THE PROCESS — The so-called audit in Arizona has come to a temporary pause, for now. State Senate Republicans had to stop their review of all of the ballots in Maricopa County on Friday because the arena booked for the process is hosting high school graduations this week. It'll pick back up on May 23, and the venue is booked through the end of June, per the AP's Jonathan Cooper. But in the interim, the top Republican officials in Maricopa, home to a majority of the state's voters, have been on a warpath pushing back against the process, which has been rooted in conspiracy theories and the false belief that President Joe Biden's election was not legitimate. "This is unhinged," tweeted Stephen Richer, the Republican county recorder who was elected in 2020, talking about one of the litany of Trump's statements blasted out over the last week. "We can't indulge these insane lies any longer. As a party. As a state. As a country." The county's official Twitter account has also kicked off a "#RealAuditorsDont" campaign laying into the audit, and the (Republican-controlled) county board of supervisors is set to hold a meeting today "to refute lies alleged by the Arizona Senate and the people involved in its audit." The "audit" is also furthering the divide in a swing-state Republican Party that has a proclivity for infighting. POLITICO Campaigns' James Arkin: "Instead of a wake-up call spurred by those two Trump-era losses and Biden's narrow statewide victory, [some Republicans] worry the audit is the latest sign of the Republican Party marginalizing itself in a state where it once reigned supreme," while others embrace it. (Two local reporters you should also follow for audit news: The Arizona Republic's Jen Fifield and KNXV's Garrett Archer.) THE SENATE MAP — Sununu, the New Hampshire governor, has been noncommittal at best about challenging Hassan in 2022. But Republicans are launching "an all-out effort" to get him to run, POLITICO's Burgess Everett and James wrote. NRSC Chair Rick Scott personally flew to meet with Sununu this spring, Burgess and James report, and senators and top party operatives are lavishing praise on him. "If he were to decide to run, that would instantly become a top-tier pickup opportunity for Republicans," Steven Law, president of the GOP super PAC Senate Leadership Fund, said. Sununu is expected to make a decision on his future later this year, but not before the end of the legislative session next month. — Pennsylvania's open Senate seat could arguably be the most competitive Senate race of the cycle. And the last week has shown that "Trump's influence remains as powerful as ever" over Keystone State Republicans, The Philadelphia Inquirer's Jonathan Tamari wrote. Meanwhile, Sean Parnell got a boost for his Senate bid, picking up the endorsements of Pennsylvania Reps. Mike Kelly and Guy Reschenthaler in an op-ed in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. LEADING THE PARTY — Rep. Elise Stefanik cruised to victory to become House Republicans' no. 3 leader, after the conference chased out Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) for pushing back against Trump's election lies. Stefanik won a secret-ballot vote on Friday, easily defeating Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), POLITICO's Olivia Beavers and Melanine Zanona reported. It means there is just one member of House GOP leadership who didn't vote to overturn the election in January. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.), Minority Whip Steve Scalise (La.), Stefanik, conference vice chair Mike Johnson (La.), conference secretary Richard Hudson (N.C.) and policy committee chair Gary Palmer (Ala.) all voted to object to the election results. NRCC Chair Tom Emmer (Minn.) — whose organization was spending January arguing that Democrats' protest in IA-02 amounted to a norm-busting overturning of an election result — is the lone leadership member who did not vote to object. — South Carolina state GOP Chair Drew McKissick easily beat back a challenge from Lin Wood, the pro-Trump lawyer who has spread conspiracy theories about the election, per POLITICO's Marc Caputo, with local coverage from The Post and Courier's Jamie Lovegrove. McKissick was repeatedly endorsed by Trump. — Republicans in 13 of Georgia's 14 congressional districts held party meetings over the weekend, where attempts to punish GOP Gov. Brian Kemp "largely fizzled," but "record crowds of activists continued a relentless focus on former President Donald Trump's lies about Georgia's election results," The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Greg Bluestein wrote. MONEY MOVES — Peter Thiel is quicking becoming one of the biggest Rerpublican megadonors. But his money is going, in particular, to promoting potential Senate candidacies of longtime associates — J.D. Vance in Ohio, and Blake Masters in Arizona — turning them into formidable contenders in crowded fields, per POLITICO's Alex Isenstadt, while he operates relatively independently from the rest of the GOP political operative universe. FIRST IN SCORE — LANDMARK LEGISLATION? — The Black Progressive Action Coalition is kicking off a seven-figure campaign to push for H.R. 1 (117)/ S. 1 (117), the For the People Act. It includes digital ads, which talk about pushes in legislatures to restrict voters' access to the polls, targeting Black voters in states including West Virginia and Arizona. BPAC's other voter contact includes direct mail, door-to-door canvassing and postcards to senators. OLD DOMINION — The Virginia gubernatorial race is heating up, even with Democrats still three weeks away