Official 2022 State and Local Election Results Thread

[Spectator]

All 40 redrawn Massachusetts state senate seats were won by Biden. Some were very close though.

[Frodo]

Remarkable to think that WV had a Democratic legislature not even a decade ago. Now the WV GOP is close to HI Dems-level domination in the state legislature:

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1594336138327916544

Update:

https://twitter.com/WVMetroNews/status/1598327819796455427

Could the West Virginia Senate plausibly go unanimous R at some point this decade?  I would imagine the lower house has majority-minority and/or college town districts that would preclude this?  The last unanimous chamber was the Hawaii Senate, which went unanimous D in the 2016 election.  R's did win seats there in 2020 and 2022.  Prior to 1970, several Southern states would have unanimous D chambers at various times, with the last one to fall being the Alabama Senate in 1982.

The last unanimous R chamber appears to have been the Maine Senate until D's won seats in 1932 with the FDR landslide.  Michigan and Vermont also had unanimous R state senates in the 1920's.  Pennsylvania and Kansas came very close.  The R's never completely locked the D's out in Utah, which surprises me.

Perhaps. The Senate is still MMDs with one of the seats up in midterms and the other up in presidential years. This means the seats are large enough to all lean R. The issue with going for the full sweep is Morgantown, which anchors district 13 to such a degree Trump only won it by 3 points. Dems did lose the Morgantown seat this year by <1% in a upset. So the GOP would have to win it during a neutral presidential year and then hold the other Morgantown seat in 2026 at the earliest for the chamber to go full R. So it seems more likely to go like Wyoming and have the Morgantown Dems plus a few other pop-ups in the future.

The house, as you assumed, is 100 SMDs, so the seats are small enough to have a few Biden won in city centers outside of but obviously including Morgantown.

I was under the impression that Republicans made all their districts single-member districts in both chambers in the last legislative session IIRC.  

[Hope For A New Era]

The R's never completely locked the D's out in Utah, which surprises me.

Shouldn't really be a surprise. SLC has always been D, even if its county was R until 2008, and there were once ancestral D areas as well - Reagan 1984's weakest county was Carbon, which he won by 0.41%.

There's also some history of a few Ds who were able to massively outperform partisanship and win anyway. Jim Matheson seems to have been the last of them. In 2000 he casually won a strongly R House seat by 12 points. In 2002 the legislature tried to gerrymander him out. They believed they had drawn a district that "no Democrat could possibly win."  He won anyway. Two years later he won again, this time outperforming the top of the ticket by 46 points.

He retired after winning by less than a thousand votes in 2012. Polarization has killed so many great politicians.

[Skill and Chance]

All 40 redrawn Massachusetts state senate seats were won by Biden. Some were very close though.

So it's probably West Virginia or Massachusetts if it happens this decade, then.

[Oryxslayer]

Remarkable to think that WV had a Democratic legislature not even a decade ago. Now the WV GOP is close to HI Dems-level domination in the state legislature:

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1594336138327916544

Update:

https://twitter.com/WVMetroNews/status/1598327819796455427

Could the West Virginia Senate plausibly go unanimous R at some point this decade?  I would imagine the lower house has majority-minority and/or college town districts that would preclude this?  The last unanimous chamber was the Hawaii Senate, which went unanimous D in the 2016 election.  R's did win seats there in 2020 and 2022.  Prior to 1970, several Southern states would have unanimous D chambers at various times, with the last one to fall being the Alabama Senate in 1982.

The last unanimous R chamber appears to have been the Maine Senate until D's won seats in 1932 with the FDR landslide.  Michigan and Vermont also had unanimous R state senates in the 1920's.  Pennsylvania and Kansas came very close.  The R's never completely locked the D's out in Utah, which surprises me.

Perhaps. The Senate is still MMDs with one of the seats up in midterms and the other up in presidential years. This means the seats are large enough to all lean R. The issue with going for the full sweep is Morgantown, which anchors district 13 to such a degree Trump only won it by 3 points. Dems did lose the Morgantown seat this year by <1% in a upset. So the GOP would have to win it during a neutral presidential year and then hold the other Morgantown seat in 2026 at the earliest for the chamber to go full R. So it seems more likely to go like Wyoming and have the Morgantown Dems plus a few other pop-ups in the future.

