Maine
SD-24 (Mid-state coast)
Jean Guzzetti vs. Denise Tepler
Result (~95% in): Tepler 50.3%, Guzzetti 49.7% | Winner TBD
Policy analyst and former Sagadahoc County Register of Probate Jean Guzzetti faces former state Rep. Denise Tepler, and the two broadly agree on most issues: both like that the state has taken a more active role in housing affordability in recent years, and both would like to see it do more. Guzzetti would like to ban assault weapons, and Tepler would like to put abortion rights in the state constitution—but based on what we can see it seems like a difference in emphasis rather than belief. Both candidates even have glowing testimonials from some of the same people, like Senate President Troy Jackson and outgoing incumbent Eloise Vitelli.
SD-32 (Portland and Westbrook)
Jill Duson (i) vs. Ken A. Capron
Result: Duson 89.3%, Capron 10.7% | Duson wins
First-term state Sen. Jill Duson, previously a Portland city councilor, is in no real danger from her challenge from Ken Capron, an accountant who the Portland Press-Herald generously describes as “an out-of-the-box thinker,” which is genteel newspaper-speak for calling someone a crank.
HD-24 (Bangor and nearby towns)
Joseph Perry (i) vs. Zachary J. Smith
Result (~95% in): Perry 72.2%, Smith 27.8% | Perry wins
While Joseph Perry doesn’t have the worst record of any Democrat in this Maine preview—more on that later—he does have a bad record, especially on abortion. He’s repeatedly voted against mandating that insurers in general, and MaineCare in specific, cover abortion services; he also voted against a bill which removed criminal penalties for certain abortions and undid the state’s ban on late-term abortions even in cases where the mother’s life is endangered. Attorney Zachary J. Smith has not cast any of those bad votes and does not throw up serious red flags, which earned him the endorsement of the progressive Maine People’s Alliance. Smith cites affordable housing, criminal justice reform, and a state-operated public bank as priority issues, and he envisions a public bank playing a central role in tackling housing affordability and building out Maine’s green energy infrastructure.
HD-64 (Waterville and Winslow)
Flavia DeBrito vs. Andrew Dent
Result (~95% in): DeBrito 66.1%, Dent 33.9% | DeBrito wins
Waterville Ward 2 city councilor Flavia DeBrito is a community organizer with a focus on affordability for working-class families, citing Maine’s new child tax credit and state aid to municipal budgets as priorities for her, as well as a proposed constitutional amendment to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution (sank by Republicans and anti-abortion Democrats like the one you’re about to read about in the next item.) Andrew Dent is running a bit to her left, criticizing Gov. Janet Mills for vetoing a minimum wage for farmworkers and criticizing the legislature for shooting down a study of passenger rail expansion; he’s also got an excellent platform that includes a guaranteed income for Mainers in poverty, universal background checks (Maine’s gun laws are unusually lax for a blue state), tuition-free public college, and state-provided universal health insurance. DeBrito has more money and, presumably, more name recognition from her city council job, so this is probably her race to lose. (Which is fine, because DeBrito seems like she’d make a good addition to the legislature.)
HD-65 (Waterville)
Bruce White (i) vs. Cassie Julia
Result (~95% in): Julia 55.7%, White 44.3% | Julia wins
Bruce White does have the worst record of any Democrat in this Maine preview. His anti-abortion record is far more consistent than Perry’s—he scored just 11% from Planned Parenthood in 2023, meaning he voted with the organization on a priority bill exactly once—and this year he also voted against Maine’s shield law for providers of gender-affirming care, which protects medical providers from liability for providing reproductive or gender-affirming care to patients who have traveled from states which ban the procedures. That’s why Planned Parenthood, EMILY’s List, and Equality Maine have lined up alongside the People’s Alliance in this primary to support Cassie Julia. Julia, who has benefited from over $6,000 in independent expenditures from Planned Parenthood (which is a lot of money in Maine’s tiny districts), is a pro-public schools activist who sits on the Waterville Planning Board—but the main thing she wants you to know is that she’s pro-choice, unlike her opponent.
HD-109 (Gorham)
Eleanor Sato vs. Seven Siegel
Result (~95% in): Sato 55.3%, Siegel 44.7% | Sato wins
Gorham councilor Seven Siegel has an eclectic mix of priorities, from farm preservation (in a Portland suburb?) to public housing (cool!) They’re endorsed by the Sierra Club and would join the nation’s small but growing number of nonbinary state legislators. Dancer and bartender Ellie Sato, who has also worked as an aide to various Maine Democrats, agrees with Siegel about the need to fund education far more than Maine currently does; she also shares Siegel’s skepticism of the Gorham Connector, a planned highway project that would cut through miles of farmland and open space. Both candidates also agree on increasing Maine’s homestead property tax exemption. In short, the stakes here are low; Sato and Siegel are both pretty close to your average liberal Democrat.
