Tag Archives: Rep. Madison Cawthorn

PA GOP Senate Recount Continues; Wisconsin Dem Primary Tightening; House Races News

Dr. Mehmet Oz (left) leads former hedge fund CEO David McCormick by 902 votes.

By Jim Ellis — June 2, 2022

Senate

Pennsylvania: McCormick Campaign Attempts “Hail Mary” — The latest signals coming from the Pennsylvania Republican Senate recount suggest that former hedge fund CEO David McCormick’s campaign representatives know their collective backs are against the proverbial wall. The McCormick contingent is now asking for hand recounts from certain precincts in certain counties where they suspect “data abnormalities.”

Since Dr. Mehmet Oz’s small lead did not lapse opposite to what the McCormick campaign had originally predicted, it appears the chances are growing strong that Dr. Oz will be certified as the primary winner on June 8. The eventual nominee, presumably Dr. Oz, will face Democratic Lt. Gov. John Fetterman who easily won his party’s nomination on May 17.

Wisconsin: Dem Nomination Tightening — Milwaukee Bucks basketball club executive and former Obama White House aide Alex Lasry has released another of his internal polls testing the Democratic US Senate primary. The Normington Petts survey (May 18-22; 700 likely Wisconsin Democratic primary voters; live interview) finds Lasry moving closer to race leader Mandela Barnes, the state’s lieutenant governor. The new numbers find the Dem contest within three percentage points, with Barnes leading 34-31 percent, while state Treasurer Sarah Godlewski trails with an 18 percent preference factor.

In February, Barnes’s margin was 35-27-9 percent over Lasry and Godlewski, respectively. In actuality, this poll finds that Godlewski is the candidate having the most dynamic momentum right now, in effect doubling her level of support from the last quarter. The Democratic primary winner on Aug. 9 will then face Sen. Ron Johnson (R) in the general election.

House

NY-10: A 15th Candidate Joins — State Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon (D-Brooklyn) became the 15th Democratic candidate to announce for the open court-drawn 10th Congressional District. The new 10th covers Lower Manhattan and part of Brooklyn.

Rep. Mondaire Jones (D-Westchester County) is moving from over an hour away to run in this district and faces former New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, ex-Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman, now two state Assembly members, and two NYC City councilmembers within the large pack of candidates. This will clearly be one of the key races to watch in the New York congressional primary scheduled for Aug. 23. The FiveThirtyEight data organization rates this seat a D+69, so the Democratic primary will determine the new member.

NC-11: First Post-Primary Poll — Democratic nominee Jasmine Beach-Ferrara released an internal small sample poll from the Survey 160 firm (May 18-20; 308 likely NC-11 voters; text) that projects new Republican nominee Chuck Edwards, a Hendersonville area state Senator, to a 46-40 percent general election lead. Sen. Edwards defeated US Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-Hendersonville) by a percentage point on May 17 to claim the GOP nomination.

Soon after a tough primary, it is not particularly surprising to see Edwards with an upside down favorability index of 36:40 percent. Rated as an R+14 district, it is likely the voting patterns will move back toward Edwards in greater numbers as we move further away from a divisive primary and closer to the general election.

Governor

Connecticut: Gov. Lamont Begins with Lead — Home state pollster Quinnipiac University tested the Connecticut governor’s contest (May 19-23; 1,660 registered Connecticut voters; live interview) and sees incumbent Ned Lamont (D) holding a 51-43 percent lead over his 2018 GOP opponent, businessman Bob Stefanowski. Gov. Lamont’s almost unanimous support among self-identified Democrats (92-6 percent) largely accounts for his positive margin in this heavily Democratic political domain.

The governor holds a 52:38 percent favorable job approval rating, which compares very favorably to President Biden’s upside-down 40:54 percent ratio. Democratic Sens. Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal post 45:37 and 45:43 percent respective scores. Sen. Blumenthal is on the ballot this year, suggesting a race against him could be one that potentially turns more competitive than expected.

