2016 Congressional Primaries

[IceSpear]

This is the most exciting night so far in the world of congressional primaries this year. Unfortunately, I fear that neither of the Senate races will go the way I want them to (although I'd be basically fine with Van Hollen and McGinty).

Same.

[IceSpear]

Sanders/Clinton inanity aside, I also hope we'll see more of Fetterman in the future.

He'll definitely run for something else in the future. I could see him putting up a strong challenge in a working class Western PA district where the incumbent Republican is a stale old corporate shill.

[IceSpear]

Someone on Wikipedia made a map for the D Senate primary.

[IceSpear]

I see JCL has learned nothing from last night.

[IceSpear]

So-called frontrunner, St. Sen. Mike Crane, has fallen behind a some dude into fourth place in GA-3. Tiny-village mayor and wealthy dentist (future lionkiller?) Drew Ferguson and businessman Jim Pace seem very likely to go to a runoff (Ferguson leads Crane 35-22, with the unheralded Chip Flanagan at 15 and Crane at 14).

Republican incumbents facing primary challenges: Loudermilk at 61, Collins at 62, Graves at 77, Scott at 81, Allen at 82. There may be a solid floor of about 15%ish (a little more, perhaps) that will vote against the Republican incumbent in a primary, for any challenger, no matter what.

In Texas, Gonzalez leads Palacios 51-49 in district 15, with 0.7% in. With 2.5% in in district 19, Robertson leads Arrington 50-50, or by 10 votes (out of 1,134 counted so far).

Pretty much anyone anywhere can get 15% or so being the sole challenger to an incumbent. Some random teabagger got that against Bob Casey in 2012.

[IceSpear]

Some interesting nuggets in CA:

CA-10: Denham + the other Republican got 57% combined here. Maybe not as vulnerable as we thought.

CA-17: Khanna finished slightly ahead of Honda. Ugh.

CA-21: Valadao completely destroyed the Democrats with 58%. Bad sign for November.

CA-31: Perennial loser Joe Baca, who lost his seat to a fellow Democrat in 2012 then got 11% of the vote in 2014, has lost again, this time as a Republican. He got 12% this time, lol.

CA-36: Ruiz dominated with 57%. Pipe dream for Republicans.

CA-49: SHOCK RESULT!!!! The odious Darrell Issa only leads the Democrat 51-45. The other 4% went to a no party affiliation candidate, which makes the results even better for the Democrats. Could this be a sleeper? Issa going down would be so sweet!

CA-52: Peters got 59% when he was supposedly vulnerable. Probably not gonna happen.

[IceSpear]

I just noticed DC has test results up. I bet Reddit will explode with fraud accusations when Hillary wins DC by more than 15 points.

[IceSpear]

I just noticed DC has test results up. I bet Reddit will explode with fraud accusations when Hillary wins DC by more than 15 points.

Man, you're just as sore a winner as you are a loser.

lol, why would you take that personally? Unless you post at r/S4P or something.

Mocking Reddit and their endless accusations of fraud is about as much "sore winnerish" as mocking Dean Chambers and UnskewedPolls.com after 2012.

[IceSpear]

God, I really hope that Heck beats Angle.

God, I really hope that Angle beats Heck.

[IceSpear]

If only the entire country counted as fast as VA-02!

[IceSpear]

By contrast, the SC districts have 1% in an hour later.

[IceSpear]

Sanford up 56-44 with 23% in.

[IceSpear]

Sanford is among my favorite Congresspeople, but his opponent is not a huge downgrade. She was the State Senator who gave that incredible speech on the Rebel flag, right? If so, I'd be fine with her. She certainly is a better personthan Sanford.

Knowing his opponent's irrational opposition to inanimate objects only makes me more enthusiastic about Sanford's re-election.

I presume your avatar is ironic?

[IceSpear]

Sanford is among my favorite Congresspeople, but his opponent is not a huge downgrade. She was the State Senator who gave that incredible speech on the Rebel flag, right? If so, I'd be fine with her. She certainly is a better personthan Sanford.

Knowing his opponent's irrational opposition to inanimate objects only makes me more enthusiastic about Sanford's re-election.

I presume your avatar is ironic?

I am not in fact a resident of the state of Maryland.

That part wasn't the problem.

[IceSpear]

Sanford won. SC continues to be terrible, news at 11. At least Horne did pretty well, all things considered. It could be within single digits.

[IceSpear]

Polls now closed in Nevada, Go Sharron Go!

[IceSpear]

Heck running away with it.