HD-118 (Bayside Portland)
Herbert Adams vs. Benjamin Chipman vs. Yusuf Yusuf
Result (~95% in): Yusuf 63.8%, Adams 36.2% | Yusuf wins
Because of term limits, state Sen. Ben Chipman was running for a demotion while state House Speaker Rachel Talbot Ross is running for Chipman’s open senate seat. We say was because Chipman withdrew from this race with a day to go, which turns this from a ranked-choice contest into a head-to-head race between former state Rep. Herb Adams and former Portland school board member Yusuf Yusuf. In terms of both fundraising and endorsements, Yusuf is a clear favorite over Adams, who has been out of the spotlight for a few years now.
HD-123 (Cape Elizabeth)
Michelle Boyer vs. Cynthia Dill vs. Kimberly Monaghan
Result: Boyer 61.7%, Monaghan 28.7%, Dill 9.6% | Boyer wins
Cynthia Dill is a former state senator who was the Democrats’ sacrificial lamb against centrist independent Angus King (who caucuses with Senate Democrats but is more moderate than most of them) in 2012. We wish she had faded into obscurity; unfortunately, she instead reinvented herself as an ultra-NIMBY and anti-affordable housing crusader in Cape Elizabeth, one of Maine’s wealthiest towns. Seriously, just read this shit she wrote about an affordable housing project slated to go up near a building she owns, it’s unhinged. She’s also worried about public schools “failing to teach fundamental American principles and ideals” and “cancel culture.” Miss us with that “public schools have gone woke” shit, the GOP is right over there. Former state Rep. Kim Monaghan and Cape Elizabeth Conservation Committee member Michelle Boyer are normal Democrats; Boyer focuses on gun control and education funding, and has the support of outgoing state Rep. Rebecca Willett, while Monaghan focuses more on climate change and affordable housing, supporting the affordable housing project that Dill rage-blogged about. Either would be a much better addition to the Maine House than Dill, and hopefully RCV allows one of them to beat her.
Nevada
SD-01 (North Las Vegas)
Michelee “Shelly” Crawford vs. Clara “Claire” Thomas
Result (~95% in): Crawford 54.4%, Thomas 45.6% | Crawford wins
Nevada System of Higher Education Regent Shelly Crawford is the choice of Nevada Senate Democrats, rather than Assemb. Clara “Claire” Thomas. Thomas thinks it’s because she opposed a suite of 2023 bills weakening restorative justice reforms that the state had passed in 2019 under Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak; in fact, she says that Senate Democrats told her so in their endorsement meeting. Coincidentally, Thomas also broke with the caucus on another flashpoint piece of legislation repealing COVID-era room-cleaning provisions which we’ll discuss later. Thomas says the state was wrong to roll back the restorative justice reforms, which sought to reform school discipline so that Black and Latino students would have fewer unnecessary interactions with the police and the criminal legal system. Thomas is backed by the powerful Culinary Union, which represents casino and hotel workers throughout the state, and SEIU, but most unions, including those representing teachers and police officers, are backing Crawford, who also has a substantial financial advantage. (So is the Vegas Chamber of Commerce, which…sigh.)
SD-03 (central Las Vegas)
Rochelle Nguyen (i) vs. Geoconda “Geo” Hughes
Result (~95% in): Nguyen 55.0%, Hughes 45.0% | Nguyen wins
For decades, Nevada Democrats were powered by Culinary Workers Union Local 226, often shortened to the Culinary Union or just “Culinary.” The incredibly well-organized union represents casino workers across Las Vegas and Reno and boasts an unrivaled turnout operation that is frequently decisive in Democratic primaries and general elections. Their relationship with Democrats in the legislature is on the rocks, though—and while that was present in the previous race, this is a better place to introduce this fight properly.
In the summer of 2020, the Nevada legislature held a special session to respond to the COVID pandemic. Among the pieces of legislation passed to respond to the pandemic was SB4, which mandated meticulous daily cleanings of hotel rooms. Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak signed the bill into law, and it created a lot of work for Culinary’s membership, affecting many workers’ part-/full-time status. The policy also undoubtedly kept Nevada hotels much cleaner and made cleaning staff’s work much easier.
