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4 Native candidates for Congress advance to November

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Via: 1stwarrior • 4 years ago • 9 comments

4 Native candidates for Congress advance to November

S E E D E D C O N T E N T

At least four Native candidates for Congress will advance to the general election.

Both candidates running in Idaho on Tuesday — Paulette Jordan, Coeur d’Alene, and Rudy Soto, Shoshone-Bannock — will appear on the November ballot.

Jordan will face incumbent U.S. Senator Jim Risch, while Soto will compete against incumbent U.S. Rep Russ Fulcher.

In New Mexico, Yvette Herrell, Cherokee, won the Republican nomination for a U.S. House seat. She will run against incumbent Democrat Rep. Xochitl Torres Small.

Incumbent U.S. Rep. Deb Haaland, Laguna Pueblo, officially won the Democratic nomination in her bid for reelection, with no opposition in her New Mexico primary. She faces Republican Michelle Garcia Holmes in November.

Also in New Mexico, Republicans Gavin Clarkson, Choctaw, and Elisa Martinez, Navajo, lost their primary bids in a U.S. Senate race.

That leaves one Native congressional candidate whose race had yet to be called late Tuesday, plus six more with primaries in August.

Indian Country Today has been following 40 Native candidates seeking various offices Tuesday, including Congress and state legislature seats, in New Mexico, Idaho, Montana, South Dakota and Iowa.

Still pending: Karen Bedonie, Navajo, is running as a Republican in a congressional primary in New Mexico. She was in third place late Tuesday with 67 percent of precincts reporting.

Another contest of note Tuesday was in Montana, where state Rep. Shane Morigeau, Salish Kootenai, won the Democratic nomination for the office of state auditor. He will run against Troy Downing in November.

Two of Tuesday's congressional candidates, Haaland and Soto, opted out of campaign parties in lieu of attending Black Lives Matter events.

Soto attended a candlelight vigil at the Idaho State Capitol in Boise. He gave post-election interviews from the event.

"I didn't want to have a celebration because it did not fit the times that we're in as a country," Soto said. He estimates thousands of people took part in the peaceful vigil.

Soto defeated Staniela Nikolova, a University of Idaho law student, in a U.S. House primary. He is running as Democrat to represent the state’s 1st Congressional District.

Also in Idaho, Jordan, the 2018 Democratic gubernatorial nominee, spoke from the Coeur d'Alene Reservation after defeating former congressional candidate Jim Vandermaas.

"Thank you all, everyone, for taking this time to vote for me and to vote for my family. By voting, you're voting for yourselves. You're voting for Idaho," she said in remarks streamed live on Facebook.

"Because we [Idaho] turned out to vote with a new record set in the Democratic primary, this has shown that people are willing to fight for our Idaho. And when the pandemic forced this primary to an all-absentee election, it triggered an unprecedented number of ballot requests, and now the highest percentage of voter participation in a primary election in decades."

Jordan advances to face a tough general-election race against Risch, who ran unopposed in the GOP primary. Risch is seeking his third six-year term representing one of the country's most conservative states.

Jordan is well-known in the state from her campaign two years ago, when she sought to become the county’s first Native American governor. She has generally advocated for progressive policies, including teacher loan forgiveness, better rural education and better access to health care.

Risch has a lengthy career in Idaho politics, serving briefly as governor in 2006. He chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and has been an avid supporter of President Donald Trump.

In New Mexico, Haaland was unopposed in her Democratic primary Tuesday in the metropolitan 1st Congressional District. In November, she will face Holmes, a Bernalillo-based attorney and former police detective.

The compact district overlapping Albuquerque hasn’t been represented by a Republican since 2009.

Four Native Republicans also competed in New Mexico primaries.

Two of them ⁠— Clarkson and Martinez — were running in the same contest to compete in an open race to replace retiring U.S. Sen. Tom Udall. They were defeated Tuesday by former television weatherman Mark Ronchetti of Albuquerque.

Bedonie is running as a Republican to represent New Mexico’s 3rd congressional district. Her opponents are environmental engineer Alexis Johnson of Santa Fe and former Santa Fe County commissioner Harry Montoya.

In southern New Mexico’s 2nd Congressional District, Herrell defeated oil executive Claire Chase of Roswell and Las Cruces businessman Chris Mathys.

In Montana, Morigeau was one of two candidates for the Democratic nomination for state auditor. He defeated consumer advocate Mike Winsor, a former assistant state attorney general.

Morigeau will face the Republican nominee in the general election, Downing, a U.S. Air Force veteran and real estate investor.

Other state legislative races with Native candidates, updated as of Wednesday, June 3 at 9 a.m. EDT:

In Iowa, one candidate ran for state Legislature: