Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* In Utah, former Republican House aide Celeste Maloy easily won a congressional special election in Utah, and will succeed her former boss, Republican Chris Stewart. What’s more, once Maloy is sworn in, Congress will have no vacancies for the first time in months.
* There’s been some speculation of late about whether Rep. Dean Phillips would try to return to Congress after his Democratic presidential campaign ends, but the Minnesotan announced last week that he’s giving up his U.S. House seat altogether.
* Speaking of retirement announcements, Republican Rep. Pat Fallon of Texas surprised many two weeks ago when he said he would step down from Congress and run for his old seat in the Texas Senate. Soon after, Fallon reversed course and said he’d run for re-election after all.
* Gov. Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign hasn’t had much good news lately, but the Florida Republican was no doubt thrilled to pick up an endorsement last week from evangelical power broker Bob Vander Plaats of Iowa.
* In related news, DeSantis’ larger troubles persist: NBC News reported last week that the leaders of the governor’s Never Back Down super PAC recently met privately and “nearly came to blows.” Soon after, Chris Jankowski, the chief executive of the super PAC, announced his resignation. * Donald Trump continues to pick up endorsements from statewide GOP officeholders, including Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. * Now that this year’s state legislative elections have run their course, Democrats can boast — at least a little — that they finished 2023 with a net gain of five legislative seats. As Bolts’ Daniel Nichanian explained, “That’s a small change, since there were more than 600 seats in play this year. But it goes against the expectation that the party that holds the White House faces trouble in such races.” * And in Louisiana two weeks ago, there were runoff elections in three powerful statewide offices: attorney general, secretary of state, and treasurer. In keeping with the Pelican State’s general partisan direction, the GOP candidate in each race prevailed.
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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