Ken Martin has been almost everywhere since he became the chair of the Democratic National Committee, attempting to put out fires for a party in the wilderness as he has hopscotched some 33 states over the last eight months.
Just this week, Martin quietly shuttled from Indianapolis, where Indiana Republicans are weighing mid-cycle redistricting at the demand of President Donald Trump, to Washington for the Supreme Court’s oral arguments of Louisiana v. Callais — which could weaken the Voting Rights Act and further set Democrats back — to Pittsburgh, where he campaigned for the Pennsylvania Supreme Court retention races.
“Most people think I’ve got the shittiest job in America, but I feel like I’ve got the best job in America,” Martin said.
But he also didn’t mince words about the challenges and drama that it has brought to his life.
“There’s not a day that I don’t go home wanting to pull my hair out, because it’s a tough job,” Martin said.
With Election Day looming next month, New Jersey’s gubernatorial matchup is making Martin nervous these days — and where he’s headed this weekend.
In a wide-ranging interview while he was in Pittsburgh, Martin spoke with POLITICO to preview the party’s prospects in New Jersey and Virginia, where Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger are trying to secure the governor’s mansions, and discuss Democrats’ efforts to defend House seats from Republican-led gerrymandering attempts.
“New Jersey is the best place, probably, for Donald Trump to actually stop the Democratic momentum — or at least minimize the Democratic momentum that we’ve seen throughout this year,” Martin said, pointing to what he cites as his party’s overperformance in nearly four dozen special elections since Trump’s inauguration. “We’ve overperformed on that to the tune of, on average, about 16 percentage points, which is a historic overperformance. And so, you know, they’re looking to blunt our momentum somewhere.”
Despite touting his party’s performance under Trump’s second presidency, Martin declined to handicap whether Sherrill needed to match or beat former Vice President Kamala Harris’ 6-point margin in the New Jersey last November.
“I don’t care if we overperform or underperform,” Martin said. “What I care about is making sure we win. At the end of the day, we know that the Republicans are feeling very bullish about their chances in New Jersey for a whole host of reasons, right? Jack Ciattarelli lost to Phil Murphy by 3 points four years ago. In the Harris race last year, they significantly shrunk the presidential margin there. And New Jersey has a history of electing Republican governors, combined with the fact that they haven’t ever elected a Democrat to a third term, right, at least in the last 50 years.”
Indeed, Republicans are feeling bullish here due to Trump’s inroads in the state last year — particularly in areas with large Black and Hispanic populations — and the increase in registered Republicans since Ciattarelli’s 2021 bid for governor, when he lost by an unexpectedly small margin. Should Sherrill win — which some Democrats acknowledge will be challenging — the party will be reading the tea leaves to see how she performed in these areas where Democrats lost ground last year.
Martin, though, said that if the election were held today, “certainly, I feel like both Mikie and Abigail would win handedly, but we’ve got three weeks left.”
Martin is also pushing for Democrats in some blue states to mount their own redistricting efforts to counter Republicans’ aggressive push to redraw maps in red states across the country, led by Trump and Vice President JD Vance. But he acknowledged that his party’s hands are tied in more ways than others.
“Every Democrat that I’ve talked to, including our governors, they all understand how imperative it is that we stand up to this, again, unconstitutional power grab by the Republicans,” Martin said. He insisted that Democrats “believe in good government” and are committed to “fair and free elections.”
“We believe in putting, you know, safeguards in place to prevent exactly what we’re seeing around the country, and as a result, in many states, including in states like Illinois and other states that are controlled by Democrats, it’s much harder for them to actually do what the Republicans are doing in those Republican-controlled states,” Martin said. “So I don’t begrudge anyone for not being able to do it.”
In addition to the gubernatorial matchups in Virginia and New Jersey, the other major race that has garnered national attention is for attorney general in Virginia, where Democratic candidate Jay Jones has landed in hot water after his use of violent rhetoric in a text message was revealed. The incident has animated the gubernatorial race and become a cudgel wielded by the White House.
Martin granted that Jones made “reckless and unacceptable” comments and pointed out that he has apologized. But he didn’t go out of his way to defend Jones.
“Virginia voters are the ones that will have to make this decision, and each race is their own,” Martin said. “Virginians will make a final decision on who they want to be their next attorney general.” Still, Martin said he believes Jones will win.
Like this content? Consider signing up for POLITICO’s Playbook newsletter.
