Tonight we're liveblogging primary results in four states: Connecticut (polls close at 8pm ET), Florida (7pm ET in most of the state, 8pm in the panhandle), Minnesota (9pm), Wisconsin (9pm). Our writeup of all the key federal and statewide races can be found
here.
Results: Connecticut | Florida | Minnesota | Wisconsin
8:25 PM PT (David Jarman): The GOP Senate primary, although it's 79% reporting, is as good as over at this point (in Tommy Thompson's favor). Most of the remaining precincts are in one of three counties: Milwaukee, Racine, and Waukesha. Eric Hovde isn't doing better than a tie in any of those right now. (It's 34-31 for Thompson in Milwaukee, a 30-30 tie in Racine, and a 33-32 Thompson lead in Waukesha.) Hovde's only hope is that the Hovde-friendly parts of those counties haven't come in yet.
8:30 PM PT: A couple of Tommy Thompson greatest hits. One:
Republican presidential candidate Tommy Thompson told a Jewish group Monday that earning money is "part of the Jewish tradition," a remark for which he later apologized.
"I'm in the private sector and for the first time in my life I'm earning money," Thompson told the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. "You know that's sort of part of the Jewish tradition and I do not find anything wrong with that."
Later, he added: "I just want to clarify something because I didn't (by) any means want to infer or imply anything about Jews and finances and things. What I was referring to, ladies and gentlemen, is the accomplishments of the Jewish religion. You've been outstanding business people and I compliment you for that."
And
two:
Tommy Thompson cited a dead hearing aid and an urgent need to use the bathroom in explaining on Saturday why he said at a GOP presidential debate that an employer should be allowed to fire a gay worker.
Speaking to reporters after giving an address at the state GOP convention, Thompson also said he was suffering from the flu and bronchitis and had been admitted to a hospital emergency room three days prior to the May 3 debate.
"Nobody knows that," Thompson said. "I've been very sick. ... I was very sick the day of the debate. I had all of the problems with the flu and bronchitis that you have, including running to the bathroom. I was just hanging on. I could not wait until the debate got off so I could go to the bathroom."
8:33 PM PT (David Jarman): And the AP calls the Wisconsin Senate GOP primary for Tommy Thompson. He'll face Tammy Baldwin in November... probably the toughest opponent for her of the four candidates, but also he emerges from the primary pretty banged up.
8:42 PM PT (David Jarman): At this point, we're just following a couple Minnesota races. In MN-08's Dem primary, Rick Nolan is putting a little distance between him and Tarryl Clark. He now leads 42-36 with Jeff Anderson at 21, with 43% reporting. Clark is doing well in the southern part of the district (where the voters might have gotten some exposure to her via her MN-06 campaign in 2010) but getting smoked in St. Louis County, the most important county in the district, where she's at 25%. Interestingly, while Nolan's from St. Louis (from the Iron Range part of the county), he's losing the county overall (at 30), since it also contains Anderson's base of Duluth (Anderson's at 45).
8:46 PM PT (David Jarman): The AP just called MN-01's GOP primary for Allen Quist, social conservative extraordinaire and mentor to Michele Bachmann. He defeats Mike Parry 54-46 and will have a very uphill race against Democratic Rep. Tim Walz.
8:50 PM PT (David Jarman): One other tidbit while we're talking about Minnesota: we'd been operating under the assumption that Kurt Bills didn't face a primary tonight, since all his name-brand opponents dropped out after the GOP convention went in his favor, thanks to the Paulist brigades. However, it looks like two Some Dudes didn't drop out... and they wound up holding Bills to only 52% of the vote. Nevertheless, the race has been called in his favor, and he goes on to being a speed bump for Amy Klobuchar in November.
8:53 PM PT (David Jarman): Huh, there's a late surge of Duluth ballots in MN-08, it looks like, with Jeff Anderson going up at the other two's expense. It's now 39 Nolan, 32 Clark, 29 Anderson, with 58% reporting.
8:57 PM PT (Steve Singiser): In closing out Connecticut, let's make one observation that falls into the category of "it may be nothing, but it may also be something to be worried about." In the Democratic-held CT-05 tonight, the combined vote for the GOP was actually about 1500 votes higher than it was for the Democrats.
Both House primaries were competitive, so that wouldn't explain the disparity. And the statewide Senate primary was actually incrementally more competitive on the Democratic side, so that doesn't explain it, either.
For what it is worth, statewide there were a bit more than 17,000 more votes counted for the Democrats than the GOP thus far in the aforementioned Senate primaries.
9:06 PM PT (Steve Singiser): Another eighty or so precincts into the books up in the Iron Range, and it looks like the Anderson boomlet has been quelled. Nolan now leads Tarryl Clark 40-33, with Anderson back at 28 percent. We are now just over two-thirds of precincts reporting.
9:17 PM PT (Steve Singiser): About an hour ago, Politico sent out a breaking news email saying that Cliff Stearns had lost in FL-06. They have issued something of a retraction, and it stems from Stearns' own reluctance to believe it, apparently:
Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) is not conceding to challenger Ted Yoho despite trailing by more than 800 votes, with 100 percent of the precincts reporting. An earlier POLITICO news alert said that Stearns had lost, according to the Associated Press. The AP has not yet called the race, and the Stearns campaign says it will await "certified results" to ensure that "all voices are heard."
9:28 PM PT (jeffmd): In MN-08, a quick-and-dirty linear projection would be Nolan 39, Clark 31, Anderson 30. With 6 counties left to report fully, Clark is outpolling Nolan in only one (Pine). The same projection estimates about 6,000 votes left to count, meaning Clark will have to pull something special to overcome her 4,500 vote deficit.
9:34 PM PT (jeffmd): And the folks at the AP must have come to the same conclusion we just did; they just called MN-08 (D) for Ex. Rep-Rick Nolan, who goes on to face Rep. Chip Cravaack (R-NHMN)
9:40 PM PT: That's a wrap, folks! Thanks for joining us. Come back next week for the Georgia runoffs.