In 2023, with newly-elected Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo settling into office, state lawmakers took a more critical look at SB4. With Republicans taking the view that it was an onerous mandate on businesses, and many Democrats viewing it as a pandemic-era policy whose time had passed, a bill repealing SB4’s daily room-cleaning mandate, SB441, sailed through the legislature, with just a handful of Democrats voting against it. This came despite Culinary fighting hard against the repeal, and it left the powerhouse union feeling betrayed by the party it had loyally supported for decades. The bill was sponsored by state Sen. Marilyn Dondero Loop, who isn’t up until 2026. Another Democrat took what seemed like a leading role in its passage: Rochelle Nguyen, a state senator who had been appointed in 2022 to fill the vacancy left by the resignation of fellow Democrat Chris Brooks, who took a private-sector job. (The Nevada legislature does not pay well.) Nguyen had previously been an assemblywoman—but that, too, was a job she had originally been appointed to in order to fill a vacancy left behind by Chris Brooks upon his 2018 elevation to the state Senate. Nguyen survived a primary for her Assembly seat in 2020, but it wasn’t a particularly strong challenge. This time around, she has to take on the full force of the Culinary Union, because they want revenge for SB441. Culinary’s candidate is Geoconda “Geo” Hughes, a nurse practitioner whose mother Geoconda Argüello-Kline led Culinary for a decade. Financially, Nguyen has an edge of nearly 20 to 1, but Hughes has Culinary—and Culinary isn’t alone. A few Teamsters locals, UFCW, and the Nevada State Education Association are backing Culinary up and supporting Hughes. Not all of labor is behind Culinary’s SB441 revenge plot, though; the Clark County Education Association is going against Culinary in almost every primary, and SEIU is sticking with Nguyen as well. Culinary is quite serious about SB441; they dramatically unendorsed every Democratic yes vote in May, and this is only one of seven primaries where Culinary is going up against the endorsed candidate of the official campaign arm of either the House or Senate Democrats.
SD-04 (central Las Vegas and North Las Vegas)
Dina Neal (i) vs. Laura Perkins
Result (~95% in): Neal 72.7%, Perkins 27.3% | Neal wins
This primary is entirely separate from the Culinary-SB441 fight. Dina Neal is serving under an ethical cloud, as the FBI investigates allegations that she pressured the director of NV Grow, a state program that provided grants and loan assistance to Nevada businesses, to steer grant money to a company connected to a longtime friend of Neal’s. Her campaign finance reports show a strange pattern of money going missing, as conservative columnist Victor Joecks originally noticed; we looked at the campaign finance reports, and he’s right that the numbers don’t add up from period to period unless she’s making unreported expenses. Joecks appears to have missed that his own paper, the Las Vegas Review-Journal, heard about a year ago that North Las Vegas city officials had met with an undisclosed law enforcement agency about Neal potentially misusing campaign funds for personal purposes. Nothing has been proven, and as such labor is either sticking with Neal or staying neutral, but her relationship with North Las Vegas city officials has—related or not—taken a marked turn for the worse, and many of them are backing Nevada System of Higher Education Regent Laura Perkins, including Mayor Pamela Goynes-Brown, who defeated Perkins and five other candidates to become mayor of North Las Vegas in 2022. City councilman Isaac Barron registered a PAC (donors undisclosed) that’s funding harsh negative attack mailers against Neal, making hay of the FBI investigation. Will it be enough to sink Neal, the daughter of longtime state Sen. Joe Neal? We’ll find out tonight.
SD-15 (Reno)
Naomi Duerr vs. Johnny Kerns vs. Angie Taylor
Result (~95% in): Taylor 63.8%, Duerr 33.7%, Kerns 2.5% | Taylor wins
Assemb. Angie Taylor was one of the Democrats who crossed Culinary on SB441, and Culinary is backing Reno city councilor Naomi Duerr instead. The two broadly agree on policy, from a state constitutional amendment to protect abortion rights to capping rent increases for seniors on fixed incomes to opposing school vouchers. Duerr, the former state water planner, brings more of a climate focus, while Taylor emphasizes her legislative experience. Duerr is not without labor support beyond Culinary, either; in particular, she has the support of unions representing firefighters in Reno and statewide. However, she is at a 2.5-to-1 financial disadvantage, and the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm is backing Taylor. Duerr is not out of this race by any means, but it tilts in Taylor’s favor.
(Also of note: this is technically a Republican-held seat, but Nevada Democrats passed new maps after the 2020 census that transformed it into a district Joe Biden won by 15 percentage points.)
AD-06 (West Las Vegas)
Jovan Jackson vs. Derek Rimson
Result (~95% in): Jackson 84.2%, Rimson 15.8% | Jackson wins
Jovan Jackson, president of the Mass Liberation Project, was an unsuccessful, progressive-backed candidate for the Las Vegas City Council in 2022. This time around, Jackson is the candidate backed by the Culinary Union, but has retained his progressive supporters as well, including Valerie Thomason (see AD-10). A formerly incarcerated man, Jackson’s right to vote and run for office was restored in 2019 when the legislature ended felon disenfranchisement. He would be the first member of the legislature to have been disenfranchised in that manner and would bring a new perspective to the Assembly. His opponent is fourth-generation Pentecostal Bishop Derek Rimson, who is backed by most of the rest of organized labor, including the AFL-CIO and SEIU. Though Rimson is probably the more moderate one judging by his backers, he’s by no means guaranteed to toe the party line—he attended a presidential campaign fundraiser for Cornel West in March of this year, and all but endorsed his campaign.
