2025-2026 election thread for Senate, House, State and cities

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Ex-FBI Official Fired Under Trump Announces Run for Congress in Maryland
By Rebecca Shabad
February 23, 2026

Introduction:

(NBC News) Former senior FBI official David Sundberg announced Monday that he plans to run for Congress this year in Maryland's 5th Congressional District.

Sundberg is running for the seat being vacated by retiring Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., which he has held since he won a special election in 1981. The district covers Southern Maryland and portions of Prince George's and Anne Arundel counties. Cook Political Report rates it as a solid Democratic seat in this year's midterm elections.

Sundberg, who joined the FBI in 2002, previously served as the assistant director in charge of the FBI's Washington Field Office during the Biden administration and was notified in late Jan. 2025, just days after President Donald Trump took office, that he was going to lose his job. His termination was among a number of firings of top FBI officials at the beginning of Trump's second term.

“I’m running for Congress because I believe in the rule of law, not the rule of one man,” Sundberg said in a statement in an apparent reference to Trump. “I have spent my life running toward crises to protect this country — from enlisting in the Air Force to serving as a local detective to dedicating over two decades to the mission of the FBI. I’ve spent my career defending our Constitution from threats abroad and at home. Now, I’m ready to take that same fight to Congress to protect our democracy from those who think they are above the law.”

Read more here: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/news/ex ... obArticle

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Recent polls show Democrat Graham Platner leading incumbent Republican Susan Collins by 11 per cent for Maine U.S. Senate seat, and Democrat Roy Cooper leading likely Republican nominee Michale Whatley by 10 per cent for North Carolina U.S. Senate seat. If these results hold up, they would be seats that would swing from Republican to Democrat in the 2026 election.

Source: https://www.realclearpolling.com/latest-polls

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Republican Texas Senate Primary Results
903,948 John Cornyn
877,830 Ken Paxton
291,802 Wesley Hunt
26,178 Sara Canady
24,311 Anna Bender
15,471 Gulrez Kahn
9,225 John Adefope
8,974 Virgil Bierschwale
2,157,739 Total with 97.90% votes counted

Democrat Texas Senate Primary Results
1,211,299 James Talarico
1,067,446 Jasine Crockett
30,872 Ahmad Hassan
2,309,617 Total with 98.20% votes counted

Source:https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-p ... e-results

Cornyn and Paxton will proceed to a runoff primary election in May. With more than 50% of the votes cast in the Democratic primary, Talarico has secured the Democratic party nomination. Note that the total turnout for the Democrat exceeded that for the Republicans. General elections are very different than primaries with typically greater turnout. A lot can happen between now and the general election. Still, Talarico looks on track to win in November. That would be a pick-up for Democrats in the U.S. Senate.

Looking toward North Carolina:

Republican North Carolina Senate Primary Results
404,199 Michael Whatley
97,589 Donald Brown
35,378 Thomas Johnson
34,961 Michele Morrow
23,794 Elizabeth Temple
14,929 Richard Dansie
148,117 Margot Dupre
758,967 Total with 98% votes counted

Democratic North Carolina Senate Primary Results
758,808 Roy Cooper
22,169 Justin Dunes
20,190 Marcus Williams
9,674 Daryl Farrow
7,218 Orrick Quick
6,739 Robert Cohn
824,798 Total with 98.90% votes counted

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-p ... -results

Whatley will face Cooper in the general election. Note that the turnout for Democrats exceeded the turnout for Republicans. So, Cooper looks on track for a narrow win in the general election. That would also be a pick-up for Democrats in the U.S. Senate.

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The Future in Texas Is Bright and Terrifying
By Tim Murphy
March 4, 2026

Introduction:

(Mother Jones) Get ready to hear a lot more about James Talarico. The Texas state representative won the Democratic US Senate primary on Tuesday, defeating Jasmine Crockett—a high-profile member of Congress representing Dallas—in a race that pitted two candidates with a knack for garnering attention and diverging theories of the electorate.

