Detroit News:
“Metro Detroiters began heading to the polls Tuesday to vote for mayors
and council members in some suburbs and Detroit, whose historic
election includes the first council members selected by district in
nearly a century. In the highest-profile race, former Detroit Medical
Center CEO Mike Duggan faces Wayne County Sheriff Benny Napoleon to see
who replaces Mayor Dave Bing and works with state-appointed Emergency
Manager Kevyn Orr.”

Hillary Clinton “hasn’t even started her 2016 presidential campaign yet — and she’s already shutting out the press,” the San Francisco Chronicle reports.

The decision to bar reporters from the Clinton speech before thousands of Realtors is “per her team’s request” and “isn’t typical” of the annual Realtors conference.

NBC News: “New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is poised to win a second term, a rare feat for a Republican running in deep-blue New Jersey. In Virginia, an emerging swing state, longtime Democratic money-man Terry McAuliffe has built a steady lead over his deeply conservative opponent, GOP Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli.”

“The two races have highlighted the GOP’s struggle to reconcile its establishment wing with its insurgent conservative class. A victory for McAuliffe would also add credibility to Democrats’ efforts to claim Virginia – once an unambiguous GOP foothold – as a toss-up state, if not Democratic-leaning.”

Rick Klein: “The result is that the two ‘off-year’ races that have long been viewed
as national harbingers are instead offering lessons primarily to a
Republican Party that’s still engaged in a spirited fight for its own
identity.”

The Fix: How to watch the exit polls in Virginia.

Rev. Calvin O. Butts III (D) “has been holding behind-the-scenes meetings with clergy and Harlem leaders as he moves ahead with a congressional bid for the seat currently occupied by Charlie Rangel, who has not declared his intentions,” the New York Daily News reports.

Joshua Spivak counts 15 officials facing recall elections today.

“The reasons for the recall span the spectrum. By far the most notable ones are in the bankrupt city of San Bernardino, where 3 officials are going before the voters — there were attempts against 10 officials in all. Other notable recalls are in Hesperia (firing of a high school coach) and Cibolo (Walmart).”

“It’s the first major race between the forces and faces of the new
Republican tea party — a tea party whose social recidivism is only
outgunned by its hostility to science and technology and innovation and
scholarship.”

— Vice President Joe Biden, quoted by Politico, campaigning in Virginia for Terry McAuliffe.

Roll Call: “With one day until the special-election runoff in Alabama’s 1st District, conservative groups are making a final push to affect the GOP contest that has become a national bellwether for Republicans.”

“Business groups are trying to boost former state Sen. Bradley Byrne over Dean Young, a tea-party-backed businessman who’s already made some controversial comments. Over the weekend, Ending Spending Inc., a PAC launched in 2010 by TD Ameritrade founder Joe Ricketts, spent $102,000 in ads to promote Byrne, according to reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.”

Politico: “Whatever dim hope Cuccinelli has of an upset rests on abysmal turnout among Democrats. For months polls have shown McAuliffe, a longtime Democratic Party fixer and businessman, leading Cuccinelli in the high single digits. So McAuliffe has had a series of high-profile surrogates vouch for him the past few weeks – President Barack Obama on Sunday, Bill and Hillary Clinton before that – to remind party that they need to finish the job.”

Harry Enten looks at the “idea that Americans are independent, and that the anger directed at both parties right now will lead to an anti-incumbent wave for both Democrats and Republicans.”

“I won’t say that an anti-incumbent wave is impossible, but I will say that it’s not likely… [Since 1954,] there are many years in which a large number of incumbents are defeated. What you don’t see is the same number of years where incumbents of both parties are defeated. In fact, such years pretty much don’t exist.”

First Read: “If the polls are correct in Virginia… then we’re likely going to re-learn an important point: The sign of a healthy political party is that you can appeal to the middle without alienating the base. That is precisely what McAuliffe has done in his campaign, as he’s reached out to the state’s business middle while mobilizing the party’s liberals.”

“By contrast, Republicans appear to have two problems right now. Either they are appealing to the base, which is alienating the middle (see Virginia). Or when they appeal to the middle, they are alienating the base (see Chris Christie in New Jersey)… To win national elections, you have to be able to appeal to the middle without alienating your base, as well as appeal to the base without alienating the middle. That’s not happening inside the GOP right now.”