Impact2020: May 11, 2020

Welcome to your Impact2020 briefing for Monday, May 11. We look ahead to tomorrow’s elections in California, Nebraska and Wisconsin, and dive into the latest voting battles in California and South Carolina.

On the Ground

Voting during a pandemic

Elections are set to take place, primarily by mail, in California, Nebraska and Wisconsin tomorrow. And the race to watch is the special election in California’s 25th congressional district.

Democrats are increasingly worried they will lose the seat vacated by former Rep. Katie Hill, who ousted a Republican incumbent in 2018 but resigned last year after nude photos of her were published online and allegations of an improper relationship with a congressional staffer.

The Los Angeles Times’ Mark Z. Barabak reports that “a ballot was mailed to each of the 25th District’s roughly 425,000 voters, with return postage paid. As of Saturday, 39% of GOP voters had mailed in their ballots compared with 25% of Democrats, according to Political Data Inc.”

Barabak notes that California Republicans haven’t flipped a House seat from blue to red since 1998.

There’s also a special election in Wisconsin’s 7th congressional district, where GOP Rep. Sean Duffy resigned last year after one of his children experienced medical issues. The seat is expected to stay in Republican hands.

The local AP reports that more than 25% of the district’s voters have requested an absentee ballot so far. “About 250 members of the Wisconsin National Guard will be activated to help work the polls in Tuesday’s special election due to a shortage of traditional poll workers.”

And Nebraska is holding its statewide primaries, including for the Democratic nominating contest. Allison Mollenkamp of NET News reports that more than 321,000 mail-in ballots have already been returned, eclipsing the total for the 2016 presidential primary.

You get a mail-in ballot, and you get a mail-in ballot...

Every California voter will get a mail-in ballot for the November general election after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order. But the Sacramento Bee’s Andrew Sheeler writes, “the executive order does not replace in-person voting ... and the state will open as many voting centers as possible.”

Secretary of State Alex Padilla called vote-by-mail the safest way to vote. “It’s great for public health. It’s great for voting rights. It’s going to be great for public participation,” he said.

Credit: Rich Pedroncelli, AP

In response to the move, Republican National Committee spokesman Michael Ahrens said they were “weighing their legal options to ensure the integrity of the election.”

Feeling the pressure

South Carolina lawmakers return to work tomorrow as pressure mounts to expand absentee voting amid COVID-19. The State’s Maayan Schechter reports that the state’s governor and some legislative leaders have said there’s “no reason to take the legislative action required to expand the reasons for voting absentee.” However, some candidates “are encouraging voters to ask for an absentee ballot even though currently there is no pandemic excuse among the qualifications to vote absentee in the state.”

That lack of policing has caused some concern for lawmakers. One lawmaker told The State that voters choosing qualifications that don’t apply to them makes a “mockery” of the voting system.

Meanwhile, three voting-related lawsuits hang over South Carolina and there may not be enough people to work at polling places for the June 9 primary, as hundreds of poll workers have opted out of this election.

Trail Mix

Election disruption

• Delaware postponed its primary for a second time, pushing the election from June 2 to July 7, Sarah Gamard reports for the Delaware News Journal.

• The deadline for voter registration is today in Georgia. More than 1.1 million voters have requested absentee ballots for the state’s June 9 primary, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Mark Niesse reports.

• Niesse also writes about a federal lawsuit that pushes for Georgia to count ballots postmarked by Election Day. Current law dictates that absentee ballots arriving at county election offices later than 7 p.m. be discarded.

• The Minnesota state Senate passed a temporary change to the election law intended to make voting safer but “doesn’t include provisions for holding the 2020 primary and general elections entirely by mail,” Peter Gallaghan reports for MinnPost.com.

Battle for Congress

• James Drew of the Tacoma News Tribune gives an overview of the state of the race to replace Democratic Rep. Denny Heck in Washington’s 10th district.

• Kansas congressional candidate Sara Hart Weir has become entangled in an Oklahoma lawsuit that accuses one of her associates of committing forgery and fraud, Bryan Lowry reports for the Kansas City Star.

• Rep. Tom McClintock of California “is offering to assist anyone who needs help in challenging actions of state and local officials, alleging they may have violated constituents’ constitutional rights or civil liberties,” David Lightman reports for the Sacramento Bee.

Governor watch

• While Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis says “there’s more data put out on a daily basis by Florida’s Department of Health than anywhere,” the Miami Herald’s David Smiley writes that attorneys for the state health department moved to block the records about COVID-19 deaths from becoming public.

Convention watch

• House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has her own idea for the fate of the Democratic National Convention: hold it in a stadium in one day, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Bill Glauber reports.

Number of the Day

55%

The number of Americans who disapproved of protests against restrictions related to the coronavirus outbreak, according to a new survey from the University of Chicago Divinity School and the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. By comparison, 31% approve of the demonstrations.

For planning purposes

May 11

Joe Biden holds a virtual fundraiser

Mike Pence holds a meeting on COVID-19 response with governors via video teleconference (he’s self-quarantined)

May 12

Nebraska primary

Special elections in California’s 25th district and Wisconsin’s 7th district

Jill Biden holds virtual events in Pennsylvania

May 19

Idaho and Oregon primaries

May 22

Hawaii primary

A tense moment

Credit: Travis Long, News & Observer

A man with a pipe wrench approached a family in Raleigh,N.C., during an armed demonstration protesting Gov. Roy Cooper’s stay-at-home order.

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This story was originally published May 11, 2020 at 11:59 AM.