Budd Wins in NC; PA Senate Race
Still Too Close to Call

By Jim Ellis
May 18, 2022

Primary Results

Yesterday’s Voting — As predicted, North Carolina US Rep. Ted Budd (R-Advance) soundly defeated former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory to win the US Senate nomination, winning 99 of the state’s 100 counties. Former US Rep. Mark Walker and author Marjorie Eastman finished third and fourth. The general election is now set, as Rep. Budd advances to face former state Supreme Court Chief Justice Cheri Beasley, who became a consensus Democratic candidate. The Tar Heel contest will be one of the most important Senate races in the country.

US Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-Hendersonville) lost his battle for re-nomination last night to state Sen. Chuck Edwards (R-Hendersonville). In the field of eight candidates, Edwards claimed the nomination with 33 percent of the vote, as compared to the scandal-plagued congressman’s 32 percent. In North Carolina, runoffs only occur if all of the candidates fall below a 30 percent threshold.

In what appears to be another congressional defeat, veteran Oregon Congressman Kurt Schrader (D-Canby) is running far behind his Democratic primary challenger, Jamie McLeod-Skinner, a former city manager, but half of the vote is still outstanding under Oregon’s all-mail voting system. Still, with a 61-39 percent margin, Rep. Schrader appears too far behind to make up all of the vote difference.

The Pennsylvania Senate Republican race is still too close to call, as television Dr. Mehmet Oz and former hedge fund CEO David McCormick are locked in a battle separated with less than two-tenths of a percentage point. It is difficult to tell how many votes remain uncounted because the state will allow ballots postmarked yesterday to be received in the coming days. It will be some time before we know the outcome, but Dr. Oz has a 2,672-vote lead of the more than 1.31 million votes cast. Pennsylvania election law guarantees an automatic recount if the margin is within .5 percent. McCormick claims the remaining mail votes will hand him the victory.

As expected, the Pennsylvania Democrats nominated Lt. Gov. John Fetterman who lays in a hospital recovering from a recent stroke that occurred from a blood clot in his heart. Fetterman, who underwent a pacemaker procedure, is expected to make a full recovery but will be sidelined for some time.

In the election, Fetterman easily defeated US Rep. Conor Lamb (D-Pittsburgh) and state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (D-Philadelphia) with a 59-26-10 percent landslide victory margin. He won all of the state’s 67 counties in a turnout of more than 1.17 million voters. Surprisingly, Democratic turnout dropped below that of Republicans for the first time in decades. This, despite the party’s 45.8 to 35.9 percent voter registration advantage.

In the PA governor’s race, state Sen. Doug Mastriano (D-Fayetteville) easily won the open Republican nomination and will face Attorney General Josh Shapiro (D) in the general election. The latter man was unopposed in the Democratic primary. Media reports suggest that Mastriano may be too conservative to win in Pennsylvania, but the large Republican primary turnout is a precursor that this race will be competitive.

In other key statewide races, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul romped to an 86 percent Republican primary victory. He will face former Louisville state Rep. Charles Booker who was an easy winner on the Democratic side. Sen. Paul is a heavy favorite for re-election. In the open 3rd Congressional District, state Senate Minority Leader Morgan McGarvey, also as expected, won a landslide Democratic primary victory last night and will succeed retiring Rep. John Yarmuth (D-Louisville) in the Autumn.

Idaho Gov. Brad Little (R) defeated Trump backed Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin, 53-32 percent, and becomes a prohibitive favorite in the general election. US Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho Falls) again defeated his 2014 primary opponent, attorney Bryan Smith, this time by 13 percentage points and will claim a 13th term in November.

