DL Open Thread: Friday, November 13, 2026

The New Delaware State Senate Leadership Team– Bryan Townsend, President Pro-Tem; Stephanie Hansen, Senate Majority Leader;  Sen. Marie Pinkney, Senate Majority Whip.  Yes, there was competition:

In an interview following the vote, Townsend declined to disclose the vote totals or name the senators who ran for leadership positions but lost. He said only that there were “multiple members” who sought the roles.

Townsend further argued that the competition was a sign of strength within his caucus. And he contrasted it with a budding leadership fight playing out in the U.S. Congress, which he described as a referendum on the incumbent Democratic leadership there.

“Here, it’s more that there were vacancies, and so people sought the opportunity to serve in a position that was being vacated,” he said.

What Does A Newly-Elected State Treasurer Need A Transition Team For?  Dunno, but Ted Lauzen has one:

State Treasurer-elect Ted Lauzen is already moving forward with his transition.

Lauzen has selected Laura Wisniewski – who has worked in the General Assembly, the Office of the Lieutenant Governor and Delaware Democratic Party – as the next Deputy State Treasurer.

Lauzen says he picked her for a few reasons.

“The selection of Laura is really based on being an incredible person, incredible and accomplished professional in Delaware and then a tremendous manager and leader,” said Lauzen.

Wasn’t Laura Winiewski the House Chief-Of-Staff who sent out the e-mail over the state server to announce an ’emergency caucus meeting’ due to Bethany Hall Long’s election financial shenanigans being made public?  In other words, one of Val’s minions re-emerges.

He also has announced his transition advisors.

Lauzen explains how they will help.

“Will be able to provide advice and kind of share some lessons learned from lived experiences during their own transitions to be able to identify and select the right team for the moment, and then to accelerate into the Inauguration Day,” said Lauzen.

Among the transition advisors is former Gov. Jack Markell, who was State Treasurer before being elected to the state’s top office.

Lauzen says having someone like Markell as an advisor is incredibly valuable and dramatically accelerates his ability to serve Delawareans.

He notes that the opportunity to learn from others who have done the job well and someone who can mentor and teach matters.

Never too soon to start plotting your next campaign…for whatever office opens up.  Idle thought–whatever happened to  Chipman Flowers, Jr., Esq?

Van Hollen To Challenge Schumer:

Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland announced on Thursday that he would challenge Senator Chuck Schumer of New York for majority leader, setting up a clash among Democrats just as they were celebrating their new majority and planning for a takeover of Congress in January.

The move by Mr. Van Hollen, a progressive Democrat elected to the Senate in 2016 after seven terms in the House representing the Washington, D.C., suburbs, comes as some Democratic senators and activists have called for an alternative to Mr. Schumer, a moderate whom they regard as too tied to the party establishment to lead a newly energized party forward in the next Congress.

OK, remember, kids, that the Blue Tsunami took place in spite of general voter dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party.  Schumer is symptomatic of that dissatisfaction.  He is incapable of symbolizing (or energizing) a newly-energized Senate.  He comes across as an insider deal-maker b/c that’s what he is.  He totally lacks what George H.W. Bush characterized as ‘the vision thing’. Which, IMO, disqualifies him for this position.  People are tired of him and his brand of capitulation.

The vote takes place on December 1.  Contact Coons and LBR.   Feel free to share this op-ed with them:

The opportunity is generational. After decades of polarization, the dam broke in Republican strongholds. From state legislatures to the U.S. Senate, many Democrats who swept into office are younger and come from unconventional political backgrounds. From the center to the left, they didn’t just promise competent governance; they directly challenged a corrupt system and obscene concentrations of power, and they promised to make that system work for the people. For the first time in the Trump decade, the Democrats were the populists. If they can sustain that energy, our Gilded Age can be followed by a progressive era.

The danger is that once in power, Democrats will revert to business as usual. Top-down leadership from party insiders. News conferences at the Capitol with canned talking points. Budget fights that play out in leaks to the political press. Stop-and-start government shutdowns. Petty quarreling between centrists and the left. Performative oversight of Mr. Trump’s renovation projects that feels disconnected from the pain Americans are feeling.

In short, Democratic power in the waning days of the Trump era must look, feel and be different from past incarnations. Governance must be visible, participatory and consequential. If it isn’t, the blue tsunami will recede.

