Podcast: General election season starts *now*

The long primary season that began—if you can believe it—more than six months ago has at last come to an end, finally setting the stage for November's general election. First, though, we have a few races to recap on this week's episode of The Downballot podcast, including the Democrats' primary for New Hampshire's open governorship, their most enticing flip opportunity in the nation. Co-hosts David Nir and David Beard also excoriate Ron DeSantis for using Florida's state government to fight an abortion rights amendment, a maneuver direct from the authoritarian's playbook.

Our guest on the show this week is Lauren Gepford, whose group, Contest Every Race, recruits Democratic candidates nationwide to run in races far down the ballot that often go uncontested. Gepford explains how her organization figures out which of the nation's half-million elected positions to target (it's a huge task!) and tells us about its remarkably effective recruitment tool: texting folks to ask them if they might want to run. Even in the reddest areas, it's all about giving voters a choice when they might otherwise have none.

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