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CNN
33 minutes ago
- Business
- CNN
South Carolina Democrats, poised to play a major role in 2028, say they want a coalition builder
South Carolina Democrat Lynn Ramirez has a decent track record of picking her party's eventual presidential nominee. Though she backed former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg over President Joe Biden in the 2020 primary, the 64-year-old Simpsonville resident said she voted for President Barack Obama in 2008 and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2016. The next Democrat to win her vote needs to be capable of reaching everyday Americans — a coalition builder. 'I think South Carolina is looking for a person of the people, that can speak to the people without lowering and debasing themselves, like the current administration seems to be doing,' Ramirez, a retired public health worker, said during an interview at the state party's Blue Palmetto Dinner on Friday. 'Speak to hope and promise and prospects, as opposed to unfounded fears and divisiveness.' The 2028 presidential primary is years away, but the Democratic Party's leadership and messaging struggles are defining it now. As the party continues to grapple with what comes next, the Palmetto State is uniquely positioned to set the tone of the conversation. For years South Carolina Democrats have played an outsize, and often decisive, role in presidential primaries, whittling down the field after the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary. In 2028, depending on how the party organizes its calendar, South Carolina Democrats could be called on to serve a similar role, boosting the candidate they deem best suited to rebuild the party and win back the White House. Until then, the state's Democrats are in the same boat as the rest of the party: looking for strong leaders. The state's weekend of Democratic Party events — including a fundraising dinner, the state party convention and Rep. Jim Clyburn's annual fish fry — come as party leaders in Washington have struggled to craft a message that resonates with voters. Polls show the party's approval at generational lows, and strategists are still brainstorming ways to win back the parts of the base that shifted to President Donald Trump in 2024. Top Democrats have moved to fill that leadership vacuum. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz's and Maryland Gov. Wes Moore's appearances at events here this weekend follow weeks of early 2028-style jockeying, from Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker's recent New Hampshire trip to Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo saying they're open to running. Each potential Democratic presidential candidate comes with their own vision for how to lead the party out of the electoral wilderness and beat Trump's eventual successor. The primary may be shaped by which vision resonates more with Palmetto State voters. Over two days, Moore and Walz pitched South Carolina Democrats on where the party went wrong in 2024 and, more urgently, what the party needs to do to right in 2025 and beyond. At the state party's annual Blue Palmetto Dinner, Moore, the keynote speaker, made the case for urgency. He called on Democrats to stop being the party of panels and yearslong studies and instead become one of action. He pointed to Trump as an example of a politician who enacts his agenda with 'impatience.' 'Donald Trump does not need a white paper to start arbitrary trade wars that will raise the costs on virtually everything in our lives,' Moore said Friday. 'And so we must think about it this way — if he can do so much bad in such a small amount of time, why can't we do such good?' Walz, who addressed the state party convention Saturday morning, shared a similar message: Democrats must show they have the 'guts' to fight for working-class voters. To do that, the party might benefit from following the president's approach. 'What Trump learned from his first term to this one is: If you say you're gonna get things done and actually do it, even if it's not the right thing, people still give you credit for getting something done,' Walz, Democrats' 2024 vice presidential nominee, said Saturday. 'Think how powerful a tool that will be if we move with the same speed that he's moving to give everybody health care.' During the early days of Trump's second term, Moore and Walz have fallen into two leadership camps among those named as possible presidential contenders. Moore, a first-term governor who is running for reelection next year, has focused on boosting Maryland and eschewing the resistance label in a way reminiscent of Govs. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania. Walz, meanwhile, has taken on a fighting stance similar to Pritzker. Asked which style he would prefer in a future presidential candidate, 74-year-old retired Army veteran Paul Brewer said: 'All of the above.' 'It's not just about how much money you can raise,' Brewer said. 'It's being positive and having a platform that everybody can buy into.' While elected officials have argued Democrats need to show concrete examples of how they've improved people's lives, voters here say Democrats need to show they can reach a wide audience. 'The winning message is taking care of the people of the country,' said Doris J. Potter Hickman, a Loris resident in her 70s who voted for the eventual winner of the 2008, 2016 and 2020 Democratic presidential nomination in her state's primary. 