| | | | | |  | | By Zach Montellaro | Programming announcement: Our newsletters are evolving. Morning Score will continue to publish daily for POLITICO Pro subscribers, but will publish once weekly for other readers starting on July 13. There will be no changes to the policy newsletters available to POLITICO Pro subscribers. To continue to receive Morning Score daily, as well as access POLITICO Pro's full suite of policy tools and trackers, get in touch about a Pro subscription. Already a Pro subscriber? Learn more here.
| | | — We have a jam-packed primary day, even if we likely won't know the winners of hotly-contested primaries in New York and Kentucky tonight. Here's our guide to the biggest races of the day. — Former Vice President Joe Biden rejected President Donald Trump's call for an additional general election debate. — The free-spending Club for Growth is wading into more House races, dropping two big ad buys in contested Republican primaries. Good Tuesday morning. Baseball's … back? Email me at zmontellaro@politico.com, or follow me on Twitter at @ZachMontellaro. Email the rest of the Campaign Pro team at sshepard@politico.com, jarkin@politico.com and amutnick@politico.com. Follow them on Twitter: @POLITICO_Steve, @JamesArkin and @allymutnick. Days until the Colorado, Oklahoma and Utah primaries: 7 Days until the Democratic convention: 55 Days until the Republican convention: 63 Days until the 2020 election: 133
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| | | PRIMARY NIGHT — We have one of our biggest downballot primary nights of the year tonight, with contested races across the country. The entire Campaign Pro team brings you the nine things we're watching tonight, but here's a quick guide in Score: Kentucky (polls close statewide at 7 p.m. ET): Democrat Amy McGrath was raising millions of dollars and seemed unbeatable in the primary to face Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. But that was not to be: state Rep. Charles Booker caught fire, fueled by the nationwide protests and endorsements from national progressives and prominent Kentucky Democrats. Can he actually pull off the win? Campaign Pro's James Arkin : "If Booker manages to pull it off, it would be the first primary defeat for a candidate backed by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee in a decade. Had the election been in May — it was postponed a month because of coronavirus — 'I don't think Charles had a snowball's chance,' said Greg Stumbo, a Democratic Party fixture in Kentucky who has served as state attorney general and state House speaker. 'But I think he's got a chance. He's got some momentum. He's got excitement.'" | 
Jamaal Bowman's primary challenge to Rep. Eliot Engel has attracted support of most progressives. | Getty Images | New York (polls close at 9 p.m. ET): Just about every New York City-area incumbent House Democrat is facing a primary challenge, but none has gotten anywhere near the attention of Jamaal Bowman, who is primarying Rep. Eliot Engel in NY-16. The Bowman-Engel primary has attracted millions in outside spending, and progressives both in New York and nationally have latched onto the former middle school principal's campaign as their best shot at knocking off an entrenched incumbent. Two good stories on the race: from POLITICO's Holly Otterbein and The New York Times' Jesse McKinley. But it is far from just Bowman. From other primary challenges in the city to a pair of open seat races in the Bronx and in the city's northern, affluent suburbs, progressives are presented with several other opportunities to add to their numbers in the New York delegation, I wrote with Sarah Ferris and Ally Mutnick. Take a read of our story to find out more about the primary challenge to Rep. Yvette Clarke in NY-09, and the open-seat races in NY-17 and NY-15. Of particular note in NY-15: One of the leading candidates is Ruben Diaz Sr., a city councilmember with a long history of anti-gay rhetoric who has also praised Trump. Sanders has also helped fuel these progressives, raising more than $750,000 for endorsed candidates running in congressional and local primaries on Tuesday, Holly reported. And let's not forget about the battleground House seats. Republicans in NY-11 will pick a challenger to face freshman Democratic Rep. Max Rose in Staten Island, where state Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis is the favorite. Democrats will pick a challenger to GOP Reps. Lee Zeldin in NY-01 and John Katko in NY-24. (Read more about these races, and a couple of other ones to watch, in the big story from Campaign Pro.) And elsewhere: But wait, there's more! There's the GOP primary runoff in NC-11 for the safe Republican seat between Trump-endorsed Lynda Bennett and Madison Cawthorn. (There's more from Ally on this race in our what to watch story.) And Democrats will pick their