Additional Extract:

…further downballot, the results showed a (Republican) party increasingly captured by a radical fringe. Take the race to replace Paxton as attorney general, which US Rep. Chip Roy entered with more name recognition than anyone else. Roy, a former Ted Cruz chief of staff, is a hard-right zealot (I do not think he would even consider that an insult), but also a kind of irascible figure in DC with a real and confounding code—he voted to certify the 2020 election results on January 6, for example. You could expect him to take on many of the same fights as Paxton, but without all the scuzziness. He faces a runoff after finishing 8 points behind state Sen. Mayes Middleton, who told voters that he had “defeated the atheists” and was “fighting Sharia law” while accusing Roy—Chip Roy!—of helping “illegals avoid deportation.”

Roy’s colleague in the US House, Rep. Tony Gonzales, is also facing a runoff in a rematch with Brandon Herrera, a gun influencer known as the “the AK guy.” Gonzales has called Herrera a “known neo-Nazi,” in reference to his opponent’s history of posting Nazi memes and Holocaust jokes. (Herrera has said he is not a neo-Nazi and that he simply has an “edgy” sense of humor.) Herrera has accused Gonzales of the far more serious offense of supporting modest gun-control legislation after the 2022 school shooting in Uvalde, which is in the district. But Gonzales may be on the ropes this time; he is now facing a congressional ethics inquiry over allegations he had an inappropriate relationship with a staffer, who later died by suicide. Another Republican incumbent, Rep. Dan Crenshaw, lost his race outright. Crenshaw was once a rising star, but drew opposition on the right for voting to certify the 2020 election, and working with Democrats on a failed border-security bill in 2024.

Read more here: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2 ... y-french/

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Outspoken Pro-Palestinian Pastor Wins Primary to Replace Crockett in House
By Stephen Prager
March 4, 2026

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) A pro-Palestine pastor has won the Democratic primary to fill the House seat in Texas that will be left behind by the pro-Israel Rep. Jasmine Crockett, who was a congregant at his church for years.

Frederick Haynes III, who has led the Friendship-West Baptist Church in Dallas for more than 40 years and was chosen by the late Rev. Jesse Jackson to lead his famed Rainbow PUSH coalition, won the primary for the seat now held by the two-term congresswoman with 72% of the vote.

Crockett announced in December that she would run for the US Senate rather than for reelection to her House seat.

Haynes—who campaigned on Medicare for All, abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and hiking the minimum wage—was endorsed by Crockett (D-Texas), who lost the bitterly contested Senate primary to state Rep. James Talarico (D-50) on Tuesday.

But where Crockett has faced heat from the Democratic base over her statements and votes in support of Israel amid its genocide in Gaza and her backing by pro-Israel megadonors, Haynes’s credibility was bolstered by his willingness to call out Israel’s human rights abuses against Palestinians when few other Democrats would.

Read more here: https://www.commondreams.org/news/hayn ... ett-seat

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Daines Drops Re-election Bid in Montana, Upending a Senate Race

Source: New York Times

March 4, 2026, 8:47 p.m. ET

Senator Steve Daines, Republican of Montana, said on Wednesday that he would not seek re-election this year, a surprise announcement that could offer Democrats a long-shot chance to flip a seat in their uphill fight to win control of the Senate.

Mr. Daines made the announcement just minutes before the filing deadline closed for November's election, saying that he had been "wrestling with this decision for months" and that it was time for "new leaders," like the state's junior Republican senator, Tim Sheehy, to "spearhead the fight for Montana in the United States Senate."

Mr. Daines, a two-term senator who led Republicans� successful effort to flip the Senate in 2024, also endorsed a successor: Kurt Alme, the U.S. attorney for Montana. President Trump also quickly endorsed Mr. Alme on Wednesday evening.