After the 2024 election, one thing most Democrats agreed upon was the need for generational change. The party needed newer, younger faces out front and should no longer defer to establishment figures just because they’d built up a reservoir of good will.

That lesson should apply to the Senate today. Chuck Schumer has been a powerful and effective force in Democratic politics, but it is time for a new leader of the party in the Senate. It is not a rebuke of his tenure to conclude that voters want to see different faces leading a regenerated Democratic Party — people who can communicate outside of Washington, challenge special interests and make Congress more accessible.

The Democratic Party has an opportunity to show that it has evolved into something different. Why not take it?

Right on cue–Jennifer Rubin’s description of Schumer:

” every time his hunched figure, glasses tipping on his nose, appears on TV to utter some hackneyed phrase with an off-putting grin on his weatherworn face, millions of Democrats cringe. Schumer sounds and looks older than his 75 years, no doubt the result of spending 45 years in Washington, D.C., marinating in every Beltway affectation and habit (e.g., excessive courtesy to loathsome fascist Republicans, infatuation with legacy media).”

BTW, Peltola’s lead in Alaska has grown to almost a 6000 vote margin.  She’s gonna win that race, might even top 50%.

Trump Punks JD.  Sad:

President Donald Trump is pulling JD Vance out of his role in Iran negotiations, he announced Thursday, a move that comes after the vice president blamed last week’s crushing GOP midterm losses on the protracted war.

Vance will instead focus his attention on combating purported corruption and crime in Democratic-run cities and states, the president directed in a Truth Social Post, adding that the U.S. doesn’t “need a deal with Iran”.

“I have asked Vice President Vance to focus his complete and total attention on the Massive Corruption and Crime taking place in Democrat run Cities and States throughout the U.S.,” he wrote. “The Blue States, such as Minnesota, California, Illinois, and many more, are all poorly run, corrupt disasters. Billions of Dollars is being stolen each and every month.”

Vance, a prospective 2028 presidential candidate who has long been viewed as a potential successor to Trump within the MAGA movement, wrote on social media last week that the war in Iran was largely at fault for the GOP’s midterm wipeout, which saw Democrats flip both the House and Senate by historic margins.

“If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so,” he wrote. “Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay. Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest.”

Gee, Vance is off Trump’s Christmas card list.  Who’dathunkit?

Voter Suppression Endangered In Georgia.  Hey, elections have consequences:

In the run-up to the midterms, members of Georgia’s State Election Board and much of its professional staff were coordinating with an activist group led by Cleta Mitchell, the conservative attorney who worked with President Donald Trump to try to overturn his defeat in the 2020 election.

The board sets the swing state’s election rules, oversees the conduct of its election officials and investigates allegations of fraud.

Recordings of private calls and events reviewed by ProPublica show current and former state board members working with the Election Integrity Network and allied organizations on shared priorities. Among them: advancing the use of a controversial, error-prone software tool known as ELLY to search voter rolls for purportedly suspicious voters.

The state board’s current vice chair, Janelle King, and her predecessor, Janice Johnston, have both attended meetings of EIN or VoterGA, an aligned organization whose membership and goals significantly overlap with EIN. Johnston retired in June but still plays an active role in state election matters behind the scenes.

At least three members of the state board’s eight-person professional staff have participated in EIN meetings, including people who handle allegations of voter fraud and misconduct by election officials.

The board’s executive director, James Mills, likewise has worked closely with members of the EIN, according to five sources with knowledge of these interactions, board documents and EIN communications shared with ProPublica.

EIN’s close ties to the board and its staff have given it extraordinary influence over how elections are run in Georgia, experts said. In particular, the group has been able to enlist the board’s help in getting counties to remove voters from their rolls based on information from ELLY.

“Trump allies captured the State Election Board to keep claims of a stolen 2020 election going and tilt Georgia elections toward Republicans,” said Max Flugrath, a director at Fair Fight Action, a voting advocacy nonprofit that has closely tracked the board’s and the network’s actions. “EIN was the behind-the-scenes driver spearheading these changes.”

The board’s chair, John Fervier, told ProPublica he had not known about EIN’s sway over the board or its staff, but said he’d long sensed that an outside force was shaping the board’s actions.

“The more I look into this, the more I’m realizing that the Election Integrity Network has been having an undue influence on the State Election Board, and that needs to cease,” he said in an interview, though he declined to go into specifics about personnel matters. “I’m looking forward to changes in how the election board operates.”

What do you want to talk about?