2026 Generic Ballot / Recruitment / Fundraising / Ratings Megathread

[Storr]

https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:ats4shmeia7i7ildqm3denmd/post/3ll4uhykpa22i

I wouldn't be surprised if this relatively early official FEC filing and campaign announcement is meant as a shot across the bow, trying to convince an 80-year old 14 term incumbent to retire:

https://twitter.com/JacobRubashkin/status/1904167817605165222

[Tekken_Guy]

https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:ats4shmeia7i7ildqm3denmd/post/3ll4uhykpa22i

Schakowsky will make short work of her if she runs.

[kwabbit]

https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:ats4shmeia7i7ildqm3denmd/post/3ll4uhykpa22i

Schakowsky will make short work of her if she runs.

She's 80 and is running in a gerrymandered district. When incumbent Democrats are at an all-time low in popularity, it's not crazy to consider that the half of the district which she's only represented for two years might be open to a change.

[wbrocks67]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

[Unbeatable Titan Susan Collins]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

[Storr]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

This line alone was enough for me to not want her in Congress: "She gained fame on TikTok for her biting political humor,"

Something interesting from that article which I didn't previously know: "Schakowsky was first elected to the 9th Congressional District in 1998, after serving eight years in the Illinois General Assembly. In her primary that year, she defeated then-businessperson JB Pritzker, who went on to become the state’s governor in 2019."

[Gass3268]

Lived in this district for a few years, there is a legit solid Muslim population here plus obviously the student/lefty vote in Evanston. Yet also a large Orthodox Jewish population. Would be very interesting. 

[インターネット掲示板ユーザー Punxsutawney Phil]

In a 2025 Committee on Energy and Commerce hearing on manufacturing, Schakowsky expressed a concern that the presence of the word "man" in the term manufacturing might harm engagement of women in the manufacturing sector, saying that the term "sounds like a guy".[66] Her comments went viral on social media and were widely ridiculed.[67][68]

Look, Schakowsky has her flaws, but I'm not sure if turfing her out for a Tiktok star is something I want to do.

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

Unsurprisingly her videos are rather obnoxious and unfunny.

[Atlas Force]

https://twitter.com/playdda/status/1904522512613937415

[wbrocks67]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

She's also saying she won't pay for TV ads either because it's an out of date practice. This woman seems more and more like a grifter by the second

[Steve from Lambeth]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

She's also saying she won't pay for TV ads either because it's an out of date practice. This woman seems more and more like a grifter by the second

This is unironically the kind of answer you'd expect to see in a New Campaign Trail mod

[Virginiá]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

She's also saying she won't pay for TV ads either because it's an out of date practice. This woman seems more and more like a grifter by the second

I feel like this is a dead giveaway that a candidate has no idea what they are doing. There's a huge difference between not over-spending on TV ads when it's already saturated (diminishing returns etc) and just not doing any at all. Seems like she's been operating in her digital bubble for too long and doesn't realize huge portions of the country still use traditional media - such as older Democratic primary voters, a group of voters she might be interested in reaching.

[Tekken_Guy]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

She's also saying she won't pay for TV ads either because it's an out of date practice. This woman seems more and more like a grifter by the second

She also said Hamas are not anti-Semitic. In a district with a heavy Jewish presence.

The primary is Safe Schakowsky if it’s just these two.

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

She's also saying she won't pay for TV ads either because it's an out of date practice. This woman seems more and more like a grifter by the second

LOL that's exactly what Ilhan Omar did in 2022 when she almost lost the primary to a 70+ year old with a ton of baggage.

To be fair it wasn't Omar herself who opted not to run TV ads but some of the clowns she had running her campaign (including a communications director who ["I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP" disclaimer] spent all of primary day bragging about his PC gaming rig on Twitter instead of working on GOTV to help his boss keep her job), but that really underscores how effective this sort of thing is.

[falling apart like the ashes of American flags]

This is giving me vibes of Washington 2020 when some other clown who was a Chapo Trap House listener and even posted on r/ChapoTrapHouse (a garbage edgelord sub that had little to do with the actual CTH podcast and later got banned) announced a primary challenge to Denny Heck with nonsensical positions like opposing the Iran deal because he wanted Iran to get nuclear weapons and not only abolishing student loan debt and making all universities tuition-free but also paying students to attend college. After Heck dropped out he started bragging about "forcing him out" and made a big fuss that he had more Twitter followers than him prior to the drop out only for it to be then revealed Heck just wanted to run for LG. So a bunch of serious Democrats got in, he got even more idiotic and gave one of the worst podcast interviews of all time, and in the end ended up getting less than 1% of the vote. Amusingly this resulted in a higher dollars spent per vote received ratio than Michael Bloomberg got in 2020.

[DaleCooper]

Ugh, I'm totally open to 80-year olds being primaried in theory, but by "progressive influencers"? Yuck

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/24/illinois-progressive-congress-member-attracts-gen-z-challenger-027500

Lives in the District No
Voted in Illinois in 2024 No

She's also saying she won't pay for TV ads either because it's an out of date practice. This woman seems more and more like a grifter by the second

I feel like this is a dead giveaway that a candidate has no idea what they are doing. There's a huge difference between not over-spending on TV ads when it's already saturated (diminishing returns etc) and just not doing any at all. Seems like she's been operating in her digital bubble for too long and doesn't realize huge portions of the country still use traditional media - such as older Democratic primary voters, a group of voters she might be interested in reaching.

Also the less money you spend on advertising for your fake congressional campaign, the more money you can steal from all the donations you get. This has con-artistry written all over it.

[GALeftist]

This is giving me vibes of Washington 2020 when some other clown who was a Chapo Trap House listener and even posted on r/ChapoTrapHouse (a garbage edgelord sub that had little to do with the actual CTH podcast and later got banned) announced a primary challenge to Denny Heck with nonsensical positions like opposing the Iran deal because he wanted Iran to get nuclear weapons and not only abolishing student loan debt and making all universities tuition-free but also paying students to attend college. After Heck dropped out he started bragging about "forcing him out" and made a big fuss that he had more Twitter followers than him prior to the drop out only for it to be then revealed Heck just wanted to run for LG. So a bunch of serious Democrats got in, he got even more idiotic and gave one of the worst podcast interviews of all time, and in the end ended up getting less than 1% of the vote. Amusingly this resulted in a higher dollars spent per vote received ratio than Michael Bloomberg got in 2020.

Man Joshua4Congress is a blast from the past lol

[Lief 🗽]

> Progressive activist influencer

> Keffiyeh conspicuously placed in background of announcement video

> Will not be spending money on ads

Congratulations to this lady, her family, and her friends, who are all about to be rich.

[wbrocks67]

Sherman is 71

https://twitter.com/allymutnick/status/1907419849938157719

[These birds not meant to fly alone]

Sherman is 71

https://twitter.com/allymutnick/status/1907419849938157719

Wow, what an ad. That's a skewering indeed. Kinda loving this new tone for Democrats going after the old guard--Mallory McMorrow's launch ad did the same. Feels like now is the time for a Democratic tea party moment.

[Existing in the context]

Sherman is 71

https://twitter.com/allymutnick/status/1907419849938157719

@JaredGolden this how you do it coward.

[Schumer can go f*** himself!]

Sherman is 71

https://twitter.com/allymutnick/status/1907419849938157719

Wow, what an ad. That's a skewering indeed. Kinda loving this new tone for Democrats going after the old guard--Mallory McMorrow's launch ad did the same. Feels like now is the time for a Democratic tea party moment.

It was a solid ad (aside from his voice sounding really whiney) until the three commitments part when he outed himself as a total moron.  Hopefully this doofus' campaign crashes and burns.

[The '90s' Last Champion]

Sherman is 71

https://twitter.com/allymutnick/status/1907419849938157719

Wow, what an ad. That's a skewering indeed. Kinda loving this new tone for Democrats going after the old guard--Mallory McMorrow's launch ad did the same. Feels like now is the time for a Democratic tea party moment.

Yes because what the Democrats need right now is more people who hold up legislation for stupid reasons and deadlock Congress. Obstructionism is bad, no matter who does it. Also after 2020-21 happened, no one who self identifies as an “activist” should ever be taken seriously again.

[These birds not meant to fly alone]

Sherman is 71

https://twitter.com/allymutnick/status/1907419849938157719

Wow, what an ad. That's a skewering indeed. Kinda loving this new tone for Democrats going after the old guard--Mallory McMorrow's launch ad did the same. Feels like now is the time for a Democratic tea party moment.

Yes because what the Democrats need right now is more people who hold up legislation for stupid reasons and deadlock Congress. Obstructionism is bad, no matter who does it. Also after 2020-21 happened, no one who self identifies as an “activist” should ever be taken seriously again.

What about this ad gave you the impression that Rakov will obstruct anything? By the way, I don't recall those you would call "activists" holding up Biden's agenda--AOC, Tlaib, Omar, Pressley, et al were very reliable votes for just about every legislative goal Biden put forth. The only folks who were obstructionists were Republicans masquerading as Democrats like Manchin, Sinema, Gottheimer, and so forth.