Dear Commons Community,

Layoff announcements soared in October as companies recalibrated staffing levels during the artificial intelligence boom, a sign of potential trouble ahead for the labor market, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

Job cuts for the month totaled 153,074, a 183% surge from September and 175% higher than the same month a year ago. It was the highest level for any October since 2003. This has been the worst year for announced layoffs since 2009.

“Like in 2003, a disruptive technology is changing the landscape,” said Andy Challenger, workplace expert and chief revenue officer at the firm. “At a time when job creation is at its lowest point in years, the optics of announcing layoffs in the fourth quarter are particularly unfavorable.”

The report provides a glimpse into the labor market at a time when the government has suspended data gathering and releases during the shutdown in Washington, D.C.

Challenger reports the highest level of layoffs coming from the technology sector amid a time of restructuring due to AI integration. Companies in the sector announced 33,281 cuts, nearly six times the level in September.

In total, companies have announced 1.1 million cuts this year, a 65% increase from a year ago and the highest level since the Covid pandemic year of 2020. October saw the highest total for any month in the fourth quarter since 2008.

“Some industries are correcting after the hiring boom of the pandemic, but this comes as AI adoption, softening consumer and corporate spending, and rising costs drive belt-tightening and hiring freezes. Those laid off now are finding it harder to quickly secure new roles, which could further loosen the labor market,” Challenger, Gray & Christmas said.

“Some industries are correcting after the hiring boom of the pandemic, but this comes as AI adoption, softening consumer and corporate spending, and rising costs drive belt-tightening and hiring freezes,” Andy Challenger, chief revenue officer for Challenger, Gray & Christmas, said in a statement. “Those laid off now are finding it harder to quickly secure new roles, which could further loosen the labor market.”

Job cuts so far this year have also been driven by what Challenger, Gray & Christmas called the “DOGE Impact” – mass reductions to the federal workforce and government contractors as well as the loss of federal funding to private and nonprofit entities.

This is not good and may only be the beginning!

Tony

Nancy Pelosi has been an irritant to Trump at one time calling him “a vile creature” in a CNN interview.  Credit…Doug Mills/The New York Times

Dear Commons Community,

Representative Nancy Pelosi announced yesterday that she will retire when her term concludes in 2027, ending a remarkable career in which she rose to become one of the most powerful women in American history.

Ms. Pelosi, 85, was the nation’s first and only female House speaker, and she will have represented San Francisco in Congress for 39 years when she leaves office. She has served during an era of seismic change for American society and her own city, from the throes of the AIDS crisis to the legalization of gay marriage, and through the meteoric rise of the tech sector and the nation’s extreme polarization. As reported by The New York Times.

She entered political office later in life and became a hero to Democrats for the way she wielded immense power to push Obamacare, climate change legislation and infrastructure programs through Congress.

“With a grateful heart, I look forward to my final year of service as your proud representative,” she told her constituents in a nearly six-minute video posted on X early Thursday morning, with clips of San Francisco’s iconic cable cars and colorful Victorian homes flashing in the background.

“My message to the city I love is this: San Francisco, know your power,” she continued. “We have always led the way, and now we must continue to do so by remaining full participants in our democracy and fighting for the American ideals we hold dear.”

Ms. Pelosi, who likes to use the phrase “resting is rusting,” led the House Democrats for 20 years, eight of which she spent as speaker. She has also been a prodigious fund-raiser and raised more than $1.3 billion for Democratic campaigns, according to her aides.

But she was reviled by conservatives, who painted her as the scary embodiment of liberal San Francisco values and blamed her for what they considered the nation’s decline.

She has been a chief irritant to President Trump, even to this day, calling him “a vile creature” in a CNN interview that aired this week. She presided over two of his impeachment votes in the House. And he has called her “Crazy Nancy,” with no sense of fondness for his foe.

Her Democratic colleagues said she was unlike any other politician with whom they had worked. Jackie Speier, a Bay Area Democrat who served in the House for 15 years, said that Ms. Pelosi would go down in history “as the most consequential speaker ever.”

“She has a command, a presence. All eyes turn to her,” Ms. Speier said.

Her retirement had been grist for the local and national political rumor mill for several years, and younger Democrats grew increasingly eager to run for her seat. They feared, however, that it would be folly to challenge one of the most powerful politicians in modern history.

Ms. Pelosi, for her part, told CNN days ago that she had no doubt she would win re-election if she were to run for another term.

Still, the overwhelming defeat Democrats suffered last year in the congressional and presidential races has prompted soul-searching within the party — and louder calls for older Democrats to step down and make way for new politicians with fresh ideas.

The race to succeed Ms. Pelosi was already shaping up to be a fierce one before she announced her retirement. Scott Wiener, a Democratic state senator from San Francisco who is a champion of housing construction, and Saikat Chakrabarti, who worked as Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff, have already announced they were running for the seat — with or without Ms. Pelosi on the ballot.

In recent months, Ms. Pelosi has refused to discuss her career plans, insisting she was focused solely on the passage of California’s Proposition 50, a ballot measure to approve newly drawn House districts. She worked behind the scenes to help Gov. Gavin Newsom craft the measure, which passed on Tuesday, and to raise money for the effort.

