In Nevada, Inslee tries to pull 2020 spotlight away from DC

The Democratic presidential sweepstakes might seem like a tale of Joe Biden and the Seven Senators, but there are plenty of governors and mayors looking for a chance to steal the spotlight from the former vice president and other headliners.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee is headed to the early caucus state of Nevada on Saturday and will soon travel to the first primary state of New Hampshire as he mulls a White House bid. Terry McAuliffe, the former Virginia governor and longtime Democratic power player, is showing up on cable news and writing newspaper op-eds. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and Montana Gov. Steve Bullock are busy with day jobs but recently finished an ambitious round of midterm campaigning. Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper left office this month, and he spent part of the fall on the road.

Billionaire and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg says he'd fund his own race if he runs. Even Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, is making noise.

FILE - In this Aug. 16, 2018, file photo, Montana Gov. Steve Bullock walks down the main concourse during a visit to the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines, Iowa. Former Vice President Joe Biden and several nationally known senators are commanding most of the attention in Democrats’ early presidential angling, but there are several governors and mayors, including Bullock, eyeing 2020 campaigns, as well. (AP PhotoCharlie Neibergall, File)

Each person is making moves that could result in a presidential campaign. But in the early days of a Democratic primary, the question is whether someone without a Washington resume can win a contest that's so far dominated by Biden, former Texas Rep. Beto O'Rourke and several nationally known senators, including Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Kamala Harris of California, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Cory Booker of New Jersey. Other senators who might join the race include Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota. And that number of senators may grow.

"Being an outsider governor or an outsider mayor is a good place to run from to cast yourself as somebody with executive experience and leadership at a time when people don't trust a dysfunctional Congress," said Dave Hamrick, who managed then-Gov. Martin O'Malley of Maryland's unsuccessful bid in 2016.

"The challenge," Hamrick said, "is figuring out whether your story is the right one for this moment and selling it when so many other people are out there."

FILE - In this Aug. 23, 2018, file photo Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti poses for a photo in front of a sprawling downtown Los Angeles landscape. Former Vice President Joe Biden and several nationally known senators are commanding most of the attention in Democrats’ early presidential angling, but there are several governors and mayors, including Garcetti, eyeing 2020 campaigns, as well.(AP PhotoRichard Vogel, File)

For now, Inslee is the most publicly active of the governors. In Nevada, he'll address activists at the Battle Born Progress convention.

Jamal Raad, an Inslee aide, said the governor will highlight Washington state's Medicaid expansion and family-leave policy while repeating his call for action on climate change. Raad notes Nevada Democrats' new combined control of the legislative and executive branches, with the governor's office being one of seven that Democrats flipped in November under Inslee's chairmanship of the Democratic Governors Association.

"He wants to lay out for them what kind of progressive agenda they can accomplish," Raad said.

Campaign finance laws give non-federal officials more leeway to raise money without having an official presidential campaign or exploratory committee, so there's less pressure on them to announce campaigns than for senators who want to travel. If those governors and mayors announce early and then fail to show fundraising prowess, their campaigns could be short-lived. But if they wait too long, they could lose out on media attention, donors and key staffers.

The sweet spot will be qualifying for the first party-sponsored debate in June. Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez hasn't yet announced debate qualification rules.

Inslee is traveling now using his federal political action committee.

Garcetti's PAC raised $2.6 million for Democrats last year. He brought in $100,000 each for several state parties, including early voting states, and he recently hired the former executive director of the Democratic Party in South Carolina, which holds the South's first primary.

Bullock, a former DGA chairman like Inslee, traveled extensively in 2018 but now is dedicated to his state's legislative session. His national advisers include Jen Palmieri, a former communications director to the Obama White House and Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign.

In Colorado, Hickenlooper opened a federal political action committee last fall and has made some top staff hires.

McAuliffe, who is also a former DNC chairman, is in contact with his old network of donors and aides; he has the personal wealth to pay for some of his own early travel.

Besides competing for money and staff, Hamrick said, candidates will have to choose their "lanes" — political identities that make them stand out.

The 2016 race amounted to Clinton and the non-Clinton lane, filled by Bernie Sanders. In 2020, it will be more complicated: policy distinctions; generational divides among older and younger candidates; demographic distinctions among white men, women and candidates of color; and a divide between Washington politicians and those elected to non-federal posts.

