The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, and Carolyn Fiddler, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.

Leading Off

● ND-Sen: That escalated quickly. On Friday, GOP Rep. Kevin Cramer said he was “very mildly” reconsidering his plans not to challenge Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, but added that “not a lot has changed” since he said no a month ago. However, a lot seems to have changed on Tuesday.​​

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​The day began with a Washington Examiner story detailing how national Republicans badly wanted Cramer to run because they felt their current field was weak, and continued when former state party chair and Cramer friend Gary Emineth dropped out while claiming that the congressman had decided to get in. A few hours later, the Washington Post reported that Republicans were now optimistic that Cramer would run, though despite what Emineth said, they didn’t think it was a done deal.

Cramer represents the entire state in the House, and he’s starting with plenty of name recognition if he ran against Heitkamp. There are plenty of reasons that Republicans may want to be careful about getting what they wish for if Cramer actually runs (more on that later), but for now, Team Red seems pretty upset with their actual candidate. National Republicans never seemed to think much of Emineth, but they really seem to hate state Sen. Tom Campbell, a wealthy potato farmer who has been running for months. David Drucker at the Examiner writes that, while party officials seemed ready to accept Campbell after Cramer said no last month, they found some “glaring” red flags when they did some routine opposition research on him.

And Campbell’s detractors seem so worried about having him as their nominee that they actually allowed Drucker to summarize what they found. A party operative forwarded him some highlights including “Campbell’s bank has foreclosed on North Dakota farmers” and “Campbell was sued for fraud over the life insurance policy he obtained on his mother.” State Republicans seem a bit less wary of the state senator, with state party chair Kelly Armstrong declaring, “We’re comfortable moving forward with the guys we have.” However, the White House, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, and NRSC head Cory Gardner reportedly have been calling Cramer to get him to run, and their persistence may already be paying off.

While Emineth claimed he was exiting the race because of Cramer’s “decision to enter the race,” Cramer hasn’t said he’s in yet. Emineth later told the Associated Press that he’d spoken to his friend several times in the past week and expects him to run. But while the Washington Post’s Sean Sullivan writes that national Republicans are “growing increasingly confident” that Cramer will run, they don’t agree how likely it is he’ll get in. Some think he’ll announce this very week, while others remember how the congressman spent over a year flirting with a bid only to say no.