Farewell & Parting Shots. Schultz is Out.

Matt Schultz suspended his U.S. House campaign Friday afternoon, which means the only serious Democrat in the race against MAGA shitster Nick Begich now returns to being a mild-mannered Presbyterian pastor.

Buried in the middle of his farewell statement, Schultz said he was disappointed by "the lack of meaningful support from Democratic institutions." The email version was even sharper, taking aim at the many institutions within the Democratic Party ecosystem that declined to meaningfully back a campaign rooted in service, integrity, and the needs of working Alaskans.

It's all very noteworthy. Schultz was the only challenger in the race when he launched in October, at a time when no one else was willing to take on Begich. Then, he spent many months watching donor networks and organizational muscle sit on their hands until an "independent" candidate eventually showed up and consolidated money and endorsements.

What Schultz says about the man he's endorsing isn't much. He is "asking Alaskans to vote for Bill Hill in November," and Hill's name appears exactly once in the entire statement, with no mention of who Hill is, what he believes, or why he'd be any good in Congress. There's no line about Hill fighting for working Alaskans, no line about trusting him, nothing you'd recognize as making an actual case for the guy. His entire argument is that defeating Nick Begich and restoring a Democratic House majority must come before any one candidate, which is an endorsement of math and common sense, not of Bill Hill.

For what it's worth, Hill has refused to say whether he’d caucus with Democrats or MAGA in Congress. You might recall how I feel about that both-sides bullshit.

So to recap - the Democratic candidate is gone, the Democratic establishment got name-shamed in Schultz's exit statement, and Bill Hill now has an open lane against Begich, along with an endorsement that has all the warmth of a quitclaim deed.

Schultz says he isn't stepping away from the fight, and given how much of one he picked in a six-paragraph goodbye, I'm inclined to believe him.