Today's installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* Ahead of Iowa's Democratic presidential caucuses, a newly released New York Times/Siena poll shows four candidates within five points of each other: Elizabeth Warren is out in front with 22%, followed by Bernie Sanders at 19%, Pete Buttigieg at 18%, and Joe Biden at 17%. The only other candidate to top 3% was Amy Klobuchar, who had 4%.
* Elizabeth Warren promised to go into more detail on how she intends to finance her Medicare-for-All plan, and this morning, the Massachusetts Democrat unveiled a relatively detailed blueprint that places most of the revenue burden on businesses and the wealthy, while proposing "not one penny in middle-class tax increases."
* Former Housing Secretary Julian Castro said he needed to raise $800,000 by last night or he'd end his presidential campaign. It appears he met his goal, so his candidacy will continue.
* With two weeks remaining before Louisiana's competitive gubernatorial race, Donald Trump said this morning he'll visit the Pelican State tonight for a campaign rally in support of first-time candidate Eddie Rispone. According to the White House schedule, however, he'll actually be in Mississippi tonight, and he'll campaign in Louisiana on Wednesday.
* On a related note, Kentucky's gubernatorial election is Tuesday, and Trump has scheduled a rally in the Bluegrass State on Monday night in support of incumbent Gov. Matt Bevin (R).
* Speaking of Kentucky, Ed Kilgore had a good piece yesterday on the degree to which Republicans are trying to create a "red scare" in the state's gubernatorial race, sending direct mail "modeled on 1930s-era Soviet posters of Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin, but with the evil commie trio of Warren, AOC, and Bernie flanking Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andy Beshear, who is about as much of a socialist as Mitch McConnell is a model of bipartisanship."
* In New Mexico, Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver (D) ended her U.S. Senate campaign this week, clearing the way for Rep. Ben Ray Luján (D) to win his party's nomination in the state's open Senate race. Toulouse Oliver quickly endorsed her former rival.
* And a year after Don Blankenship's failed Senate campaign in West Virginia, the former coal executive and ex-con is apparently launching a third-party presidential campaign, seeking the nomination of the far-right Constitution Party.