nominee in VA-05, where freshman GOP Rep. Denver Riggleman was recently ousted as the party's nominee. (Here's my preview on the primary from last week's Score.) And a note on the process: Barring decisive margins in the election-day vote, we likely won't know the winners for those closely-watched primaries in Kentucky and New York, as I reported last week . Kentucky's two largest counties aren't anticipating reporting results until after absentee ballots are counted, and in New York, absentee ballots can't even be processed until a week after the election. And there's a whole lot of 'em in the Empire State: The state Board of Elections announced on Monday that over 1.7 million voters requested. There's a last-minute dust-up over the number of in-person voting locations in Kentucky. The usual 3,700 polling places have been reduced to less than 200, including one in the city of Louisville. Some national Democrats and celebrities cried voter suppression, but Republican Secretary of State Michael Adams and Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear pushed back, saying the state is on its way to record turnout because of the aggressive, bipartisan campaign they undertook to allow for expanded mail-in and early voting. The Louisville Courier Journal's Phillip Bailey and Joe Sonka have more. | | | | BUILDING A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE - A DIFFERENT KIND OF NEWSLETTER : Are you interested in creating a sustainable future for generations to come? Our sustainability newsletter, "The Long Game," is designed for executives, investors and policymakers who lead crucial conversations about how society can continue to thrive. Join the sharpest minds for a discussion about the most significant challenges from pandemics to plastics, climate change to land use, inequality and the future of work. Winners play the long game, subscribe today. | | | | | | | | THE DEBATE DEBATE — The Biden campaign said it was committed to the three scheduled general election debates, rejecting the Trump team's call for an additional debate and a revamped schedule. "Joe Biden looks forward to facing Donald Trump in a multi-debate series that the American people have come to expect from their leaders; we hope that President Trump would not break that tradition or make excuses for a refusal to participate," Biden campaign manager Jen O'Malley Dillon wrote in a letter to the Commission on Presidential Debates that was obtained by The Washington Post's Matt Viser. As POLITICO's Alex Isenstadt reported last week, the Trump team wanted more debates and a say in choosing moderators. O'Malley Dillon wrote that Trump's demands were "a debate distraction," and the Trump campaign said that Biden was ducking the president. The second scheduled Trump-Biden showdown is getting a new host, however. According to the Detroit Free Press' David Jesse, the University of Michigan will announce today it is withdrawing as a debate site and won't stage the Oct. 15 meeting. The New York Times' Reid Epstein and Matt Stevens reported that the debate is headed to Miami's Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, citing "two sources directly familiar with the debate planning." THE PLATFORM — DNC Chair Tom Perez announced he was appointing 15 people to the platform drafting committee. The drafting committee will be chaired by Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms. The rest of the members: Tony Allen (Del.), Stuart Appelbaum (N.Y.), Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas), Heather Gautney (N.Y.), Don Graves (Ohio), Rep. Deb Haaland (D-N.M.), Analilia Mejia (N.J.), Josh Orton (Wis.), state Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez (Fla.), Julianne Smith (D.C.), Richard Trumka (Pa.), and former Gov. Tom Vilsack (Iowa). Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Cali.) will be an ex-officio member, and Biden adviser Carmel Martin will be a non-voting member. For the convention, Andrew Grossman will be platform director, and Leah Bess Moody will be platform deputy director. ON THE AIRWAVES — Like clockwork, Priorities USA Action is up with a new TV ad that features Trump saying at his weekend rally that he "said to my people, 'slow the testing down please.'" The super PAC said the ad will air in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. | | | | JOIN TOMORROW 1 p.m. EDT - THE SPEED OF SCIENCE POST-COVID-19: What does the future of science in a post-Covid-19 world look like? What lessons can we learn to accelerate medical research outside of the coronavirus? How can newly developed drugs and vaccines be distributed equitably? What can we do to minimize misinformation from flawed or inaccurate scientific studies published during a public health emergency? Join Patrick Steel, CEO of POLITICO, and Alexander Hardy, CEO of Genentech, for this critical and timely