It was considered one of her final achievements, both a blow to Mr. Trump, who had sought more Republican seats in the House by gerrymandering in conservative states, and a parting gift to the next generation of California Democrats who could benefit from as many as five additional seats in the state.

Mr. Trump still has strong contempt for Ms. Pelosi.

“The retirement of Nancy Pelosi is a great thing for America,” he said on Thursday in a response to Fox News. “She was evil, corrupt, and only focused on bad things for our country.”

At a packed union hall in San Francisco on Monday morning, Ms. Pelosi was the emcee for a Proposition 50 rally that included Mr. Newsom and labor leader Dolores Huerta.

“This is a moment of truth for America,” Ms. Pelosi told the crowd. “It’s self-defense for our democracy.”

In the audience, union workers wore T-shirts that Ms. Pelosi had autographed for them and pins with drawings of six tiny Nancy Pelosis standing side by side, each wearing a suit in a different color of the rainbow.

At the rally, the ever-stylish Ms. Pelosi was sporting a green corduroy suit and green stilettos, never mind the fall she took in December on a marble staircase in Luxembourg that forced her to get a hip replacement and remain stuck for several months in dreaded flats.

Ms. Pelosi’s career in elected office has been a long one, but it did not span even half her life. Born into a politically powerful family of Democrats in Baltimore — her father and brother each served as the city’s mayor — Ms. Pelosi went the more traditional route for women of her age.

At first, anyway.

She met her husband, Paul Pelosi, at Georgetown University, and the couple moved to his hometown, San Francisco, where she stayed home to raise their five children. During that time, Mr. Pelosi grew his career as a venture capitalist.

As a young mother, Ms. Pelosi found a way to support the Democratic Party by opening up the family’s large home for fund-raisers. That led to friendships with a host of prominent San Francisco Democrats in the 1970s and 1980s, including Willie Brown, Jerry Brown and Phil and John Burton, brothers who served in Congress.

Her connections and fund-raising prowess helped her get elected as the first woman to chair the California Democratic Party.

When Representative Phil Burton died in office, his wife, Sala Burton, replaced him. Sala Burton was soon after diagnosed with cancer and told Ms. Pelosi she wanted her to run for the seat. Ms. Pelosi, who had shrugged off other suggestions to run for elected office, finally agreed.

A special election was held in June 1987, and Ms. Pelosi, then 47, edged out Harry Britt, a gay socialist who had worked as an aide to Harvey Milk, the San Francisco supervisor who was assassinated at City Hall in 1978.

Cleve Jones, who also worked for Mr. Milk and who created the AIDS Memorial Quilt, had backed Mr. Britt. Mr. Jones recalled in an interview that he initially had dismissed Ms. Pelosi as “a society lady.”

“I had the most wrong first impression of Nancy Pelosi,” he said. “I just didn’t take her very seriously.”

But he said his view changed when Ms. Pelosi used her first floor speech in the House to talk about the AIDS crisis as the Reagan administration largely ignored it. That same year, she helped Mr. Jones get his quilt installed on the National Mall in Washington.

In 1990, she fought for the passage of an act named after Ryan White, a teenager who contracted H.I.V. from a blood transfusion and was banned from his school after his diagnosis. The program paid for health care for H.I.V./AIDS patients who lacked medical coverage.

“She’s just always been there,” Mr. Jones said. “She’s more than an ally. She’s family.”

Barbara Boxer, who represented a different part of San Francisco in the House and later became a U.S. senator, said in an interview that she and Ms. Pelosi were constantly confused for each other and lumped together as “the two women from San Francisco.”

They bonded by sitting next to each other during countless flights home. Ms. Boxer praised her friend’s unique combination of her social justice values, driven by her Catholic faith, and her tactical ability to know every facet of every bill and exactly where each member stood on it.

Together, they convinced the federal government to dump a plan to turn San Francisco’s military base, the Presidio, into condominiums. Instead, the government preserved it as a national park.

Karen Bass, the mayor of Los Angeles who served in Congress alongside Ms. Pelosi, said her colleague was a “masterful leader” who listened to widespread dissent in her caucus, but used her smarts and persuasion to repeatedly corral them and win key votes.

“I was in awe watching her,” she said.

Ms. Pelosi’s rise — and her wins on Capitol Hill — made her a regular target for conservatives. During the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, some rioters made a beeline for her office, tore down her wooden nameplate and broke into her chambers. One man, who was later prosecuted, was seen sitting in her chair with his feet propped up on her desk in a display of defiance.

The next year, in October 2022, her husband was brutally attacked in the Pelosi home by a man living in the Bay Area who seemed obsessed with right-wing conspiracy theories.

On Monday, however, Mr. Pelosi was at the union hall with his wife, appearing healthy.

At the Proposition 50 rally, Mr. Newsom thanked Ms. Pelosi for her work on the ballot measure.

“Some people go off and they talk about the way the world should be, but they don’t do anything to damn manifest it,” he said. “Nancy Pelosi doesn’t go out to try to make points. She makes a difference.”

