Grassley Not Yet Out to Pasture

Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley may be facing his most competitive reelection bid of his U.S. Senate career, but he is still favored to win a seventh term against Democratic nominee Patty Judge. Just 15 U.S. Senators have won seven terms during the direct election era including Mississippi Republican Thad Cochran in 2014. [A 16th, Wyoming…

Read More

One and Done?

Fifteen first-term U.S. Senators are running for reelection this cycle (excluding Illinois Republican Mark Kirk who served a shade over a month in 2010 after winning special and general elections that November). Many of these incumbents are facing grim to uncertain prospects for winning a second term and history suggests at least one will be…

Read More

The Real Law and Order Party

On Monday, Donald Trump proclaimed himself the “law and order candidate” – resurrecting Richard Nixon’s 1968 campaign rhetoric. More than a century prior, the actual Law and Order Party had electoral success for a brief period in Rhode Island. Formed in the early 1840s in response to the Dorr Rebellion (a movement led by Thomas…

Read More

Hard to Say Good-Bayh?

Evan Bayh’s headline-making entrance into Indiana’s 2016 U.S. Senate race brings a familiar name back to the front page in Hoosier State politics. Bayh previously served two terms in the chamber before retiring in 2010 while his father, Birch, served three terms ending with a 7.4-point loss to Republican Dan Quayle during the Reagan Revolution…

Read More