discussion. REGISTER HERE. | | | | | | | | FIRST IN SCORE — ON THE AIRWAVES — Club for Growth Action is wading into a pair of competitive Republican primaries, launching ads boosting candidates CFG PAC endorsed in each race. In the battleground ME-02, which is represented by freshman Democratic Rep. Jared Golden, the Club is out with an ad boosting Eric Brakey. The ad says Brakey, who was the party's 2018 Senate nominee, "led the battle against Obamacare in Maine," and "Brakey knows it's time to get our economy open again." The ad is backed by a $400,000 buy. And in the red-leaning MI-10, the Club is out with an ad supporting Shane Hernandez to replace the retiring GOP Rep. Paul Mitchell. The ad strikes a similar tune to the Brakey ad and says Hernandez "fought Gretchen Whitmer's reckless tax increases" as a state lawmaker. The ad is backed by a $360,000 cable and satellite buy in Detroit and Flint. Lisa McClain, another Republican running in MI-10, also recently released a new TV ad. In the ad, a positive bio spot, she says she's a "pro-Trump Republican." — One Nation, the GOP dark-money group focused on the Senate, is out with a new ad backing Sen. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.). The ad is backed by a $1 million TV, digital and radio buy and says McSally is "fighting to end our dangerous dependence on China" on medical drugs. POLL POSITION — A whole laundry list of polls out over the last 24 hours. Cygnal, the Republican pollster, showed in a mixed-mode poll that both Republicans Jeff Sessions and Tommy Tuberville are leading incumbent Sen. Doug Jones (D-Ala.). Sessions is at 45 percent to Jones' 35 percent, and Tuberville at 50 percent to 36 percent for Jones (530 likely general election voters; June 13-16; +/- 4.3 percentage point MOE). Cygnal isn't working with a candidate or outside group in the race. Jones put out an internal poll conducted by FM3 Research that showed the race closer, with Tuberville at 47 percent to Jones' 44 percent, but the poll was conducted a month ago (601 likely voters; May 14-18;+/- 4 percentage point MOE). — An internal poll from Republican Peter Meijer has him in a strong position in the GOP primary in MI-03. (The seat is currently represented by Libertarian Rep. Justin Amash.) The IVR poll by National Research Inc. has Meijer at 41 percent, to 17 percent for Lynn Afendoulis (400 likely GOP primary voters; June 15-16; +/- 4.9 percentage point MOE). — A poll paid for by House Majority PAC, the Democratic super PAC, shows a competitive race in PA-01. The poll from Victoria Research has GOP Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick and Democrat Ashley Finello each at 46 percent (403 registered voters; June 7-14; +/- 4.9 percentage point MOE). FIRST IN SCORE — THE CASH DASH — Freshman Democratic Rep. Andy Kim is out with his pre-primary report numbers, ahead of Thursday's filing deadline for the July 7 primaries. Kim, who is up for reelection in NJ-03 and will face either Republican Kate Gibbs or David Richter in November, raised $718,000 from April 1-June 17, for more than $4.2 million raised this cycle. He'll report more than $3.2 million in the bank. THE SENATE MAP — The latest dust-up in the Kansas Republican Senate primary is on Rep. Roger Marshall's record. The Kansas City Star's Jonathan Shorman and Bryan Lowry reported over the weekend that in 2008, an assistant Barton County Attorney asked that (and was granted) Marshall's conviction for reckless driving be erased and replaced with a lesser charge — and the prosecutor was the son of Marshall's business partner. More from The Star: "Marshall's campaign has offered little explanation for the reduction in charges or the candidate's ties to the prosecutor. The campaign also refused a request by The Star to release an affidavit in the criminal case that would likely contain a law enforcement narrative of the incident." Kris Kobach, one of Marshall's primary opponents, has since called on the congressman to release an affidavit tied to the case (he has refused to do so), Lowry reported. FIRST IN SCORE — ENDORSEMENT CORNER — NARAL Pro-Choice America is endorsing a slate of Democrats trying to flip Republican House seats. Many of them are reach districts for Democrats. The list: Brynne Kennedy (CA-04), Chris Bubser (CA-08), Kate Schroder (OH-01), Desiree Tims (OH-10), and Hillary Scholten (MI-03). STAFFING UP — America Rising, the GOP research shop, is launching a new state arm: Virginia Rising Action. The newest state arm will be led by Tucker Davis. CODA — QUOTE OF THE DAY: "Americans are consuming streaming content now more than ever, and we want to be part of what they're seeing," CIA spokesperson Nicole de Haay to The New York Times, on the spy agency's first streaming ad. | | | |  | | | | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
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