Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* With three weeks remaining before Election Day in Virginia, an analysis published by NOTUS found that a majority of the ads from Republican gubernatorial nominee Winsome Earle-Sears and her conservative allies have focused on attacking transgender people.
* In Maine’s U.S. Senate race, two-term Gov. Janet Mills is reportedly poised to launch a Democratic campaign, hoping to take on Republican Sen. Susan Collins next year. The incumbent governor and former state attorney general is likely to face primary rivals.
* As the government shutdown continues, the Democratic National Committee is launching a new ad campaign, which will include billboards and bus shelter ads near hospitals and clinics in a handful of Republican-held battleground House districts, focused on Affordable Care Act subsidies.
* In California, where voters are poised to consider a ballot measure that would allow the state to redraw congressional district boundaries, billionaire Tom Steyer said last week that he’s going to invest $12 million in support of the initiative. If successful, Proposition 50 would likely result in a map that would give Democrats five additional U.S. House seats.
* In related news, California Republicans are reportedly scaling back their Proposition 50 advertising, increasingly convinced that the ballot measure will pass, and reluctant to waste limited resources.
* Though there was some speculation about Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs’ electoral plans, the incumbent Democrat announced last week that she will, in fact, seek a second term next year.
* In a bit of a surprise, David Pruhs, the Republican mayor of Fairbanks, Alaska, lost his re-election bid last week, losing to Democrat Mindy O’Neall.
* And Dominion Voting Systems made headlines last week for an unexpected reason: The election machine manufacturer, which was targeted with Republican conspiracy theories after Donald Trump’s 2020 defeat, was purchased by a company called Liberty Vote, a new group run by a former local election director. Liberty Vote’s founder, Scott Leiendecker, is a former Republican election official from Missouri.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