The house, as you assumed, is 100 SMDs, so the seats are small enough to have a few Biden won in city centers outside of but obviously including Morgantown.

I was under the impression that Republicans made all their districts single-member districts in both chambers in the last legislative session IIRC.  

That did occur in full in the House. If you read my post in full, you will see the Senate MMDs are treated as SMDs electorally with each district having two seats, one up in midterms and the other up in pres years with staggered terms.

[Frodo]

Remarkable to think that WV had a Democratic legislature not even a decade ago. Now the WV GOP is close to HI Dems-level domination in the state legislature:

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1594336138327916544

Update:

https://twitter.com/WVMetroNews/status/1598327819796455427

Could the West Virginia Senate plausibly go unanimous R at some point this decade?  I would imagine the lower house has majority-minority and/or college town districts that would preclude this?  The last unanimous chamber was the Hawaii Senate, which went unanimous D in the 2016 election.  R's did win seats there in 2020 and 2022.  Prior to 1970, several Southern states would have unanimous D chambers at various times, with the last one to fall being the Alabama Senate in 1982.

The last unanimous R chamber appears to have been the Maine Senate until D's won seats in 1932 with the FDR landslide.  Michigan and Vermont also had unanimous R state senates in the 1920's.  Pennsylvania and Kansas came very close.  The R's never completely locked the D's out in Utah, which surprises me.

Perhaps. The Senate is still MMDs with one of the seats up in midterms and the other up in presidential years. This means the seats are large enough to all lean R. The issue with going for the full sweep is Morgantown, which anchors district 13 to such a degree Trump only won it by 3 points. Dems did lose the Morgantown seat this year by <1% in a upset. So the GOP would have to win it during a neutral presidential year and then hold the other Morgantown seat in 2026 at the earliest for the chamber to go full R. So it seems more likely to go like Wyoming and have the Morgantown Dems plus a few other pop-ups in the future.

The house, as you assumed, is 100 SMDs, so the seats are small enough to have a few Biden won in city centers outside of but obviously including Morgantown.

I was under the impression that Republicans made all their districts single-member districts in both chambers in the last legislative session IIRC.  

That did occur in full in the House. If you read my post in full, you will see the Senate MMDs are treated as SMDs electorally with each district having two seats, one up in midterms and the other up in pres years with staggered terms.

Yes, I just saw that the West Virginia Senate has two-member districts. 

[Mr.Phips]

Remarkable to think that WV had a Democratic legislature not even a decade ago. Now the WV GOP is close to HI Dems-level domination in the state legislature:

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1594336138327916544

Update:

https://twitter.com/WVMetroNews/status/1598327819796455427

Could the West Virginia Senate plausibly go unanimous R at some point this decade?  I would imagine the lower house has majority-minority and/or college town districts that would preclude this?  The last unanimous chamber was the Hawaii Senate, which went unanimous D in the 2016 election.  R's did win seats there in 2020 and 2022.  Prior to 1970, several Southern states would have unanimous D chambers at various times, with the last one to fall being the Alabama Senate in 1982.

The last unanimous R chamber appears to have been the Maine Senate until D's won seats in 1932 with the FDR landslide.  Michigan and Vermont also had unanimous R state senates in the 1920's.  Pennsylvania and Kansas came very close.  The R's never completely locked the D's out in Utah, which surprises me.

Perhaps. The Senate is still MMDs with one of the seats up in midterms and the other up in presidential years. This means the seats are large enough to all lean R. The issue with going for the full sweep is Morgantown, which anchors district 13 to such a degree Trump only won it by 3 points. Dems did lose the Morgantown seat this year by <1% in a upset. So the GOP would have to win it during a neutral presidential year and then hold the other Morgantown seat in 2026 at the earliest for the chamber to go full R. So it seems more likely to go like Wyoming and have the Morgantown Dems plus a few other pop-ups in the future.

The house, as you assumed, is 100 SMDs, so the seats are small enough to have a few Biden won in city centers outside of but obviously including Morgantown.

Amazing how Democrats dummymandered the Charleston area in the state senate in the 2011 redistricting.  They attached Charleston to increasingly Republican counties to the north while leaving another Kanawha county district with just the suburbs.  They ended up losing both seats in each district.  Had they just drawn Charleston in with the most Dem parts of Kanawha county, they would probably have two more relatively safe seats.

