Just dropped · Trial Balloon · Ep. 192
November Surprises
“Pennsylvania could be the whole ballgame for House Democrats on election night,” MS NOW reports.
“The results could also offer a big test for the political clout of the state’s Democratic governor, Josh Shapiro, who is running for re-election but possibly has his eyes on a different race in 2028.”
“The Keystone State is home to four battleground House districts. If Democrats flip them all, it’s more likely than not they will control the House chamber next year.”
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) was interviewed by Fox News host Alica Acuna:
ACUNA: There have been now five audio leaks from a private fundraiser you attended on September 24 published by various media outlets. Are you concerned that they all came from the same, and are you figuring out who did it? But then also, it raises some flags over your thoughts, publicly and privately, over the president and Washington.
PAXTON: Look, I’m not worried about it at all. You can look at my record, you can look at what I’ve done over the last 12 years. I’ve supported President Trump, I love President Trump… Just because they were able to clip a few things doesn’t mean that’s actually what I meant.
Los Angeles Times: “If it seems like Hilton — the British immigrant and former Fox News talk show host — is just about everywhere, taking just about every media interview that comes his way, well, that’s the point, he says.”
“He has logged thousands of miles on the proverbial campaign trail, visiting all 58 counties in his quest to lead the nation’s most populous state, where no Republican has been elected to statewide office in 20 years.”
“Meanwhile, his heavily favored — and far more staid — opponent, Democrat Xavier Becerra, has kept a comparatively low profile, agreeing to just one debate with Hilton and holding few public events, mostly in urban areas.”
“Democrats are leading or within striking distance in five Republican-held governor’s races this fall as President Donald Trump’s second term puts Republicans in a defensive position,” MS NOW reports.
“Heading into the final weeks before Election Day on Nov. 3, polling averages compiled by the website FiftyPlusOne show Democrats ahead in Iowa and Ohio, places where the party hasn’t won a governor’s race since 2006. Races in Georgia, Nevada and Texas are close, with Republicans narrowly ahead in close contests. Kansas is the outlier: Republicans are on track to defy national momentum and end eight years of leadership from the termed-out Democratic incumbent.”
“With a week to go before early voting starts in Texas’ Senate race, Democrat James Talarico said Sunday he is running as a moderate who can appeal to Republicans without changing his positions on contentious social issues,” the Dallas Morning News reports.
“In an interview with The Dallas Morning News editorial board, the Austin state representative rejected suggestions he has softened his views on transgender issues, defended his disagreements with fellow Democrats and acknowledged deliberately provocative past comments about religion.”
The Bulwark: MAGA’s Talarico mental breakdown conspiracy implodes—instantly.
“Gov. Gavin Newsom is reportedly considering commuting the sentences of the 563 people condemned to death row in California prisons, as public opinion has shifted in the week since a Tennessee female prisoner survived a botched execution by lethal injection,” the Sacramento Bee reports.
“Newsom, who is term-limited, has discussed with his advisors reducing death row inmates’ sentences to life in prison without parole as one of his final acts in office.”
“Gov. Tim Walz considered leaving public office after the assassination of former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark,” Minnesota Star Tribune reports.
Said Walz: “I didn’t want to do this job anymore after that. Not just out of fear or anything, but the joy of public service, the joy of being with Melissa Hortman, and just how that was taken.”
“James Talarico, the Texas Democratic nominee for Senate, on Sunday dismissed GOP conspiracy theories about his flu-induced absence from the campaign trail and sought to turn the tables,” MS NOW reports.
Said Talarico: “I had the flu. This is the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. It’s wild that someone can just post something on the internet and then the media just runs with it.”
“He dismissed the brouhaha as ‘silly season in our politics’ and issued a fresh challenge to his GOP rival, Ken Paxton, who spent the better part of 10 days fueling wild speculation about Talarico’s whereabouts while the Democrat recovered from his illness.”
He added: “He asked for proof of life from me. I’m asking proof of spine from him.”
“Pennsylvania and New York’s Democratic governors have taken vastly different approaches to fighting measles outbreaks in their states,” Politico reports.