Governor

Wisconsin: New Republican Leader According to Dem Poll — Democratic pollster Public Policy Polling surveyed the Wisconsin Republican gubernatorial primary and produced results not found in other polls. The study (May 9-10; 675 likely Wisconsin Republican primary voters) projected construction company executive and 2004 US Senate nominee Tim Michels taking a small lead over former Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch. This is the first poll find anyone but Kleefisch claiming the top position. The ballot test gave Michels a 27-26 percent edge, with businessman Kevin Nicholson trailing well behind in third place with nine percent preference. The Milwaukee Works, Inc. organization released the ballot test portion of the PPP survey.

States

Texas: Conflicting AG Polls — Next Tuesday, Texas Republican voters will decide the runoff election between incumbent Attorney General Ken Paxton and Land Commissioner George P. Bush. The race has turned negative and earlier polls were giving Paxton, who is still under a stalled 2015 SEC indictment, a strong lead. The new University of Texas at Tyler survey (May 2-10; 570 likely Texas Republican runoff voters) projects Paxton’s lead to be only 41-35 percent.

During the same sampling period, as previously reported, the CWS Research group (May 4-10; 992 likely Texas Republican runoff voters) produced a much different 58-31 percent ballot test result in the attorney general’s favor. Since these polls were conducted during the same period, we will have to see more data to determine the correct trajectory. It appears clear, however, that Paxton is the race leader, but whether his margin is wide or tight is open to question.

North Carolina Map Rejected

Rejected 2022 North Carolina Congressional Redistricting map (click on map above or here to go to an interactive map at DavesRedistricting.com)

By Jim Ellis

Feb. 8, 2022 — In what has almost been a decade-long game of gerrymander ping pong, the state Supreme Court on Friday rejected the new North Carolina congressional and state legislative maps, thus repeating their actions from the two previous times the panel’s majority disqualified a Republican legislature’s map.

The vote was 4-3, with all four Democrats voting in favor of declaring the map a partisan gerrymander, consistent with their past action, while the three Republicans voted to uphold the plans.

We are again looking at a relatively quick re-draw situation because the twice-postponed North Carolina primary is now scheduled for June 7. If an agreement cannot be reached, it is possible the candidate filing deadline and statewide primary are again postponed.

The high court’s move was expected, but this is a serious setback to Republicans from a national perspective since North Carolina appears to be the only state where the party can gain multiple seats through redistricting.

It is likely that the inter-party pairing of Reps. Virginia Foxx (R-Banner Elk) and Kathy Manning (D-Greensboro) will be re-drawn when a new congressional version is passed. The Greensboro area has been the major focal point of this and the previous maps, with the partisan Republican legislature and partisan Democratic court continuing to battle over a map that will eventually become the state’s 2022 political playing field.

As drawn, the legislature’s map — under North Carolina law and procedure, the governor, in this case Democrat Roy Cooper, has no veto power over redistricting — would have returned either 10 Republicans and 4 Democrats or possibly has high as 11 Republicans and 3 Democrats. Under the current draw, the Republican advantage is 8-5.

North Carolina gained one seat under national reapportionment, and the last iteration of the state Supreme Court map, ordered before the 2020 election, resulted in the Republicans losing two seats, one in Raleigh and the other in the Greensboro area.

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Redistricting Challenges – Part I

By Jim Ellis

Jan. 25, 2022 — Today we begin a two-part series about incumbent US House members who could be considered redistricting “victims”, meaning those who find themselves in districts with a largely unfamiliar constituency.

A total of 27 states have completed their redistricting process, and 41 incumbents seeking re-election in these places will be in new seats where a majority of the electorate has not previously seen their names on the congressional ballot.

Interestingly, many of the changes are positive for some of the members in question, because the new constituents are favorable to the incumbent’s party. Others, however, face potentially tough re-nomination or re-election battles, and some will see challenges coming from both Republicans and Democrats.

Interestingly, the four incumbents with the most new constituents, those having a district where a range from just 10 to 20 percent of their current electorates are present in the new CD, actually chose to run in the new places. Each eschewed a seat where they have a larger number of current voters.


