FRIDAY’S CAMPAIGN ROUND-UP…. Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t necessarily generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:
* After trailing in the polls for about a year, Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn (D), the onetime lieutenant governor to Rod Blagojevich, managed to win a full term this week, narrowly defeating former state Sen. Bill Brady (R).
* In Minnesota’s gubernatorial election, former U.S. Sen. Mark Dayton (D) leads state Rep. Tom Emmer (R) by just under 9,000 votes — out of over 2 million votes cast — and a recount appears inevitable.
* There are apparently still some ambiguities, but it looks like Dan Malloy (D) is probably going to be Connecticut’s next governor.
* In one of the U.S. House races that remained unresolved, Rep. Raul Grijalva (D) was declared the winner in Arizona this morning. The net gain for Republicans, then, remains at 60 seats.
* On a related note, there are still 11 U.S. House races where we do not yet know who won.
* In Alaska, plenty of litigation will probably follow the resolution of the U.S. Senate race, and this morning, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R) created a legal defense fund to bankroll her post-election fight with Joe Miller (R).
* Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman (R), who cruised to a landslide re-election win this week, announced yesterday he will not challenge Sen. Ben Nelson (D) in 2012. State Attorney General Jon Bruning (R) will very likely be Nelson’s opponent.
* Nate Silver did some preliminary analysis and found that Rasmussen was 2010’s least accurate pollster. On the other hand, SurveyUSA and Quinnipiac fared quite well.
* No one seems to want to be chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) for the 2012 cycle, and the caucus appears ready to beg Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to take the job he recently held.
* On a related note, Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) is stepping down as chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) after two terms.
* And in 2012 news, Howard Dean is “absolutely, categorically” not running for president in 2012. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton isn’t running, either.