Ms. Pelosi stood behind him, beaming. Then, she exited the stage.

She was a giant for the Democratic Party!  No one has filled her shoes in Congress.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The Federal Aviation Administration said yesterday that it was taking the extraordinary step of reducing air traffic by 10% across 40 “high-volume” markets beginning tomorrow to maintain travel safety as air traffic controllers exhibit signs of strain during the ongoing government shutdown.   

The cutback stands to impact thousands of flights nationwide because the FAA directs more than 44,000 flights daily, including commercial passenger flights, cargo planes and private aircraft. The agency didn’t immediately identify which airports or cities will be affected but said the restrictions would remain in place as long as necessary.  As reported by The Associated Press.

“I’m not aware in my 35-year history in the aviation market where we’ve had a situation where we’re taking these kinds of measures,” FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said at a news conference.

Air traffic controllers have been working unpaid since the shutdown began Oct. 1, and most have been on duty six days a week while putting in mandatory overtime. With some calling out of work due to frustration, taking second jobs or not having money for child care or gas, staffing shortages during some shifts have led to flight delays at a number of U.S. airports.

Bedford, citing increased staffing pressures and voluntary safety reports from pilots indicating growing fatigue among air traffic controllers, said he and U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy did not want to wait until the situation reached a crisis point.

“We’re not going to wait for a safety problem to truly manifest itself when the early indicators are telling us we can take action today to prevent things from deteriorating,” Bedford said. “The system is extremely safe today and will be extremely safe tomorrow. If the pressures continue to build even after we take these measures, we’ll come back and take additional measures.”

He and Duffy said they would meet with airline executives later Wednesday to determine how to implement the reduction in flights before a list of the affected airports would be released sometime Thursday.

Airlines and passengers wait for information

United, Southwest and American all said they will try to minimize the impact on consumers as they cut their schedules to comply with the order.

Calls to the customer service hotlines at United and American were answered within a few minutes Wednesday afternoon, suggesting anxious passengers were not swamping the airlines with questions about the status of their upcoming flights.

In a letter to employees, United CEO Scott Kirby promised to focus the cuts on regional routes and flights that don’t travel between hubs. He said the airline will try to reschedule customers when possible and will also offer refunds to anyone who doesn’t want to fly during this time, even if their flight isn’t canceled.

“United’s long-haul international flying and our hub-to-hub flying will not be impacted by this schedule reduction direction from the FAA,” Kirby said. “That’s important to maintain the integrity of our network, give impacted customers as many options as possible to resume their trip, and sustain our crew pairing systems.”

Airline industry analyst Henry Harteveldt, who is president of Atmosphere Research Group, said he thinks the government may have bungled this announcement by not meeting with airlines first and giving them more time to adjust schedules made months in advance.

“To tell airlines you’ve got 48 hours to rebuild your schedules at 90% of what you’ve got isn’t much time, and it’s going to result in a lot of chaos,” said Harteveldt, who was waiting to hear if his own flight from San Francisco to Dallas on Saturday would be canceled. He added that the Trump administration may be using aviation safety “to force the two sides in Washington back to the negotiating table to resolve the shutdown.”

AAA spokesperson Aixa Diaz advised travelers to watch for flight updates on the airline’s app and airport social media accounts. She also recommended allowing plenty of time at the airport before a scheduled flight.

“It’s frustrating for travelers, because there’s not much you can do. At the end of the day, you either fly or you don’t,” she said.

The cuts could represent as many as 1,800 flights and upward of 268,000 seats combined, according to an estimate by aviation analytics firm Cirium. For example, O’Hare International Airport in Chicago could see 121 of its 1,212 flights currently scheduled for Friday cut if the FAA distributes the reductions equally among impacted airports, Cirium said.

Data shows worsening weekend staffing

The FAA regularly slows down or stops flights from taking off toward an airport for a number of reasons, including weather conditions, equipment failures and technical problems. Staffing shortages also may lead to slowed or halted departures if there aren’t enough controllers and another facility can’t absorb some of the work load.

Last weekend saw some of the worst staffing shortages of the shutdown, which became the longest on record early Wednesday.

From Friday to Sunday evening, at least 39 different air traffic control facilities announced there was some potential for limited staffing, according to an Associated Press analysis of operations plans sent through the Air Traffic Control System Command Center system. The figure, which is likely an undercount, is well above the average for weekends before the shutdown

During weekend periods from Jan. 1 to Sept. 30, the average number of airport towers, regional centers overseeing multiple airports and facilities monitoring traffic at higher altitudes that announced the potential for staffing issues was 8.3, according to the AP analysis. But during the five weekend periods since the shutdown began on Oct. 1, the average more than tripled to 26.2 facilities.

Travel industry joins unions in urging shutdown’s end

Major airlines, aviation unions and the wider travel industry have urged Congress to end the shutdown.

Wednesday’s announcement came on the heels of Duffy warning a day earlier that there could be chaos in the skies next week if the shutdown drags on long enough for air traffic controllers to miss their second full paychecks next Tuesday.

Duffy said the FAA wanted to take a proactive approach instead of reacting after a disaster. He pointed to all the questions that arose after the deadly midair collision in January between a commercial jet and a military helicopter near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport about why FAA didn’t recognize the risks and act sooner.

“We learned from that. And so now we look at data, and before it would become an issue, we try to assess the pressure and try to make moves before there could be adverse consequences,” Duffy said. “And that’s what’s happening here today.”

Not a good situation!  Thank you, Trump!

Tony

Nate Silver

Dear Commons Community,

Pollster and statistician Nate Silver commented yesterday that polls this year were overestimating Donald Trump’s pull with voters.  Silver pointed to the “huge” poll miss in the New Jersey governor’s race where Democrat Mikie Sherril easily defeated Republican and Trump-backed candidate Jack Ciattarelli.  Here is reporting courtesy of Newsweek.

Polls could be overestimating President Donald Trump’s support following a “huge” miss in the New Jersey gubernatorial race, pollster Nate Silver said.

Why It Matters

Democrats swept Tuesday night’s elections, handily winning the closely watched New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races and securing other victories across the country. These gains have reignited Democratic optimism ahead of the 2026 midterms, as the party pushes to reclaim control of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.

What To Know

Silver, in his Silver Bulletin newsletter, lamented on polls being “not great,” particularly in New Jersey. A flurry of them released before Election Day showed a tight race between Democratic Governor-elect Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli. Real Clear Politics’ aggregate gave Sherrill only a 3-point advantage.

But Sherrill ended up winning by a much larger margin. She held a 13-point lead over Ciattarelli with 95 percent of the vote in, meaning she performed 10 points stronger than polls predicted. She also outperformed former Vice President Kamala Harris in the state. In November 2024, Harris only carried New Jersey by about 6 points in the presidential election—a disappointing result compared to past Oval Office candidates.

Silver described that as a “huge miss,” noting that it was “more than twice as large as the overestimation of Hillary Clinton in 2016.”

“There’s also, just perhaps, a question of whether the polls are actually overestimating Trump after three presidential elections in a row where they lowballed him,” Silver wrote.

He added that Democrats have a “considerable upside” in the midterms, as they prevailed with “different sorts of Democrats in different sorts of elections all performing strongly.”

Trump’s 2016 victory upended political polling, as surveys heading into Election Day gave former Secretary of State Clinton a comfortable lead. Polls also narrowly overestimated Democrats in 2020 and 2024. Last year, polls gave Harris only a narrow popular vote lead; Real Clear Politics gave her a 0.8-point edge. Trump ended up winning by 1.5 points.

Political analysts have pointed to theories including “shy” Trump voters, as well as the president’s ability to turn out lower- propensity voters, to explain the discrepancies. Silver wrote that Democrats’ strength among highly educated voters, who are generally more likely to vote, could be beneficial in off-year elections.

Polls were closer in Virginia, where Democratic former U.S. Representative Abigail Spanberger easily defeated GOP Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears. Real Clear Politics gave Spanberger a 10-point lead. She is up nearly 15 points with 96 percent of the vote counted.

What People Are Saying

Journalist Dave Weigel, on X: “Polls underestimated Mikie Sherrill’s strength in #NJGov – and some Dems fretted it was closer after [Governor Phil] Murphy’s 2021 near-death experience. Also, decades since a Dem replaced a two-term Dem. But she’s ending up w biggest Dem margin in 24 years, bigger than Murphy ’17.”

Lakshya Jain of SplitTicket, on X: “A lot of forecasters and pundits went out on a limb to say that Mikie Sherrill struggling was proof of moderates flopping. Not sure those takes have aged particularly well — it was weak reasoning then and looks worse now.”

Sherrill, during her victory speech: “Here in New Jersey, we know that this nation has not ever been, nor will it ever be, ruled by kings. We take oaths to a Constitution, not a king. We’ve chosen liberty, the very foundation of democracy, and we’ve chosen prosperity necessary to create opportunity for all.”

What Happens Next

Every seat in the House of Representatives and one-third of Senate seats are up for reelection. Democrats have expressed optimism about their chances, particularly after the party’s victories on Tuesday, but polls suggest competitive races.

I tend to agree with Silver. I live in New York and was bombarded with media reports of polls showing a tight race in New Jersey.  I was skeptical because I did not think that Republican candidate Jack Ciattarelli was wise in connecting himself to Trump.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Amazon is planning to cut as many as 30,000 corporate jobs immediately as the company pares expenses and compensates for over-hiring during the peak demand of the pandemic, according to three people familiar with the matter.   As reported by Reuters.

The figure represents a small percentage of Amazon’s 1.55 million total employees, but nearly 10% of its roughly 350,000 corporate employees. This would mark Amazon’s largest job cut since late 2022, when it started to eliminate around 27,000 positions.

Amazon has been trimming smaller numbers of jobs over the past two years across multiple divisions, including devices, communications and podcasting. The cuts beginning this week may affect a variety of divisions, including human resources, known as People Experience and Technology or PXT; operations, devices and services; and Amazon Web Services.

