“As he gears up for a possible second presidential run, Texas Gov. Rick Perry is crisscrossing the country extolling a business-first philosophy he says made his state’s economy white-hot — and can work for the rest of America too,” the AP reports.

“But back home, members of Perry’s own party seem poised to dismantle key parts of his legacy. The longest-serving governor in state history isn’t seeking re-election and may see two of his achievements — distributing hundreds of millions of dollars to attract top employers to Texas and stockpiling a rainy day fund robust enough to bankroll infrastructure projects — swept away not long after he moves out of the governor’s mansion.”

TPM: “A Mississippi tea party official with close ties to U.S. Senate candidate Chris McDaniel apparently ended up inside a locked and empty county courthouse late Tuesday night after primary election results had come in.”

South Dakota U.S. Senate candidate Annette Bosworth (R) turned herself in following the issuance of a warrant for her arrest just after she lost the election, the Sioux Falls Argus Leader reports.

Keloland: “Bosworth confirms that she has been charged with six counts of perjury and six counts of offering a false or forged instrument for filing… Concerns were raised during her campaign that she had submitted nominating petitions where she was listed as the petition circulator but was allegedly not in the country at the time the petition was circulated.”

According to Business Insider, Bosworth’s Facebook and Twitter accounts provided evidence against her.

A new Clemson University Palmetto poll in South Carolina finds Sen. Lindsey Graham (R) leading the GOP primary for Senate with 49%, followed by Lee Bright (R) at 9% and five other candidates in the low single digits. Another 35% of respondents said they were still undecided.

Graham needs 50% support to avoid a runoff.

Oregon U.S. Senate candidate Monica Wehby (R) spoke to the Oregonian about the police reports which said she stalked an ex-boyfriend and harassed her ex-husband.

Said Wehby: “I think these are personal matters that have been put to rest by the fact that both of these guys are close friends of mine and very supportive of my candidacy. I don’t think any of us – man or woman – would like to answer out in the public square for things that we say to our spouses in the heat of an argument. I find this to be a despicable attack by Merkley and his band of bullies.”

“Merkley has said he didn’t know anything about the report before it became public and said he doesn’t intend to make an issue of her personal life.”

The Cook Political Report has learned that American Crossroads is staying out of the Mississippi GOP Senate runoff, denying Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) “a major source of outside spending.”

The Fix: “We looked at six times since 2000 in which an incumbent has faced a primary runoff, and then compared the primary vote totals to the runoff totals in each race. In all but one case, the challenger took at least 75 percent off the votes that were ‘up for grabs’ in the runoff, and in two of those cases, the incumbent actually lost votes in the runoff.”

The Week: “Annette Bosworth’s South Dakota Senate campaign ended Tuesday with a loss in the GOP primary, a defeat made all the more humbling by the way Bosworth learned she’d lost: in a live interview on Fox News.”

“Hello, how are you doing? I’m Thad Cochran.”

— Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS), to The Atlantic‘s Molly Ball less than half an hour after she interviewed him.

First Read says that if Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) “was in trouble before the last night, he’s in bigger trouble today.”

Two questions: “One, do pro-Cochran outside groups try to prop up the incumbent? McDaniel has benefitted from outside groups so far, but does Haley Barbour now bring in the cavalry to save Cochran? Two, what does the National Republican Senatorial Committee do in the runoff? In the original primary, not only was it backing the incumbent Cochran, it also went for the kill against McDaniel — helping to turn those arrests into a national story. We bet the folks at the NRSC are doing some polling right now to see how electable, or unelectable, McDaniel could be in a general election. As we wrote yesterday, Democrats have a semi-credible candidate waiting in the wings to face the runoff winner: former Rep. Travis Childers (D-MS).”

“Part of what I’ve been thinking about, is everything I’m interested in and everything I enjoy doing – and with the extra added joy of ‘I’m about to become a grandmother,’ I want to live in the moment. At the same time I am concerned about what I see happening in the country and in the world.”

— Hillary Clinton, in an interview with People magazine.