It's almost all over but the shouting, and tonight may provide plenty. Three states go to the polls for regular primaries as well as one special election in Florida that almost certainly won't be. After this, the primary calendar only has four states left, all in the Northeast and all in September. A week from today, we'll watch runoff election results in Georgia, Oklahoma, and South Carolina.
But for tonight, the big fights are in Florida. Our Decision Desk HQ partners will provide live results from all three states on tap tonight, although good luck in getting any final calls from Alaska's jungle primary and ranked-choice voting fiasco until, oh, Labor Day. The real popcorn-passing opportunity for our readers will come from the Democrat House primary in FL-20, the sole remaining majority-black district after redistricting under the Callais precedent. A very pale Debbie Wasserman Schultz wants to stay in Congress and her House leadership positions, and so she faces a very crowded field of very unhappy black politicians, including the one who resigned her seat after getting indicted for a $5 million COVID-aid fraud:
Tucked between the 22nd and 25th districts, the redrawn 20th District is a plurality-Black seat. Given the constituency’s demographics, the Democratic primary has understandably attracted four noteworthy Black candidates. But it’s the fifth major contender, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, whose presence has generated the most headlines. Having previously represented safe blue turf before the redistricting scramble, Wasserman Schultz decided to run in this Harris 68%-31% seat instead of one of the red-leaning alternatives. However, she currently represents only 2% of the new 20th’s population, and her bid has infuriated some local Black leaders who view her as an interloper in a seat that should be represented by a Black Democrat.
In early June, an effort to rally behind one Black candidate failed. This left a crowded field that could help elect Wasserman Schultz. Among the other candidates is ex-Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, who resigned from the current 20th District in April after a House Ethics Committee report found she had illegally shifted money from her family’s company into her campaign account. Progressive activist Elijah Manley, meanwhile, has tried to seize on the Left’s rising success. He’s the only candidate besides Wasserman Schultz to raise at least $1 million, though his $1.1 million is far below her $3.3 million. Former Broward County Mayor Dale Holness is also running, having barely lost to Cherfilus-McCormick in the Democratic primary for a 2022 special in the old 20th District. Lastly, hip hop artist-turned-community-activist Luther Campbell of 2 Live Crew fame is mounting a bid.
Pass the popcorn indeed. Manley could end up beating Debbie Downer, but ... don't bet on it. The party establishment has rallied to her side, cognizant of her connections in both Congress and the Democrat Party. She could have run in FL-22 and won the nomination unopposed, but it's now an R+10 district.
In fairness, the GOP has an embarrassing contest of its own in their House primaries:
For fans of electoral curiosities, the most entertaining contest on Tuesday is the GOP primary in the southwest Florida-based 19th District, a safely red seat left open by Donalds’s gubernatorial bid. This election is truly The Carpetbagger Contest. Of the 10 Republicans on the ballot, six (!) previously ran for the U.S. House in other states. And two are even former members of Congress: ex-Reps. Chris Collins of New York and Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina. Both left office under a cloud of scandal — Collins with a resignation and Cawthorn with a primary defeat.
Catalina Lauf carpetbagged from Illinois, but she's a MAGA and MAHA activist who got Donald Trump's endorsement. Let's just hope that we have seen the last of Collins and Cawthorn for a while. DDHQ also highlights some I-4 Corridor contests that may test whether the GOP can really pick up four seats from redistricting, so scroll down for the details on those contests.
Florida has a special election for the US Senate seat vacated by Marco Rubio. Interim appointee Ashley Moody drew three GOP challengers, but she's expected to easily prevail tonight. Democrats have a real fight brewing between Alex Vindman, a Never Trumper who amassed a $16 million war chest while having only lived in the state for three years, and state legislator Angie Nixon, a native who used a bullhorn on the legislature floor in an attempt to obstruct redistricting. Florida Dems can pick their brand of crazy, but it's a waste of money and resources in a state as red as Florida has become.
The other big race in Florida is the open gubernatorial primary to replace term-limited Ron DeSantis. Byron Donalds will almost certainly win this after getting an early endorsement from Trump and is likely to become the first black governor of the state. He faces three challengers, none of whom are well-known, with the closest in polling being investor James Fishback. Fishback's choices of investment in this campaign have DDHQ seeing red in a very different way:
Of the six surveys of likely voters conducted since mid-July, four have found Donalds at around 50% with a big lead. But the other two have put him in the low 30s, including the most recent one from fresh-faced pollster The Public Sentiment Institute. That poll, which really puts the organization out on a limb, found Donalds only narrowly in first place ahead of Fishback, 31%-28% — easily Fishback’s best poll in the final month of the campaign.
It turns out that there was a reason for that sudden pop:
Edit (2:30 p.m., Monday, Aug. 17): After publishing this on Monday, I discovered that an earlier poll from TPSI was clandestinely sponsored by Fishback’s campaign. If that was also the case for TPSI’s August poll, they are a) stupid and b) evaporated any droplets of credibility they may have hoped to retain ahead of November. Anyway…
¡Ay caramba! And people wonder why I enjoy politics so much.
Wyoming's primary appears to be mainly drama-free. Rep. Harriet Hageman is running for the Senate, and nine Republicans are vying to replace her in the at-large seat. Hageman faces several challengers as well, but should prevail fairly easily. Wyoming has an open gubernatorial election too, but the eventual Republican nominee should carry the state in November.
In Alaska, the only real drama revolved around an ersatz "Dan Sullivan" that Chuck Schumer attempted to use as a challenger to incumbent Republican Dan Sullivan in the Senate primary. A judge kicked the phony off the ballot, and Sullivan is widely expected to prevail along with Democrat Mary Peltola in the jungle primary. Again, though, this election will use ranked-choice voting, so don't expect results until later in the week.
There's one special election tonight for which we won't get live results. Eric Swalwell resigned from Congress after allegations of sexual assault emerged. California will hold a special election to fill the rest of this term and to preview the exact same contest less than three months from now for the next session. Dave Weigel has the details at Semafor:
One of two Democrats will fill this San Francisco Bay Area seat and complete Eric Swalwell’s term: State Sen. Aisha Wahab, who’d be the first Afghan American member of Congress, or transit board director Melissa Hernandez.
Wahab grabbed 43% of the vote in the June primary, to Hernandez’s 17%. She started the race with a bigger political profile in the district, too, but Hernandez got nearly $3 million of help from AIPAC and its PAC affiliates in recent months — without Wahab becoming a progressive cause célèbre. Wahab’s fought back with progressive endorsements and warnings.
When it’s over, Wahab and Hernandez will face each other again in November.
California doesn't use RCV – yet, anyway – but they're about the worst state in the nation for counting votes. The Supreme Court had an opportunity to force Gavin Newsom and the state legislature to fix it but punted instead. It might take a week or two to get a winner if this is at all close, so we're sparing you the real-time updates in an election process that hearkens back to the Pony Express era.
Keep checking back for updates, and pass the popcorn while it's hot. Florida actually runs tight elections and gets results quickly, so the suspense may be limited ... thankfully.
Poll Closing Times:
- Florida: 7 PM ET, 8 PM ET in western panhandle
- Wyoming: 10 PM ET
- Alaska: 12 AM ET
Editor’s Note: The 2026 Midterms will determine the fate of President Trump’s America First agenda. Republicans must maintain control of both chambers of Congress.
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