"There are overlaps, of course," Hamrick said.

So Bullock can be the 52-year-old white governor who mixes his Ivy League education with his Montana roots. McAuliffe, the 61-year-old former Virginia governor, can be the establishment liberal who restored felon voting rights and pushed Medicaid expansion but who warns against a "federal jobs guarantee" and "free college tuition."

Inslee told The Associated Press in an interview last fall that he doesn't buy into "lanes," but the 67-year-old also has made clear his intention to be the "climate change candidate" if he runs. He has a trip to New Hampshire later this month to speak on that topic at Dartmouth College.

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Israel’s military said early Friday it had conducted a wave of strikes “in the heart of Tehran” while smoke was seen billowing in the Beirut skyline after U.S. President Donald Trump delayed his threat to obliterate Iran’s energy plants over its effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

Israel has moved thousands of troops across the border into Lebanon, where Israeli officials said they want to take control of the entire area south of the Litani River — some 20 miles (about 30 kilometers) north of the border.

Facing a convulsing stock market, Trump on Thursday extended a deadline for reopening the Strait of Hormuz until April 6, saying Iran asked for the grace period and that talks were going “very well,” despite the fact Iran continues to publicly insist it is not negotiating with the White House on a 15-point proposal to end the conflict

The war has killed more than 1,900 people in Iran and nearly 1,100 in Lebanon. Eighteen people have died in Israel, while three Israeli soldiers have also been killed in Lebanon. Thirteen U.S. military members have died, as well as a number of civilians on land and sea in the Gulf region. Millions of people in Lebanon and Iran have been displaced.

Here is the latest:

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Russia and Iran have a military-technical cooperation agreement, and Moscow “supplied Iran with certain types of military products.”

“But we can’t accept the accusations that we’re helping Iran with intelligence,” Lavrov said in an interview to France Television on Thursday night.

He added that “everyone knows” the coordinates of U.S. military bases in the region. “It’s public information. I’m not surprised that Iran is attacking them,” Lavrov said.

The Saudi Embassy in Beirut said in a statement Friday that the decision is related to the “repercussions of the current events” taking place in Lebanon.

The embassy added that Saudi Arabia’s travel ban to Lebanon has been in place for years.

Israel has moved thousands of troops across the border into Lebanon, and Israeli forces and Iran-backed Hezbollah militants have been fighting on the ground for at least three weeks.

Bahrain sounded its missile alert siren late Friday morning over an incoming Iranian attack.

Qatar, which had not seen a major attack in days, also sounded its alerts Friday.

Kuwait said Friday its Shuwaikh Port in Kuwait City came under attack and sustained “material damage.” It said no one was hurt in the attack but offered no other details.

A Thai-flagged cargo ship that came under attack from Iran in the Strait of Hormuz and was abandoned by its crew has run aground, Iranian media reported Friday.

Thailand’s Foreign Ministry said Friday that the Iranian and Omani authorities were able to reach the Mayuree Naree on a rescue mission as three sailors remain unaccounted for. The ship came under attack March 11.

The semiofficial Tasnim and Fars news agencies, believed to be close to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, reported that the ship ran aground near the village of Ramchah on Qeshm Island.

Finance Minister Nicola Willis outlined Friday a four-tier plan for future fuel shortages, which at its most severe levels includes limits on buying gasoline and its prioritization for life-preserving services.

Willis disclosed criteria, including export restrictions and the state of domestic fuel stocks, that would guide movement between the four levels.

Willis said that the current designation was phase one, the lowest level, but that it was important for New Zealanders to know the possible extent of future restrictions.

There are no restrictions currently enacted on gasoline use or purchasing in New Zealand.

Israeli soldiers carry the flag-draped casket of Staff Sgt. Ori Greenberg who was killed in combat in Lebanon, during his funeral at Mount Herzl military cemetery in Jerusalem Thursday, March 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)

From left, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, President Donald Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick listen during a Cabinet meeting at the White House, Thursday, March 26, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Children displaced from Beirut's southern suburb of Dahiyeh shelter from the rain inside their tents along the coast in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, March 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

A man removes rubbles as he looks for missed stuff from his destroyed house that was hit in an Israeli airstrike in the southern port city of Tyre, Lebanon, Thursday, March 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)