Managers of impacted teams were asked to undergo training on Monday for how to communicate with staff following email notifications that will start going out on Tuesday morning.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy is undertaking an initiative to reduce what he has described as an excess of bureaucracy, including by reducing the number of managers. He installed an anonymous complaint line for identifying inefficiencies that has elicited some 1,500 responses and over 450 process changes, he said earlier this year.

Jassy said in June that the increased use of artificial intelligence tools would likely lead to further job cuts, particularly through automating repetitive and routine tasks.

“This latest move signals that Amazon is likely realizing enough AI-driven productivity gains within corporate teams to support a substantial reduction in force,” said Sky Canaves, an eMarketer analyst. “Amazon has also been under pressure in the short-term to offset the long-term investments in building out its AI infrastructure.”

Item 1 of 2 A visitor stands near a logo of Amazon during the annual Retail Leadership Summit in Mumbai, India, February 27, 2025. REUTERS/Hemanshi Kamani

The full scope of this round of job cuts was not immediately clear. The people familiar with the matter said the number could change over time as Amazon’s financial priorities shift. Fortune earlier reported that the human resources division could be targeted with a cut of roughly 15%.

A program begun early this year to bring employees back in the office five days per week, among tech’s most stringent, has failed to generate sufficient attrition, said two of the people, citing that as another reason for the size of the layoff. Some of the employees who are not swiping in daily because they live far from corporate offices, or for other reasons, are being told they have voluntarily quit Amazon and must leave without severance, a savings for the company.

Layoffs.fyi, a website tracking tech job cuts, estimated that about 98,000 jobs have been lost so far this year among 216 companies. For all of 2024, the figure was 153,000.

Amazon’s largest profit center, cloud computing unit AWS, reported second-quarter sales of $30.9 billion, a 17.5% increase that was well below gains of 39% for Microsoft’s, Azure, and of 32% for Alphabet’s Google Cloud.

Estimates indicate that AWS will have boosted third-quarter sales by about 18% to $32 billion, a slight slowdown from last year’s 19% increase. AWS is still reeling from a roughly 15-hour internet outage last week that felled many of the most popular online services, like Snapchat and Venmo.

Amazon appears to be expecting another big holiday selling season. It plans to offer 250,000 seasonal jobs to help staff warehouses, among other needs, the same as in the prior two years.

Amazon on Friday also announced a reorganization of a segment of its PXT unit focused on diversity initiatives, a memo reviewed by Reuters showed. The changes largely involved promoting people to new roles.

Amazon shares rose 1.2% to $226.97 on Monday. The company plans to report third-quarter earnings on Thursday.

As Amazon goes so will many other companies with large corporate tech operations!

Tony 

Winners:  New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Rep. Mikie Sherrill; New York City Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani; and Abigail Spanberger, Democratic gubernatorial candidate for Virginia. AFP; Bloomberg; Getty Images

Dear Commons Community,

It was a good election day for Democrats yesterday as they won key races throughout the country. They won the governor races in New Jersey and Virginia, New York City’s mayoral race, and the California referendum proposed by Governor Gavin Newsom. Early analysis is that the results were a complete rebuke of Trump, the state of the economy and the federal government shutdown.  Below is an analysis courtesy of The Associated Press.

Tony

—————————————–

The Associated Press.

Democrats dominate as economic woes take a toll on Trump’s GOP. Takeaways from Election Day 2025

By  STEVE PEOPLES and WILL WEISSERT

Updated 11:40 PM EST, November 4, 2025

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats dominated the first major Election Day since President Donald Trump returned to the White House.

And while a debate about the future of the Democratic Party may have only just begun, there are signs that the economy — specifically, Trump’s inability to deliver the economic turnaround he promised last fall — may be a real problem for Trump’s GOP heading into next year’s higher-stakes midterm elections.

Democrats on Tuesday won governor’s races in Virginia and New Jersey, the only states electing new chief executives this year. They also swept a trio of state Supreme Court contests in swing-state Pennsylvania and ballots measures from Colorado to Maine.

Trump was largely absent from the campaign trail, but GOP candidates closely aligned themselves with the president, betting that his big win last year could provide a path to victory this time. They were wrong.

Democrats are hoping the off-year romp offers a new winning playbook, but some caution may be warranted. Tuesday’s elections were limited to a handful of states, most of which lean blue, and the party that holds the White House typically struggles in off-year elections.

Meanwhile, Republicans in Washington may be more excited than Democrats that a self-described democratic socialist will become New York City’s next mayor.

Here’s some top takeaways:

A new Democratic playbook emerges

Democrat Abigail Spanberger won the Virginia governor’s race Tuesday, defeating Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears to give Democrats a victory heading into the 2026 midterm elections and make history as the first woman ever to lead the commonwealth.

Former Rep. Abigail Spanberger will become Virginia’s next governor — and its first female chief executive — while Rep. Mikie Sherrill won the New Jersey governor’s office by running campaigns focused largely on the economy, public safety and health care.

Early results showed Democrats outperforming their margins from four years ago in fast-growing suburbs, rural areas and even places with high concentrations of military voters.

