Americana

1. Mutually assured redistricting
2. After Adams
3. Virginia’s close call
4. Pop Pill
5. Spanberger the security mom
6. Republicans’ N.J. wrap
7. Pa. judicial messaging

Mutually assured redistricting

RICHMOND, Va. — Winsome Earle-Sears asked a telling rhetorical question on Monday at a press event in front of Virginia’s state Capitol.

“Virginians have told us, loud and clear, that they want voters to choose their legislators, not the other way around,” Earle-Sears said, decrying a Democratic redistricting push alongside her state’s five Republican members of Congress. “So what changed?”

President Donald Trump started this avalanche of attempts to redraw congressional maps, of course. What started with a quick push in Texas has spread from California to Florida, and from Indiana to Kansas.

If this keeps up, the future of House elections in many states will be determined by the most recent makeup of their legislatures, a messier version of what the Senate was before the 17th Amendment was ratified in 1913. That would benefit the president’s party — for now.

But the current redistricting wars still leave Republicans like Earle-Sears at a conspicuous disadvantage. She’s stuck using the same argument that national Democrats did when they passed legislation that would ban partisan gerrymandering (which they still favor): Politicians shouldn’t be able to choose which voters they’d like to face.

Before Trump changed things by urging Texas Republicans to delete five Democratic House seats, Virginia Democrats were cheering the independent redistricting commission that voters had approved by a landslide five years ago. These days, they’re moving on a constitutional amendment that would undo its work.

If Democrats hold the state legislature next week, they can put that amendment on the ballot next year; if it passes, and Abigail Spanberger beats Earle-Sears in the race for governor, Democrats can then redraw the state’s congressional map.

“While we oppose gerrymandering, the reality is it’s happening now in states across the country,” said Joan Porte, the president of Virginia’s League of Women Voters chapter, when I asked for their view on the remap.

“We ask for a transparent process and that legislators do not dilute or divide the voting power of communities that have been historically and continuously targeted by manipulative map-drawing,” she added.

Anti-gerrymandering campaigners got the LWV on their side in 2010, when the commission was approved. But the group has not gotten involved in California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s push for a ballot measure that will take out five Republican-held House seats and is on track to pass next week. And Virginia’s chapter has not taken a position on Democrats’ effort to undo the commission.

New York’s mayor quits, Cuomo gains

One knock on Andrew Cuomo’s New York City mayoral campaign is that he’s relied on other people to make mistakes and get out of his way, instead of forging his own path with a compelling message. But Eric Adams did get out of his way. Then — after vowing not to — he endorsed him. The result was a bump for Cuomo, who picked up nearly all of Adams’ supporters since Suffolk’s poll last month. (Two percent of voters still support Adams, who dropped out too late to remove himself from the ballot.)

Zohran Mamdani’s support has stayed steady, but months as a front-runner, as well as weeks of critical coverage and non-endorsements, have affected his favorable rating. Though Cuomo’s rating hasn’t budged, Mamdani’s favorable is down to 47%, with 37% of voters now viewing him negatively.

Democratic advantage shrinks in Virginia polls

The late wave of polling for next week’s Virginia elections is converging in the same direction: a clear advantage for Spanberger and some Democratic weakness down the ballot. Still, no Republican can crack 50%, and Democrats see undecided voters as more likely to break against Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s party.

Republicans have come home to the ticket — candidate John Reid’s six-month-old erotic photo scandal is basically forgotten — and Democrat Jay Jones’ behavior three years ago (homicidal text messages, a speeding ticket he paid off by working for his PAC) have wounded him but not knocked him out. This same poll, taken four years ago, found Democrats narrowly leading all three races, which they narrowly lost in the end.

