Scott reminded me about the primary in AZ-01 and sent in this AP story about the results. The Downballot has the whole sad tale:
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee just saw another of its preferred candidates lose a primary, marking the committee’s third unsuccessful intervention this cycle.
On Wednesday night, the Associated Press called the contest in Arizona’s 1st Congressional District for former state Rep. Amish Shah, who led former TV anchor Marlene Galan-Woods 40-34.
Shah, who is also an emergency room physician, ran for this same seat in 2024, narrowly winning the Democratic primary—in which Galan-Woods placed a close third—before losing to Republican Rep. Dave Schweikert by a tight 52-48 margin.
Following Shah’s near-miss, the DCCC’s decision to spend so heavily on Galan-Woods’ behalf perplexed and infuriated Democrats across the spectrum both before and after election night.
Telling Axios she was “frustrated” by the move earlier this month, progressive Arizona Rep. Adelita Grijalva said, “I get the argument that you want to back the person you think can beat the Republican, but unless the other candidate is a DINO, I think they need to stay out,” using a shorthand for “Democrat in name only.”
On Wednesday, Rep. Susie Lee, a moderate from neighboring Nevada, similarly questioned the wisdom of getting involved in primaries when Democrats are fighting to take back control of the House.
“I personally don’t think we should be investing against Democrats when we’ve got a big battleground,” she told Axios.
Unlike in some other contests where the DCCC has weighed in, though, there was little if any ideological gap between the two candidates. Rather, according to Axios, the committee found Shah “difficult to work with” during his last campaign, complaining that he preferred knocking doors to fundraising and did not want to air negative ads.
Shah, though, didn’t seem averse to raising money, as he brought in more than $6.3 million during the 2024 cycle, making him one of the strongest fundraisers among Democratic challengers.
He also ran almost neck-and-neck with the top of the ticket despite facing an incumbent: According to calculations by The Downballot, Donald Trump carried the 1st District 51-48, while Schweikert, who badly lost the GOP primary for governor on Tuesday, prevailed by just 4 points.
The last paragraph is a little confusing — to be clear, Schweikert is not running for AZ-01 so it’s an open seat with Shah, who put in a good showing in 2024, running in November. Why would you want to throw $500K into any side of this primary, as the DCCC did? Shah has all the marks of a decent candidate, and this is clearly a “let the voters decide” election. The DCCC’s action here makes no sense to me. Here are some more fails:
Other efforts also unfolded late in the day. In California’s 22nd District, the committee waited until the week before the June 2 primary to try to boost moderate Assemblywoman Jasmeet Bains past her more progressive rival, school board trustee Randy Villegas, with a reported $135,000 ad buy. But it was Villegas who prevailed and will now take on Republican Rep. David Valadao in the fall.
The DCCC took a similar approach in Maine’s open 2nd District, where it unsuccessfully spent a reported $157,000 to help state Sen. Joe Baldacci defeat state Auditor Matt Dunlap just one week before they squared off on June 9. Dunlap will go up against former Gov. Paul LePage in November.
[…]
In all three cases, the DCCC didn’t act until the primary was close at hand, and in at least the first two races, it spent relatively little.
One of the things that’s infuriating about this is that 2026 will probably be a wave election, even with all the gerrymandering. The DCCC could just as easily send $100-200K to reasonable candidates in “stretch” districts — ones where it’s unlikely that the Democrat could win, but has a chance. That money would go a long way to pay a staffer or two, pay for travel for the candidate, and pay for signs, bumper stickers, etc. Instead, they’re just throwing away money on ineffective ad buys. They could have just as easily lit that money on fire, for all the good it did.