Mr. Daines' announcement "a surprise even to his Senate colleagues" upended the political landscape in Montana, a sparsely populated and independent-minded state that has veered rightward in recent years. The last remaining statewide Democrat, Senator Jon Tester, lost his re-election bid to Mr. Sheehy in 2024.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/04/us/e ... -race.html

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Political earthquake in N. Carolina. 3 Incumbent Democrats, who vote with GOP, lose their primaries by big margins
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/05/us/n ... =url-share

The American flag cake was about half eaten by the time Phil Berger, North Carolina�s most powerful legislator, stepped to the podium on Tuesday at his election night party.

The leader of the State Senate did not appear in a good mood. He and his allies had pumped a staggering $10 million into his surprisingly tight primary race against Sam Page, a popular small-town sheriff. He had enlisted allies from Raleigh to campaign for him. He had even secured a coveted endorsement from President Trump, who is beloved in this rural stretch of northern North Carolina.

But as of Wednesday, his opponent was clinging to a two-vote lead, with provisional, military and overseas ballots still waiting to be counted. The extremely tight margin underscored the main takeaway for state legislative races across politically purple North Carolina on Tuesday night: This was a primary season about punishing incumbents on both sides of the aisle.

Three veteran Democrats in safe seats who tended to vote with the G.O.P. all lost their primaries by as much as 48 points, as their challengers promised to push back harder against Republicans� steamrolling approach to legislating.

Five Republican incumbents, and possibly Mr. Berger, were also swept from the State Legislature.

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Axios- Older Dems are sick of hearing about "generational change"

https://archive.ph/FLSig

"I have no idea why this is the year to write this story, except that Joe Biden was old. I think voters will just pick who's doing the best job."
Constant internal talk of generational change over the last several years is "pissing people off," a senior House Democrat told Axios. "The seasoned members, they're pissed off."

Problem is, some of these morons ain't doing a good job.

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New Poll: Control of U.S. House Could Come Down to Clean Water in Iowa
February 17, 2026

Introduction:

(Food & Water Action) In Iowa, where the First and Third Congressional Districts are among the most vulnerable Republican seats in the U.S. House, a new statewide poll conducted by Global Strategy Group on behalf of Food & Water Action finds that clean water and cancer rates are top priorities for voters. This comes as Iowa has some of the nation’s most polluted waterways and is one of only two states where cancer rates are rising — both are linked to industrial agriculture pollution.

Key findings include:

• Cancer rates, clean water are top concerns for Iowa voters: Voters are more concerned with rising cancer rates than the cost of living (72-61%), and more concerned about water quality and water pollution than crime and public safety (58-27%).

• Clean water is an electoral priority: 82% of Iowa voters would be more likely to vote for an elected official who makes it a top priority to protect clean water, including cutting industrial agriculture pollution. This includes 72% of Republicans and 92% of Democrats. That number jumps to 85% in IA-01 and IA-03.

• Regulations for industrial agriculture are overwhelmingly popular: 79% of Iowa voters support mandatory requirements for industrial agriculture to reduce pollution. This jumps to 86% in IA-01 and 83% in IA-03. When forced to choose between limiting agriculture regulations and protecting clean water, the vast majority of Iowa voters, by a 70-28% margin, choose clean water. That margin jumps to 78-22% in IA-01 and 75-22 in IA-03.

Additional Extract:

Iowa voters could determine control of the U.S. House this fall. IA-01 incumbent Rep. Miller-Meeks narrowly held her seat in 2024, winning by less than 800 votes despite significant national tailwinds — Miller-Meeks trailed Trump by over 20,000 votes. IA-03 Rep. Zach Nunn is also vulnerable. These are two of the fourteen Republican-held districts rated as “toss up” by Cook Political Report. In December, both Republicans voted to pass the PERMIT Act, which would weaken the Clean Water Act to enable further agricultural pollution. Iowans will also be voting to fill open gubernatorial and U.S. senatorial seats this year, rated Lean Republican and Likely Republican, respectively.

Read more here: https://www.foodandwateraction.org/pre ... -in-iowa/

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Results of Georgia 14th District special election to replace Marjorie Taylor Greene.

