Bernie Sanders has parted ways with one of his deputy field directors in Iowa, Politico reports.

Lata’s departure is the latest in a series of staff shakeups in the critical early states of Iowa and New Hampshire.

Washington Post: “That’s one of the key findings of an intensive report by Third Way, a center-left think tank that analyzed all 235 districts held by House Democrats to look at where the fault lines were not just for the House but also the Senate majority and the presidency in next year’s elections.”

“The result is a portrait of the Democratic coalition, from the rural edge of Kind’s western Wisconsin district to the inner-city neighborhoods of Tlaib’s Detroit-based district, that shows the path to victory at every level of power in Washington.”

Amy Walter: “Biden has set himself up as the ‘most electable’ candidate in the race. If he loses in Iowa and New Hampshire, well, the rationale for his candidacy also goes up in smoke. The best way for Warren to prove that she can beat Trump in November is to win in those early states. Obviously, winning a primary or caucus is not the same as proving that you can beat the sitting incumbent president. But, voters like winners. Once a candidate starts to win, it gets harder and harder for the ‘but can he/she win in November?’ to get much traction.”

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Friday that he is dropping out of the Democratic presidential race after failing to gain traction in the crowded field, the Washington Post reports.

Said de Blasio: “I feel like I’ve contributed all I can to this primary election.”

“Contest Every Race, a new coalition of Democratic groups, is launching a seven-figure campaign to challenge Republican incumbents in 26,849 down-ballot local races,” Axios reports.

“2020 is more than just the presidential election. Democrats are getting serious about trying to gain more power at the local level, whether through city council seats, school boards, or state legislatures.”

“There are 520,000 elected offices in the country. As many as 75% go uncontested, per the group, ceding many of those seats to Republicans.”

Politico: “Ten candidates participated in September’s DNC debate and 11 have qualified for the October edition, but the DNC has yet to spell out the thresholds it will use to ration debate participation in November and December with time running short. Even small changes in the criteria could have far-reaching effects: When the DNC set its thresholds at 65,000 donors or 1 percent in polls earlier this year, 20 candidates made the stage.”

“But merely increasing the polling threshold to 2 percent in four DNC-approved surveys, and doubling the donor threshold, capped the September debate at one night. Even a modest increase for November could spell the end of several campaigns that are just hanging on to the debate stage, and while we know the criteria are likely to keep going up, no one knows exactly how it will affect the 2020 field. And in a nationalized presidential election, the debates have proven to be the most important opportunity for candidates to introduce themselves to large audiences and try to change the direction of their campaigns.”

Philip Bump: “Look, the GOP isn’t going to literally die off anytime soon. But when you’re a political party that sneaked into the White House on the strength of 78,000 votes in three states — Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — having a significant portion of your voter base in that 65-and-older group has to be somewhat worrisome. Younger voters are overwhelmingly Democratic but also tend to be lackadaisical about casting ballots. That foundation of older, conservative voters is essential to the GOP.”

“We wondered, then, how much death had reshaped the electorate since the 2016 election. Was it the case, for example, that the Grim Reaper is conducting the Final Get-Out-The-Vote in red states more than blue ones? What does that mean for 2020?”

“Thanks to data from L2, a nonpartisan voter data firm, we can report that in nearly every state, the number of new voters added since the 2016 election is larger than the number of voters removed from the voting rolls due to being dead. But the variation in the relationship between those two groups of voters (living, dead) is itself not even — nor is the partisan composition of the new-voter pool.”

“A consistent but uneasy front-runner in Democrats’ 2020 presidential primary scramble, Joe Biden is flexing his muscle with new endorsements from three congressmen: two former chairmen of the Congressional Black Caucus and a former Florida governor,” the AP reports.

“The moves from Reps. G.K. Butterfield (D-NC), Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO) and Charlie Crist (D-FL) underscore Biden’s play both for the party establishment and minority voters who will be key in the early stages of the primary calendar, especially in South Carolina’s late February primary and the Southern states that follow in March.”