AD-07 (North Las Vegas)
James Fennell III vs. Tanya Flanagan
Result (~95% in): Flanagan 80.3%, Fennell 19.7% | Flanagan
James Fennell III is a Teamster who likes rent control. However, he reports a balance of zero dollars, and even his own union local is backing former newspaper reporter and local philanthropist Tanya Flanagan, who has held roles with the Las Vegas Urban League and the Las Vegas chapters of the National Association of Black Journalists, the Susan G. Komen Foundation, and the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority. Flanagan should win, and win by a lot.
AD-09 (southwest Las Vegas suburbs)
Steve Yeager (i) vs. Adeline Celio
Result (~95% in): Yeager 83.4%, Celio 16.6% | Yeager wins
Culinary may have emphatically unendorsed incumbent Steve Yeager over his vote for SB4, but Adeline Celio isn’t their doing. Celio is a bodybuilder who filed to run for the assembly all on his own, and then promptly disappeared from public life, as far as we can tell, not even updating his social media accounts.
AD-10 (central Las Vegas)
Kyle Greenwood vs. Venise Karris vs. Valerie Thomason
Result (~95% in): Karris 47.3%, Thomason 33.8%, Greenwood 18.9% | Karris wins
Almost the full weight of the Nevada Democratic establishment is uniting to elect IBEW union steward Venise Karris: from the Democratic Caucus, to most unions, to the Chamber of Commerce. The only missing figure is Culinary, who are staying out of this one for reasons that are hard to parse—our best guess is that Karris simply might be too moderate and close with Democratic leadership, and they don’t trust her. It’s a fantastic opening for one of the most exciting and left-wing candidates in Nevada: Teamster and former Bernie Sanders organizer Valerie Thomason. Thomason is a DSA member, endorsed by Las Vegas DSA, and her campaign is strongly hitting democratic socialist points, from single payer healthcare, to a $23 minimum wage, to housing for all. She does have some union support as well: Southern Nevada’s SEIU local dual-endorsed in this race, and the Nevada State Education Association is backing Thomason. Nevadans for Economic Opportunity, a Trump-supporting business group run by Karris’s son-in-law, is running an attack mailer comparing Thomason to Donald Trump because she put money from a PAC she used to run into her campaign. Thomason might be the underdog, but business interests are clearly scared of her.
Kyle Greenwood “does not appear to be actively running a campaign”, according to the Nevada Current.
AD-11 (East Las Vegas)
Thomas Lambert vs. Cinthia Moore
Result (~95% in): Moore 77.9%, Lambert 22.1% | Moore wins
Despite the fight between Culinary and state Democrats, the two camps do agree in some races, mostly ones that are barely contested. Here, they agree that environmentalist community organizer Cinthia Moore should be the next member of the Assembly from District 11, not union organizer and MBA Thomas Lambert, who has self-funded his campaign’s entire budget of $264.80.
AD-16 (south Las Vegas suburbs)
Cecelia González (i) vs. Eva Chase
Result (~95% in): González 72.2%, Chase 27.8% | González wins
Assemb. Cecelia González, a second-term incumbent with a strong partisan voting record, is being challenged by Eva Chase, a trans USMC veteran who bills herself as more “independent”. Chase’s poorly funded campaign and odd online presence suggest she won’t do much better than her first foray into politics, 2022’s LG primary, where she finished last with 4% of the vote.
AD-17 (North Las Vegas)
Linda Hunt vs. Mishon Montgomery vs. Chauntille Roberts
Result (~95% in): Hunt 64.9%, Montgomery 27.1%, Roberts 8.1% | Hunt wins
SD-03 is one of Culinary’s priority races; the other is this one, where Culinary member and leader Linda Hunt is seeking an open Assembly seat. Labor is split but leans towards Hunt; the Clark County Education Association (whose director has a dim view of Culinary, calling them “a political force that’s in decline”) and police unions are behind Nevada Assembly Democrats’ pick, Air Force veteran and motivational speaker Mishon Montgomery, but the Nevada AFL-CIO and most unions are backing Hunt, a longtime casino food server. (Peculiarly, the Nevada State Education Association is backing nonprofit worker Chauntille Roberts, who badly lags her competition financially.) Unlike SD-03, this race hasn’t turned ugly; it looks like Culinary and other unions are simply excited to elect one of their own members and leaders to the legislature.