Texas Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Austin) has the least carryover of any member from a redistricting completed state. Moving from his current 35th District into the new 37th CD means just 10.0 percent of his current constituents reside in the succeeding district. Placing Doggett here was not the intent of the map drawers, however, as the 37th was meant to be one of the state’s two new seats, a Democratic district fully contained within Austin’s Travis County.

Doggett’s 35th District is now the open seat, in a domain that again stretches from Austin to San Antonio. Had he stayed in the 35th, a total of 60.7 percent of his constituency would have remained constant, according to the Daily Kos Elections site statisticians who have calculated the redistribution percentages for all of the states that have completed redistricting.

Rep. Doggett faces little in the way of Democratic primary opposition, and the new 37th is a similar Austin-anchored seat to his original 10th District in which he began his US House career back in 1995.

North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-Hendersonville) chose to run in the 13th District, which was designed to be that state’s new seat. Despite having only 11.1 percent of his current constituency in the new district, Rep. Cawthorn likes his chances. The 13th lies closer to the Charlotte metro area in comparison to his current western North Carolina seat.

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North Carolina Rep. G.K. Butterfield’s Retirement Leaves a Competitive 2nd

North Carolina Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-Wilson)

By Jim Ellis

Nov. 22, 2021 — As was suggested earlier in the week, 10-term North Carolina Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-Wilson) announced late last week that he will not seek re-election next year. He leaves a new 2nd District – his seat had been numbered NC-1 throughout his career – that will be more competitive in 2022.

Rep. Butterfield attacked the Republican-passed redistricting plan as a gerrymander on his way out and says the draw hurts African Americans in his district. He says that largely because an African American section of Pitt County was removed from the district, along with a small conservative county, and replaced with three larger and decidedly more Republican localities along the Virginia border.

North Carolina gained a seat in reapportionment, but the Butterfield seat was the only current Tar Heel State CD that needed to gain residents. The current 1st District was 58,205 individuals short of the state’s new population quota of 745,671 individuals per CD, so the map drawers had no choice but to add people. Virtually all of the surrounding counties are Republican.

The new 2nd District is certainly more competitive. While President Biden carried the current 1st District with a 54-45 percent margin, on par with Hillary Clinton’s 55-44 percent spread in 2016, the new 2nd District would have given Biden only a 51-48 percent vote split.

Though the new 2nd will be more competitive, the current 1st District was beginning to show signs of political change. This somewhat dispels Rep. Butterfield’s gerrymandering argument. While the previous eight elections delivered an average vote of 72.6 percent for Butterfield, his 2020 victory margin dropped to 54-46 percent opposite accountant and political activist Sandy Smith (R).

Though the state Supreme Court changed the North Carolina map for the 2020 election and basically awarded the Democrats two of the Republicans’ seats, the 1st was left largely unchanged. This suggests that the electorate could be transforming naturally, thus alternative reasons exist for the district becoming more conservative than simply altering the district lines.

We can expect to see competitive primaries in both parties, and things will quickly unfold now that the seat is open. Prior to the retirement announcement, Henderson City Councilman Jason Spriggs had announced a Democratic primary challenge to Rep. Butterfield but he was not rated as a serious challenge to the congressman.

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North Carolina’s Rep. Cawthorn Switching Districts in 2022

By Jim Ellis

Nov. 15, 2021 — With the newly enacted North Carolina congressional map being vetted and analyzed, candidates for the various districts are beginning to come forth. One surprising move is the decision from freshman Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-Hendersonville) to run in new District 13 instead of where his home and the majority of his current constituents reside, in new District 14.

Rep. Madison Cawthorn

Cawthorn, at at the age of 26, is the youngest member of Congress; he was elected to represent the 11th District in 2020, succeeding Mark Meadows, the former Trump chief of staff who left the US House to enter the White House. The 11th has traditionally been the number for the district that sits in the Tar Heel State’s far western corner, anchored in Asheville and nestled among the Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, and South Carolina borders, but the newly enacted congressional map changes its number to 14.

