Posted in2026 election

Once again, Nate Silver’s midterm election model is even better for Democrats

As of today, the midterm election is just two weeks away. My mood vacillates between optimism, since Democrats are expected to do well, and anxiety, since if the Democrats come out on top on November 3, Trump may do a constitutionally crazy thing and declare the election is so beset with fraud (which would be a total lie), he's declaring a national emergency and impounding ballots/voting machines. One of the ways I deal with these conflicting emotions is by immersing myself in factual information about the election. That helps ground me in external reality, rather than the internal machinations of…
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Posted in2026 election City Council

In November 3 city council election, write in Mai Vang and vote for Micki Varney

Salem voters, soon you'll be getting your ballot for the November 3 election. Two city council races remain to be decided. If you live in Ward 6, be sure to write-in Mai Vang to be your councilor. If you live in Ward 8, be sure to vote for Micki Varney to be your councilor. Mai Vang is the incumbent Ward 6 councilor (East Salem). She's done a great job representing her ward. Vang's web site explains why it is necessary to write-in her name on the ballot. I'm launching my write-in campaign for the November general election to retain my…
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Posted in2026 election Oregon politics

Tobias Read tells Salem City Club Oregon election is safe from Trumpian meddling

Oregon is fortunate to have Democrats in all statewide elected offices. Keep that in mind if you're thinking of voting for Republican Christine Drazan to be governor rather than incumbent Tina Kotek. Because today our Democratic Secretary of State, Tobias Read, assured attendees at his Salem City Club program, "Safeguarding the Process: Oregon's Stand for Secure State Run Elections," that whatever the Trump administration may try to do to meddle with our upcoming November 3 vote by mail election, our state is ready to fight it. Read started off by quoting Benjamin Franklin (this is from Google AI). Benjamin Franklin…
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Posted in2026 election Oregon politics

Poll shows Oregon governor’s race is basically tied. But Kotek is still heavily favored.

Being an avid Democrat, this wasn't what I wanted to see in my X/Twitter feed soon after I woke up today. Taniel is a respected election analyst who I follow. It would indeed be a major flip if Republican Christine Drazan were to unseat incumbent Governor Tina Kotek in Oregon, a decidedly blue state where Democrats hold every statewide office and all but one of the Congressional and Senate seats. But when I clicked on the OPB link, there it was: Searching the OPB story for some good news about Kotek's chances, I found this. OPB’s poll suggests the governor’s…
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Posted in2026 election

Nate Silver’s midterm election model now looks even better for Democrats

I need some positive political news, being a Democrat anxious about the upcoming midterm election. And the polls have been providing it lately. Which is one reason why Nate Silvers' midterm election model looks even better for Democrats today, compared to September 2, when I first shared some forecasts that go out to Silver Bulletin subscribers (I'm one). On September 2, about three weeks ago, Silver gave Democrats a 52.4% chance of taking back both the House and Senate. Now the chance is 67.0%. Before there was a 31% chance of a Democratic House and a Republican Senate. Now the…
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Posted in2026 election Oregon politics

In the race for Oregon governor, remember that Trump wants Republicans to pretend he’s on the ballot

A vote for Republican Christine Drazan to become Governor of Oregon is a vote for Donald Trump to lead our state. This is certain, because high-ranking Republican politicians have to be loyal to Trump, and Drazan is a high-ranking Republican politician. So when Trump said recently to Republican voters, "Pretend I'm on the ballot," all Oregonians should take that seriously. A vote for Drazan is a vote for Trump. Drazan knows this, because she is a loyal Republican. But she can't admit it, because she wants to be Governor of a blue state where Trump isn't popular. That's why Republican…
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Posted in2026 election Donald Trump

Supreme Court decision means vote-by-mail is safe from Trump’s executive order

It's always a pleasure when some crazy Trump idea is struck down by the courts. Doubly pleasurable when it is the Supreme Court telling Trump no. Which made today's decision by the court that the postal service can't go ahead with requiring states to comply with vote-by-mail restrictions so satisfying. The Supreme Court on Monday blocked a Trump administration plan to dramatically change how Americans vote by mail in the lead-up to the midterm elections, a major loss for President Trump, who has long claimed without evidence that fraud is rampant in mail voting. The ruling was a resounding win…
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Posted in2026 election National politics