AD-27 (Reno)
Heather Goulding vs. Alex Velto
Result (~95% in): Goulding 57.1%, Velto 42.9% | Goulding wins
This is the final legislative race where Culinary and Nevada Democrats have chosen opposing sides in a primary. Labor lawyer Alex Velto is Assembly Democrats’ preferred pick to join their caucus, and most of labor is backing him, as are progressive groups like Make the Road Action Nevada and Run for Something. However, he’s also backed by the Vegas and Henderson Chambers of Commerce and several police unions, and his campaign bank account has money in it from multiple fossil fuel companies and developers, which makes his vague issues page more concerning than that of his Culinary-backed opponent, Reno community activist Heather Goulding. Goulding also has the Sierra Club in her corner (we bet they don’t like the fossil fuel money) as well as Planned Parenthood Votes Nevada and a handful of Nevada Democratic politicians, including 2018 gubernatorial candidate Chris Giunchigliani (whose PAC donated to Goulding) and former Lt. Gov. Kate Marshall. Both candidates, when they do take specific positions, agree; for example, both support the proposed referendum to incorporate abortion rights into the Nevada Constitution. However, Velto is stuck answering for his past work for law firm Hutchison and Steffen, whose Northern Nevada managing partner represented several anti-abortion groups in litigation; Velto published an op-ed stating he quit because of his boss’s anti-abortion work, but his critics aren’t buying it, responding to the op-ed by noting that Hutchison and Steffen is a conservative law firm that has pursued politically charged cases against Democrats for years. After reading up on Hutchison and Steffen ourselves, we don’t buy it either. The Hutchison in Hutchison and Steffen stands for former GOP Lt. Gov. Mark Hutchison, and the boss who Velto supposedly quit over, Jason Guinasso, was a Republican candidate for a Reno Assembly seat back in 2016. It’s not hard to figure out Hutchison and Steffen is a Republican law firm, and that didn’t stop Velto from working there until he was eyeing a run for office.
AD-42 (Spring Valley)
Tracy Brown-May (i) vs. Sayed Zaidi
Result (~95% in): Brown-May 87.6%, Zaidi 12.4% | Brown-May wins
Assemb. Tracy Brown-May is safe against perennial candidate Sayed Zaidi, who she defeated 81%-19% in 2022.
Las Vegas Mayor
Kola Akingbade vs. Tera Anderson vs. Lynn Baird vs. Shelley Berkley vs. Dan Chapman vs. Cedric Crear vs. Irina Hansen vs. Kara Jenkins vs. Eric Medlin vs. Donna Miller vs. Michael Pacino vs. Deb Peck vs. Victoria Seaman vs. William Walls
Result (~95% in): Berkley 35.3%, Seaman 29.5%, Crear 18.7%, others 17.5% | Berkley and Seaman advance to runoff
Don’t mind the imposing wall of names. Las Vegas’s next mayor is probably going to be either moderate former Congressmember Shelley Berkley, running as the de facto Democrat, or conservative Councilmember Victoria Seaman, running as the de facto Republican. If anyone else has a chance of making the runoff, it’s Councilmember Cedric Crear, running as an anti-development candidate, which is rich coming a former casino marketing executive when casinos are one of the biggest drivers of development in the city. Crear is also anti-homeless and voted for the city’s camping ban, meaning he’s, at best, not any better than Berkley. In fact, given that he’s running on his efforts to stop apartments from being built on what used to be a private golf course, he’s probably more dangerous in a mayoral contest specifically.
Las Vegas City Council Ward 1 (central Las Vegas)
Brian Knudsen (i) vs. Dennis Chairez vs. Miriam Gibson
Result (~95% in): Knudsen 61.6%, Gibson 24.1%, Chairez 14.3% | Knudsen wins
Councilman Brian Knudsen is likely to coast in the face of token challenges from political consultant Miriam Gibson, who has spent less than $100, and anti-development advocate Dennis Chairez, who has reported spending nothing. As far as outside groups go, they’re divided between ignoring this race and perfunctorily endorsing Knudsen.
Las Vegas City Council Ward 3 (western Las Vegas)
Olivia Diaz (i) vs. Melissa Clary vs. David Gomez
Result (~95% in): Diaz 56.7%, Clary 33.7%, Gomez 9.6% | Diaz wins
David Gomez, a former Republican candidate for state Assembly, is likely to be eliminated. That’s probably bad for Olivia Diaz, who narrowly beat Melissa Clary for this open seat in 2019; Clary is endorsed by just about every police union in the state, and candidates like that are usually easier to beat when they openly affiliate with the GOP. Clary scans as a conservative in general; while she has no issues page this time around, in 2019 she said “there are some places in [Ward 3] that look like a third-world country,” and she’s a neighborhood preservationist. (In Las Vegas? What in Las Vegas is sacred, exactly?) Clary is far from broke, too, though she’s definitely at a financial disadvantage given the absurd four hundred thousand dollars parked in Diaz’s campaign account.
