Just dropped · Trial Balloon · Ep. 189
Navigating the Nonsense
Harry Enten: “With the primary on Tuesday, the word ‘mess’ is the only real way to describe the Democratic mayoral primary in the country’s most populated and heavily Democratic city.”
“There are a lot of candidates (eight of whom qualified for the final debate last week), a new ranked choice system where voters get to rank up to five candidates if they want, and low turnout is likely.”
“Andrew Yang and Kathryn Garcia, two leading candidates in the New York City mayor’s race, joined each other on the campaign trail on Saturday, a late alliance that the contest’s front-runner, Eric Adams, immediately sought to portray as an attempt to weaken the voice of minority voters,” the New York Times reports.
“Mr. Yang and Ms. Garcia stopped short of an official cross-endorsement, with Mr. Yang urging voters to rank Ms. Garcia second on their ballots but Ms. Garcia refraining from doing the same for him. Still, the two distributed fliers at a rally in Queens that featured their photos and names side by side.”
Politico: “After six months of endless zoom forums, erratic polls and a truncated campaign season, the race remains a tossup less than a week out. With ranked-choice voting throwing more uncertainty into the process, the Democratic nominee, who is all but certain to win the general election, will likely not be named until well after Tuesday’s primary.”
Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball: “Ranked-choice voting as well as the many twists and turns of the race makes it difficult to predict a winner in next week’s Democratic primary.”
“New York City’s eight leading mayoral candidates will take the stage Wednesday night in the last debate of the primary — and with less than a week until election day, none can claim to be the undisputed front-runner. But a few hope to be, by the end of the night,” Politico reports.
The debate will be held from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. ET.
You can watch online via NBC New York.
“Glenn Youngkin was for Terry McAuliffe’s economy before he was against it,” Insider reports.
“It’s an uncomfortable bit of reality for Youngkin, now the GOP nominee for Virginia governor who as CEO of the global investment firm The Carlyle Group routinely praised the state’s economic progress while McAuliffe was its chief executive.”
Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “We never want to read too much into special legislative elections, which have notoriously low turnout. But Republicans still have to be pretty pleased with the outcomes in two contests Tuesday to fill vacant seats in the Georgia General Assembly.”
“In the rural Georgia open seat in House District 156, two Republicans are headed to a runoff, while a Democrat lagged with just 15% of the vote, underperforming Joe Biden.”
“And in the Marietta-based House District 34, vacated by former GOP Rep. Bert Reeves, GOP voters combined to amass about 60% of the tally. Biden notched about 47% in the district in November.”
California Secretary of State Shirley Weber (D) has set the requirements for candidates to appear on the ballot for the recall election of Gov. Gavin Newsom (D).
The requirements are 65 signatures, a $4,195 filing fee, and 5 years of tax returns.
“Four decades after last holding the position, Dennis Kucinich, the Democratic former Boy Mayor, U.S. congressman and presidential candidate, announced he wants a second chance to be Cleveland’s mayor,” the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports.
“Kucinich’s long-expected announcement brings arguably the most high-profile name to the already crowded list of candidates looking to succeed four-term Mayor Frank Jackson. The nonpartisan primary is Sept. 14, with the top two finishers squaring off in the Nov. 2 general election.”
A new Politico/WNBC/Telemundo poll in New York City shows Eric Adams (D) leading the Democratic mayoral primary with 24% on the first ballot and finishing with 56% after ranked choice voting has concluded.
Kathryn Garcia is in second with 17% of the first ballot vote and finishing second in ranked choice voting with 44%.
A new JMC Analytics poll in Virginia finds Terry McAuliffe (D) with a 4-point lead over Glenn Youngkin (R), 46% to 42% with 12% still undecided.
“This year’s competitive gubernatorial race in Virginia will likely come down to answers to these two questions,” First Read reports.
“One, just how potent is Republican nominee Glenn Youngkin’s change message? (‘It’s going to take an outsider, a new kind of leader to bring a new day to Virginia,’ Youngkin says in his heavily played TV ad.)”
“And two, is Trump still a powerful — and galvanizing — issue for Democrats and nominee Terry McAuliffe? (‘Glenn Youngkin is not a reasonable Republican. He is a loyalist to Donald Trump,’ goes a new McAuliffe digital ad.)”
First Read: “With most (though not all) of the votes counted in last night’s Democratic gubernatorial primary in Virginia, turnout was more than 480,000.”
“That’s higher than the Dem gubernatorial primary of 2009 (319,168), but lower than the Dem primary of 2017 (542,858).”
“But that Democratic turnout yesterday even got close to what it was in the first year of Trump’s presidency is something Dem strategists are touting.”
“The race for New York City mayor took an extraordinary turn on Wednesday as the leading candidate, Eric Adams, gave reporters a tour of a Brooklyn apartment he owns, while rival campaigns questioned his residency and fitness for office,” the New York Times reports.
“I don’t think Trump has the courage to come back to Virginia.”
— Former Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D), in an MSNBC interview, on whether he expects Donald Trump to campaign for Glenn Youngkin (R) in Virginia’s gubernatorial race.
Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball: “Virginia’s Democratic trend gives Terry McAuliffe an early edge, but it’s common for Virginia gubernatorial races to look a lot different than the previous year’s presidential race.”
“Matchups for the state’s down-ballot races were also set, but don’t expect a ton of ticket-splitting among the state’s three statewide elected offices.”
“Kasim Reed, who fulfilled his lifelong goal by becoming mayor of Atlanta by the age of 40 and who then left City Hall eight years later under a cloud of controversy and investigation, has officially entered the wide-open mayor’s race,” the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
Politico: “The mayoral hopeful has been staying overnight and keeping late-night and early-morning hours in the government building where he and his staff work… When he is not laying his head in the taxpayer-owned building, the borough president has provided conflicting information on official documents about where he resides.”
“Adams is leading the pack of Democratic candidates to become New York City’s next mayor, riding a wave of concern about crime that is bolstered by his 22-year career with the NYPD. Now as borough president, an examination of his government and political activity reveals blurred lines between the two, as well as a confusing account of his residential status for someone seeking one of the most visible jobs in the country.”
Jack Ciattarelli (R) will win the Republican nomination for New Jersey governor, CNN projected, setting him up to take on Gov. Phil Murphy (D) in the fall.
Taegan Goddard
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.
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