Omar seeks to fend off primary challenge amid tough cycle for the ‘squad’
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) will look to survive a primary challenge Tuesday night in what has been a rough election cycle for progressive “squad” members.
Progressive Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) and Cori Bush (D-Mo.) lost hotly contested primaries in recent months, underscoring Democratic divisions over Israel and the war in Gaza.
Omar will face former Minneapolis City Council member Don Samuels (D) in a primary rematch.
Omar narrowly defeated Samuels in 2022, squeezing past him by fewer than 2,500 votes.
Omar is the favorite to win tonight. She out-raised Samuels this cycle $1.6 million to $535,000.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which pumped a combined $25 million into House primaries to oust Bowman and Bush, did not invest heavily in Omar’s race.
Samuels has hit Omar for her Pro-Palestinian stance on the Gaza war, which has divided Democrats. In 2019, the House voted to condemn “anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, racism and other forms of bigotry” following an uproar over remarks Omar made about Jewish influence and money in Washington.
Election rules in Minnesota allow voters to choose which primary to participate in, so it’s possible some Republicans could potentially cross over to try and oust Omar.
In addition to Minnesota’s primaries, there are also elections in Connecticut, Wisconsin and Vermont.
Other races we’re watching:
Republican businessman Eric Hovde is expected to win the Republican primary for Senate in Wisconsin. If he prevails, he’ll face off against Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) in a race that will go a long way to determining the balance of power in the Senate.
Eight Republicans are on the GOP ballot for Senate in Minnesota, including former NBA player Royce White and Navy veteran Joe Fraser. White has made a slew of controversial remarks but has support from the state party, while Fraser is seen as the centrist pick. The winner will take on Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) in a state that has suddenly become a focal point in national politics with Gov. Tim Walz (D-Minn.) on the Democratic presidential ticket.
FBI investigating suspected efforts by Iran to hack presidential campaigns
The FBI is investigating suspected efforts by Iran to hack into the campaigns of former President Trump and Vice President Harris.
The Washington Post reports that Harris’s campaign has been receiving spear phishing emails.
The Trump campaign says it was hacked. Both the Post and Politico were contacted by an anonymous person sending along internal Trump campaign documents.
Roger Stone
, Trump’s longtime friend and adviser, appears to have been compromised.
Stone:“I was informed by the authorities that a couple of my personal email accounts have been compromised. I really don’t know more about it. And I’m cooperating. It’s all very strange.”
The hacking efforts echo 2016, when the Democratic National Committee (DNC) was compromised and Wikileaks released emails showing DNC members putting their thumb on the scale in the primary between Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
The hack was a months-long headache for Clinton and the DNC, as news outlets ran stories on their internal communications.
The cyber firm that handles the DNC’s security says Russia was behind the 2016 hack, and Trump at one point publicly called on Russia to keep doing it.
News outlets have so far abstained from publishing the internal Trump campaign documents they’ve received.
From Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.):
“This is a tactic – the ‘hack and leak,’ that we have seen coming from foreign adversaries in the past, including in the 2016 Presidential election. Our adversaries are intent on sowing chaos and undermining our democratic process, they’ve done it before. So we have to stand firm to ensure our cybersecurity can withstand such intrusions as we head into November.”
News outlets have chosen not to print leaked insider material from the Trump campaign.
Vice President Harris’s campaign has been a three-week thrill ride following her unexpected entrance into the presidential race.
The Hill’s Amie Parnes reports that Democrats say Harris’s campaign energy evokes former President Obama’s 2008 ride to the White House.
The Hill’s Alex Gangitano reports that Harris’s campaign is trying to present a ‘joyful’ front that goes against the nation’s sour political mood.
But Democrats expect the honeymoon to end at some point, and how Harris and her team respond to the grind of a three-month race could determine the outcome.
The Hill’sNiall Stanage has a great primer on the questions Harris will face:
Does she pay a price for her policy shifts?
How much detail will she provide on her economic plans?
What specifically does she want to do on Israel and Gaza?
Can she escape the Biden administration’s vulnerabilities on immigration?
How will she perform in unscripted interviews and on the debate stage with Trump?
We’ll start to get answers to some of those questions this week.