Las Vegas City Council Ward 5 (central Las Vegas)
Sheila Collins vs. Katie Duncan vs. Josanna Espejo vs. Barbara Jones Zangaro vs. Cameron Miller vs. Mariana Catherine Santiago vs. Erika Smith vs. Shondra Summers-Armstrong
Result (~95% in): Summers-Armstrong 31.0%, Miller 19.0%, Collins 14.1%, Duncan 11.0%, Espejo 10.3%, Santiago 5.9%, Smith 5.1%, Jones Zangaro 3.5% | Summers-Armstrong and Miller advance
Culinary, organized labor, and several veterans groups support Shondra Summers-Armstrong for this district, which is probably good enough to get her into the runoff. That’s frustrating, as she’s an annoying centrist type who wants to find “common-group solutions” with “both large & small businesses”. Several candidates are running to her right, including GOP-endorsed Josanna Espejo, former Republican Assembly candidate Erika Smith, and Katie Duncan, who somehow has managed to find 15 separate cop unions to endorse her. The only viable candidate not running to Summers-Armstrong’s right is Assemblymember Cameron Miller, who ran Amy Klobuchar’s presidential campaign in Nevada, which does not inspire confidence.
South Carolina
SD-07 (Greenville)
Karl Allen (i) vs. Michelle Goodwin-Calwile
Result: Allen 68.0%, Goodwin-Calwile 32.0% | Allen wins
Karl Allen has spent over a decade each in the state house and senate, and has, despite the occasional ethical hiccup, has been a solid liberal Democratic vote, and more of a workhorse than a showhorse. He’s being challenged by teacher and Greenville County School Board member Michelle Goodwin-Calwile, who promises to be more “approachable and accountable” but hasn’t articulated any more concrete differences between the two of them.
SD-19 (north Columbia metro)
Tameika Isaac Devine (i) vs. Michael Addison
Result: Devine 91.9%, Addison 8.1% | Devine wins
While Tameika Devine has only been in office a few months following a special election, she managed to avoid a real primary, being challenged only by repeat candidate Michael Addison, a man of eclectic fashion and political positions, which include anti-immigrant screeds.
SD-22 (northwest Columbia metro)
Monica Elkins vs. Ivory Thigpen vs. Overture Walker
Result: Thigpen 42.9%, Walker 40.3%, Elkins 16.8% | Thigpen and Walker advance to runoff
A rare open seat in the senate has resulted in a star-studded affair—school board member Monica Elkins, state Rep. Ivory Thigpen, and Richland County Board chair Overture Walker are all in the mix. Walker has been asleep at the wheel as oversight of the county jail got so bad the state had to step in. We shudder to think what the conditions of a jail could be that the state of South Carolina would find unacceptable, but they did. Elkins has the opposite problem of perhaps being too invested in her office, as seen in a memorable 2019 school board meeting where she, after adjourning, threatened to kill the husband of another member and told the sister of state Sen. Mia McLeod “‘Bitch, I asked you to get the fuck out of my face before I beat your ass”. Thigpen, the least exciting choice, is probably the best here.
SD-32 (rural Lowcountry)
Ronnie Sabb (i) vs. Prinscillia Sumpter
Result: Sabb 76.1%, Sumpter 23.9% | Sabb wins
Ronnie Sabb is one of the few remaining Democratic officials in South Carolina with a truly mixed voting record on abortion, and he’s being challenged by a Democrat who specifically wants to support reproductive rights. And yet, when offered the opportunity to differentiate herself on the issue, nursing home administrator Prinscillia Sumpter said she supports Sabb’s 20-week position. Yeah, it’s another fight over whether a member of the minority in a legislature is an effective legislator, something that’s basically impossible to measure.
SD-36 (rural Columbia area)
Kevin Johnson (i) vs. Eleazer Carter
Result: Johnson 77.4%, Carter 22.6% | Johnson wins
In 2020, state Senator Kevin Johnson defeated Eleazer Carter by a margin of 76% to 24%. Carter is an attorney who keeps getting reprimanded by the state supreme court for a wide range of issues that seem less like corruption than massive, massive incompetence. He’s running again, and only barely made the ballot after a state court reversed the state party’s attempt to take him off the ballot over residency issues. While voters will have the opportunity to vote for a terrible lawyer who may or may not live in the district, we don’t think many will take them up on it.
SD-40 (Orangeburg and rural central SC)
Brad Hutto (i) vs. Kendrick Brown
Result: Hutto 71.5%, Brown 28.5% | Hutto wins
Brad Hutto is the minority leader of the state senate, making him probably the second most powerful Democrat in the state, behind Jim Clyburn. Hutto has resisted the tendency among many Southern Democrats of his era (he was first elected in 1996) to move to the right in an attempt to win over an increasingly Republican state. Which is why we really wish he kept up those values in his personal life as a lawyer. Famously, he defended a privileged teen against charges of rape by saying the victim “didn’t say no”. Even though teacher Kendrick Brown is an underfunded challenger running mostly on being young, we wouldn’t be upset if he won.