'It's time for the average and lower-income people to have an opportunity to participate within their own country and to receive the benefits of their own country.' Ever since Democrats moved South Carolina into the early primary window in 2008, the state has played a key role in winnowing the field. In 2008, after Obama won the Iowa caucuses and Clinton won New Hampshire, the future president's victory here helped propel his campaign against the former first lady. Eight years later, Clinton's win in the state highlighted independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' weakness with Black voters and moderates, which contributed to his eventual loss. But never has South Carolina been as decisive as it was in 2020. After Biden managed to only come in fourth in Iowa and fifth in New Hampshire, his third presidential run seemed to be fading. But Clyburn's endorsement, and Biden's strong first-place finish in the state, quickly led to several candidates dropping out and endorsing the former vice president. 'We gave him the nomination,' said Carmen Quesada-Virella, an 80-year-old retired organizer with the National Education Association. Quesada-Virella, who supported Biden in 2020 and Clinton in 2016, said she wants Democrats to develop a consistent message that responds to what people are going through in the country. She said she didn't think Democrats would be able to work with Trump, and instead wants someone who could reach a broad coalition. 'What I don't think we can have right now — or maybe ever — is someone who goes to the extremes, who can't bring people in,' Quesada-Virella said at the palmetto dinner. Roxanne Cordonier, a 65-year-old retired radio host and longtime Democratic activist from Greenville, said part of what sets South Carolina apart is the strong presence of Black voters, who have power within the party and 'a deep sense of who is resonating.' 'I wasn't a crazy Biden supporter but … when Clyburn said, 'Let's go for Biden,' I was like 'OK, we gotta win this thing,'' she said at the palmetto dinner. 'There's a lot of deep grassroots energy here that you need to pay attention to.' Looking to the future, Cordonier rejected the notion that Democrats need to move to the center, and said instead the party needs an 'issue-based' message with broad appeal. 'We have to form coalitions across party lines and across issue lines to form what we see as the strength of the movement,' she said. 'If we just get the message out and let people listen to us, I think we can win.'
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Dem candidate for Georgia Public Service Commission challenges disqualification
A Fulton County Superior Court hearing is scheduled for June 10 on Georgia Public Service Commission candidate Daniel Blackman's appealing a ruling disqualifying him from the Democratic Primary of June 17. Stanley Dunlap/Georgia Recorder (file) A Georgia Public Service Commission candidate will remain on the Democratic primary ballot after appealing a decision this week disqualifying him from the race for failing to meet residency requirements. A Fulton County Superior Court hearing is scheduled for June 10 when Chief Judge Ural Glanville will hear arguments on PSC candidate Daniel Blackman's appeal. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger had affirmed a state court judge's ruling that Blackman was unable to provide evidence that a Fulton County property is his primary domicile. Blackman is a candidate for District 3, which includes Clayton, DeKalb, and Fulton counties. Commissioners are elected statewide but must be residents of a given district for at least 12 months. Blackman served as the Environmental Protection Agency's Southeast regional administrator under the Biden administration, and he's a former PSC candidate who came close to winning a seat on the commission back in 2020. Blackman's lawyer, Matthew Wilson, said Blackman's name will remain on ballots after Glanville granted an injunction Thursday. 'Once we're given the opportunity for a fair hearing, I'm confident that Daniel will prevail because all of the facts and all of the law are on his side,' Wilson said Friday. The complaint against Blackman was filed by Atlanta resident Rodney Stephens, who currently resides in a home previously owned by another Democratic candidate, Keisha Waites, according to online county property records. Stephens and Waites declined to comment about the residency challenge. The residency dispute involves a one-bedroom dwelling in Atlanta that Blackman leased on Oct. 4, 2024. Blackman testified that he purchased the property to live closer to work while his wife and children continued to reside in their Forsyth County home north of Atlanta, according to the 12-page ruling. The state court judge wrote that Blackman failed to provide evidence that he actually lived in the home, such as utility bills or mail being delivered to the Atlanta address. Early voting for two PSC seats began Tuesday with Blackman's name on ballots statewide. If Blackman's ban is permanent, notices will be placed in polling places advising voters of his disqualification and votes cast for him will not be counted, Raffensperger's office said. Election Day is June 17. Three other Democrats appear on the District 3 PSC ballot: Waites, a former Atlanta City Council member and ex-state representative; Peter Hubbard, founder of the clean nonprofit Center for Energy Solutions, and Robert Jones, a former utility executive. The winner will face GOP incumbent Fitz Johnson in the Nov. 4 general election. Johnson was appointed to the seat by Gov. Brian Kemp in 2021. Jones said Friday he would like to see an expedited final decision in the Blackman case so candidates can focus solely on their own campaigns without having to deal with the distraction. 'The appeal filed Wednesday was another surprise in a race that has had too many,' Jones said. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
NYC mayoral race tightens with Mamdani gaining on Cuomo
