Rep. Kenny Marchant (R-Texas) announced Monday he will not seek re-election in 2020, becoming the fourth Texas Republican House member to announce retirement in recent weeks, the New York Times first reported.
Why it matters: Texas, which holds 38 electoral college votes, is increasingly becoming more competitive for Democrats in both presidential and congressional elections. Marchant won re-election in Texas' 24th district in November by just 3 points and is now the 12th House Republican retiring at the end of their term. Only 3 House Democrats have announced they aren't running in 2020.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer urged Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to return the Senate from August recess to "immediately" vote on a House-passed background check bill and send it to President Trump's desk.
The big picture: Pelosi and Schumer are putting the pressure on McConnell to respond to the weekend's 2 mass shootings, pointing to the fact that the House passed 2 gun-control bills earlier this year. Pelosi led a noon call with the House Democratic Caucus on Monday to discuss how to move forward.
President Trump condemned racism and white supremacy Monday during an address to the nation after mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, over the weekend.
"In one voice, our nation must condemn racism, bigotry and white supremacy. These sinister ideologies must be defeated. Hate has no place in America. Hatred warps the mind, ravages the heart and devours the soul."
President Trump said in a pair of Monday tweets that Republicans and Democrats should "come together and get strong background checks" after mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, over the weekend, suggesting the policy could be tied to immigration reform.
The big picture: The Democratic-led House passed a series of bills addressing gun reform, including the Bipartisan Background Checks Act in February. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has yet to take up those bills for debate, though it's unclear whether Trump supports the House proposal — or something else entirely.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told me yesterday that he’d advised President Trump it would be a huge mistake, substantively and politically, to withdraw all U.S. military members from Afghanistan by the 2020 election.
What he's saying: "When it comes to the election of 2020. I think it would be very easy for the president to defend leaving a counterterrorism force that was recommended by our military and intelligence community, to protect the homeland after the debacle in Iraq."
At one point Sunday morning, three different 2020 Democrats were being interviewed about the shootings on CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, calling for more gun restrictions but directing much of their criticism at President Trump, AP reports.
Between the lines: ABC News political director Rick Klein told Jonathan Karl on "This Week," "I've been struck by how many candidates have gone straight from the gun control debate to this broader issue ... about the environment that's being festered in this country of racial divisiveness, of the president's rhetoric."
The state of play: "I don't care about the politics right now," texted a friend who's in politics at the highest level. "I'm scared that we could look back on this as the beginning of a true catastrophe for America."
Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke criticized the media's treatment of President Trump after a CNN reporter asked if there's anything Trump can do to make things better following 2 mass shootings over the weekend.
"What do you think? You know the s--- he’s been saying. He’s been calling Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. I don’t know, like, members of the press, what the f---? ... I mean, connect the dots about what he's been doing in this country."
Bernie Sanders had the highest volume of Twitter mentions in the second round of the Democratic debates last week, and the debates generated 18% more tweets than the first round in June even though the TV audience was much smaller, according to data provided to Axios by Sprout Social.
Why it matters: Compared to the first round, last week's debates were heavier on disagreement and confrontation, allowing voters to see discrepancies in the candidates and how they responded to challenges in real time, a departure from rehearsed stump speeches.
