Tuesday's Campaign Round-Up, 4.22.25: Haley Stevens joins crowded Senate field in Michigan
* In Michigan, the Democrats' U.S. Senate primary field is getting increasingly crowded, with Rep. Haley Stevens throwing her hat into the ring. She joins state Sen. Mallory McMorrow and former Wayne County health director Abdul El-Sayed.
* In Arizona's gubernatorial race, Donald Trump had already endorsed Karrin Taylor Robson's Republican candidacy, but now that Rep. Andy Biggs is also running against her in a primary, the president has decided to endorse him, too. (Trump has a history of issuing 'dual endorsements,' backing multiple candidates in the same GOP primary.)
* On a related note, the far-right Club for Growth appears to be intervening in the Arizona race, claiming that Biggs, the former chair of the House Freedom Caucus, is more electable than Robson.
* Republican Rep. Andy Barr is poised to launch his U.S. Senate bid in Kentucky, setting up a primary fight against Daniel Cameron, the former state attorney general who lost a gubernatorial race in the Bluegrass State in 2023.
* In related news, with Barr giving up his U.S. House seat — in Kentucky's most competitive congressional district — Democrats are making no secret of the fact that they see a key pickup opportunity.
* High-profile Georgia Democrats have steered clear of next year's gubernatorial race, but state Sen. Jason Esteves hopes to fill the void, kicking off a statewide bid this week. For now, he's the only Democrat in the race, after Rep. Lucy McBath withdrew to focus on her husband's health issues.
* Republicans do not yet have a top contender in California's gubernatorial race, but Steve Hilton, perhaps best known as a former Fox News host, hopes to change that. He joins Chad Bianco, the sheriff of Riverside County, as the GOP candidates in the race.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
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Yahoo
15 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Evansville City Councilor Mary Allen launches bid for seat in Congress: 'Why not me?'
EVANSVILLE — Mary Allen is trying to pull off one of the hardest feats in American politics — but that didn't matter to the roughly 250 people who came to Wesselman Park on Wednesday to help launch her campaign for Congress. To them, the at-large member of Evansville City Council offers the best hope 8th District Democrats have to deal a blow to Republican President Donald Trump and help usher in a Democratic House majority. Allen didn't mention Trump's name or the name of the Republican who holds the congressional seat she is seeking, Mark Messmer, in her seven-minute speech. Allen rejects the notion that by running for Messmer's seat she is asking voters to fire him and hire her instead, "I want to tell people why they should vote for me," Allen told the Courier & Press this week. "I'm not telling people why they should fire Mark Messmer. I want people to know and believe in me and why they should hire me." Allen, who was elected to the City Council in 2023, did offer reasons for her new campaign during her announcement speech. They hinted at the frustration of a Democrat confronting the reality of a Republican Congress and White House. "Looking at the national landscape, I was tired of feeling helpless and hopeless," she said. "And I don't know if any of you all can relate to that." The crowd responded with hearty agreement and applause. "And I thought, 'Why not me?'" Allen continued. "Why not? And even more so, 'If not now, then when?'" Elsewhere in her announcement speech, Allen alluded to a need for "new voices in Congress who are willing to make decisions that truly represent the people of the 8th District." More: Messmer makes it official: He will seek re-election to Congress But that was as close as she came to articulating a case against Messmer, who would have a lot of advantages in a general election. The 21-county 8th District, which stretches all the way from southern Posey County up the Illinois-Indiana border to the top of Fountain County, is solidly Republican. Messmer also has the benefits of incumbency — contributions from political action committees, the ability to send taxpayer-funded mailers that tout his accomplishments and the power to help constituents by sorting out their problems with government agencies. A majority member of the House Committee on Agriculture, House Armed Services Committee and House Committee on Education and Workforce, Messmer also has the unqualified support of Trump, who won the 8th District in the 2024 election with 67% of the vote. And then there's money. Money in a congressional race is very much to the point. Messmer's campaign reports having $427,302 cash on-hand as of June 30 with $8,250 in debt, according to the Federal Election Commission. Allen had a little more than $3,400 in her City Council campaign account as of January. Allen's community service has been her emphasis Against Messmer's advantages, Allen plans to sell herself to voters as a hand-on servant to her community, something she says is "at the heart of" her life. A resident of Downtown Evansville, Allen is the owner/operator of small business Sixth and Zero. The business's website gives a glimpse of