“The divide underscores the different approaches to containing the disease, which has come roaring back in the U.S. amid falling vaccination rates after decades of containment, as well as how politicized fighting infectious disease has become.”
The Bulwark: “Mike Rogers has been consistent about one thing: He won’t take on Trump directly. Whether talking about the ‘war’ with tariffs or the war with bombs, he won’t blame the president. And it’s no mystery why. Breaking with Trump is not something you can do in modern Republican politics.”
“That explains the precarious political position of Rogers and so many other Republicans, both here in Michigan and in the rest of the country as well. They can’t separate themselves from Trump without antagonizing him and his most rabid supporters. But if they don’t make a clean break from Trump, they are stuck leaving the impression that they support his policies or, maybe even worse, that they are afraid to confront him when they don’t.”
“Here in Michigan, Rogers’s solution has been to make the debate about El-Sayed—and then, to make El-Sayed seem as scary as possible—in hopes voters will forget about everything Trump has done to the state.”
Rolling Stone: Abdul El-Sayed wouldn’t let Mike Rogers wash off his MAGA makeup.
“California Gov. Gavin Newsom has long opposed a high-profile ballot measure that would tax billionaires’ wealth. Now he is endorsing a different measure aimed at prohibiting wealth taxes,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“National Republicans, facing stiff headwinds in some of the most conservative parts of the country, see a ray of hope in an unlikely state: Oregon,” the New York Times reports.
“With Oregon’s ballots set to hit the mail next week, Gov. Tina Kotek’s quest for re-election in one of the country’s most consistently liberal states is at risk of being derailed by a conservative, anti-abortion Republican, State Senator Christine Drazan.”
“Conservatives are not exactly surging statewide in the land of protest frogs and craft beer. But Ms. Kotek, a first-term Democratic governor, has managed to become almost as unpopular among her constituents as President Trump, whom they denounce routinely on the streets.”
“President Trump took to Truth Social Thursday to encourage Alaska voters to vote for the Republican ticket in November and criticized the state’s voting system in the process,” NewsNation reports.
“Trump questioned why there are three Republicans facing off against one Democrat in the November governor election, calling the system ‘stupid.'”
ProPublica: “Records show the Texas attorney general has taken nearly 1,000 trips during his tenure, costing $3.3 million in security. We could only connect 138 of those trips and $553,000 in security costs to state business.”
“Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro refused to commit to serving out a full term if he wins reelection, following in the footsteps of Maryland Gov. Wes Moore as 2028 rumors fly,” the New York Post reports.
“Instead, Shapiro trained fire on his GOP rival, state Treasurer Stacy Garrity, for seeking the governor’s mansion instead of finishing out a full term in office.”
Russell Berman: “What attention Hochul attracted in her first years as governor was largely negative. She won her own full term in 2022 by six points, a relatively narrow margin for New York that Nancy Pelosi blamed for costing Democrats control of the House… By late 2024, Hochul’s approval rating had dropped below 40 percent, and the Democrats who were plotting primary challenges included her own handpicked lieutenant governor, Antonio Delgado.”
“But the past two years have yielded an impressive turnaround. Hochul has drawn praise for forging productive relationships with both Trump and Mamdani. She easily dispatched opponents on her left (Delgado quit his campaign for governor in February) and her right (Representative Elise Stefanik’s bid lasted just more than a month). Hochul appears on track to secure another four-year term as New York’s governor, and if she remains something less than an A-list political celebrity, she has earned the respect of a party that all but dismissed her not long ago.”
“Cisco Aguilar believes this Election Day will be unlike any other in Nevada’s history. He is bracing for immigration agents to descend on polling locations, for federal law enforcement to move to seize ballots and for the President to openly dispute the state’s election results,” Time reports.
Said Aguilar: “If this administration chooses to challenge the elections, yes, we are preparing for it. We know it’s a very high probability.”
“Digging in to defend both his pride and his political fortunes, President Donald Trump on Wednesday returned to deep-red Texas to rally for Ken Paxton’s Senate bid, while revealing at times his own trepidation that one of the Republican Party’s longest winning streaks may be about to end on his watch,” Time reports.
Trump warned the crowd in San Antonio: “We’ll never forgive you for what you have done if you let that happen.”
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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