Tough primary season for incumbents reaches grand finale in Massachusetts 

▪ Generational battles in Massachusetts

▪ Army secretary hands in resignation

▪ Supreme Court lets Trump’s ballroom go ahead

▪ Kalshi issues platform bans

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A brutal primary cycle for congressional incumbents will face its final test cases today in Massachusetts as longtime officeholders seek to fend off challenges from much younger opponents. 

Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) appears likely to comfortably win his race against the more moderate and much younger Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), setting him on track for another six-year term. 

But things aren’t looking as rosy for Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.), who has served in the House since 2001. This year’s challenge from attorney and voting rights advocate Patrick Roath is the toughest of his career.  

Roath, who is 39 years old, is running to the 71-year-old Lynch’s left, attacking him for votes on immigration, healthcare and abortion. He’s refused to accept corporate PAC money and declared support for abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and instituting term limits for members of Congress. 

Lynch has meanwhile pointed to his decades of experience and accomplishments for Massachusetts’s 8th Congressional District. But that experience may be a vulnerability in a year that has seen members of both parties fall to anti-incumbent sentiment. 

So far this cycle, 11 incumbent House members have lost primaries to challengers, seven of whom are Democrats. The total is the highest number of House members defeated for renomination in a nonredistricting year since at least 1960. 

This year has functioned as a redistricting year of sorts with several Republican- and Democratic-led states redrawing their lines this year as part of the national redistricting war. But only one member — Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) — lost his primary after being forced to run directly against another incumbent. 

One additional Republican will be ousted in November as GOP Reps. Ken Calvert and Young Kim will face off for a second time this year, as a result of California’s redistricting and jungle primary system.  

Rep. Julie Johnson (D-Texas) also lost her primary after her district was redrawn, but that was because former Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas), after losing a Senate run two years ago, mounted a political comeback. 

In addition, two Senate incumbents — GOP Sens. John Cornyn (Texas) and Bill Cassidy (La.) — both lost to primary challengers, an occurrence that hasn’t happened since 2010. 

Lynch isn’t the only incumbent House Democrat facing a primary challenge in Massachusetts. Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.) is trying to fend off a primary challenge from teacher Jeromie Whalen, while AI researcher Jason Poulos is challenging Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-Mass.). 

But Roath is much more well-funded, has attracted support from several big names and seems to be best positioned to advance. 

Roath has outraised Lynch in the primary, racking up nearly $1.3 million compared to the incumbent’s roughly $900,000, according to the latest Federal Election Commission filings. 

A former aide to former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D), Roath has notched a key endorsement from his old boss as well as David Hogg, the gun control advocate and founder of the political group Leaders We Deserve. 

Roath also has support from The Boston Globe’s editorial board and multiple teachers’ unions. 

A few other tests of the establishment will take place before the primary cycle fully wraps up. Rep. Chris Pappas (D-N.H.) is trying to win the Democratic nomination for Senate next week against a progressive opponent, while Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee (D) is facing a challenge from former CVS executive Helena Foulkes. 

But Tuesday seems likely to mark the last real chance of this cycle for an incumbent congressman to be taken down. If Lynch does come up short, that would bring the number of defeated House members to an even dozen. 

▪ The Hill Insider: Democratic incumbents try to defy generational change push. 

▪ The Hill Insider: Democrats argue they’re the normal ones. 

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) read a dozen........

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