SD-42 (Charleston)
Deon Tedder (i) vs. Kim Greene
Result: Tedder 83.3%, Greene 16.7% | Tedder wins
Last year, moderate state Rep. Deon Tedder won the special election for this seat over Bernie Sanders-endorsed labor champion Wendell Gilliard by just 11 votes. Gilliard is opting to run for reelection as a state representative instead of trying again, which was the prudent decision at the time he made it, but turned out to be the wrong one, now that the public has found out that Tedder has been under investigation for two years for “forcible rape”. Luckily, Tedder isn’t the only option on the ballot. Human resource manager Kim Greene is running vaguely as a progressive, and even though she hasn’t raised much money, does have support from at least one labor union, International Longshoremen's Association Local 1422.
HD-15 (Charleston suburbs)
JA Moore (i) vs. Damian Daly
Result: Moore 86.9%, Daly 13.1% | Moore wins
JA Moore is a rare Democrat that actually flipped a legislative seat, a feat he pulled off in 2018. Even though he’s good at raising money, he still flopped hard running for state senate in a 2023 special election, taking only 15%. Our theory as to why is just that he’s kind of boring. That’s one thing you can’t accuse Damian Daly, the Connecticut ex-cop running as a progressive, of being. He has a garish, hard-to-read website where he idly asks “Why is [Dylann Roof] still alive by the way?”, and demonstrates pride for his adopted state by declaring “We're not Alabama or Mississippi. We live on the coast we should be an enlightened state”.
HD-25 (Greenville area)
Wendell Jones (i) vs. Bruce Wilson
Result: Jones 74.6%, Wilson 25.4% | Jones wins
Bruce Wilson is a community activist who has been commendably involved with racial justice issues and is one of the few candidates taking renters’ rights seriously in the state, but several year ago, Wilson, then 50, was also accused by his then-27-year-old wife of false imprisonment and assault in what sounds like a harrowing experience for her. While we don’t know precisely what happened after that, he did plead guilty to cruelty to children soon after, and the next year The Greenville News mentioned that he had been convicted of false imprisonment at some point. We’re hoping that Wendell Jones wins a second term.
HD-54 (rural Pee Dee region)
Jason Luck vs. Betty Quick
Result: Luck 53.1%, Quick 46.9% | Luck wins
Jason Luck is a lawyer running on two things: being endorsed by the previous representatives in this seat, and being a lawyer. In explaining why it would be so valuable to have a lawyer in this seat, he says “You can’t speak truth to power if you don’t speak the same language”, whatever that’s supposed to mean. He sounds very annoying, on top of which he’s a white guy running for a district where a majority of the population, and a large majority of the Democratic voters, are Black. Betty Jo Quick is a nonprofit director and a chaplain, and is Black. That’s, unfortunately, all the information we have on her, because this part of the state is a bit of a news desert.
HD-70 (western Columbia area)
Eve Carlin vs. Mama G. Miller vs. Robert Reese
Result: Reese 50.5%, Miller 28.3%, Carlin 21.3% | Reese wins
Though, as is the case with many Democrats in red states, the candidates in the race aren’t thinking much beyond opposing GOP policies and supporting a few general Democratic principles, grant writer Robert Reese stands out for a focus on environmental issues that are less common. Eve Carlin is focusing more on her political experience…in New York politics circa the 90s. Finally, Mama G. Miller is really excited to tell you about her decades of work in self defense, but it’s not clear how that translates to governing.
HD-72 (downtown Columbia)
Seth Rose (i) vs. Tate Few
Result: Rose 91.3%, Few 8.7% | Rose wins
Tate Few is cool. He’s running on a detailed and thought-out, though not especially progressive, platform, and would be one of only a few LGBTQ+ members of government anywhere in the state. Unfortunately, even though he’s raising good money, he only moved to the district last year for law school. Campaigning during law school and running as a recent transplant are both difficult enough—doing both seems like a campaign death sentence. Still, this is a progressive, transplant-heavy part of the city, and we wish him the best against prosecutor-turned-unremarkable-politician Seth Rose.
HD-73 (north Columbia)
Christopher Hart (i) vs. Touami Pride
Result: Hart 85.0%, Pride 15.0% | Hart wins
Touami Pride, who “intends to” become a lawyer one day, ran for this seat last cycle and got crushed by incumbent Christopher Hart 82%-18%. We’re not even sure he’s campaigning this cycle as hard as he did then.
