Race not called yet. But it’s looking like Brandon Johnson is in a strong position to defeat Paul Vallas in the Chicago mayoral runoff. Johnson is the more progressive candidate, Vallas the more centrist or right-leaning. Both are Democrats. This was definitely portrayed as a referendum on urban Dem “soft on crime” politics. But voters don’t seem to have gone along with that narrative. Vallas currently has a tiny lead. But all the folks who know how to analyze the numbers say Vallas’ chances are on life support, given the votes that are left to be counted.

As I was writing this very short post, Johnson just moved into the tiniest of leads. But again, it’s not a matter of watching each additional vote come in. The remaining votes in toto seem to heavily favor Johnson. Dave Wasserman hasn’t called it yet but as of 9:05 he says it’s “virtually done.”

A big thank you to the 108 new members who subscribed to TPM since we launched our annual drive yesterday afternoon. We really, really appreciate it. We’ve had a big news day and we’ve got a big election tonight. But I just want to remind you: This is a really important drive for us. Please take a moment to join us right this moment. Just click here. Thank you.

We’ve given our everything to capturing the spectacle and the legal intricacies of today’s events. The big thing is that we’ve now gotten to see the indictment. We know what Trump’s facing. But don’t forget that there are two big elections tonight. The Chicago mayoral run off is a big one. But the Wisconsin Supreme Court election is not only big for Wisconsin — it has major, major national implications as well. There’s no denying that the latter is the most consequential election of 2023. And we’re going to know the results tonight. As I’ve mentioned before, the people who I follow to get the minute to minute results on election nights are the folks on this curated Twitter list.

In other news, our friend Rick Hasen thinks the Bragg case is weak, relies too much on novel legal theories that could get bogged down in appeals for years or even tossed for legal insufficiency. I have no ability to evaluate the legal arguments at this level. But it’s significant to me that Rick sees the case’s merits in these terms. My own expectation is that the whole question will become moot, as a public if not a legal matter, with other indictments. But we shall see.

Late Update: Here’s a contrary take on the case and New York state law from JustSecurity.

There’s one thing to remember here. Trump blazed a path of almost nonstop criminal conduct over seven years. He’s finally being charged with one crime. More serious charges are likely to follow. It’s pretty straightforward really. Crimes often lead to indictments. It’s not as sure as night following day. But it’s a pretty established pattern.

If you haven’t yet, check out our live blog of the day’s events, with TPM on the scene outside the courthouse doing interviews and absorbing the moment while the rest of the team provides running updates on every development. I found this very low-key interview with 62-year-old Trump supporter, Al, who came from outside Philly to be very interesting.

On a different front entirely, I noticed a statement sent out by email from CPAC denouncing the indictment of the former president. No surprise there. But down at the bottom it’s signed by Matt Schlapp, who has somehow managed to hang on as president of the group, and by CPAC’s general counsel, David Safavinian. Yes, the same guy who was sentenced to prison in the Abramoff scandal. Small world. I guess he managed to get his law license reinstated after prison. I didn’t realize it was that easy. But good for him for getting rehabilitated. I’m a lover not a fighter.

Thank you to everyone who has signed up so far in our annual TPM membership drive. A good start but a long way to go. It’s super, super important. If you want to join us just click here.

Today we kick off our annual TPM membership drive. This is a critical part of every year for us. I’ll be in your debt if you can simply read what follows.

Since our revenues are close to 100% made up by subscription fees (about 88%) sustaining and hopefully expanding our number of members is critical for the future and vitality of the site. These are harrowing times for all news organizations. But our reliance on readers who value what we do allows us to sidestep some of those broader industry trends. If you find what we do important and necessary, please consider signing up to become a member. You’ll be able to make sure we’re around into the future and, hopefully, expand our reach. You’ve heard enough? Just click right here.

Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton (R) is threatening to expel three Democratic members of the state House after they acknowledged and supported a public protest over lax gun laws and the deadly school shooting at Covenant School, a Christian elementary school in Nashville, Tennessee. The shooting took place one week ago today, March 27th. The shooter shot and killed three children and three adults before being killed in a firefight with police officers. Thousands descended on the capitol building three days later demanding greater restrictions on firearms.

That protest is at the center of plans to expel the three members.

We’re standing up a live blog of events leading up to and through tomorrow. So we’ll have you covered on all the developments. But we’ll do it a bit differently. There’s a strong Stations-of-the-Cross vibe to a lot of the coverage: Trump making his doleful march to meet justice or rather the HOAX WITCH HUNT in New York City, the humble sacrifice he makes of himself on behalf of real America. And we’ll capture some of that, with more irony and implicit mockery one would imagine. But we’ll try to focus also on the internals of the case, the more interesting nonsense the spectacle generates, how much the conventional press gets taken in by and how much the GOP — in spite of all the confident predictions last fall — manages to re-pledge its allegiance to Trump as steadfastly as it did in 2016, 2019 and 2020. It is also in our neck of the woods. So we’ll deploy our New York City knowledge to give you some more of that flavor.

This Sean Hannity clip is getting huge play today. (You can see it below the fold.) Hannity tells Trump during their interview, I can’t imagine you’d ever say bring me those documents we took from the White House. Trump responds no I can totally do that, I would do that. Hannity says, okay let’s move on, but Trump persists. It’s Hannity at his journalist-as-defense counsel best.

Trumpers are going full stations of the cross with Trump’s doleful procession into Jerusalem New York City …

It seems like the whole political world is waking up to the reality that absent some dramatic and unlikely new development, the 2024 GOP primary isn’t just Donald Trump’s to lose, it’s very difficult to come up with a scenario in which he does lose. One new poll illustrates numerically what is clear enough from the news in front of us. In a head-to-head race, A Yahoo/Yougov poll showed Donald Trump jumping to a 26-point lead over Ron DeSantis (57%–31%) from a 8-point lead less than two weeks ago. As recently as February, it was a 4-point lead. In a ten-candidate field — the more real-world scenario — Trump holds 52% support while DeSantis falls to 21%.