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| State Sen. Troy Balderson (R-OH) |
1. Troy Balderson (Probably) Wins in Ohio
The marquee race last night was in Ohio's 12th district, an historically Republican seat that had become competitive in the waning days before the election. This is a race that never should have been competitive, and is yet another sign that President Trump's low approval ratings and polarizing policy positions (and perhaps more pertinent, his public statements) could be a death knell for Republicans in November. Indeed, depending on how you rank such things, there are somewhere between 65-80 seats currently held by the GOP that are less Republican than OH-12 (the range is due to how people weight open seats vs. seats where the incumbent is running). That this was competitive at all is a sign that the Republicans are in deep trouble heading into November and a blue wave is likely.
But it does appear that the Republicans saved themselves the embarrassment that they suffered in Alabama and Pennsylvania, as State Sen. Troy Balderson probably bested County Recorder Danny O'Connor. The race was within 1-point, with a number of provisional and absentee ballots still left to be counted (1754 votes in all), so it still wasn't called. For longtime election night watchers, Ohio does have an historically large number of provisional ballots each year, and Democrats have overcome a margin like that before, specifically in 2008 when County Recorder Mary Jo Kilroy was behind State Sen. Steve Stivers on election day in the OH-15 race by roughly 600 votes but ended up winning the race by over 2000 thanks to provisional & absentee ballots, but it's difficult to see that being duplicated this year thanks to the percentage of the remaining vote that O'Connor will have to take, and that Kilroy was running in a presidential election. So I'd assume that Balderson ends up winning, though the loser here is any Republican in an R+12 district or less headed into November, as they might not be so lucky.
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| President Donald Trump with Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R-KS) |
2. Kobach (Might Have) Won in Kansas
Unlike OH-12, the Kansas governor's race ended properly too-close-to-call (OH-12 feels more like news outlets not wanting a repeat of Florida in 2000). With over 200 precincts still left outstanding in Johnson County (the state's most populous county and home to the Kansas City suburbs), Secretary of State Kris Kobach led incumbent Gov. Jeff Colyer by just 600 votes, meaning the victor will be decided in the remaining precincts of the state. Democrats will be watching this race closely, as polls have shown that immigration hardliner Kobach (who has frequently been chastised by judges for abusing his position and for trying to deny people their voting rights), will be an easier target in November rather than Colyer, who is a more mainstream Republican. Expect this race to be decided in the next day or so, but if Kobach wins this is another victory for President Trump, who also has Balderson (even if POTUS incorrectly took credit for the victory last night, which probably belongs more to Gov. John Kasich's popularity in Delaware County) and Michigan's John James, who won the Senate nomination there for the GOP after Trump's endorsement. Kansas is an odd state in that it seems to have been having the hardliner vs. moderate battle long before that became en vogue in the GOP, and moderate Republicans have historically been able to be wooed by the Democrats in the general election if their man doesn't win (that's how Dennis Moore had such a long career), though as 2016 proved, it's a risky game to think your opponent is unelectable, so it's not entirely clear whether the D's would prefer Kobach to Colyer as their eventual opponent.
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| State Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) |
3. Democratic Women (Defintely) Win Big
The one thing I can say definitively this morning is that Democratic women had a fantastic night. In competitive primaries in Kansas and Michigan, Democratic women beat a slate of male candidates to become the party's nominees in November, making the number of women nominated by the party a record 9 (that sounds lower than it actually is considering there's only 36 contests and Democrats have a strong possibility of women being their nominees in a number of upcoming primary states, including Florida, Minnesota, Vermont, New Hampshire, Wyoming, Hawaii, and Rhode Island). In Michigan, State House Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer bested a challenge from her left (more on that in a second) to take on Attorney General Bill Schuette in one of the Democrats' best pickup opportunities, while State Sen. Laura Kelly easily took the nomination in Kansas. As I mentioned above, Kelly has led Kris Kobach but trailed Jeff Colyer, so if Kobach wins his primary this would become a tossup state pretty darn quickly. Combined with Sens. Claire McCaskill and Maria Cantwell taking their nominations in Missouri and Washington, respectively, and you've got a number of statewide women chosen by Democrats last night.
