Rep. Vance McAllister (R-LA) told the Monroe News-Star that he won’t be seeking reelection to his seat next fall.
“McAllister has been under siege since a scandal broke before Easter when a video was published showing the married congressman kissing a married former staffer.”
Rep. Michael Grimm (R-NY) was indicted on 20 counts including “federal fraud charges for underreporting the wages and payroll while running an Upper East Side restaurant, concealing the actual payroll in a separate set of computer records,” the New York Times reports.
He also lied under oath in January 2013, while he was a member of Congress, during a deposition, the indictment says.
Roll Call: “Grimm will be on the general-election ballot unless one of three unlikely events takes place… He has already been designated by the state party as its nominee, so the only way he can be removed is by moving out of the district, running for a judgeship or being convicted before the general, the source said.”
Cook Political Report moves the seat to “Lean Democrat.”
“I don’t think U.S. senators make that much money.”
— Iowa U.S. Senate candidate Mark Jacobs (R), quoted by NBC News, on whether he would forgo his Senate salary if he wins the office.
You're reading the free version of Political Wire
Upgrade to a paid membership to unlock full access. The process is quick and easy. You can even use Apple Pay.
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) emphasizes the importance of her Senate seniority in a very effective new ad.
The Boston Globe notes that Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and former Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) “created no bonds” and “rarely interacted and barely spoke” while they served together in the U.S. Senate.
“The unusually cool relationship across the partisan divide helps explain why the New Hampshire Senate race has quickly turned bitter, now that Brown has moved north and is running against the incumbent Shaheen after Elizabeth Warren foiled his own 2012 reelection bid in Massachusetts.”
Rep. Michael Grimm (R-NY) surrendered to the FBI and was arrested on federal criminal charges, NBC New York reports.
Staten Island Advance: “The federal indictment against Grimm, two-plus years in the making, would be made public on Monday as well. The charges are expected to concern tax issues and wire and mail fraud having to do with Healthalicious, the health food restaurant Grimm owned for a time after leaving the FBI.”
The FBI “is exploring whether confidantes of Gov. Sam Brownback (R) operated influence-peddling operations in Kansas pivoting on personal access to the Republican governor and top administration officials,” the Topeka Capital Journal reports.
“Of concern to the FBI were behind-the-scenes financial arrangements related to Brownback’s privatization of the state’s $3 billion Medicaid program. The governor’s branding of KanCare handed to three for-profit insurance companies exclusive contracts to provide Medicaid services to 380,000 of Kansas’ disabled and poor.”
“Usually when I get up this early, I get up to kill something.”
— Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), quoted by BuzzFeed, at an early morning church service to a congregation not familiar with his passion for bowhunting.
Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC) “seems as if she should be part of the firewall in the Democrats’ bid to retain the Senate, considering that incumbents tend to win re-election in states that are competitive in presidential elections,” Nate Cohn writes.
“But Ms. Hagan is far more vulnerable than she appears at first glance. North Carolina might be the state where Democrats suffer the most from low midterm turnout. The state is divided between older, culturally Southern and conservative voters, and younger, more diverse and more liberal voters, especially around the Research Triangle and Charlotte.”
“In presidential elections, those two groups fight nearly to a draw. In midterm elections, when older voters turn out at much higher rates than younger ones, the Republicans have a big advantage.”
Coming in June: The Chairman: The Rise and Betrayal of Jim Greer by Peter Golenbock.
The book is a billed as “a political tell-all about how wealth begets power in Republican-led Florida state politics. The book details the secret deals, the dirty pool, the payoffs. Featuring political treachery at every turn, it’s also a personal, inside look at the brotherly relationship between Greer and Crist and the ruthlessness of potential presidential candidate Marco Rubio and attorney general Bill McCollum.”
The New Hampshire Republican Party plans to formally request the FEC “to investigate whether there was an illegal coordination between the Jeanne Shaheen’s re-election campaign and a Democratic Super PAC, which began running a new series of ads in the state Friday,” WMUR reports.
