National
RFK: For the few people still thinking Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (I) might emerge as a serious candidate this fall, RFK is vetting the ex-wife of Google founder Sergey Brin, Nicole Shanahan (who also funded the RFK Super Bowl ad) to be his VP nominee. But fear not–he’s also vetting 90’s-era ex-Minnesota Gov. and former wrestler Jesse “The Body” Ventura (I), who, somehow, is still over 6 years younger than either Biden or Trump.
Congress
NJ-Sen: Rep. Andy Kim (D) won Atlantic County’s endorsement decisively over Heir Force Gen. Tammy Murphy (D), and will have it there if it isn’t declared unconstitutional. The margin of Kim’s victory was a surprise, as Murphy has the support of the George Norcross organization, whose caporegimes have longstanding interests in Atlantic County business.
OH-Sen: East Carolina University, which apparently polls Ohio, has Matt Dolan (R) narrowly ahead of Bernie Moreno (R) and Frank LaRose (R), 33-31-23. ECU also pushed the 14% who were undecided, and found that 47% leaned toward Dolan. The primary is tomorrow, and Dolan has late momentum much as he did in 2022, when he climbed from the back of the pack but ended up 2nd behind now-Sen J.D. Vance (R). ECU also polled the general and found Dolan up 43-41 on Sherrod Brown (D), with Brown beating Moreno 45-41 and LaRose 45-40.
More OH-Sen: Florida Atlantic University, which also apparently polls Ohio, has Dolan up by a similarly tight 40-37-24 margin on Moreno and LaRose with leaners included.
AZ-8: Abe Hamadeh (R), who threw away the AZ-AG race in 2022 by running to Stop The Steal, is facing criticism for message-board posts he made as a teenager blaming Israel for 9/11. Hamadeh claims he has been pro-Israel throughout his adulthood. He’s part of a crowded primary for this medium-red suburban seat that also includes State House Speaker Ben Toma (R), State Sen. Anthony Kern (R), ex-Rep. Trent Franks (R), and Blake Masters (R), one of Hamadeh’s teammates on the disastrous 2022 ticket.
TX-34: Godwin’s Law alert! Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D) compared Latinos who vote for Trump to “Jews for Hitler.” Gonzalez is facing a rematch against ex-Rep. Mayra Flores (R) after winning by just 8 points in 2022 in an overwhelmingly Latino district that Hillary Clinton won by over 35 points in 2016, suggesting Latinos are trending briskly toward Republicans in a way that Jews did not trend toward the Nazi Party.
State
NC-Supt.: Republicans appear ready to punt this race, after nominee Michelle Morrow (R, sadly) doubled down on statements from 2020 calling for Obama and Biden to be publicly executed for treason. Morrow said of Obama “I prefer a Pay Per View of him in front of the firing squad,” and of Biden “We need to follow the Constitution’s advice and KILL all TRAITORS!!!” A spokesman for Thom Tillis (R) confirmed that Tillis is unlikely to support Morrow in November.
NJ-All: NJ Attorney General Matt Platkin (D) declined to defend the state’s use of “The Line” in party primaries, suggesting that he believes the Line to be unconstitutional. A federal judge is weighing a constitutional challenge to The Line, a uniquely Jersey feature of electoral politics, places all the candidates endorsed by a county party into an easy-to-vote bracket, while scattering non-endorsed candidates into different brackets across the ballot. This ballot setup tends to give a big advantage to the county party’s endorsed candidates, and makes NJ’s county machine bosses the most powerful in the country. An end to The Line would tend to favor Kim over Murphy in this year’s Senate primary, but more broadly, would seismically change the way machine politics work in New Jersey.
International
UK: The British press is circling October 10 as the likely date of the next general election, which must be held before January. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has committed only to an election date in the second half of 2024; with Sunak’s Conservatives likely to lose, the CW had been that he will wait until later in the year, or at least until after someone finds Kate Middleton.
France: An early poll of France’s 2027 elections finds that National Rally, the economically-left and culturally-right party of the Le Pen family, would win a majority of legislative seats, mostly at the expense of Emanuel Macron’s liberal Renaissance party. The Le Pens have had strong early polls in many election cycles, but have yet to break through and win when French voters have had a binary choice between them and a single opposition, although they’ve been getting closer.
Russia: Vladimir Putin squeaked by to win another term with 87% of the vote over the weekend. Putin overcame systemic voter fraud to win by millions and millions of votes because Mike Pence had the courage.