But it was in the House where Democrats really emerged victorious. In the three most competitive seats for November in Michigan, Democrats backed female candidates. State Rep. Gretchen Driskell (7th) and Obama administration official Elissa Slotkin (8th) both won their primaries with ease, while another Obama administration official (Haley Stevens) was leading in the 11th district, though outstanding precincts meant her race had not yet been called (and no-I don't know why so many states didn't just count all of their ballots last night, as this is unusual). On top of that, State Rep. Rashida Tlaib won the nomination for John Conyers' open seat in November (though oddly enough, she's currently behind to win the special election to hold his seat, so Detroit City Council President Brenda Jones may have to make the tough decision of whether or not to resign from her current office to serve in a seat she'll only hold through January...though as is the trend, precincts are still left uncounted so Tlaib may make history even earlier if they turn her way). In Kansas, Sharice Davids led in the race for the competitive 3rd district (still uncalled, however), and would become the first Native American woman elected to Congress in this swing district were she to win. And then there's Washington...
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| Rep. Jamie Herrera Beutler (R-WA) |
4. Washington (State) Republicans are in Big Trouble
Only three states do what is referred to as a "jungle" primary (California, Louisiana, and Wisconsin), where candidates run and regardless of party, the top two finishers advance to the general election. In June, the California race caused an enormous amount of heartburn for Democrats who were worried their many candidates might allow Republicans to advance two candidates to the general in one of the seven GOP-held seats that Hillary Clinton won in 2016. That was less of a risk in Washington last night, but looking at the vote totals, it's probable that there will be some race rating changes in the Evergreen State even so.
That's because the GOP did abysmally in the three most competitive seats. Though the state's mail-in-ballots system means that a larger number of votes are left uncounted this morning, looking at the results that are in is a damning indictment on Republican voter enthusiasm for November. In the 8th district, an open seat won by Hillary Clinton, State Sen. Dino Rossi sits at only 43% of the vote, despite getting in the mid-50's when he's run in the 8th district in past statewide races, and the Democrats appear on-track to have more than 50% of the vote when all is said-and-done (though it's unclear who will be their nominee as Dr. Kim Schrier led Deputy County Prosecutor Jason Rittereiser by 1300 votes with 70% of the vote tallied). In the fifth district, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the fourth highest-ranking House Republican, couldn't even get to 50% of the vote and could end up in second place in the runoff against former State Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown. This is a district that Donald Trump won by 13% but President Obama came much closer in, and is filled with the suburban white voters that pundits keep talking about being crucial to this November's general election; it's increasingly possible that we're underestimating how safe McMorris Rodgers is. Finally, the big unheralded story of the night was in the 3rd district, a district Obama won in 2008 (and nearly took in 2012), but that President Trump landed by 7-points in 2016. There Rep. Jamie Herrera Beutler is barely hanging onto 40% of the vote (with 70% of precincts reporting), and the Democratic percentage of the vote is actually higher than the Republicans. College Professor Carolyn Long, who hasn't made much noise this year other than pretty decent fundraising, will surely receive new attention after this impressive posting last night (she could well best Herrera Beutler when all votes are counted, and is the certain Democratic nominee). Worse news still for Rossi, Herrera Beutler, and McMorris Rodgers-Republicans historically over-perform in the primaries compared to the general in Washington, with Democrats improving their margins come November. If that's true, all three could be headed for defeat this fall, and give the Democrats a couple of seats that weren't part of their equation for a majority on Tuesday morning.
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| Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) |
5. Bernie Sanders & Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Have a Bad Night
A refrain throughout this year has been that "Democratic Women Win, Bernie Sanders Loses" come the day after a primary, and that appears to be the case post last night. Sanders, who has had terrible luck trying to translate his impressive 2016 run into votes for other politicians in 2018, saw his candidate lose in Michigan's gubernatorial primary, as Abdul El-Sayed got crushed by Gretchen Whitmer in the contest (worth noting-Hillary Clinton probably did get her "W" in Michigan as Haley Stevens is the frontrunner in the 11th district). Sanders was joined in this endorsement by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who rocked the political world when she bested Rep. Joe Crowley in a primary a few weeks ago. Both candidates also got behind former Sanders campaign official Brent Welder in Kansas, and while that race isn't decided yet, he's behind this morning to Sharice Davids. If these are both losses, it adds to a long list of (mostly male) candidates that Sanders has endorsed and missed this year, and may show that voters aren't "feeling the Bern" the way they were in 2016. Ocasio-Cortez's losses also indicate that, despite the "sky is falling" articles about how the Democrats have their own Tea Party now, her election appears to be more of an anomaly than a trend.
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