“The five-page complaint says that when the Shaheen campaign posted a new webpage with, what they allege a sample script and ready-for-television images, it were signaling to the Senate Majority PAC that it needed an ad immediately and what it should look like and say… The finished ad, however, doesn’t use this script or the photos, but does basically follow the same line of attack on Shaheen’s potential Republican opponent, Scott Brown.”
Robert Costa: “Four years after using her unique position to propel a number of conservatives — many previously unknown and not favored by party leaders — in the tea party wave of 2010, Palin is today a diminished figure in the Republican Party. Even as she travels to Iowa and elsewhere to bolster her handpicked candidates, her influence in these midterm elections has been eclipsed by a new class of stars and her circle has narrowed, with a handful of aides guiding her and a few allies in Washington beyond a group of backbench troublemakers in Congress.”
The Wall Street Journal says May 20 is shaping up as a good day for the Republican “establishment.”
“That’s the day Republican primary voters in Georgia, Idaho and Kentucky pick their nominees for the fall campaigns – and, in the process, help settle which faction of the GOP holds the upper hand in an ongoing split between party leaders and conservative activists. May will bring some of this year’s most competitive Republican primaries. At this point, it looks as if the environment is tilting heavily in the establishment’s favor.”
A new Democracy Corps survey in battleground congressional districts shows 52% of respondents want to “implement and fix” the 2010 health care reform law versus 42% who want to “repeal and replace” it.
Politico: “Two dozen interviews about the 2016 race with unaligned GOP donors, financial executives and their Washington lobbyists turned up a consistent — and unusual — consolation candidate if Jeb Bush demurs, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie doesn’t recover politically and no other establishment favorite gets nominated: Hillary Clinton.”
“The country’s leading gay rights groups and donors, after a decade focused on legalizing same-sex marriage, are embarking on a major drive to win more basic civil rights and workplace protections in Southern and Western states where the rapid progress of the movement has largely eluded millions of gay men and lesbians,” the New York Times reports.
“The effort will shift tens of millions of dollars in the next few years to what advocates described as the final frontier for gay rights: states like Mississippi, Georgia, Arkansas and Texas, where Republicans dominate elected office and traditional cultural views on homosexuality still prevail.”
Jonathan Chait: “Since at least October, the assumption has held that the midterm elections will revolve thematically around Obamacare. A series of new developments is suddenly making that once-rock-solid assumption look questionable.”
“I’m the only Republican running this year that every crazy liberal in the country’s heard of.”
— Sen. Mitch McConnnell (R-KY), quoted by the Huffiington Post.
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
“There are a lot of blogs and news sites claiming to understand politics, but only a few actually do. Political Wire is one of them.”
— Chuck Todd, host of “Meet the Press”
“Concise. Relevant. To the point. Political Wire is the first site I check when I’m looking for the latest political nugget. That pretty much says it all.”
— Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the Rothenberg Political Report
“Political Wire is one of only four or five sites that I check every day and sometimes several times a day, for the latest political news and developments.”
— Charlie Cook, editor of the Cook Political Report
“The big news, delicious tidbits, pearls of wisdom — nicely packaged, constantly updated… What political junkie could ask for more?”
— Larry Sabato, Center for Politics, University of Virginia
“Political Wire is a great, great site.”
— Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”
“Taegan Goddard has a knack for digging out political gems that too often get passed over by the mainstream press, and for delivering the latest electoral developments in a sharp, no frills style that makes his Political Wire an addictive blog habit you don’t want to kick.”
— Arianna Huffington, founder of The Huffington Post
“Political Wire is one of the absolute must-read sites in the blogosphere.”
— Glenn Reynolds, founder of Instapundit
“I rely on Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire for straight, fair political news, he gets right to the point. It’s an eagerly anticipated part of my news reading.”
— Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist.