State Legislature Special Election Mega Thread

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Kevin Landrigan‏ @KlandriganUL  24s25 seconds ago
Unofficial final: GOPer Mark McLean beats Democrat James Morin, 657-536 (55-45%) in Hills Dist. 44 special election. #nhpolitics

Interesting that there was only a little improvement here, but enough to flip the race in the other district.

If the below is true it makes perfect sense though:

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According to Dailykos:

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The district that swung towards Trump was held easily by the GOP while the one that swung away from him was lost.

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So we are up to 4 Democratic special election tonight, 11 for the year. Unprecedented gains.

Is that 2 NH + 2 GA races?

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Please explain

If one party wins a seat 65% to 35%

In the next election the same party wins 55% to 45%

Is that a 10% or a 20% swing?

For what it is worth Wikipedia defines the swing as:

One party swing (in percentage points) = Percentage of vote (current election) – Percentage of vote (previous election).  In my example the swing would have been -10%.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swing_(politics)

Each party swing 10% (in opposite directions) but the margin swing is 20%.

They're perfectly equivalent if there are always only 2 parties. They will differ when 3rd parties exist and vary in strength between elections. Usually most people would then prefer the margin swing as being more reflective.

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Also defining swings as margin change is reasonably better when there are 3rd party candidates involved.