The Democrats won by actively distancing themselves from some of the Democratic Party’s far-left policies and emphasized what Spanberger described in her victory speech as “pragmatism over partisanship.”

A growing collection of Democratic leaders believe the moderate approach holds the key to the party’s revival after the GOP won the White House and both congressional chambers last year.

Above all, the Democrats in both states focused on rising costs such as groceries, energy and health care, which Trump has struggled to control.

In addition to tacking to the middle on economic issues, Spanberger and Sherrill downplayed their support for progressive priorities, including LGBTQ rights and resistance against Trump’s attack on American institutions. Spanberger rarely even mentioned Trump’s name on the campaign trail.

Both also have resumes that appealed to the middle.

Spanberger is a former CIA case officer who spent years abroad working undercover, while Sherrill spent a decade as an active-duty helicopter pilot for the Navy before entering Congress. Both played up their public safety backgrounds as a direct response to the GOP’s attack that Democrats are soft on crime.

It’s (still) the economy, stupid

Trump and his Republican allies have been especially focused on immigration, crime and conservative cultural issues.

But voters who decided Tuesday’s top elections were more concerned about the economy, jobs and costs of living. That’s according to the AP Voter Poll, an expansive survey of more than 17,000 voters in New Jersey, Virginia, California and New York City suggesting that many voters felt they can’t get ahead financially in today’s economy.

Ironically, the same economic anxieties helped propel Trump to the White House just one year ago. Now, the economic concerns appear to be undermining his party’s political goals in 2025 — and could be more problematic for the GOP in next year’s midterm elections, which will decide the balance of power for Trump’s final two years in office.

That’s even as Trump regularly brags about stock prices booming and boasted about leading a new renaissance of American manufacturing.

About half of Virginia voters said the economy was the most important issue facing their state while most New Jersey voters said either taxes or the economy were the top issue in their state. Just over half of New York City voters said cost of living was their top concern.

It was unclear whether kitchen table concerns weighing so heavily on voters might help break the impasse that has prompted the government shutdown, which has spanned more than a month.

A referendum on Trump

This was the first election since Trump’s return to the presidency and voters rejected candidates and causes aligned with his Republican Party from Virginia and Pennsylvania to Maine and New Jersey. It was, in fact, difficult to point to any significant victory for Trump’s party.

They also expressed strong feelings about the direction of the country under his leadership.

About 6 in 10 voters in Virginia and New Jersey said they are “angry” or “dissatisfied” with the way things are going in the country today, according to the AP Voter Poll. Just one-third said they are “enthusiastic” or “satisfied.”

In a sign of the extent of the GOP’s struggles, Republicans lost the Virginia attorney general’s race to Democrat Jay Jones, who was forced to apologize after text messages surfaced weeks before Election Day in which he depicted the murder of political opponents.

Fearing a bad night, Trump tried to distance himself from the election results.

The president endorsed Ciattarelli in New Jersey but held only a pair of tele-town halls on his behalf, including one Monday night. Trump also did a Monday night tele-town hall for Virginia Republican candidates, but he focused mostly in favor of the GOP candidate for attorney general, who also lost.

Despite Trump’s distance, his policies — including his “big, beautiful” budget bill and his massive cuts to the federal workforce — played a central role in Virginia, New Jersey and even New York City’s mayoral contest. And the Republicans in each refused to distance themselves from the president or his agenda.

The results left the president ducking blame.

“TRUMP WASN’T ON THE BALLOT, AND SHUTDOWN, WERE THE TWO REASONS THAT REPUBLICANS LOST ELECTIONS TONIGHT,” according to pollsters, he posted on his social media account.

Trump planned to have breakfast Wednesday at the White House with Senate Republicans who have so far opposed his calls to end the shutdown by abandoning the legislative filibuster, the 60-vote minimum needed to pass most major legislation though the Senate.

A new star for Democrats (and Republicans) in New York City

Zohran Mamdani was elected New York City mayor Tuesday, capping his meteoric rise to national prominence. The 34-year-old democratic socialist will make history as the city’s first Muslim mayor – and its youngest in more than a century.

Moderates won in Virginia and New Jersey. But it was a self-described democratic socialist who cruised to victory in New York City.

Zohran Mamdani, a 34-year-old state legislator who backs radical changes to address economic inequality, will serve as the next mayor of the nation’s largest city.

His bold agenda and inspirational approach helped generate the largest turnout in a New York City mayoral race in at least three decades. It also spooked some business leaders and voices in the Jewish community, who otherwise support Democrats but oppose some of Mamdani’s past statements about personal wealth accumulation and Israel.

Trump, who actually endorsed Mamdani’s independent opponent, former Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo, falsely called Mamdani a communist on the eve of the election.

Some Republicans in Washington were quietly rooting for a Mamdani victory. Even before his win was final, Republican campaign committees launched attack ads against more than a dozen vulnerable House Democrats in New York and New Jersey linking them to Mamdani and his far-left politics.

The ad campaign is expected to extend to Democrats across the country ahead of next year’s midterms.

More Democratic wins

California voters approved new congressional district boundaries Tuesday, delivering a victory for Democrats in the state-by-state redistricting battle that will help determine which party wins control of the U.S. House in 2026

The Democratic successes extended beyond Virginia, New Jersey and New York.

