The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Daniel Donner, and Cara Zelaya, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
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Leading Off
● MI-Sen, MI-07, MI-10: Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin on Monday morning became the first major candidate from either party to announce a bid to succeed retiring Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow in Michigan, a move that also opens up her competitive 7th Congressional District. Slotkin’s kickoff in this swing state came shortly after Republican Rep. John James and a pair of Democrats, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow and Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist, each said they would stay out of the race.
We’ll start with Slotkin, a former CIA analyst and Department of Defense official who arrived in Congress after unseating Republican Rep. Mike Bishop 51-47 during the 2018 blue wave. Slotkin’s Lansing-based seat, which was then numbered the 8th District, immediately became a top Republican target, but the new congresswoman once again proved to be a tough opponent. The incumbent turned back Republican Paul Junge in another 51-47 win as Trump was taking the 8th 50-49.
The new Michigan Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission went on to make Slotkin’s seat, which was renumbered the 7th District, a little more blue, but it was still far from safe at 49.4-48.9 Biden. Her opponent for 2022 was state Sen. Tom Barrett, a far-right politician who wore a "naturally immunized" wrist band and refused to say if he's vaccinated; Barrett also tried to raise money by sending out a fundraising appeal by text message falsely telling recipients that "your child's gender reassignment surgery has been booked," complete with a phony time for the appointment.
Stotkin outspent her opponent by a vast $11.3 million to $2.8 million, but major outside groups on both sides believed this would be one of the top House races in America. The big four House groups (the DCCC and House Majority PAC on the Democratic side and the NRCC and Congressional Leadership PAC for the GOP) altogether spent $21.3 million, putting it behind only California’s 22nd. The fabled red wave didn’t materialize for Michigan Republicans, though, and Stotkin won by an unexpectedly strong 52-46 margin.
While Stotkin’s decision to run for the Senate means that Democrats both have a top-tier statewide candidate even as they need to focus on defending her seat, Republicans have the opposite issue with James. The freshman congressman, who lost the 2018 race to Stabenow and narrowly failed to unseat Sen. Gary Peters in 2020, would have given Senate Republicans a strong fundraiser had he chosen to make a third statewide bid.
Their counterparts in the House, though, will be happy to have James defending the 10th District in the Detroit suburbs: This seat backed Trump only 50-49, though James himself beat Democrat Carl Marlinga just 48.8-48.3 last year in an open seat race that the two largest Democratic outside groups spent nothing on.
A number of Republicans have expressed interest in running for the Senate, but there's no word if any of them are close to running. The only notable declared candidate is state Board of Education member Nikki Snyder, who failed to even make the ballot in 2020 when she tried to challenge Rep. Elissa Slotkin.
On the Democratic side, Simon Schuster writes in MLive.com that actor Hill Harper is also "privately telling Democrats he intended to run," while an unnamed source says we should anticipate an announcement from "The Good Doctor" cast member in what Schuster describes as "the near future." Wolverine State Democrats are also watching to see if Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson will get in. Benson didn't rule anything out to Schuster but sounded reluctant, saying that "my heart is committed to doing the work that Michiganders hired me to do."
House
● AZ-03: Phoenix City Council Member Betty Guardado has confirmed that she's considering entering the Democratic primary to succeed Senate candidate Ruben Gallego in this safely blue seat.
Mayors and County Leaders
● Chester County, PA Board of Commissioners: Democrats in 2019 won their first ever majority on the Board of Commissioners for Chester County, a suburban Philadelphia community that swung hard to the left during the Trump era, but Republicans are hoping to retake the three-member body this year. GOP Commissioner Michelle Kichline is not running, and her party has endorsed former state Rep. Eric Roe and teacher David Sommers ahead of the May primary. The two Democratic incumbents, Marian Moskowitz and Josh Maxwell, are seeking re-election without any serious intra-party opposition in sight.
All three Commission seats are elected countywide, and voters in November can select up to two candidates. However, each party can only nominate two candidates this May, so the body will wind up with a 2-1 split no matter what. Moskowitz and Maxwell in 2019 grabbed the top positions with 27% and 26%, respectively, while Kichline outpaced a fellow Republican incumbent 24-23 for the third and final spot. That same evening saw Democrats in nearby Bucks County win their own historic majority, and local Republicans are hoping to retake that Commission as well.
● Chicago, IL Mayor: M3 Strategies, which has released polls this year for a group opposed to Mayor Lori Lightfoot, has publicized a new one showing her taking third place in Tuesday's nonpartisan primary. (There's no word if this survey had a sponsor.) The numbers are below, with the early February results in parenthesis:
former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas: 32 (31)
Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson: 18 (16)
Mayor Lori Lightfoot: 14 (17)
Rep. Chuy Garcia: 12 (13)
Wealthy perennial candidate Willie Wilson: 6 (7)
Lightfoot, meanwhile, earned an endorsement from former Rep. Bobby Rush, who is the only person to ever beat Barack Obama in an election.
● Dutchess County, NY Executive: The Dutchess County Democratic Party on Thursday endorsed Army veteran Tom Zurhellen, who walked across the country in 2019 to bring attention to veteran homelessness and suicide, in this November's race for county executive. The county Republican Party that same evening backed former state Sen. Sue Serino's bid to hold a post that the GOP has held since 1991 even though this Hudson Valley community has supported Democrats during each of the last four presidential elections.
While Zurhellen and Serino still need to win their respective primaries in June, neither of them faces any serious intra-party opposition. Both are campaigning to succeed unelected incumbent Bill O'Neill, who was sworn in after fellow Republican Marc Molinaro resigned to join Congress and is not running for a full term. Biden won Dutchess County 54-44, but local voters last year favored Republican Lee Zeldin 52-48 over Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul.
● Philadelphia, PA Mayor: Businessman Jeff Brown's allies at For a Better Philadelphia are running an ad that uses old footage of former Gov. Tom Wolf praising their man, a move that comes weeks after Michelle Obama's team condemned Brown and the PAC for doing the same thing with her. Wolf's spokesperson responded to this new spot by saying, "Governor Wolf has not endorsed in the race for mayor in Philadelphia and has no plans to do so … As such no campaign or outside entity has been given permission to use his likeness."