Nate Silver’s midterm election model looks good for Dems both nationally and in Oregon

It's September. Time to start taking seriously projections for how the November 3 midterm election will turn out. My favorite prognosticator is Nate Silver, who runs the Silver Bulletin that I subscribe to, political junkie that I am. Silver is analyzing every race for the House, Senate, and Governor, along with the probability of each party controlling the House and Senate. Naturally Silver's model will be frequently updated between now and November 3, so what I've shared below is just a snapshot as of September 2. This is a description of the basic methodology used by Silver's FLIPR model: Forecast…
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Posted in2026 election City Council

Support Mai Vang’s write-in campaign for Ward 6 city councilor

Mai Vang was treated badly by city officials when they made a screwy decision that despite Betsy Vega failing to meet the residency requirement to be a Ward 6 city councilor, Vega's narrow victory in the May election over incumbent Mai Vang should stand. I described why this decision was so unfair to Vang in "City officials ignored Salem charter in wrongly qualifying Betsy Vega as Ward 6 city councilor." Basically, the city charter says "a councilor shall have resided in the ward the councilor represents during the 12 months immediately before being elected or appointed to the office." But…
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Posted in2026 election City Council

City of Salem hiring Eugene attorney to help with investigation of Betsy Vega’s eligibility to be city councilor

Initially the City of Salem announced that the City Recorder and City Attorney would investigate an allegation that Betsy Vega is ineligible to be a city councilor even though she beat incumbent Mai Vang in the May election. That investigation was expected to be completed by June 22. But yesterday the City of Salem said that the investigation deadline now is July 7 because a Eugene attorney, Truman Stone, has been hired to help the City Recorder. Here's a screenshot of part of an email from the Salem Reporter (I'm a subscriber). This seems like a wise decision. If the…
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Posted in2026 election National politics

Democratic Socialists of America do well in New York primaries. Great news for Democratic Party.

I'm a firm believer in the Big Tent approach to Democratic Party politics. We need to include all sorts of people under the party banner. Including those who don't pass the sort of purity test that some Democrats demand of their politicians. Opposed to abortion? Welcome to the Big Tent. Love your assault rifle? Welcome to the Big Tent. Support Israel? Welcome to the Big Tent. Big fan of billionaires? Welcome to the Big Tent. Favor more drilling for oil and gas? Welcome to the Big Tent. Those are examples of how people with some right-wing leanings can find a…
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Posted in2026 election City Council City of Salem

Betsy Vega’s election as Ward 6 city councilor may hinge on definition of “qualified elector”

Betsy Vega has been certified by Marion County Elections as the winner of the May 19 election for the Ward 6 city council seat, as she got 44 more votes than Mai Vang, the incumbent. But Paige Barton, Vang's campaign manager, has filed a complaint with the City of Salem that asserts Vega may not be qualified to be a city councilor, according to the City Charter. Section 25. Qualifications. (1) An elective city officer shall be a qualified elector under the state constitution and shall have resided in the city during the 12 months immediately before being elected or…
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Posted in2026 election National politics

Graham Platner’s Maine primary victory is a win for flawed people — which is everyone

Today the voters of Maine made Graham Platner the Democratic nominee for the Senate seat currently occupied by Republican Susan Collins. With 71% of the vote in, the New York Times shows Platner ahead of Janet Mills, the governor of Maine, 72% to 20%. Sure doesn't look like Maine Democrats have lost faith in Platner, even after reports surfaced that he had behaved badly with several girlfriends, and had exchanged sexual text messages with some other women at the beginning of his marriage. Nineteen polls were taken between July 2025 and June 2026 of the Democratic primary between Platner and…
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Posted in2026 election City Council

Salem city officials are refusing to enforce the city’s own requirement to be a city councilor

We're all familiar with bureaucracies behaving badly. But I expected more from officials at the City of Salem when it comes to enforcing their own requirement for serving as a city councilor, because they're refusing to make sure that Betsy Vega meets the residency requirement for serving as the Ward 6 city councilor. There it is, on the City of Salem web site, on a page titled Elections - Run for Elected City Office. I'll attach a screenshot. The residence requirement for becoming a city councilor is "Live within the city ward candidate seeks to represent 12 months prior to…
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Posted in2026 election City Council

If Betsy Vega didn’t live in Ward 6 for a year before the May 19 election, she is ineligible to be a city councilor

Currently Betsy Vega has a 40 vote lead over incumbent Mai Vang in the Ward 6 Salem City Council race. Since it looks virtually certain that Vega will have gotten more than 50% of the vote when this race is certified by Marion County Elections, seemingly Vega will replace Vang as the Ward 6 councilor next January when her term begins. Seemingly. Not certainly. Because the Salem Reporter has a May 28 story by Joe Siess with the provocative title, "Vega's Ward 6 residency questioned as Salem city council race remains unsettled." Excerpt: State elections officials are reviewing allegations that…
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Posted in2026 election City Council

Looks like progressives have gained one seat on the Salem City Council

Today was the end of the seven-day deadline for mail-in ballots to be returned to the Marion County Elections Office after the May 19 primary election where the races for Salem mayor and four city council seats would be decided if a candidate got over 50% of the votes. As I wrote about on May 20 in "Election for Salem mayor and city council turned out well for progressives, but not perfectly," from the initial results of these five races it seemed virtually certain that Vanessa Nordyke would defeat incumbent Julie Hoy in the mayor race, incumbent Linda Nishioka would…
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Posted in2026 election City Council Vanessa Nordyke

Election for Salem mayor and city council turned out well for progressives, but not perfectly

The races for Salem mayor and city council are nominally nonpartisan, but in reality almost always there are conservative and progressive slates for these offices. So given the extent to which even local politics has become nationalized, every two years control of the city council hinges on whether the election winners tilt more toward the right or left of the political spectrum. Since Oregon's vote by mail allows for ballots to be counted if they are postmarked on or before election day, May 19, there's an unknown number of ballots remaining to be counted. What I've shared below are screenshots…
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Posted in2026 election 2028 election National politics

Democrats need to make “Won’t Get Fooled Again” their political theme song

This morning I woke up to news that the Virginia Supreme Court had ruled that the redistricting referendum recently approved by the state's voters by a 52-48 margin had been overturned by the court -- causing Virginia's congressional map to revert to a 6-5 likely Democratic majority rather than the 10-1 likely majority under the redistricting proposal. A song title popped into my head. "Won't Get Fooled Again." That was a 1971 song by the Who. The title perfectly encapsulated how I feel about well-meaning Democratic efforts to do the when they go low, we go high thing. Several blue…
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Posted in2026 election Julie Hoy Vanessa Nordyke

Vanessa Nordyke and Julie Hoy have very different visions for Salem. Vote for mayor accordingly.

This screenshot from the Salem Reporter home page nicely sums up the race for Salem mayor that will be decided in the May 19 election. Here's excerpts from the Salem Reporter profiles of the two candidates that illustrate the differences between them. Vanessa Nordyke -- Mayoral candidate and Salem City Councilor Vanessa Nordyke says she’ll prioritize ordinary people over the rich and powerful if elected on May 19. -- She’s backed by Progressive Salem, which is supporting a slate of progressive candidates in city races. -- She has cast the upcoming race as a contest between moneyed interests and the…
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Posted in2026 election City Council Julie Hoy

This is important to know about candidates for mayor and city council

I'm a political junkie. I'm addicted to following politics closely. But many people here in Salem aren't. They believe in voting, including in the May 19, 2026 election that likely will decide the races for mayor and four seats on the city council. (While this is a primary election, a candidate that gets more than 50% of the vote in those races wins outright; such will probably happen, given that there are two candidates in each race.) But those people don't have an inclination to dig deep into the qualifications and policy positions of the candidates vying to be mayor…
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