Florida
Personnel note: House Democrats staff-up for 2018 campaign cycle
Florida House Democrats are beefing up their campaign arm for next year’s elections, hiring a communications chief and operatives to begin work immediately. Kionne McGhee, scheduled to become House leader following the 2018 elections, said it is “imperative” that Democrats “take back power” in the House. “I’m pleased to welcome our new staff into the fray,” McGhee said in a written statement. “They represent part of our bold, aggressive effort towards the critical elections ahead of us. Together, we will hold House Republicans accountable for their extreme policies that have ignored the voters’ will, degraded our environment, put our public schools on the back-burner, and hurt working families across Florida,” McGhee said.
Georgia
Democratic State Rep. Stacey Evans of Smyrna jumps into governor’s race
State Rep. Stacey Evans, D-Smyrna, has announced she will run for governor in 2018. Evans declared her candidacy early Thursday morning in a news release that put education and jobs at the center of her platform. “I am running not only to protect the HOPE scholarship, which was the only way I could have gone to college, but also to fight to bring hope to so many Georgians who are struggling to make ends meet,” Evans wrote. “I’m running to bring good jobs to Georgia and help our small businesses so that every Georgia family has the opportunity to make a better life for themselves.” Evans enters a field that so far includes Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, Secretary of State Brian Kemp and State Sen. Hunter Hill on the Republican side. Possible Democratic candidates to challenge Evans for the party’s nomination include state Rep. Stacey Abrams and former state Sen. Jason Carter, grandson of former President Jimmy Carter, though neither have officially announced yet.
Maryland
Hogan vetoes bill requiring employers to provide paid sick leave in Maryland
Maryland Democratic Party chair Kathleen Matthews said the bill had “brought all sides of the table together” to provide sick leave to more than 700,000 state residents. “Hard work should pay off, and working Marylanders shouldn’t have to decide between a paycheck and taking care of themselves and their families,” Ms. Matthews said Thursday in a statement.The bill made it through both chambers with veto-proof majorities, but the Senate margin was razor-thin. It passed in April with 29 votes, the minimum amount needed to override a veto. Ms. Matthews did not say whether Democrats plan to try to override the veto, but did offer a jab at Mr. Hogan’s re-election prospects. “Voters will remember in next year’s election that Governor Larry Hogan put his own agenda ahead over the health of working Marylanders and their families,” she said.
Mississippi
MS Republican Party Push For More Leaders
The Mississippi Republican Party is making a big push across the state to elect more republican candidates in the June 6 municipal elections. MPB's Alexis Ware reports. Mississippi Democratic Party chairman Bobby Moak says they are also working to maintain and increase Democratic elected positions at the municipal level. He says they're concerned more Republicans elected locally could lead to policies that will hurt cities and towns. "This program is not working that the republicans have been pushing, so as much as they would like to whistle past the graveyard on those issues, they simply cannot. With the state hundreds of millions of dollars in red ink and now they want to elect their Republican officials at the municipal level to bring that same policy to our cities. People are not wanting to do that at all." Mississippians will be voting for mayors, councilman and alderman in the June 6th general election. According to the Secretary of State, voter turnout is typically low for municipal elections.
Montana
Donald Trump Is A Big Reason Why The GOP Kept The Montana House Seat
Montana, where the president remains broadly popular, was always a dubious place to harness the energy of the anti-Trump backlash. “The lesson here, and I think frankly even around the country, is that it’s too soon for there to be a backlash,” said Jacquie Helt, a vice chair of the Montana Democratic Party and the state director of the Service Employees International Union. “It takes a while. People want to dance with who brung them,” Helt added, referring to her fellow Montana voters. “They also, I think, are reluctant to admit that they made a mistake.” Jorge Quintana, a Montana Democratic National Committee member and veteran of Democratic politics in the state, credited Quist’s campaign for keeping the loss margin so close. “We’re only five months into his administration. Trump won the state by 20 points,” he said. “Tonight, Quist, a brand-new candidate who has no experience in this, came up seven points short.”
New Jersey
Former Vermont governor touts would-be New Jersey governor in Newark church
One prominent politician, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, came to church for Wednesday's service in his role as a surrogate supporter of Phil Murphy, the front-runner in the June 6 New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial primary. The Democratic candidates in the race are preaching that they are the true progressive, with left-of-center views that they hope will lead them to win in New Jersey and help shape the national Democratic Party's direction. The potential shift is even more crucial in the aftermath of the party's 2016 presidential campaign defeat. But first, Murphy must win the nomination and that means courting a critical community that has seen politicians come and go: African-Americans in Newark, the state's largest city and a treasure trove of Democratic primary voters.
Virginia
After Trump win, surge of Democrats for Virginia House races
More Democrats than Virginia has seen in years are stepping up to run for the Republican-controlled House of Delegates, where every seat is up for grabs this fall. The surge in candidates is among the latest examples of activism sparked by President Donald Trump’s surprising November victory, party officials and candidates say. Democrats in Virginia — the only Southern state Hillary Clinton won — hope they can chip away at the solid GOP House majority in November, if not retake the chamber for the first time in nearly two decades. “It’s been raining candidates for us for about six months since Trump got elected,” Democratic House minority leader David Toscano said in a recent interview. They are contesting 54 of 66 GOP-held seats, she said. Compare that with 2015, when they fielded candidates in 56 districts and contested only 28 of 67 GOP-held seats, according to the Virginia Public Access Project, a nonpartisan political tracker. |