from selecting their nominee. "It's already clear that this year's contest — which will help define the national political landscape heading into the 2022 midterm congressional elections — is likely to be a strange, expensive, surprising affair," The Washington Post's Laura Vozzella and Gregory Schneider wrote. The Post's story is a good curtain-raiser on the race, from the yet-to-be-decided Democratic race with former Gov. Terry McAuliffe as a frontrunner and the GOP's historically diverse statewide ticket led by gubernatorial nominee Glenn Youngkin, and what role Trump will play. Also check out Youngkin's 11-minute interview with Virginia Scope's Brandon Jarvis to hear him in his own words on his general election case (where he repeatedly targets McAuliffe) and more. — Speaking of that Democratic gubernatorial primary: Higher Heights for America PAC, which backs Black women candidates, endorsed former state Del. Jennifer Carroll Foy. The third (of four) primary debates will be this Thursday, hosted by WRC-TV. — State Attorney General Mark Herring, a Democrat, met his primary challenger Del. Jay Jones for their second primary debate on Saturday, the Richmond Times-Dispatch's Andrew Cain wrote, describing it as "sometimes combative," with Jones going after Herring for his own blackface scandal that was unearthed two years ago. MESSAGING MATTERS — It is normally a surefire bet for the party out of power to run against an incumbent president in the midterms. But Biden is different, POLITICO's David Siders wrote. "Interviews with more than 25 GOP strategists and party officials depict a president whose avuncular style and genial bearing make him a less-than-ideal foil. … In response, Republicans are preparing to break with time-honored custom and cast the president less as the central character in the midterm elections than as an accessory to the broader excesses of the left." ON THE BALLOT? — Mississippi's state Supreme Court gutted the state's ballot initiative procedure while issuing a ruling that struck down a voter-approved medical marijuana program. Mississippi Today's Geoff Pender and Bobby Harrison wrote that the state Supreme Court found that the state's "ballot initiative process is 'unworkable and inoperative' until lawmakers and voters fix state law and the constitution" because of how it is worded. The ballot initiative procedure requires that proposed measures get signatures from Mississippi's five congressional districts — which is the number the state had in the 1990s, but one more than it currently has. "The loss of congressional districts did, indeed, break [the ballot initiative provision] so that, absent amendment, it no longer functions," state Justice Josiah Coleman wrote. FIRST IN SCORE — NOTABLE FLOATABLES — Club for Growth PAC, the big-spending anti-tax group that has allied itself with Trump, is laying down a marker for the potential Republican gubernatorial primary in Arizona. A WPAi poll sponsored by the Club has former Rep. Matt Salmon leading Karrin Taylor Robson, a member of the state board of regents, 42 percent to 10 percent in a theoretical primary head-to-head (534 likely GOP primary voters; May 12-13; +/- 4.4 percentage point MoE). Neither has launched a bid to replace the term-limited GOP Gov. Doug Ducey, and Salmon was an ally of the Club during his congressional tenure. GETTING IN — North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee, a Republican, is launching a bid to challenge Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak. Lee recently switched parties from Democrat to Republican, highlighting that in his launch video: "Like Reagan and Trump, I switched parties," he said in his video, where he rails against socialism and highlights his recovery from cancer. ALRIGHT ALRIGHT ALRIGHT — Actor Matthew McConaughey has publicly floated a Texas gubernatorial bid. But he's gone a step further than just talking about it in interviews and has "has been quietly making calls to influential people in Texas political circles, including a deep-pocketed moderate Republican and energy CEO, to take their temperature on the race and to talk about seriously throwing his hat in the ring," POLITICO's Meridith McGraw reported. Texan strategists who talked to Meridith remain skeptical of a run, and it isn't even clear what party (if any) he'd run with should he actually go through with it. RECALL TIME — The Democratic Governors Association has given the single largest donation to the effort to defend California Gov. Gavin Newsom from a recall, POLITICO California's Jeremy B. White reported, kicking in $500,000. (The state Democratic Party has given more in total, spread out across multiple donations.) GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD — Some more big endorsements coming down in the New York City mayoral race, with a little over five weeks to go until the Democratic primary: The New York Daily News' editorial board backed Kathryn Garcia, while Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) backed Maya Wiley, per The New York Times' Katie Glueck. STAFFING UP — EMILY's List, the powerful liberal group that backs Democratic women, announced that Jessica Mackler will be the new VP of federal and gubernatorial campaigns. She is a DGA and DCCC alum. CODA — QUOTE OF THE DAY: "Dig deeper. … Come on, don't you have your own ideas?" — Sol Sender, who led the team that designed then-candidate Barack Obama's famous 2008 logo, on the imitations of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's logo popping up, to The New York Times. | 
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