Politics

What to Watch in Tuesday’s Primaries: Ilhan Omar and Georgia’s QAnon Candidate


Six states hold primaries and runoffs on Tuesday, but the spotlight will be on Representative Ilhan Omar, Democrat of Minnesota. In her primary race for re-election on Tuesday, she hopes to continue a string of victories by progressive candidates nationwide, but she faces a well-financed challenge from Antone Melton-Meaux, a lawyer who has raised more than $4 million.

In Georgia, a Republican QAnon supporter has a good chance of winning her party’s nomination in the 14th Congressional District. But the attention in Georgia will be on the election system there as much as on the candidates; ditto Wisconsin, which also votes on Tuesday. These two battleground states struggled to hold earlier primary elections amid the coronavirus pandemic; though Tuesday’s elections will probably be lower turnout, any test of the voting apparatus in Wisconsin and in Georgia will be closely monitored.

Polls are open from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Eastern time in Minnesota; 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Eastern time in Georgia; and 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Eastern time in Wisconsin.

It was long thought that Representative Rashida Tlaib, Democrat of Michigan, was the only member of the so-called squad who would face a difficult re-election. But by the time Ms. Tlaib cruised to victory last week, Ms. Omar’s challenge might have eclipsed Ms. Tlaib’s. That’s because Ms. Omar is facing a well-funded opponent.

Ms. Omar is one of the few Muslim voices in Congress, and groups on the left believe that her representation has changed the scope of international debates. While both Ms. Omar and Mr. Melton-Meaux refer to themselves as progressives, one dividing line between them is their stance on Israel. Ms. Omar supports an effort to divest from Israel over its treatment of Palestinians, while Mr. Melton-Meaux has the backing of several pro-Israel groups.

Should Ms. Omar prevail, it would mean a clean sweep of victories for the squad, the group of four progressive Congresswomen of color who have been at the vanguard of the Democratic Party, helping to push it leftward.

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, the best-known member of the group, cruised to a dominant primary victory in June. Representative Ayanna S. Pressley of Massachusetts is unopposed. And last week, Ms. Tlaib easily dispatched an opponent she had edged out two years ago.

A victory for Ms. Greene is going to make that balancing act far harder. She has been caught in Facebook videos making a series of offensive remarks about Black people, Jews and Muslims. And unlike some other QAnon-linked candidates, she has made no effort to soft-pedal her support for the conspiracy theory. She recently called it “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to take this global cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles out.”

Yet she nonetheless won 40 percent of the vote in the district’s Republican primary in June. Mr. Cowan won 21 percent, and the remainder of the votes were split between seven other candidates.

In Wisconsin, which was the first state to hold a large, statewide election as the number of coronavirus cases was surging in the U.S. in early April, the virus is still nearing peak levels but the elections apparatus appears to be on more solid footing. One of the central causes of the long, mask-clad lines in Milwaukee in April was a drastic shortage of poll workers, which led to the city consolidating its polling locations to five from 180.

On Tuesday, about 170 voting sites will be open in Milwaukee, or roughly 95 percent of the regular sites. The state also activated the National Guard, which will be dressed in plain clothes, to be on standby should there be any emergency shortages on Tuesday.

Though the complaints of missing or late arriving absentee ballots in Wisconsin are fewer this year, the Wisconsin Election Commission still had about 9,000 absentee ballot requests to fulfill as of Friday, and the return rate of ballots was still somewhat low. Officials are also wondering whether the state will be able to count all of the absentee ballots in time for reporting results by Tuesday night.

In Georgia, where about 60 percent of the state’s counties are holding elections, the turnout isn’t expected to reach levels where long lines would be a problem like during the primary. The state’s most populous county — Fulton — also opened an early voting location at State Farm Arena to help alleviate Election Day surges.

The absentee ballot deadlines, which required a ballot to arrive by close of business on Friday, remain unchanged from the primary election in June.



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