Democrats target statehouse races in first big campaign spend of 2024

Democrats are targeting seven battlegrounds in their first campaign spend of the year on state legislature elections, the Guardian has learned, and intend to draw “clear contrasts” with Republican candidates tied to former US president Donald Trump.

The latest round of investments will deliver “critical resources” to Arizona, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC) said.

The DLCC’s total spending for this electoral cycle is now close to $750,000. The money is used to support staff hiring, digital infrastructure, field operations and other expenditures.

Once seen by outsiders as sleepy backwaters, state legislative chambers have come into sharp focus in recent years because of their role in curbing reproductive freedoms, imposing book bans, assailing transgender rights and making it harder to vote.

With Trump dominating the presidential primary and all but certain to be the party nominee, some Republicans running for seats in swing states may try to distance themselves from a man seen as toxic among moderates and independents. Democrats, however, intend to hitch them to Trump at every opportunity.

“He is the Republican party,” said Heather Williams, the president of the DLCC, the arm of the Democratic party focused on building power at state level. “He is the leader of the Republican party. Republicans cannot escape from that and at this point it’s just a given, if you will, much like Joe Biden is our president and therefore the leader of the Democratic party.”

From Arizona to Oregon, from Idaho to Texas, many state-level Republican parties have embraced Trump and, in some cases, the QAnon conspiracy movement and white nationalism.