NEW YORK (PIX11) — New exclusive polling from PIX11, Emerson College and The Hill is showing a tightening in the race for New York City mayor. Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo may no longer be running away with the Democratic Primary. This poll conducted from May 23 to May 26 shows him with a 12-point lead over Queens Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, a lead that shrinks to 8% with ranked-choice voting. More Local News Cuomo is getting 35% of first-choice votes in the first round of Emerson's ranked-choice voting simulation, which excluded approximately 4% of voters who said they were undecided. Mamdani is at 23% in round one, and Comptroller Brad Lander rounds out the top three getting 11%. Cuomo's lead further narrows as lower candidates are eliminated and their votes flow to others under NYC's ranked-choice system. He beats Mamdani in the final round of ranked-choice voting by 54% to 46%. In response to the poll Cuomo Campaign spokesman Rich Azzopardi wrote: 'This poll of registered voters appears to be an outlier, but the facts across the board remain the same — Andrew Cuomo is the consistent and overwhelming frontrunner in this race. That's because New Yorkers know he is the only candidate in this race with the executive experience and the proven record of results to fix what's broken and put this city back on the right track after 12 years of failed leadership.' More: Latest News from Around the Tri-State Here is the full ranked choice voting simulation from Emerson College Polling, including all Democratic Primary candidates: 'Cuomo has led in the polls since early 2025, but Mamdani has surged, gaining 23 points and winning second-choice votes nearly 2-to-1, cutting Cuomo's ranked-choice lead from 12 points to 9 points,' Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling, said. 'With four weeks to go, the question is whether Cuomo can run out the clock, or if he needs to win over second-choice voters to hold off Mamdani's momentum.' More News: Politics PIX11 recently obtained an internal survey from Zohran Mamdani that also showed him inching closer to Cuomo in the polls. But most other publicly available polling from earlier in May, including polls by Marist and Survey USA, show Cuomo with more than a 20% lead in round one of ranked-choice voting simulations. This poll shows Cuomo, if he wins the Democratic nomination, would have an easier time in a hypothetical general election that includes likely Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa, Mayor Eric Adams running as an independent, and lawyer Jim Walden also running as an independent. Cuomo gets 44% in this hypothetical matchup, Sliwa gets 13%, Adams gets 10%, Walden gets 7% and 26% are undecided. Mamdani would still be the favorite in November, just not by as much as Cuomo. In a hypothetical with Mamdani as the Democrat, he gets 35%, Sliwa gets 16%, Adams gets 15% and Walden gets 6%, with 27% undecided. On the issues, New Yorkers now say housing is the top concern at 30%, followed by the economy at 22% and crime at 19%. Nearly half of New Yorkers, 49% said their family finances are worse than a year ago. Most New Yorkers, 61%, support making it easier to involuntarily remove people from the streets and subways if they cannot take care of themselves, which state lawmakers just enacted. Mayor Adams and President Donald Trump both remain unpopular in New York City with 69% of likely voters saying they had an unfavorable view of each leader. When it comes to mass deportations of undocumented immigrants, 50% of New York City voters said it's negatively impacting the city while 30% think they are positive. About 20% are unsure. Voters were a bit mixed on how important it was for the next mayor to be supportive of Israel with 46% saying it was unimportant, 33% saying it was and 21% having no opinion. In the race for Comptroller, Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine leads in the Democratic Primary poll getting 37% of voters surveyed. Brooklyn City Councilman Justin Brannan gets 17% and State Senator Kevin Parker gets 12%. A whopping 29% of those surveyed were undecided. Levine would easily win a ranked-choice voting simulation run by Emerson College Polling that eliminates undecided voters. Current Public Advocate Jumaane Williams appears poised to keep his job. The survey found him getting 56% of first-choice votes. Queens Assemblywoman Jenifer Rajkumar got 15% and Financial Analyst Marty Dolan got 13% while 16% of respondents were undecided on the Public Advocate Democratic Primary. The Emerson College Polling New York City survey was conducted from May 23 to May 26, 2025. The sample of New York registered voters, n=1,000, has a credibility interval, similar to a poll's margin of error (MOE), of +/- 3 percentage points. The sample of Democratic Primary voters includes n=606, with a credibility interval of +/-3.9%. The final mayoral rank-choice simulation includes n=500 with a margin of error of +/-4.3%. The data sets were weighted by gender, education, race, age, party registration, and region based on 2025 voter turnout modeling. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Cuomo's lead narrows as Mamdani gains ground in NYC mayoral race: poll
NEW YORK (PIX11) — An internal poll from Zohran Mamdani's campaign obtained by PIX11 News shows he is gaining on former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the race for mayor, although Cuomo remains the favorite. The polling by Workbench Strategy on behalf of the Mamdani campaign showed Cuomo receiving 40% of first-choice votes, with Mamdani getting 27% of first-choice votes. All other candidates in the crowded field got less than 10% of first-place votes in the survey of 500 likely Democratic Primary voters conducted from May 14-18. More Local News Workbench's ranked-choice voting simulation ultimately has Cuomo breaking the 50% barrier required to win a ranked-choice primary in the seventh round, where Cuomo would hypothetically defeat Mamdani 56%-44%. A 13% first-round lead is the closest anyone has come to Cuomo in recent polls. The former governor resigned following several scandals and has been the clear frontrunner since entering the race about two months ago. An unaffiliated recent Marist poll gave Cuomo a 22% first-choice lead. More: Latest News from Around the Tri-State A recent poll by Survey USA, done around the same time as the internal Mamdani poll, showed Cuomo with a more than 30% lead. Mamdani, an assemblyman from Queens, has surged into second place in recent weeks, having made big progressive campaign promises like freezing the rent and free buses. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Challenger Kenyatta Stewart competitive in fundraising for NJ 35th District Assembly seat
PATERSON — Lawyer Kenyatta Stewart has raised $125,692 in contributions for his primary challenge against the two candidates backed by the Passaic County Democratic Party's leadership in the 35th District Assembly race. Stewart — whose funding includes $31,000 in loans he made to his own campaign — sits pretty much in the middle of his two main rivals in fundraising, as seen in preliminary campaign finance reports filed with the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission. Al Abdelaziz, the former Paterson councilman appointed by Democrats to fill a vacant 35th District Assembly seat in January, has collected $173,231 in donations. Another candidate, Orlando Cruz, a Passaic County commissioner, has received $47,100 in fourth candidate, Romi Herrera, a former Garfield council member, reported raising just $4,706. The district is composed of Paterson, Prospect Park, Haledon and North Haledon in Passaic County and Elwood Park and Garfield in Bergen County. 'If you look at Stewart's list of contributions, it shows that he is well-connected as a prominent attorney,' said Micah Rasmussen, director of the Rebovich Institute of New Jersey Politics at Rider University. 'This is not your normal outsider challenge, someone who comes to the table without connections and without fundraising ability.' Stewart works as Newark Mayor Ras Baraka's corporation counsel in that Essex County municipal government. Political insiders said they expect Baraka's popularity among Paterson's African American voters in the gubernatorial primary to have a spillover effect to help Stewart. Rasmussen said Abdelaziz and Cruz will benefit from their backing by the Passaic County Democratic leadership through campaign signs and possible election mailings that feature all candidates backed by the organization. He also said the county party will run a get-out-the-vote operation on the day of the primary that should help Abdelaziz and Cruz at the polls. After court rulings last year eliminated the 'party-line' ballot advantage that existed in New Jersey primaries for decades, political observers say they're seeing this year's June contests approach with unprecedented uncertainty, as well as a greater number of challengers taking on organization-backed candidates. Abdelaziz said the money he has raised will help him communicate with voters. 'Our campaign is proud to have built strong grassroots and community support across the 35th District,' Abdelaziz said. 'Fundraising is just one part of that story — and we're grateful to everyone who believes in our message of affordability, public safety and delivering real results for working families.' More than $80,000 of Abdelaziz's contributions came from business owners and professionals connected to South Paterson's Middle Eastern and Palestinian communities. Political strategists said that money also will benefit Cruz, Abdelaziz's running mate in the Assembly contest, with mailings, fliers and house signs bearing both of their names. 'We're working collectively,' Cruz said. The county commissioner said he and Abdelaziz have focused on door-to-door campaigning. 'It's not a concern to me,' Cruz said when asked about Stewart's fundraising edge over him. "We know the work we've been putting in. We're reaching out to voters in their neighborhoods, as opposed to opening storefronts.' Cruz was referring to Stewart's May 22 announcement about a new campaign headquarters in Haledon, which joined his existing election offices in Paterson and Garfield. Stewart said his six-figure total in preliminary campaign finance reports reflects what he described as a change in attitude among Democrats in the state. 'It speaks to the fact that voters throughout New Jersey want a different type of Democrat,' Stewart said, 'someone who's based on community first.' Stewart's finance reports contained more than 25 donations from people who listed their profession as 'attorney.' He described himself as a candidate with 'grassroots' popularity along with financial support from professionals. Stewart said he wanted to send a message by giving his campaign a substantial loan. 'You've got to have a personal investment in this,' he said. Rasmussen, the politics expert from Rider, said the $125,000 listed on Stewart's 29-day pre-election report won't be enough money to put out cable television commercials or to send out many campaign literature mailings. But, Rasmussen said, Stewart's first finance report puts him in the upper level among those taking on candidates backed by party leaders. Benjie Wimberly is running unopposed for in the 35th District Senate primary. Wimberly was appointed to the Senate seat in January after Nellie Pou left the state Legislature to become a member of Congress. This article originally appeared on Kenyatta Stewart competitive in fundraising for NJ 35th District seat