where Allen's passions lie. "SIXTH is a nod to the original Sixth Street Soapery in Evansville, IN where we first began creating pure and natural skincare and body products to help you be kinder to yourself (because you are lovely)," it states. "As we learned more about the goodness of nature and being kinder to the planet, we started to expand and carry more products to help us all live more sustainably, thus the ZERO for zero waste. Or as we like to say, zero-ish. Because it's simply about taking our next step to waste less, live more, right?" More: Sources: Democratic Evansville City Council member will run for Congress Allen is the founder of the Haynie's Corner Art District Association and served alongside her husband for a decade in a nonprofit urban ministry. She chairs the board of the Evansville Urban Enterprise Zone, where she says she works to revitalize distressed neighborhoods. She's a member of Rotary International, whose motto, she noted Wednesday, is Service Above Self. Allen recalled the day she decided to create a parent-teacher organization to support the then-newly established New Tech Institute High School in 2010. "(One of her three daughters) was in the first class at New Tech Institute," she said. "When she first started going there, there was no parent-teacher organization. It was literally a freshman class of new students, new teachers, a new principal into this new program and type of school." Allen remembered wondering, "How can we pull everybody together to support one another?" "Just always looking for ways to gather people around a cause, to garner support and just to create a positive environment and change," she told the Courier & Press. Will a positive campaign be enough? Matthew Hanka, a political scientist at the University of Southern Indiana, said it won't be enough for Allen to run a positive campaign that doesn't sharpen the distinctions between her and Messmer. Allen faces the daunting prospects of raising millions of dollars in campaign cash, appealing to people in parts of the 8th District that bear no resemblance to her base in Downtown Evansville and convincing scores of voters who went with Messmer in 2024 to change their minds, Hanka said. And Hanka said he hasn't seen a sign as yet that a national wave of support for Democrats in 2026 is building, Allen will have to artfully blend a rationale for ousting Messmer with positive information about herself, the USI political scientist said. It's a narrow ledge to walk. "You've got to present something and yes, it might be perceived as criticisms or could even be (perceived as) potential attacks, but you're making your case," he said. "Often times you're making your case by saying, 'This is what my opponent isn't doing and here's what I would do.' "If she doesn't mention Messmer at all by name, she runs the risk of it being hard to kind of pinpoint what she's going to do." What happened the last time 8th District Democrats ousted a GOP congressman? It was 19 years ago that Democrats last won the 8th District congressional seat by unseating a Republican congressman. That year, Vanderburgh County Sheriff Brad Ellsworth defeated Rep. John Hostettler, then a 12-year veteran of Congress. Ellsworth ran a positive campaign — but he didn't shy away from criticizing Hostettler. Hurricane Katrina, which killed at least 1,833 people and ravaged Gulf Coast cities in 2005, was a focal point. Hostettler voted against a $51.8 billion Katrina relief package in 2005, saying he wasn't against aid but preferred smaller amounts and greater oversight. Almost $52 billion was a budget-busting figure and an invitation to fraud, the Republican congressman said. But Ellsworth told the Courier & Press he couldn't fathom why Hostettler would vote no. "These are Americans on our soil that are dying," the Democrat said. "You buck up and do what you have to do." Ellsworth also said, among other things, that Hostettler had been ineffective against a surge of illegal immigrants since his election in 1994. He accused Hostettler's campaign of accepting "dirty special interest money" and said the Republican congressman had stopped listening to voters. But Ellsworth had money. If Allen can't raise several million dollars, Hanka said, she won't be able to get her message out. And even then, the right framing of her differences with Messmer will be critical, he said. "This is somebody who's going to motivate and inspire a lot of people," Hanka said of Allen. "But that alone, when you're trying to convince a blood-red (Republican) district that 'Hey, I'm the person,' there has to be more to bring to it." For her part, Allen envisions earning victory with hard work. "We're going to connect with voters in all 21 counties in person at community events, public forums and door-to-door," she said Wednesday. "Through mailboxes to inboxes, we're going to remind our neighbors that they're not alone — and I say 'we,' because it's going to take all of us." This article originally appeared on Evansville Courier & Press: Evansville's Mary Allen announces she's running for Congress Solve the daily Crossword
Politico
16 minutes ago
- Politico
Blue State Republicans Helped Win the House Majority. The Redistricting Wars May End Their Careers.
