Welcome to the Thursday, June 25, Brew. Here’s what’s in store for you as you start your day:

1. Initial June 23 election results
2. Coronavirus could allow next Congress to block more Trump administration regulations
3. Previewing the Utah Republican gubernatorial primary

Initial June 23 election results

We covered elections in seven states on June 23. Below is a selection of battleground race results that were available on Wednesday afternoon. Both Kentucky and New York election officials said they will count absentee ballots in major population centers until June 30, so we won’t have full results from those states until next week.

North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District Republican primary runoff

Madison Cawthorn defeated Lynda Bennett in North Carolina's 11th Congressional District Republican primary runoff. Cawthorn received 66% of the vote to Bennett's 34%. Former incumbent Mark Meadows (R) left office early to serve as White House chief of staff. Meadows, along with President Donald Trump, endorsed Bennett in the race. Cawthorn was endorsed by several former primary candidates, local sheriffs, and the Protect Freedom PAC.

Cawthorn completed Ballotpedia’s Candidate Connection survey. He listed the following as the three key messages of his campaign: 

• Balanced budget amendment to the constitution

• Term limits on members of congress

• Combating the rise of socialism in America 

New York’s 14th Congressional District Democratic primary

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D) defeated challengers Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, Badrun Khan, and Sam Sloan in the Democratic primary for New York's 14th Congressional District. Ocasio-Cortez had received 72.9% of the vote to Caruso-Cabrera's 19.6% as of Wednesday at noon Eastern. This was Ocasio-Cortez's first primary after she unseated incumbent Joseph Crowley in the 2018 election. 

New York’s 16th Congressional District Democratic primary

Jamaal Bowman defeated incumbent Eliot Engel in the Democratic primary for New York's 16th Congressional District. Chris Fink, Sammy Ravelo, and Andom Ghebreghiorgis, who unofficially withdrew from the race but appeared on the ballot, all received less than 2% of the vote. Engel, who was first elected in 1988, received endorsements from former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D), and the Congressional Black Caucus. Bowman, a former middle school principal, was endorsed by U.S. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I) and Elizabeth Warren (D) and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D). Engel is the fourth incumbent to lose a re-election bid this cycle.

United States Senate election in Kentucky (Democratic primary)

Ten candidates ran in the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate seat from Kentucky. As of Wednesday afternoon, the race remained too close to call. Kentucky Rep. Charles Booker and Marine Corp veteran Amy McGrath have the top-two spots, with Booker receiving 36.5% of the vote to McGrather’s 44.7%. Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez endorsed Booker. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and VoteVets were among McGrath's endorsers. The race won’t be called until June 30, when the remaining absentee ballots will be counted.

Learn more

       

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Coronavirus could allow next Congress to block more Trump administration regulations

The coronavirus pandemic has affected many different aspects of the government and politics, whether it’s federal policy changes, legislative session changes, or statewide school and court closures. But one aspect I found particularly interesting is how Trump administration regulations could be affected by the coronavirus. Here’s a quick breakdown.

• Under the Congressional Review Act (CRA), a new Congress has 75 legislative days to overturn agency rules issued in the last 60 days of a prior session of Congress. Since the coronavirus pandemic led congressional leaders to cancel business on several days when Congress would have otherwise been in session, attorney Robert Mangas argued in the National Law Review that the beginning of the final 60 days may have already passed. There could be an expanded window of opportunity under the CRA to challenge agency actions taken in the remaining months of this year. According to the Congressional Research Service, between 1996 and 2007 (104th to 110th Congresses), the 60th day from the end of the session ranged from May 12 to Sept. 9.

• The president must sign CRA resolutions for them to go into effect. A CRA resolution is legislation passed by Congress that blocks new agency rules from going into effect and prevents agencies from making similar rules in the future without permission from Congress.

•  If President Trump wins re-election, opponents of agency actions taken this year would have to gather enough votes to override his veto. However, if another candidate becomes president in 2021, rules made by agencies through most of 2020 could be vulnerable under the CRA.

Administrative law scholars refer to rules adopted at the end of presidential administrations as midnight rules. Since 1948, agencies have made rules at a higher rate in the time between election day in November and inauguration day the following January compared with other periods.

In the first four months of the Trump administration, President Trump signed 14 CRA resolutions from Congress that overturned rules issued near the end of Barack Obama's (D) presidency. Before 2017, Congress had used the CRA successfully once to overturn a rule on ergonomics in the workplace in 2001.

Previewing the Utah Republican gubernatorial primary

We’ll be covering statewide elections in Colorado, Oklahoma, and Utah on June 30. Leading up to Tuesday, we’re previewing some of the battleground races that will be on the ballot. Today, let’s look at the Republican primary for the governor’s race in Utah.

Utah Lieutenant Gov. Spencer Cox, former state Rep. Gregory Hughes, former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, and businessman Thomas Wright are running in the primary. Cox, Huntsman, and Wright earned their spots on the primary ballot by submitting petitions from 28,000 registered party members, while Hughes earned his spot by placing second in the state party’s annual nominating convention (Cox, the first-place finisher, had already qualified via signature). 

Polling and media attention have identified Cox and Huntsman as the leading candidates. Both emphasize their political experience in campaign messaging. Gov. Gary Herbert (R) and former 2020 gubernatorial candidate Aimee Winder Newton (R) endorsed Cox, while Sen. Mike Lee (R) and Former Rep. Mia Love (R) endorsed Huntsman. When he won re-election in 2016, Gov. Herbert announced he would not seek an additional term in 2020.

The outcomes of the 2020 election cycle in Utah stand to influence the state's redistricting process following the 2020 census. In Utah, the state legislature is responsible for enacting both congressional and state legislative district plans. District plans are subject to gubernatorial veto.

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