Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* NBC News reported that the North Carolina Supreme Court temporarily blocked a lower court’s ruling “that would have required that more than 65,000 votes cast in the disputed 2024 state Supreme Court race be recounted and verified.”
* As Democratic officials start to feel some optimism about the 2026 midterm elections, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced this week that it’s targeting 35 Republican-held House seats. The party will need a net gain of three seats to take back the majority in the chamber.
* Home Depot co-founder Ken Langone, a longtime Republican donor, condemned the White House’s trade tariffs in an interview this week. “I don’t understand the goddamn formula,” Langone told The Financial Times.
* To the surprise of no one, Republican Rep. John James of Michigan launched a 2026 gubernatorial campaign this week. It will be his third bid for statewide office, following failed Senate campaigns in 2018 and 2020.
* In Texas, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott finally scheduled a congressional special election to fill the vacancy left by the late Rep. Sylvester Turner’s death. That said, voters in the Houston-area district won’t get to choose a new representatives until November, leaving them without a voice in Congress for the next six months.
* In Georgia, Sen. Jon Ossoff’s re-election campaign raised $11 million in the first quarter, and if that sounds like a lot, it is: As Politico noted, the Democratic senator’s haul was “the most ever raised by an incumbent in the first quarter of an off-year.”
* And while state attorneys general races tend not to generate a lot of national attention, The New York Times reported that former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s group will spend $10 million to help elect Democratic attorneys general this year and in 2026. This first test will be this fall in Virginia, where a Republican incumbent, Jason Miyares, is seeking a second term.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com