In Pennsylvania, Democrats swept all three elections for state supreme court justices. The wins could have implications for key cases involving redistricting and balloting for midterm elections — and the 2028 presidential race — in the nation’s most populous swing state.

Conservative causes struggled on ballot questions in other states as well.

Maine voters defeated a measure that would have mandated showing an ID at the polls while approving a “red flag” rule meant to make it easier for family members to petition a court to restrict a potentially dangerous person’s access to guns.

Colorado approved raising taxes on people earning more than $300,000 to fund school meal programs and food assistance for low-income state residents.

And in California, Gov. Gavin Newsom, frequently mentioned as a 2028 presidential hopeful, led a triumphant charge to redraw congressional maps to give Democrats as many as five more House seats in upcoming elections.

The push is the centerpiece of a Democratic effort to counter new Republican maps in Texas and elsewhere that were drawn to boost the GOP’s chances in next year’s fight to control Congress. For the new maps to count in 2026, however, Californians had to vote on a yes-or-no ballot question known as Proposition 50. It was easily approved.

Former President Barack Obama and New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial candidate, U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ). ((Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images))

Dear Commons Community,

Today is Election Day.  Be sure to take the time to vote if you have not already done so.  Here are five elections to watch with predictions made by Eric Garcia of The Independent and Inside Washington.

Welcome to the first referendum on Donald Trump’s presidency: Election night 2025.

For most of this year, the only evidence that public opinion has turned against Trump was an occasional special election or a judicial race in Wisconsin — approval ratings, aside.

But, as Inside Washington broke down last month, the gubernatorial races and other major-ticket statewide races. And it doesn’t get much better than a mayor’s race in New York that could determine if socialist progressive insurgent Zohran Mamdani can have a clear mandate to govern, two moderate Democratic congresswomen can win governorships in states chock full of suburbanites and voters of color — and whether Democrats can redraw their congressional map in California, which would bolster Gavin Newsom’s presidential aspirations.

Inside Washington has been following these races ravenously, checking out fundraising, polling and early voting. While occasionally we get it wrong and we promptly admit it, here’s our boldest predictions for tomorrow night’s elections in the heart of Dixie, the Garden State, the Big Apple and the Golden State.

Virginia: Can Democrats win back the suburbs?

This is the easiest one for the ol’ crystal ball. Abigail Spanberger, a former CIA officer congresswoman who turned a red district in the suburbs of Richmond blue in 2018, will crush Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears.

While Sears has gone all-in on transphobia, it has fallen flat amid a government shutdown and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency slashing federal jobs, which particularly hurts employees in the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C. Sears also fell for Spanberger’s bait in a debate when she said “that’s not discrimination” when Spanberger pointed out Earle-Sears would ban same-sex marriage.

What matters is just how big Spanberger’s win will be. Democrats hope to gain a supermajority in the state House of Delegates, which would allow them to redraw their congressional map with ease. Polling shows a Spanberger lead between 10 to 14 points.

Final prediction: Spanberger wins by 12 percent and nabs a supermajority.

Democratic candidate for governor Abigail Spanberger in Virginia, (Getty)

Virginia attorney general’s race: A scandal-rocked high-stakes race

If the governor’s race in Virginia a matter of how big Spanberger will win, the attorney general’s race is going to be razor-thin.

While governors cannot run for consecutive terms in Virginia, the attorney general can. Republican Jason Miyares flipped the seat in 2021 and would likely be a future candidate for governor. Unlike Earle-Sears, he’s earned Trump’s support.

And he’s running against an incredibly flawed candidate in Democrat Jay Jones, who came under fire after text messages revealed that he fantasized about shooting and killing the former speaker of the state House Todd Gilbert and calling his children “little fascists.”

Polling has shown the race is either in a dead heat or even has Jones in the lead. If Democrats win, he will likely join lawsuits against the Trump administration. But if Miyares wins, he might serve as a bulwark against the Spanberger administration and the general assembly.

Final prediction: Based on Spanberger having a big enough margin of victory, Jones wins by less than a point.

New Jersey: Can Trump’s non-white working-class coalition hold?

As New Jersey’s most famous son would say, you can’t start a midterm fire without an off-year spark. In 2024, Kamala Harris only won it by a little less than six points, about ten points less than Joe Biden won it in 2020.

Trump did it by flipping Passaic County, home to a large Latino population. He cut into Democratic margins in Hudson County, whose large Cuban-American population led to part of it being called “Havana on the Hudson.”

Republican Jack Ciattarelli, who nearly beat incumbent Gov. Phil Murphy, is hoping that holds for his election against Rep. Mikie Sherrill. Sherrill is “national security Democrat,” in the mold of Spanberger and Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.). While she lacks the charisma of Spanberger, she’s aggressively attacked Ciattarelli, specifically after Ciattarelli’s campaign obtained her private Naval records.

And according to VoteHub, which tracks early voting, Democrats make up about 51 percent of in-person early voting in the Garden State, while Republicans make up only 29 percent.