HD-79 (east Columbia area)
Jonnieka Farr vs. Hamilton Grant
Result: Grant 63.1%, Farr 36.9% | Grant wins
Hamilton Grant is an MBA who currently works as a business coach and is deeply involved with the local Chamber of Commerce. The red flags thrown up by that biography are also present in the way he talks about issues, from wanting schools to focus on skill sets that will be helpful to local businesses, to proposing tax breaks for homebuyers, to launching his campaign with the goal of ensuring government projects don’t “disrupt our small businesses”. He even has taken to calling campaign contributions “investments” people can make to “partner” with the campaign. Naturally, he’s better financed than his opponent, and has the support of local businessmen and local political players, including centrist pundit Bakari Sellers, fresh off his efforts to defeat Rashida Tlaib.
The combination of those factors suggests the better choice is Jonnieka Farr, who may not have the money Grant does, but was previously the Chair of the Richland Democratic Women's Council, and nearly won a seat on the Richland County Council in 2020. Farr talks about similar goals as Grant, but without the noxious business mindset infesting everything.
HD-82 (rural Augusta area)
William Clyburn Sr. (i) vs. Brian Doyle
Result: Clyburn 89.8%, Doyle 10.2% | Clyburn wins
Yes, William “Bill” Clyburn Sr. is related to Jim Clyburn—they’re cousins. Bill has this job guaranteed as long as Jim is alive, and the caliber of opponent he’s getting is a symptom of that—Brian Doyle is a convicted Medicare fraudster who previously tried to sue the state party for RICO.
HD-93 (rural Midlands)
Johnny Felder vs. Phillip Ford vs. Jerry Govan Jr. vs. Chris Roland
Result: Govan 45.9%, Felder 32.1%, Ford 11.2%, Roland 10.7% | Govan and Felder advance to runoff
State Rep. Jerry Govan Jr. represented Orangeburg in the state house for 30 years before redistricting drew him out of his district and into the neighboring one. Govan decided against challenging incumbent Jerry Ott last cycle, but with Ott retiring this year, Govan is attempting to make a return to the chamber. Govan was a rare endorser of Tom Steyer in the 2020 presidential primary, which many thought was related to the $43,000 Steyer paid Govan. Govan and his allies were really, really indignant at the suggestion, but what other conclusion is anyone supposed to reach?
Unfortunately, another leading candidate doesn’t inspire any more confidence. Johnny Felder is a lawyer who wants to “bring common sense” to the state house. While that’s merely eye-rolling, he’s also heavily emphasizing that part of the reason he’s qualified for the seat is that his dad held it for 24 years. His father, John G. Felder, was originally elected as a Democrat in the 70s, but switched parties in the 90s, and spent a term in the house as a Republican before being defeated a Democrat. He ran for office a few more times as a Republican, and, according to Vicki Ringer, the Director of Public Affairs for Planned Parenthood South Atlantic SC, Johnny has voted in more Republican primaries than Democratic ones.
Planned Parenthood wound up endorsing the only unequivocally good candidate in the race: Phillip J. Ford, a lobbyist for the ACLU and several other nonprofits. Ford is openly gay, and would be one of the few gay members of South Carolina government. Chris Roland, an engineer, is the only candidate without a strong chance of making the likely runoff.
HD-111 (Charleston)
Wendell Gilliard (i) vs. Regina Duggins vs. Dwayne Green
Result: Gilliard 77.4%, Green 17.1%, Duggins 5.5% | Gilliard wins
To quote ourselves from when Wendell Gilliard ran for a state senate special election:
Gilliard, who is 69, has been politically active longer than either of his opponents has been alive; he became active in the United Steelworkers as a chemical plant worker in the 1980s, eventually becoming the president of his local. He won his first public office, a seat on the Charleston City Council, in 1998; ten years later, he moved up to the state House. He’s made a name for himself as a lonely defender of labor in the most union-hostile of the 50 states, and in recent years has also gained notice as a prominent South Carolina supporter and friend of Bernie Sanders, who appeared at a rally with Gilliard in support of a $17 minimum wage in June.
His opponents have a high bar to clear if they want to convince voters of the need to replace Gillard, but Regina Duggins, an out and proud lesbian who co-founded Charleston Black Pride, might honestly be up to the standard Gillard has set. Unfortunately, she’s not the bigger threat to Gilliard. That threat is, instead, attorney Dwayne Green, an ally of Deon Tedder, the moderate state rep who defeated Gilliard by just 11 votes in that special election. It’s not hard to imagine Tedder is involved in this challenge to some degree, but Green very well could have made this decision himself—he already ran for office once before, in 2016, when he outraised an incumbent state senator 2:1 and still lost the primary to him 75%-25%. Now, like then, Green’s problem is that he has no compelling reason to run. Even if Gilliard should be the favorite, Green is a monied attorney and thus can’t be entirely discounted as a threat to one of the most progressive members of the legislature.