Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* As expected, the Michigan Supreme Court announced a couple of hours ago that it will not hear a 14th Amendment challenge to Donald Trump’s 2024 candidacy. As a result, the former president will appear on the state’s primary ballot. (The case did not relate to the general election ballot.)
* How serious are Democrats about flipping former Republican Rep. George Santos’ seat? The House Majority PAC, which is aligned with the House Democratic leadership, is investing $5.2 million in initial reservations for TV and digital ads in the hopes of winning in the New York district. The special election is scheduled for Feb. 13, which is only seven weeks away.
* As the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary approach, Vivek Ramaswamy’s Republican presidential campaign has apparently abandoned all television advertising. The entrepreneur’s operation said, however, that it’s still spending on direct mail and phone contacts.
* With less than a month to go before the New Hampshire primary, Chris Sununu, the state’s incumbent Republican governor, appears in a new TV ad in support of former Ambassador Nikki Haley’s presidential campaign.
* Donald Trump’s campaign, meanwhile, launched a new television ad on Christmas Eve that’s airing in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. It focuses on the Republican’s surprise Christmas visit to Iraq five years ago. * HuffPost reported that the Republican National Committee is heading into 2024 “with just $7.6 million available, barely a tenth of what it had four years ago, after accounting for inflation.” The report added, “Even compared to the end of 2015, the last time it was entering a presidential election year with the opposite party controlling the White House, it has just a third of the $21.3 million the party had then in inflation-adjusted dollars.” * Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota, who’s still running a primary campaign against President Joe Biden, claimed late last week that there isn’t “one shred of evidence” that the incumbent Democrat can defeat Trump in 2024. For what it’s worth, recent national polling from NPR, The New York Times, and Quinnipiac each showed Biden leading Trump in hypothetical general election match-ups, which appear to be shreds of evidence.
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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