an organization of 19 Democrats and independents, Stutes, and me is going to be in the best interests of the state," Jesse Sumner said to Herz, predicting, "They'd run circles around me." Will Stapp in turn said of partnering with the coalition, "I haven't seen or heard anything that would make me think that it's in the best interests of the Interior, or my town or community."
Whatever happens, we could be in for a long wait: Following both the 2018 and 2020 elections, alliances in the House weren't finalized until February, so it wouldn't be a surprise to see a similar delay this time.
Grab Bag
● Where Are They Now?: A state judge has dismissed the criminal charges against former Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder over his alleged role in the Flint water crisis, which poisoned the majority-Black city with lead-tainted water and led to the outbreak of disease starting in 2014.
Snyder was indicted in early 2021 by a one-person grand jury, but the state Supreme Court in June ruled that indictments by this method weren't legal. State Judge F. Kay Behm, who was recently confirmed for a federal judgeship, dismissed the charges Wednesday after determining that they "were not properly brought."