Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* As recently as this past weekend, Democratic Rep. Frederica Wilson of Florida responded to scuttlebutt about her looming retirement. “It’s a crazy rumor, a crazy crazy rumor,” she told Axios. “I’m almost distraught. It’s not true. I am still planning on running.”
Five days later, the congresswoman sat down with the Miami Herald and confirmed that she is, in fact, stepping down at the end of her current term. Wilson said her claims from days earlier were intended to be “politically strategic” in light of Florida Republicans’ redistricting plans.
Her decision complicates matters in her Miami-area district, where candidates will now scramble ahead of an August primary.
* In Texas’ closely watched Senate race, Democrat James Talarico picked up an endorsement from the editorial board of the Houston Chronicle, which condemned Republican Ken Paxton’s “moral rot” and touted Talarico as someone “who’ll stand up for us, who’ll fight corruption, and who’ll bring us together to get our country back on track.”
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* As for Paxton’s many Republican critics, GOP officials have spent the past few days grudgingly offering their support for the scandal-plagued state attorney general and scrubbing their websites of months’ worth of condemnations.
* Though it’s not yet official, Louisiana’s Republican-led state government is poised to approve a new congressional district map that would erase one of the state’s two majority-Black congressional districts. Once completed, a court fight is inevitable.
* With time running out in California’s gubernatorial race, the latest Public Policy Institute of California poll found Democrat Xavier Becerra leading the multi-candidate field with 23%, followed by Republican Steve Hilton, who had 20% support in the survey. Another Democrat, billionaire Tom Steyer, was third, with 15%. The statewide “jungle” primary is next week.
* In Maine’s closely watched Senate race, two statewide polls were released this week showing Democrat Graham Platner leading longtime Republican incumbent Sen. Susan Collins by margins in the high single digits.
* And in 2028 news, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer told a reporter for Detroit’s WJBK-TV, “There will be a robust group of people running for president. I will not be one of them in 2028. I can tell you that.” Hours later, however, the Democratic governor told a group of political and civic leaders gathered on Mackinac Island, “Never say never.”
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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