Final prediction: Sherrill wins by 7 percentage points

New York City: The Mamdani Mandate

Nobody disputes that Zohran Mamdani will become New York City’s next mayor. What everyone wants to know is whether he wins by a big enough margin to have a clear mandate to govern.

While Mamdani caught fire with his message about affordability, he also benefited from the fact incumbent Mayor Eric Adams exited the Democratic primary and disgraced former governor Andrew Cuomo had significant baggage in the primary due to the fact he resigned after allegations of sexual misconduct.

For Mamdani to have a mandate, he’ll need to not only win, but win a clear majority. That means not just running up the margins with Latinos, Asian-Americans and young upwardly mobile professional whites; it will require him cutting into Cuomo’s margins with Black voters, the beating heart of the Democratic Party establishment. So far, Mamdani has the momentum.

Final prediction: Mamdani clears a majority, but does not hit 55 percent. A safe bet is around 52 to 53 percent.

California: The future of the midterms and the Democratic Party

No Democratic elected official has made himself the face of the anti-Trump resistance more than California Gov. Gavin Newsom. When Texas began its efforts to add five safe Republican seats, Newsom responded by saying he’d “meet fire with fire” and shepherded a ballot initiative known as Proposition 50 to allow for a one-time partisan redraw of congressional districts to respond to Texas’s gerrymander.

It’s an audacious move. But Democrats have poured $129 million to support the initiative, with Newsom and his allies making up 72 percent of all spending, according to AdImpact. If it passes, Democrats can get around the nonpartisan redistricting commission and draw seats that will put Republicans out of a job and allow the Democrats to get a boost in the 2026 midterm.

In addition, it will undoubtedly vault Newsom to the front of the 2028 presidential field and it’s not even close. The University of California Berkley’s Institute of Governmental Studies had the initiative polling at 60 percent. Early voter turnout overwhelmingly favors the Democrats. By turning the initiative into a referendum against Trump, it looks like Democrats have the right message.

Final prediction: Proposition 50 passes with 58 percent of the vote.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The Progressive Magazine had an article yesterday speculating on what New York City’s education system might look like if Zohran Mamdani is elected mayor.  Here is an excerpt in which my colleague David Bloomfield is quoted:

In New York City, former Mayor Michael Bloomberg established mayoral control in 2002, when he lobbied the state legislature to replace the city’s school boards with Panel for Education Policy (PEP), to which the mayor appoints one-third of members. David Bloomfield, a professor of education leadership, law, and policy at Brooklyn College and City University of New York, tells The Progressive that the previous system of thirty-two locally elected school boards had weakened over the decades following its establishment in 1970. 

“People found that it really wasn’t working for kids,” Bloomfield says. “There was corruption. There was a lack of accountability. The board members who had been appointed by the borough presidents could then run on their own without much control from anybody else.”

Bloomfield suggests that the next mayor could return power to local communities by turning the appointed seats, particularly the chancellor, into positions confirmed by city council. A report issued last year by New York State’s education department found that checks and balances similar to Bloomfield’s idea are a recommended way to reform mayoral control. The report also suggested a new commission to institute reforms and fewer mayoral appointments to PEP, among other proposals. 

The entire article is worth a read!

Tony

Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro

Dear Commons Community,

Maureen Dowd’s New York Times column yesterday was entitled, “Bros Need Some Bros” in which she comments on what she sees as a decline in male friendships due to attachment to social media.  She opens by describing the relationships of celebrities and lifelong buddies like Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro. Here is an excerpt.

“It’s young men who are not making connections with friends, mentors or mates,” said Scott Galloway, the podcaster and New York University professor whose new book is “Notes on Being a Man,” a memoir/aspirational code for masculinity for young men.

“When a woman doesn’t have a romantic relationship, she pours that energy into her work and her friends,” he said. “When a man doesn’t have a romantic relationship, he pours that energy into porn and conspiracy theories. It’s the guy that comes off the tracks and goes down a rabbit hole,” sometimes, in extreme cases, leading to mental illness and violence.

“Men need relationships much more than women,” he said, adding that the growing number of men who can’t connect to other men or women is “a disaster.”

“It’s a combination of the loneliness, the lack of economic opportunity for men and being in these synthetic online relationships where they aren’t forced to take risks and develop real life skills around work, friendships, and romantic and sexual relationships. And then they have this godlike technology that creates lifelike relationships that are frictionless.

“Managing a romantic relationship is really hard, but victory in that gives you the skills to be successful in other parts of your life and ultimately create purpose and meaning in life.”

Alarmed at the cases of teens committing suicide when egged on by an online avatar, Galloway said he believes that synthetic relationships should be outlawed for anyone under the age of 18.

“Young men need male role models, they need friends, and ideally a romantic partner,” he said.

Could the ad duets of actors who are friends serve as a positive example?

Galloway wasn’t sure that young, financially struggling, lonely men would be inspired by the celebrity bromances.

“These guys are wealthy and outside of the house a lot and a little bit older, so they’re not addicted to their phones,” he said. “They haven’t been radicalized. They have women in their lives, which is a key component.”

Yes!

Tony