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12:54 PM PT: VA-Gov: Hmm. Former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe, who lost in the 2009 Democratic gubernatorial primary, is reportedly calling supporters and major players to inform them that he plans to run for governor again next year. That's not the "hmm" part, though, since a repeat bid always seemed likely. Rather, one such McAuliffe backer, Hampton mayor Molly Ward, says that T-Mac told her that Sen. Mark Warner had "given him the green light" to proceed. Warner, a former governor himself, is also a potential 2013 candidate, and he recently told reporters that he'd decide by Thanksgiving. Warner's also said that other hopefuls shouldn't wait on him to decide, but I wonder if McAuliffe is maneuvering now to try to keep Warner out.
1:21 PM PT: UT-04: The AP is being ridiculous and has still refused to call the race in UT-04, where Dem Rep. Jim Matheson has a 2,646-vote lead over Mia Love, who in any event has conceded. So why are they holding off? Probably because there are some 43,000 provisional and mail ballots still left uncounted in Salt Lake County. But as UtahPolicy.com explains, there's no way for them to change the outcome: Love would need 63% of those ballots in order to win, but among votes already tallied in SLCo., she's only taken 44%. That's an impossible hurdle, which explains why Love conceded the race. But it doesn't explain why the AP is being so obstinate.
On a related note, the Salt Lake Tribune has a lengthy look inside Matheson's exceptionally improbable win. One important detail: Libertarian Jim Vein took over 5,700 votes—more than the margin between Matheson and Love. A Democratic group called UTE PAC spent $10K on calls to Republican voters, trying to convince them to support Vein instead of Love. It looks like that ratfucking paid off handsomely.
2:18 PM PT: AZ-02, -09: We're still waiting for the remaining votes to be counted in Arizona's 2nd and 9th, but here's an update (which may be out-of-date by the moment I hit "post"). In the 2nd, Republican Martha McSally's lead over Rep. Ron Barber is now down to 426 votes, so Barber may still have a shot at hanging on. Meanwhile, in the 9th, Democrat Kyrsten Sinema's edge over Vernon Parker is now at 2,715, making her look like a good bet to win.
2:59 PM PT: WA Ballot: Great news! The AP has now called the contest for Washington state's same-sex marriage ballot measure for the good guys. Though there are votes still remaining to be counted, opponents have thrown in the towel. This means gay marriage supporters went an amazing four-for-four this cycle, approving marriage equality in Maryland and Maine as well, and also rejecting a ban in Minnesota.
3:04 PM PT: State Leges: While some races are still undecided, the DLCC has done some preliminary math and they've conluded that Democrats have picked up a net of 170 state legislative seats nationwide. And if you haven't seen it yet, you'll also want to see their list of which chambers changed hands on Tuesday night.
3:30 PM PT: NE-02: Here's another under-the-radar race that wound up shockingly close: GOP Rep. Lee Terry turned back underfunded Dem challenger John Ewing by just a 51-49 margin, meaning Ewing almost certainly ran ahead of Barack Obama. I will say we always thought an upset was possible and kept this one at "Likely R" the whole way through, though, precisely because we thought Obama could keep it close, because Terry's often underperformed, and because we believe enthusiasm among African-American voters would be unusually high, given that Ewing is one the area's most prominent black elected officials.
With some more money and a better-run campaign, Ewing might have pulled it off; if I were him, though, I'd think about waiting until 2016 to try again. However, he doesn't sound all that enthused, saying: "My initial thought is no, to be perfectly honest. But I don't know if I can give you a complete answer on that." Hopefully he'll change his mind.
3:49 PM PT: KY-Sen: The Great Mentioner has already cranked into high gear in Kentucky, where Republican very-much-the-Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is up for re-election. McConnell may be the only GOP senator potentially vulnerable in 2014, and the KY Democratic Party is a lot more robust than its counterparts in most Southern states. (Dems just hung on to the state House on Tuesday, for instance.) The sexiest name in the early going is actress Ashley Judd, who's politically active (she announced Kentucky's votes for Obama at the DNC), but that's mostly just because she's famous, not seriously considering the race (she hasn't said a word).
Other names are more plausible (and some will be familiar to political junkies, even if they aren't as well-known as Judd): Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, Lt. Gov. Jerry Abramson, and Obama chief fundraiser Matthew Barzun. Only Abramson is quoted on the record, and he's not ruling anything out. McConnell, though, already has a $6.8 million warchest and will be very formidable, so I wouldn't be surprised if Dems were not able to land a top-tier recruit.
4:01 PM PT: Meanwhile, another Republican, state Sen. Kirk Dillard, sounds like he's gearing up to run for governor himself. You'll recall that Dillard, who just won re-election to the legislature on Tuesday, very narrowly lost the 2010 GOP primary fellow state Sen. Bill Brady (who in turn went on to narrowly lose to Dem Gov. Pat Quinn). Speaking of Quinn, as we've mentioned before, his terrible approval ratings have painted a big target on his back, and now another Democrat is holding open the door to a possible primary challenge: former White House chief of staff Bill Daley.
4:04 PM PT: MN-Gov: Hennepin County Commissioner Jeff Johnson, a Republican, says he's "thinking about" running for governor in 2014, when Dem Gov. Mark Dayton will be up for re-election.
4:12 PM PT: Judd responded to her name getting circulated by Rep. John Yarmuth and offered a very non-commital statement that definitely doesn't close the door. And Grimes has previously also indicated an open mind.
4:22 PM PT: IL-02: I don't particularly care for Michael Sneed's third-person writing style, which makes his writing sound somewhat gossipy ("Sneed has learned," "a top Sneed source," and the like), but his past stories on Dem Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. have by-and-large panned out, so I'll mention this one: Sneed reports that Jackson "is in the midst of plea discussions with the feds probing his alleged misuse of campaign funds." We'll see where this one goes. Jackson, by the way, was just re-elected with 63% of the vote in his solid blue district—by far the weakest haul of his long career.