[IceSpear]

So Nevada decided to take a collective nap after counting the first 10% of the statewide vote.

Reince Priebus is rigging the ballots against Angle! She should run as an independent/Tea Party candidate in protest.

[IceSpear]

Accidental Congressman Hardy would not have beaten a ham sandwich.

[IceSpear]

LOLCOGOP.

Remember back when Mike Lee was supposed to drastically underperform the Republican presidential nominee because he was so polarizing? Fun times. He'll still win in a landslide, but his margin will be weaksauce for an incumbent Utah Republican...though not quite as weaksauce as Trump's eventual margin will be. Just like the Kansas backlash, the Utah backlash will almost certainly just amount to decreased margins. Misty Snow...that's quite a name.

It's interesting they have yet to call the race for Espaillat when he's up 3 points with 99% in.

By the way, I don't think anyone's mentioned this: Lee Bright, the SC state Senator who challenged Graham in 2014 and notable Confederate flag fetishist, lost re-election. The curse of the bloodthirsty queen strikes again!

[IceSpear]

Snow is a transgender woman who works as a Wal-Mart cashier. Either she ran a very good campaign, or Swinton ran a terrible one.

Or people just voted for Snow because the name sounded better.

I mean, Swinton is a marriage counselor. In terms of political resume, that's not really better than Wal-Mart cashier. I'd guess both of their "campaigns" were virtually nonexistent, though I could be wrong if Zioneer would like to correct me.

[IceSpear]

Swinton is basically a right-winger and Utah Democrats are pretty liberal. Snow also seems to have attached herself to Bernie Sanders somewhat, who is popular with Dems there.

A tendency i noticed in many states and counties: if you stick to a party, which is in dire minority in your state/county - you (usually) stick to party's most "faithful" wing and vote accordingly. Some precincts in 99% Democratic (and liberal) parts of Brookline went for Cruz in Republican primary. And Democrats in, probably, most conservative Florida county (Holmes, in Panhandle) went for Sanders... So - not surprising that Utah Democrats tend to be liberal: for moderate it's better to try his/her  luck in Republican party, which gives better chances  for electoral success (good example - state Representative Rebecca Edwards, who just won her primary with 52% of vote - she will regularily "attract" more conservative opposition in primary).

In some cases, like Utah, yeah. But the Florida Panhandle voters were Dixiecrats who always vote Republican in the general who wanted to stick it to the party/Obama/Hillary/the establishment. They weren't voting for Sanders because he was the most liberal. Notice how Martin O'Malley got very high vote shares as well.

[IceSpear]

Throne-Holst has won the primary in NY-01 to face Zeldin.

http://www.newsday.com/long-island/suffolk/anna-throne-holst-wins-1st-congressional-district-primary-1.12021603

[IceSpear]

Bold prediction: Reality is somewhere between that and the polls that showed Ryan up 60-70 points.

[IceSpear]

So some observations from the final CA results...

CA-07 (Ami Bera, D, Even PVI): Won 54-46. He should be fine in November, particularly with Trump on the top of the ticket and a D vs. D Senate race possibly hurting Republican turnout.

CA-10 (Jeff Denham, R, R+1 PVI): Denham got 48%, but another Republican got 10%, so this seems to be an unlikely flip, barring a Democratic wave. It's quite surprising the Republicans won the vote here 58-42 despite the Democratic primary getting far more votes overall than the Republican one. Denham had quite a bit of crossover support.

CA-17 (Mike Honda, D, D+20 PVI): Khanna (also a D) won 39-37. Hard to predict what happens here.

CA-21 (David Valadao, R, D+2 PVI): Valadao won 54-46 (combined Democratic vote share.) Initially Valadao won much bigger, but late ballots skewed heavily Democratic. Valadao is a slight favorite, but he could definitely lose.

CA-25 (Steve Knight, R, R+3 PVI): 56-44 combined vote share. Could fall in a wave.

CA-36 (Raul Ruiz, D, R+1 PVI): Extremely impressive 58-42 win. Should be safe.

CA-39 (Ed Royce, R, R+5 PVI): 60-40 win. There was some talk he could be in trouble, but with a margin like that it's doubtful, even in a wave.

CA-49 (Issa, R, R+4 PVI): Obviously the big surprise of the night, with Issa only winning 51-46. The remaining vote went to an independent candidate. The question is if Dems are willing to devote resources here, considering Issa has an essentially unlimited bank account to draw from.

CA-52 (Peters, D, D+2 PVI): 59-41 win. Safe D.