State Legislature Special Election Megathread v3

[MarkD]

A Democrat winning MO HD99 is rather surprising. I don't think that area has ever elected a Democrat before, at least, not in the last few decades. If there was any district in SW St. Louis County that would elect a Democrat, it would be 99, and most of the other adjacent districts that surround it are more heavily Republican than 99. A year ago the incumbent won re-election with only 53%, but two years before that she won her first election with 58%, while the district voted for Trump by a margin of only 5 percentage points and in general supported the Republican ticket by about 10 percentage points. In 2014, the district re-elected an incumbent Republican with 63.5%, and two years before that it voted for him by 59%, while generally supporting the Republican ticket by about 10 percentage points. So this is a big win for the Democrats. It's hard to say whether this Democrat can win a whole term next year.

[MarkD]

I’m guessing Nicole Galloway won HD-99 last year since she crushed it pretty much everywhere in the suburbs, but does anyone know if McCaskill did as well?

Both did, yes. I believe by quite a bit as well, but I don't have the numbers on hand.

I've calculated a few statistics about HD-99. Clarifying what I said above, this district voted for Trump in 2016 by 49.32% to Clinton's 44.21%; meanwhile the district generally supported the Republican ticket by 53.43% to 43.47%. But you're right that in 2018 it swung to Galloway and McCaskill. In District 99, Galloway won the Auditor's race 56.86% to 38.36%, while McCaskill carried the district by 53.20% to Hawley's 44.24%. And Democrat Cort VanOstran carried the district with 50.19% to Rep. Wagner's 48.10%. At the same time (as I noted above) the incumbent Republican state Rep. won with only 53%.

Don't count on this Democratic swing in HD-99 seeping into any adjacent districts, though. HD-99 shares boundaries with HD-90, which already swung to the Democrat earlier this decade, HD-89, HD-96, HD-98, and HD-100, all of which are much more heavily Republican than HD-99. Each of those districts supported the Republican ticket by at least 60% in 2016. (I suppose I could calculate how well Galloway, McCaskill, and VanOstran did in 89, 96, 98, and 100, but that's going to take some more time.)

There's only one other district anywhere in St. Louis County that Democrats have a good chance to pick up soon and that's HD-94 in SE County. Besides that, there are one or two possible districts in St. Charles County, such as HD-65 and HD-106, and certainly Democrats need to put in a lot of effort to win back some seats in Jefferson County that flipped Republican only in the relatively recent past.