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Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* Now that former Gov. Mitch Daniels has bowed out of Indiana’s open Senate race, the National Republican Senatorial Committee is rallying behind far-right Rep. Jim Banks, who was already in the race.
* On a related note, the NRSC’s move in Indiana wasn’t great news for Republican Rep. Victoria Spartz, who has been eyeing the same statewide race, and who apparently won’t have her party’s backing.
* Rep. George Santos didn’t need yet another unflattering report, but the New York Republican has one anyway: Mother Jones spoke to one of the congressman’s relatives, who’s listed on campaign finance documents as having given Santos $5,800. That same relative said there was no such donation.
* Meanwhile, two other New York Republican congressmen — Reps. Nick LaLota and Anthony D’Esposito — said Santos’ decision to step away from his committee assignments wasn’t good enough and the scandal-plagued liar still needs to resign.
* In Arizona, former Sen. Dennis DeConcini — technically, the only Arizona Democrat in the last half century to serve a full term in the Senate — has endorsed Rep. Ruben Gallego’s 2024 Democratic Senate campaign. In 2018, DeConcini was an enthusiastic supporter of Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, before she became an independent.
* Speaking of 2024 endorsements, Donald Trump hasn’t exactly been flooded with congressional supporters, but two freshmen GOP senators — Ohio’s J.D. Vance and Missouri’s Eric Schmitt — have announced that they’re backing the former president’s comeback bid.
* The Washington Post had an interesting report yesterday, noting that the Republican National Committee’s National Election Integrity Team has prepared a report endorsing the creation of “a permanent infrastructure in every state to ramp up ‘election integrity’ activities in response to perceptions within GOP ranks of widespread fraud and abuse in the way the country selects its leaders.” Or put another way, the party isn’t giving up on the Big Lie or the thinking surrounding it.