Though the seat in its present configuration has become strongly Republican, that was not always the case. Throughout the 1980’s the district became one of the most politically marginal CDs in the country. During that entire decade, the 11th switched repeatedly back and forth between Democrat James Clarke and Republican Billy Hendon.

Once businessman and former state legislator Charles Taylor defeated Rep. Clarke in 1990, he was able to hold the district for eight consecutive terms until losing in 2006 to Democrat Heath Shuler, the former star University of Tennessee quarterback and NFL player. Shuler represented the district for three terms before retiring, leading to Meadows winning the first of his four elections. Rep. Cawthorn then recorded a 55-42 percent win in 2020 to keep the seat in the Republican column.

The new iteration of the westernmost North Carolina district returns to a more politically marginal status with a statistical history producing Republican victories in the low 50s rather than the high 50s. The adjacent new open 13th District, which annexes the western part of the Charlotte metropolitan area and moves to the Buncombe County line, becomes the region’s new safe Republican seat.

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North Carolina – A Different Take

North Carolina’s 12 Congressional Districts

    By Jim Ellis

    Aug. 19, 2021 — Based upon the 2019 census estimates, it appeared that the new North Carolina congressional seat was bound for the Charlotte area, but the actual 2020 census figures released late last week may be suggesting a different location.

    In looking at the current 13 congressional districts, all but Rep. G.K. Butterfield’s (D-Wilson) 1st District must shed population, hence the reason North Carolina was awarded a new seat. While the census estimates found Rep. Alma Adams’ (D-Charlotte) 12th District being the state’s most over-populated CD, the actual census data finds another district moving beyond the resident number that the Adams’ seat must shed (159,818) in order to reach the state’s target population figure of 745,671 individuals.

    The new data find that freshman Rep. Deborah Ross’ (D-Raleigh) 2nd District is the state’s largest, housing 165,703 people over the state’s new per CD quota. Additionally, neighboring Rep. David Price (D-Chapel Hill), whose 4th District also contains part of Raleigh’s Wake County, also must shed a large number (129,692).

    Looking at the neighboring districts in the Charlotte area, the 8th and 9th CDs of Reps. Richard Hudson (R-Concord) and Dan Bishop (R-Charlotte), along with one county from Rep. Virginia Foxx’s (R-Banner Elk) western 5th District, means that the Charlotte area’s population surplus is approximately 250,000, while the Raleigh districts are over-populated by a slightly larger approximate figure of 300,000 people.

    In the east, the Butterfield district is short just 6,238 people and neighboring Rep. Greg Murphy’s (R-Greenville) 3rd District must shed 10,979 individuals, meaning a relatively simple swap between these two seats and a sliver from a third, most likely Rep. David Rouzer’s (R-Wilmington) 7th District, will easily bring these seats into balance.

    The western sector is also relatively well defined. Freshman Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s (R-Hendersonville) 11th District sits in the Tar Heel State’s far western corner. It needs to shed 22,890 people, but can only go one way, east, because this district is bordered on three sides by South Carolina, Georgia, and Tennessee. Therefore, Reps. Cawthorn, Foxx, and Patrick McHenry’s (R-Lake Norman) 10th CD all shedding relatively small population segments to the east should also be a relatively easy population balancing exercise.

    This suggests the new seat could be placed in the region between Raleigh and Charlotte, meaning those existing districts that lie between the two metropolitan areas – those of Hudson, Bishop, and Rep. Ted Budd’s (R-Advance) open 13th District, in addition to the severely over-populated seats of Reps. Adams, Ross, and Price – will likely see the greatest change.

    This brings us to the Republican-controlled state legislature and how they might draw the new congressional map. In North Carolina, the governor has no veto power over redistricting, so Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper will not be a factor in how the congressional and NC House and Senate maps are constructed. Republicans gained four seats in the state House in 2020 bringing their majority to 69-51. In the state Senate, Democrats added a net one seat thus lessening the GOP majority to 28-22. Therefore, the Republican leadership is in the driver’s seat.

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