Trump's move may well work. Even if California's new map wipes out five Republicans and shores up some Democratic seats there, more than neutralizing GOP gains in Texas, the president can likely rely on additional red states such as Ohio, Missouri and Indiana to salute him and overhaul their congressional boundaries to squeeze out the few Democrats left in their delegations. And this is to say nothing of how many more majority-minority districts in red states could be wiped out should the Supreme Court effectively gut the Voting Rights Act before next year's elections. Such an endgame will surely wind up in a series of state and federal courts, transforming the early going of the midterms into as much a legal fight as a political one. It would make for a mess. And it wouldn't stop with 2026. New York, for example, is constrained by its voter-approved independent redistricting commission and can't undo the commission and redraw its House maps until the 2028 election. But why would Democrats in Albany not do so if Trump effectively muscles a House majority into existence next year via a series of red states upending their own maps? If New York Democrats do pursue such a redraw, it will likely doom the most politically vulnerable House Republicans still left there after the midterms. Which gets to the cold reality for GOP lawmakers in California and New York: The very Republicans who helped deliver their party's congressional majority by winning in the two mega-states in 2020 and 2022 could be collateral damage to Trump's gambit. That includes House veterans such as Reps. Darrell Issa and Ken Calvert, both of California, but also younger, promising Republican lawmakers such as Kiley, 40, and Rep. Mike Lawler (N.Y.), 38. 'This creates a situation where you're going to lose blue state members, which over the long haul are critical to keeping the majority,' Lawler told me. It's all, Lawler said, 'mutually assured destruction once people go full throttle.' The redistricting threat is especially cruel to Lawler, who was already eager to avoid yet another tough race in his Hudson Valley district by running for governor next year. But Trump made clear he preferred Rep. Elise Stefanik, a born-again MAGA disciple, as the standard-bearer even though running a Trump acolyte statewide may only ensure Stefanik ends next year where she started this year: hoping for a Trump cabinet appointment.
Boston Globe
16 minutes ago
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The lease of a popular R.I. restaurant will not be renewed after more than 60 years. Officials have pledged to fight back.
'I heard through the grapevine they were looking somewhere else for another tenant, and they plan on putting someone else there,' Matthews said in an interview on Wednesday. 'We're going to be leaving, unfortunately, after all this time.' Matthews said she doesn't know what tenant may replace the restaurant. WS Development declined to comment. Advertisement Matthews said the restaurant is looking for a new location in the area. Newport Creamery operates nine other locations around Rhode Island and Massachusetts, according to its Still, customers have been 'very disappointed,' Matthews said. The Garden City store has been a staple of the plaza for 63 years. 'We're a nice restaurant that, you know, families are comfortable going in with their little children,' Matthews said. 'If the child screams a little bit, nobody gets upset. You can't do that in many restaurants anymore. You can come in and get a good meal for an extremely reasonable price. It's a very, very good product — good ice cream — and everybody's happy.' Advertisement State Representative Charlene Lima, a Democrat representing Cranston and Providence, called the restaurant an 'icon to the community.' 'People are very upset about the way they were treated and how they're trying to get rid of them,' Lima said on Wednesday. Lima along with Cranston City Council Member Andy Andujar, has pledged to fight the decision not to renew the lease by 'any legal means necessary,' including, possibly withholding any tax breaks the management company receives, according to a press release. In an interview, Lima said she had not yet researched what, if any, tax breaks the company benefits from. But she was on her way to the restaurant on Wednesday morning to speak to customers and get a petition signed, she said. She also said she plans to file legislation to require the firm to hire Cranston police to patrol the center, claiming 'there has been an uptick in crimes and violent behavior in Garden City' in recent years, including 'On [WS Development's] website, they say that the company …is always concerned with the needs of the community,' Lima said. 'They say they view community engagement as vital. 'So the way that they went about in not renewing a lease to a company that's an icon, that's very important to the people of the community, was horrible.' The press release from the two lawmakers also references Advertisement In their release, Lima and Andujar said, 'if WS Development thinks they can pull a 'Wally Wieners' fiasco in Cranston they are gravely mistaken.' Christopher Gavin can be reached at