Harris will hold a rally Friday in North Carolina, where she’ll unveil pieces of her economic plan. Her remarks will focus on “her plan to lower costs for middle-class families and take on corporate price-gouging,” a campaign official told The Hill.
Other questions, such as how Harris will do in unscripted moments, will have to wait.
Some in the media are getting antsy, as Harris has not sat for an interview or held a press conference since becoming the nominee. She said she’d likely do an interview before Labor Day.
CNN’s John Berman pressed Harris spokeswoman Adrienne Elrod on that front on Tuesday:
“She could do an interview today,” Berman told Elrod, who said Harris is more focused on “taking her message directly to the American people.”
Former President Trump’s campaign has been hitting Harris for hiding from the press.
Speaking of …
Trump sat for a conversation Monday night with billionaire businessman Elon Musk. Musk has put his support and money behind Trump, so it wasn’t an adversarial interview.
Republicans have been pressing Trump to stay on message and abandon personal attacks in the wake of Harris becoming the Democratic nominee.
There were occasions that Trump stayed on message:
“The election is coming up and people want to hear about the economy. Food prices are up…and this stupid administration allowed this to happen. And it’s a shame. And that’s the thing people most care about in my opinion.”
But over the course of the 150-minute conversation, which was plagued at the start by technical issues, there were plenty of moments where Trump ran afield.
Trump said climate change is good because it will open “more oceanfront property.”
He said striking workers should be immediately fired, provoking the United Auto Workers to file a claim against him and Musk for trying to “intimidate and threaten” workers.
He dipped into the Project 2025 playbook to say he’d eliminate the Department of Education.
Perspectives:
The Hill: Harris is using Trump’s tactics against him. Will it work?
Vice President Harris has been building momentum in national surveys and swing state polls since President Biden dropped out of the race.
The Hill’s Jared Ganshas the rundown on the state of the race, which is still very close despite Harris’s impressive gains over the last few weeks.
Washington was buzzing on Tuesday about the latest USA Today/Suffolk University poll of Florida, which is not viewed as a battleground.
The poll found former President Trump with only a 5-point lead.
The survey has a 4.4 point margin of error, provoking questions about whether the red state that Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) carried by nearly 19 points in 2022 might be in play.
There are reasons to be skeptical.
There are 1 million more registered Republicans in Florida than there are Democrats.
The Biden campaign has previously said Florida is not in play. It’s an extremely expensive ad market that would suck resources away from other swing states if the Harris campaign wanted to take a shot.
CNN polling analyst Harry Entenwarned Democrats Tuesday against getting carried away with Harris’s recent polling surge.
In 2016, the polls of Blue Wall states at this point underestimated Trump’s final support by 9 points. In 2020, they underestimated him by 5 points. Harris leads in those states by 4 points in the latest
New York Times/Siena College poll.
In May, 62 percent of Blue Wall Democrats said they were certain to vote for Biden, while 58 percent of Blue Wall Republicans were certain to vote for Trump. Those numbers have barely budged, despite Harris’s surge. Now, 61 percent of Democrats are certain to vote for Harris, and 60 percent of Republicans are certain to vote for Trump.
Trump’s favorability rating surged after the shooting, and he’s more popular now than he was in either 2016 or 2020.
In addition, DecisionDeskHQ’s Michael Pruseraccumulated data that suggests the GOP’s ground game might be stronger than they’re getting credit for.
In July, there were more than 253,000 newly registered Republicans across 25 states, including battlegrounds such as Arizona, Nevada, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. Over that same period, there was a decline of 19,000 registered Democrats in those 25 states.
There are several wild cards at play:
Independent candidates Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Cornell Westmade the ballot in battleground North Carolina.
Bipartisan task force investigating Trump shooting gets underway
The House bipartisan task force investigating the security failures that led to the assassination attempt on former President Trump has begun its business.
Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Penn.), the chairman of the task force, and Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.), the ranking member, sent letters to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Attorney General Merrick Garland, and FBI Director Christopher Wray requesting “all documents and information that have been produced to date, to any committee of the House or Senate related to the attempted assassination of former President Donald J. Trump.”
The New York Times has primers on Kelly, who represents the district where Trump was shot, and Crow, the decorated Army Ranger and veteran of U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, New York Democratic Rep. Ritchie Torresintroduced a bill that would expand the Secret Service perimeter at public events.
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