American Eagle’s summer campaign with Sydney Sweeney blew up in ways no one could’ve imagined, but chief marketing officer, Craig Brommers, knew they were going to hit a cultural nerve. This week, Ben and Max bring on the AE CMO to give us an inside look into the “Great Jeans” campaign, what he made of the controversy that surrounded it, and how Donald Trump and JD Vance boosted their sales. They also discuss how marketing today is like running an entertainment company, why he ignored the advice of what he calls the “crisis communication industrial complex,” and whether their campaign with Travis Kelce was timed to Kelce’s engagement to Taylor Swift.

Pro-lifers want the GOP to push against abortion meds

Last year, Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America and other anti-abortion groups gave Trump space to win. They supported him even though he rejected their push for a national abortion ban and ignored their opposition to taxpayer funding for IVF. They are pushing back now, critical of his half-measure IVF proposal (not free coverage, like he ran on) and the availability of FDA-approved abortion medication.

SBA tapped Trump’s campaign pollster for this summer study, released this week, which found that even an electorate that largely supports Planned Parenthood can be convinced to back limits on the abortion pill.

Spanberger’s closing ad emphasizes her background

Virginia Democrats got thrown off-course in October, spending weeks answering questions about three-year-old text messages from their attorney general nominee. Spanberger didn’t conceal her annoyance at the story or the media’s focus on it. She stopped campaigning with Jones and closed with the message of this ad, emphasizing that her career in “public service” leaves her ready to handle the job.

Her other paid messaging promises that she’ll bring down the cost of living. Over this year, Spanberger won the favorability contest with Earle-Sears, whose campaign intermittently focused on her own Marines record. Spanberger’s final words: “Service. Country. Commonwealth.”

National Republicans take their final jab at Sherrill in New Jersey

Republicans continue to feel more optimistic about New Jersey’s gubernatorial race than they do about the one down I-95. Nothing new has happened; they’ve just spent months hammering Democrat Mikie Sherrill over old mistakes.

Restore New Jersey PAC, a spinoff of the Republican Governors Association, is ending the election by repeating the clip of Sherrill’s tongue-tied answer in a May interview with CBS News in which she was asked what bill she’d pass first, if she could pass anything. The ad doubles as a preview of how Republicans will campaign against other House members, like Sherrill, next year: Her “no” on the GOP’s tax plan is rebranded here as a vote to raise taxes and “give illegal immigrants taxpayer-funded health care.”

GOP brings Trump to Pennsylvania court races

Next week, Pennsylvania voters will choose whether to retain three Democratic judges for 10-year terms. Led by Gov. Josh Shapiro, Democrats have framed it as a way to “protect democracy” and abortion rights — and both are more popular in the commonwealth than his party is.

As in Wisconsin, where Republicans lost a state Supreme Court race this year, the GOP is trying to excite its base by invoking the president. This digital spot, titled Vote No in November, doesn’t mention the judges by name. Instead, it attacks them as wanting “unchecked power,” a year after Democrats “weaponized the courts” against Trump.

You can’t be everywhere, and you can’t cover every election. Unless you’re Bolts, the essential governing and elections magazine, which has brought back reporting from every race that’s gone under the radar this year.

Alex Burness’ story about a Republican-backed Maine referendum that would curtail mail voting will be essential next week; in the Midcoast Villager, Alex Seitz-Wald’s report on why Graham Platner’s voters haven’t abandoned him is also going to have a very long tail.

I’ve urged readers to listen to TrueAnon before, and the left-wing-but-uncategorizable podcast is getting a surge of new attention. The show has gotten profiled this month in GQ and The New York Times, and in a new essay for The Baffler, co-host Brace Belden writes line after funny line about podcasts replacing the written word: “For the aspiring liberal Rogans, my recommendation is you take Vyvanse and a beta blocker and email Ro Khanna. He will agree to an interview.” Go read it.

• Six days until off-year elections in New Jersey, Virginia, and other states
• 34 days until the special election in Tennessee’s 7th congressional district
• 41 days until the special election runoff in Texas’s 18th congressional district
• 367 days until the 2026 midterm elections