The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Carolyn Fiddler, and Matt Booker, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
Leading Off
●NC-Sen: Former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory announced Wednesday that he would enter the primary to succeed his fellow Republican, retiring Sen. Richard Burr. The only other notable Republican currently in the race is former Rep. Mark Walker, but a number of others have expressed interest. We also got a new name this week when an unnamed spokesperson for far-right Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson confirmed that he was thinking about getting in.
We'll start with McCrory, a longtime politician who tried to rebrand himself as an "outsider" in his kickoff video. McCrory was elected mayor of Charlotte back in 1995, and he cultivated a moderate reputation during his 14 years in office, which made him the longest-serving mayor in city history. McCrory lost a close race for governor in 2008 to Democrat Bev Perdue, and he decided to retire as mayor the following year ahead of their widely anticipated 2012 rematch. Perdue, though, ended up retiring in the face of poor approval ratings, and McCrory decisively won the contest to succeed her.