Donald Trump leads Joe Biden 48% to 44% across the seven swing states being polled by Bloomberg News/Morning Consult.
In the “Blue Wall” battlegrounds of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, Biden and Trump are separated by no more than 2 percentage points.
Biden also gained ground from April in each of the competitive Sun Belt states. He now trails Trump by 7 points in North Carolina, 5 points in Arizona, 3 in Georgia and is even in Nevada.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll found President Biden’s public approval rating at just 36% — its lowest level in almost two years and tying the lowest reading of his presidency in a warning sign for his reelection effort.
CALIFORNIA 20TH DISTRICT PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. Assemblyman Vince Fong beat Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux in Tuesday’s all-Republican special election to replace former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Fong leads 60-40 as of Wednesday morning, with the Associated Press estimating that 87% of the vote has been tabulated. It’s possible the margin may change as the remaining ballots are counted, but the outcome is not in doubt.
Fong and Boudreaux will face off one more time in November in the general election to represent California’s conservative 20th District, which is based in the Central Valley, for a full term.
GEORGIA 3RD DISTRICT PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. Former Trump aide Brian Jack and former state Sen. Mike Dugan will face off in a June 18 primary runoff after no candidate won a majority of the vote in this five-person field.
Jack took first with 47%, while Dugan outpaced former state Sen. Mike Crane 25-16 for second. The winner of next month’s runoff should have no trouble in the general election to replace retiring GOP Rep. Drew Ferguson in Georgia’s 3rd District, a reliably red seat based in the southwestern Atlanta exurbs.
Jack earned Trump’s endorsement hours before he even announced he was running, and he also benefited from $1.5 million in spending from super PACs. (None of his opponents received any serious outside support.) It wasn’t quite enough to secure an outright win for Jack on Tuesday, but it should give him a formidable advantage over Dugan in the second round.
GEORGIA 6TH DISTRICT PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. Rep. Lucy McBath handily won renomination in Georgia’s revamped 6th District, setting her up for an easy November victory in this safely blue constituency. The well-known McBath took 85% while Cobb County Commissioner Jerica Richardson finished with a distant 9% and state Rep. Mandisha Thomas ended up with 6%.
Thanks to multiple rounds of redistricting since she was first elected in 2018, McBath will have represented around 20% of the state once she’s sworn in next year, according to analyst Varun Vishwanath.
GEORGIA 13TH DISTRICT PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. Rep. David Scott defeated six challengers on Tuesday, clearing the way for the longtime congressman to win a 12th term in Georgia’s redrawn 13th District in the fall. Despite serious concerns about his health, Scott won 57% of the vote while his nearest competitor, former South Fulton City Councilman Mark Baker, earned just 12%. Like McBath’s 6th, this district is safely Democratic.
OREGON SECRETARY OF STATE PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. State Treasurer Tobias Read defeated state Sen. James Manning in the primary to replace Secretary of State LaVonne Griffin-Valade, a fellow Democrat who did not run for a full term. Read leads 71-21 with the AP estimating that 71% of the vote has been counted.
Read will take on state Sen. Dennis Linthicum, who was one of the six Republican members of the upper chamber who were prohibited from seeking reelection this year because of a 2022 measure aimed at punishing legislators who take part in quorum-busting boycotts. Linthicum’s advantage over his nearest opponent, businessman Brent Barker, stood at 66-20 on Wednesday morning with the AP estimating that 74% of the vote has been counted.
Read will be favored in this blue state for a post that’s both the state’s chief elections officer and first in line to succeed the governor in case of a vacancy. That latter role will be a familiar one to Read: Oregon has no lieutenant governor, but because Griffin-Valade was appointed to her role after her predecessor, Shemia Fagan, resigned amid a scandal, Read is currently first in line.
OREGON 5TH DISTRICT PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. State Rep. Janelle Bynum defeated 2022 nominee Jamie McLeod-Skinner for the right to take on freshman GOP Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer. Bynum leads 69-31 with 70% of the estimated vote in.
Bynum, who would be the first Black person to represent Oregon in Congress, benefited from the support of the DCCC and Gov. Tina Kotek. A mysterious super PAC, by contrast, launched a late ad campaign to boost McLeod-Skinner in what appears to have been an unsuccessful Republican attempt to meddle in the primary.
McLeod-Skinner spent the race dogged by allegations that she had mistreated her staff as a candidate and as a municipal official, which could help explain both why Republicans wanted her and why national Democrats wanted Bynum. The 5th District, which is based in Portland’s southern suburbs and central Oregon, favored Joe Biden 53-44 in 2020.
OREGON 3RD DISTRICT PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. State Rep. Maxine Dexter beat former Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal in the primary to replace their fellow Democrat, retiring Rep. Earl Blumenauer, in this safely blue seat in the eastern Portland area. Dexter leads Jayapal 51-29 as of Wednesday morning, with the AP estimating that 63% of the vote has been tabulated.
Dexter benefited from more than $2 million in support from 314 Action, a group that promotes Democratic candidates with backgrounds in science (Dexter is a pulmonologist). She also decisively outraised her opponents late in the race thanks in part to a large infusion from donors with a history of also giving to the hawkish pro-Israel group AIPAC.
