House races

Former California state Sen. Tony Strickland (R) has filed for a rematch against freshman Rep. Julia Brownley (D-Calif.), giving Republicans a strong recruit in a slightly Democratic-leaning suburban Los Angeles district.

Strickland, a highly touted 2012 recruit who narrowly lost to Brownley, filed his statement of candidacy and campaign paperwork on Tuesday.

The former state senator came within 5 percentage points of Brownley in 2012, running a few points ahead of GOP nominee Mitt Romney in the district. Democratic outside groups had to spend millions against him to win the district. 

In a lower-turnout midterm election, he could prove to be a tough candidate for Brownley to hold off.

Comedian Stephen Colbert is hosting a pair of fundraisers in Washington and New York to support the his sister's bid to capture South Carolina's first congressional district.

Tickets to the fundraisers start at $500 and go as high as $10,000, according to a report from CNN. 

"Lulu and I have been through a lot together, and I know she is a bright, competent, caring woman who will work hard on behalf of all the citizens of South Carolina's 1st Congressional District," Colbert writes in the invitation for the event.

Read more...

Gwen Graham, the daughter of former Florida Gov. Bob Graham and a top Democratic recruit, will challenge Rep. Steve Southerland (R-Fla.) in 2014, she announced Tuesday.

Two Democrats are jumping in for the chance to face Rep. John Kline (R-Minn.). Read more...

Former Obama administration official Ro Khanna (D) will officially announce he'll run against longtime Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.) on Tuesday. Read more...

Redlands, Calif., Mayor Pete Aguilar (D) will make another bid for Congress, giving Democrats a top-tier challenger to Rep. Gary Miller (R-Calif.). Read more...

Citizens United Political Victory Fund contributed $101,000 in the first quarter to 18 candidates running in state and federal races nationwide, an indication it plans to help defend those candidates from primary challenges in 2014.

South Carolina's 1st congressional district leans heavily Republican, but the upstart Democrat has run a strong campaign.

Democratic House candidate Elizabeth Colbert Busch has scrubbed her Twitter account, deleting hundreds of tweets from her account on Monday — the day before the general election will begin.

The campaign portrayed the move, which was caught by the Sunlight Foundation, as an attempt to make it easier for supporters to follow her event schedule. Many of the tweets deleted were retweets from other sources.

But a few removed retweets of jokes making fun of the Republican Party — she needs to win over independents and some Republicans to win — as well as one saying she is "both pro-choice and in favor of marriage equality," positions that could be tricky in the Republican-leaning district.

Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch leads former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford (R) heading into their likely general election faceoff, according to a new poll released by her campaign.

Colbert Busch, a businesswoman and sister of comedian Stephen Colbert, leads Sanford 47 percent to 44 percent in her poll. 

While campaigns' polls should always be taken with a grain of salt, these numbers line up with those from a recent poll by Democratic-affiliated Public Policy Polling that also showed a tight race.