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Wake Up To Politics - November 23, 2015

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Monday, November 23, 2015
351 Days until Election Day 2016
70 Days until the Iowa Caucuses I'm Gabe Fleisher for Wake Up To Politics, and reporting from WUTP world HQ in my bedroom - Good morning: THIS IS YOUR WAKE UP CALL!!!
To send me questions, comments, tips, new subscribers, and more: email me at wakeuptopolitics@gmail.com. To learn more about WUTP and subscribe, visit the site: wakeuptopolitics.com, or like me on Twitter and Facebook. More ways to engage with WUTP at the bottom.    #WUTPDebate: Faces of Des Moines

  • To complete my coverage of the second Democratic debate in Des Moines, Iowa (which I attended last week), I created “Faces of Des Moines,” photographs of six people I met on the Drake University campus, and why they support the presidential candidate they do.
  • If you missed my firsthand account of the debate, “Wake Up To Politics Goes for a Spin,” you can read that report here.
  • All photographs in “Faces of Des Moines” were taken by me, and all quotes collected in interviews I conducted with the six people photographed.

Election Central

  • Louisiana: Edwards Wins Governor’s Race, Vitter to Retire from Senate Democratic State Rep. John Bel Edwards emerged victorious in the Louisiana gubernatorial election Saturday, trouncing Republican U.S. Sen. David Vitter in the GOP-leaning state. When Edwards takes office in January, the Democratic Party will finally claim a Deep South governorship – and a second statewide elected official in the region (Mississippi attorney general Jim Hood is the other).
  • Edwards took 56% of the vote Saturday, to Vitter’s 44% – a decisive 12-point margin of victory.
  • How did a lowly Democratic state legislator beat a powerful Republican Senator in a traditionally Republican state? A) Edwards is a Blue Dog Democrat, with conservative stances on gun control and abortion, both issues where he is to the right of his party. B) And then, the elephant in the room: Vitter’s prostitution scandal, which Edwards willingly used to attack Vitter’s credibility.
  • In conceding the gubernatorial race Saturday, Vitter also announced his decision not to run for a third term in 2016, a bombshell announcement. “I've lost one political campaign in my life,” Vitter said. “And ironically, it’s the campaign that I’m most proud of, particularly the last few weeks fighting shoulder to shoulder with all of you.”
  • He continued: “I’m eager to refocus on the important work of the United States Senate. I’m only going to be doing that for one more year, through the end of this term.”
  • “I have reached my personal term limit,” Vitter explained.
  • With the incumbent out of the race, next year’s Senate race opens to a wide bench of Louisiana Republicans angling for higher office. Reps. Charles Boustany and John Fleming, state Treasurer John Kennedy, and Public Service Commissioner Scott Angelle may all run in the Republican primary.
  • Although he is likely battle-scarred from the governor’s race, Vitter’s retiring is a huge boon for his party, now that his chances of winning statewide are in doubt.

2016 Central

  • Today on the Trail Where are the 2016 candidates today?
  • Iowa Republican Carly Fiorina is in the fourth and final day of an Iowa swing; today, she attends two house parties, one in Council Bluffs and the other in Sioux City.
  • Republican Marco Rubio is on the penultimate day of his five-day Iowa swing; he will hold two town halls, one at Greasewood Flats Ranch in Carroll and the other at Holiday Inn & Suites in Council Bluffs.
  • Nevada Democrat Hillary Clinton will visit Crossroads, a “public-private partnership between Washoe County Social Services and Catholic Charities of Northern Nevada” according to the campaign, and is hosting an organizing event at Pine Middle School in Reno, Nevada.
  • The Silver State is third to vote in the Democratic presidential primary process, after Iowa and New Hampshire.
  • New Hampshire Democrat Martin O’Malley visits the Granite State today, attending the Future Leaders Forum at Bedford High School and holding town halls at the Riverwoods Retirement Community in Exeter and at Franklin Pierce University in Rindge. Notably, this is the birthday of that university’s namesake, President Franklin Pierce (a New Hampshire resident).
  • Republican Lindsey Graham is on the fourth day of a five-day swing through the Granite State; today, he tours businesses in Hillsborough and Keene, and also holds a town hall at Franklin Pierce University in Rindge.
  • Ohio Republican Donald Trump will hold a rally at the Greater Columbus Convention Center in Columbus, Ohio.

White House Watch

  • The President’s Schedule At 12:15am, President Barack Obama returned to the White House from his nine-day Asia trip. There are no other items on his public schedule.
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For more on Wake Up To Politics, listen to Gabe on NPR's "Talk of the Nation, the Political Junkie podcast, and St. Louis Public Radio; watch Gabe on MSNBC's "Up with Steve Kornacki, and read about Gabe in Politico, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Globe, and the St. Louis Jewish Light