While AIPAC did not officially endorse Dexter, it responded to her victory by tweeting that “AIPAC members were proud to support” her against Jayapal.
Jayapal, who is the sister of Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, received no major outside support and was also on the receiving end of more than $3 million in attacks from a new super PAC called Voters for Responsive Government.
We still don’t know who’s funding the super PAC, though. VFRG was required on Monday to disclose any contributors it received through April 30, but the forms it submitted only revealed that all of its donations came after that date.
IDAHO 2ND DISTRICT PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS. While Rep. Mike Simpson didn’t come close to losing renomination, the 13-term incumbent took an unimpressive 56% of the vote against a pair of underfunded foes; his nearest intra-party opponent, 2022 independent Senate candidate Scott Cleveland, earned 35%. But Simpson, who considered retiring this cycle before opting to seek reelection, should have nothing to worry about in the fall in this dark red constituency.
GEORGIA SUPREME COURT ELECTION RESULTS. Conservative Justice Andrew Pinson fended off a late challenge to win a six-year term on Georgia’s Supreme Court, turning back former Democratic Rep. John Barrow 55-45.
Barrow had hoped his vocal support for abortion rights would help make him the first challenger to unseat a sitting justice in more than a century. Pinson, however, benefitted from his status as an incumbent—he was even listed as such on the ballot—and outside support from Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who appointed him to the bench in 2022.
VERMONT GOVERNOR. Former Gov. Howard Dean announced Monday that he would not seek the Democratic nomination to take on Republican Gov. Phil Scott, a move that came a little more than a week after the incumbent confirmed he’d seek a fifth two-year term.
Dean told reporters that, while unreleased polls showed him within 10 points of beating Scott, victory would have required the type of “scorched earth” campaign he didn’t want to run. It remains to be seen whether any notable Democrat will challenge Scott, who has always won reelection with ease, ahead of the May 30 filing deadline.
Former Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger announced Monday that he wouldn’t seek the Democratic nomination to challenge Republican Gov. Phil Scott, who said earlier this month that he would seek a fifth two-year term. Weinberger led Vermont’s largest city for 12 years before leaving office earlier this year. With former Gov. Howard Dean also saying recently that he’d sit out the race, Democrats lack a prominent candidate ahead of the May 30 filing deadline.
WEST VIRGINIA GOVERNOR. Unnamed sources close to Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin told MetroNews’ Brad McElhinny that the retiring senator is being encouraged to run for governor by Republicans seeking a moderate alternative to state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, a far-right hardliner who won the GOP nomination last week. McElhinny added that Manchin “has made no decision, but also he has not dissuaded the conversations,” and the senator himself didn’t rule it out Monday.
Complicating matters, Democrats have already nominated Huntington Mayor Steve Williams, who told McElhinny that he was aware of the talk surrounding Manchin but hasn’t spoken to him about the prospect. Williams noted, though, that Manchin has donated to his campaign and has “been a friend for over 40 years now.” The mayor would have to withdraw by Aug. 13 for Manchin to take his place by Aug. 19; otherwise, the senator could run only as an independent.
Williams has struggled to raise money, though, and supporters of a potential Manchin candidacy could wait a few weeks for new poll data before proceeding. Manchin, who previously served as governor and has won three Senate races—including a 2018 reelection campaign against Morrisey—would likely be a much stronger nominee. Still, he’d just as likely face a tough general election in what has now become a dark red state.
When asked by Axios’ Stephen Neukam about McElhinny’s story on Monday, the senator did not close the door on a bid.
“I don’t know,” Manchin said. “It’s whatever Steve decides. If something’s come up I don’t know about, we’ll find out.”
However, it may be a while before the senator gives us a definitive answer. Manchin spent much of the past year and a half leaving everyone in doubt about his plans by flirting with running for reelection, the governorship, and even the White House. Despite announcing in November that he wouldn’t seek reelection, he’s continued to send mixed messages. In March, the 76-year-old Manchin didn’t fully rule out running for reelection as an independent, an option that remains open to him until Aug. 1.
MARYLAND U.S. SENATOR. Former Republican Gov. Larry Hogan has launched his first general election ad, which focuses on abortion and is part of a $1 million buy. The commercial, obtained by Politico, presents Hogan as an abortion rights supporter who claims he’ll codify Roe v. Wade if elected.
Hogan had described himself as “pro-life” for years and notably vetoed a bill in 2022 that would have expanded abortion access, which Democratic lawmakers overrode. After kicking off his surprise bid for Senate in February, however, he began shifting his stance
That shift accelerated after Hogan won the GOP primary earlier this month, when he began calling himself “pro-choice” and endorsed the reproductive rights amendment that Democratic lawmakers placed on November’s ballot following a party-line vote last year. But just days after he joined the race in February, Hogan told CNN’s Dana Bash that abortion was an “emotional issue for women” and the ballot measure “wasn’t really necessary.”
While serving as governor, Hogan repeatedly claimed he wouldn’t seek to restrict abortion access, but that prospect was always a nonstarter with Democrats dominating the state legislature. By contrast, if Hogan wins his Senate race, he would have the first chance in his career to restrict abortion rights by helping Republicans win a majority.
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