Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* In Oregon’s gubernatorial race, Secretary of State Shemia Fagan concluded yesterday that Nicholas Kristof is ineligible to run because he does not meet the state’s residency requirements. The former New York Times columnist is expected to appeal the decision.
* Remember Arizona’s utterly bonkers election audit? The firm hired to conduct the sham process, Cyber Ninjas, is refusing to cooperate with a public-records request. A judge yesterday ordered the company to pay $50,000 a day in court-ordered sanctions.
* In related news, Cyber Ninjas said yesterday that it’s shutting down all of its operations and laying off its entire workforce.
* In Illinois, while there was considerable chatter about retiring Rep. Adam Kinzinger launching a bid for statewide office in 2022, the Republican congressman announced this week that he will not run for governor or Senate, at least not in this election cycle.
* In New Jersey, Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez’s son, Robert Menendez Jr., kicked off a congressional campaign yesterday. The Democrat, who currently serves on the board of the Port Authority, hopes to succeed retiring Rep. Albio Sires in a heavily “blue” district. * Alabama’s gubernatorial race got a little more crowded yesterday, with former Books-A-Million CEO Lew Burdette launching a Republican campaign. He’s one of a handful of GOP candidates taking on incumbent Gov. Kay Ivey. * And in Tennessee this week, state Rep. Jeremy Faison, a top Republican state lawmaker, thought it’d be a good idea to try to pull down the pants of a referee at a high school basketball game as part of a larger tantrum. The GOP legislator later conceded in a statement that the incident was “completely stupid.”
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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