100% reported

Total Votes: 115,820
Total Republican: 69,107
Total Democrat: 46,111
Total Libertarian: 321
Total Independent: 281

Based on this turn out, it looks like a run-off election will result in Republican Clay Fuller winning over Democrat Shawn Harris.

Here are the individual candidate results:

Shawn Harris
Dem
43,241 votes
37%

Clay Fuller
Rep
40,388 votes
35%

Colton Moore
Rep
13,472 votes
12%

Brian Stover
Rep
5,418 votes
5%

Tom Gray
Rep
4,078 votes
4%

Jim Davis
Dem
1,772 votes
2%

Nicky Lama
Rep
1,364 votes
1%

Jim Tully
Rep
1,309 votes
1%

Jonathan Hobbs
Dem
1,098 votes
1%

Beau Brown
Rep
926 votes
1%

Jenna Turnipseed
Rep
633 votes
1%

Star Black
Rep
473 votes
0%

Eric Cunningham
Rep
404 votes
0%

Reagan Box
Rep
346 votes
0%

Andrew Underwood
L
321 votes
0%

Megahn Strickland
Rep
296 votes
0%

Rob "Rush" Ruszkowski
I
281 votes
0%

Source: https://www.wsbtv.com/news/local/georgi ... pilot.com

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Retiring GOP Senator Trashes Republican Party’s ‘Lazy and Unstrategic’ Handling of Bitter Senate Runoff
By Sarah Rumpf
March 16, 2026

Introduction:

(Mediaite) Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) sharply criticized the divisive Texas Senate runoff, lamenting President Donald Trump’s delay in issuing an endorsement and calling his fellow Republicans “lazy and unstrategic.”

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) is in the fight of his political life in the May 23 runoff election against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, and it’s already gotten viciously, personally brutal. The incumbent is widely viewed as a stronger candidate in the general election due to Paxton’s series of scandals, lawsuits, and controversies, but the attorney general has gotten support from the MAGA wing of the GOP for his combative, far-right stances.

Trump declined to endorse for the primary but posted on Truth Social the next day that he would endorse “soon,” urging whoever didn’t get his endorsement to drop out.

Multiple media outlets reported the president was expected to endorse Cornyn, but Paxton tweeted a Hail Mary that seems to have been effective in at least delaying an endorsement for his rival, pledging he would drop out if Senate leadership lifts the filibuster to pass the SAVE Act, a bill Trump vehemently supports. Cornyn had already expressed his support for the SAVE Act but soon publicly declared his willingness to ditch the filibuster to get it passed, a position he had not taken before.

Additional Extract:

Even before the runoff, this year’s Texas Senate battle was the most expensive Senate primary on record, burning through over $128 million, with a whopping $98.9 million spent just by the Republican campaigns and PACs

Read more here: https://www.mediaite.com/politics/reti ... -runoff/

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Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton wins Democratic primary for US Senate

Source: AP

CHICAGO (AP) — Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton won Tuesday’s Democratic primary for U.S. Senate, edging out two sitting members of the U.S. House to advance to a November general election against Republican nominee Don Tracy, the former state party chair.

The retirement of U.S. Sen Dick Durbin, the Senate’s longtime No. 2 Democrat, triggered a competitive campaign on the Democratic side, drawing as candidates Stratton and U.S. Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi and Robin Kelly, among others. Furious fundraising and sharp elbows marked the race, which tested the influence of Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker. The governor, whose name has been floated as a 2028 presidential contender, backed Stratton.

The races were testing grounds for some of the biggest issues facing the Democratic Party, from support for Israel to immigration enforcement and the cryptocurrency and AI industries, as super PACs poured millions of dollars into the hotly contested primaries.

Most primary winners in the Democratic stronghold are expected to win in November, shaping a new generation of leadership in the state’s congressional delegation.

Read more: https://apnews.com/article/election-pri ... bdbcd4e492

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