In Georgia, a GOP candidate with a track record of incendiary rhetoric and ties to the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory is in a primary runoff. If Marjorie Taylor Greene prevails in the runoff, she will be well positioned to win a congressional seat in the fall, putting national Republicans in the difficult position of how to respond.
Republican voters will also pick a candidate in a primary for a Minnesota congressional seat in a district that went for President Donald Trump in 2016 by a wide margin and is currently represented by endangered Democratic Rep. Collin Peterson.
Those are a few of the races to watch on Tuesday with contests taking place in Georgia, Connecticut, Vermont, Wisconsin and Minnesota.
'Squad' member Ilhan Omar faces well-funded Democratic primary challenger
Omar faces a well-funded Democratic primary challenger in Minnesota's 5th Congressional District on Tuesday.
Omar has faced attacks from challenger Antone Melton-Meaux that she is divisive and overly focused on building a national profile. Democratic Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, also members of the "squad," faced similar attacks in primary races of their own, but both prevailed in fending off those challenges earlier this year.
Melton-Meaux, an attorney who runs a mediation practice and a first-time candidate for elected office, does not have as much of a national profile as the challengers who ran against Ocasio-Cortez and Tlaib, but he has still raised a substantial amount of money. He had raised more than $4.1 million as of July 22, according to FEC data, while Omar had raised around $4.3 million by the same date.
Omar's outspoken support of progressive priorities has given her a devoted following on the political left. At the same time, however, her rhetoric related to Israel has made her a target of criticism from Republicans as well as some members of her own party. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other members of House Democratic leadership once went so far as to publicly call on Omar to apologize for comments they said included "anti-Semitic tropes."
That controversy may have helped propel her Democratic challenger. Of the money raised in support of Melton-Meaux's bid, several hundred thousand dollars has been bundled by a pair of pro-Israel political action committees.
Omar apologized after her rebuke from House Democratic leaders and has sought to limit the damage and win over skeptics. Last May, she co-authored an op-ed with Illinois Rep. Jan Schakowsky, who is Jewish, urging the Muslim and Jewish communities to "come together to confront the twin evils of anti-Semitic and Islamophobic violence."
Melton-Meaux has been cautious about broaching the issue, saying in an interview that Omar's past comments had created "a lack of trust" in the Jewish community that she had not adequately sought to repair. But his campaign has spent more time questioning Omar's national profile, and whether it has distracted her from the job.
Omar, who lost her father this year to Covid-19, has across-the