[Skill and Chance]

Remarkable to think that WV had a Democratic legislature not even a decade ago. Now the WV GOP is close to HI Dems-level domination in the state legislature:

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1594336138327916544

Update:

https://twitter.com/WVMetroNews/status/1598327819796455427

Could the West Virginia Senate plausibly go unanimous R at some point this decade?  I would imagine the lower house has majority-minority and/or college town districts that would preclude this?  The last unanimous chamber was the Hawaii Senate, which went unanimous D in the 2016 election.  R's did win seats there in 2020 and 2022.  Prior to 1970, several Southern states would have unanimous D chambers at various times, with the last one to fall being the Alabama Senate in 1982.

The last unanimous R chamber appears to have been the Maine Senate until D's won seats in 1932 with the FDR landslide.  Michigan and Vermont also had unanimous R state senates in the 1920's.  Pennsylvania and Kansas came very close.  The R's never completely locked the D's out in Utah, which surprises me.

Perhaps. The Senate is still MMDs with one of the seats up in midterms and the other up in presidential years. This means the seats are large enough to all lean R. The issue with going for the full sweep is Morgantown, which anchors district 13 to such a degree Trump only won it by 3 points. Dems did lose the Morgantown seat this year by <1% in a upset. So the GOP would have to win it during a neutral presidential year and then hold the other Morgantown seat in 2026 at the earliest for the chamber to go full R. So it seems more likely to go like Wyoming and have the Morgantown Dems plus a few other pop-ups in the future.

The house, as you assumed, is 100 SMDs, so the seats are small enough to have a few Biden won in city centers outside of but obviously including Morgantown.

Amazing how Democrats dummymandered the Charleston area in the state senate in the 2011 redistricting.  They attached Charleston to increasingly Republican counties to the north while leaving another Kanawha county district with just the suburbs.  They ended up losing both seats in each district.  Had they just drawn Charleston in with the most Dem parts of Kanawha county, they would probably have two more relatively safe seats.

Like AR, they erroneously thought they would be able to contest control of the chamber for the entire decade.  The only place that kind of approach even came close to working out for Dems was the lower house in KY.  It very nearly worked for VA R's as they held out until 2019, but the presidential margins obviously weren't 60/40 against them.   

[It's not just that you are a crook senator]

I don't blame the party switcher because the only real way he can have influence in WV is by being Republican at this point. Honestly, if I were a state house member in WV, I would just resign, there is just no point.

[politicallefty]

What do you think is the most likely opportunity for a unanimous chamber in the near future then?  I think the 2 remaining Wyoming Senate Dems are in college town and mountain resort liberal safe seats, so that doesn't seem likely.  My understanding is that there are only 3 Republicans left in the Massachusetts Senate.  I know there aren't any large enough concentrations of Republicans to have an R-leaning congressional seat, but there probably are a couple of R-leaning seats at the state senate level.

The South Dakota Senate is brutal for Democrats, though they somehow gained a seat this year (a double-digit win in Sioux Falls). It'll be 31R-4D, though it's worth noting three of those Democratic seats were won by less than six points. In North Dakota, Democrats have fallen even further this year, to a 43R-4D deficit. Fargo is enough to prevent a total wipeout though.

The Massachusetts Senate is interesting because Republicans are currently at an all-time historic low. There's also nowhere Democrats can't win in the state either. However, those three Republicans won very easily.

I think you're right about Wyoming. The two remaining Democratic seats in the state senate appear quite safe.

Overall, I think the most likely look like this (though none are particularly likely):

Hawaii Senate
West Virginia Senate
South Dakota Senate
Massachusetts Senate

[Oryxslayer]

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1601088763311947776?s=20&t=c5-dZmPo7OOoTbh...

Something in MA? Both candidates accept legal action will ensue. Also another recount is occurring in a NH border seat in the coming days.

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1601081931055394819?s=20&t=c5-dZmPo7OOoTbh...

Dems hold the NY Senate supermajority. This is SD-50 in the Syracuse region.

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1601086473624690689?s=20&t=c5-dZmPo7OOoTbh...

Perhaps the tightest result in decades for the CA legislature. Will go to a recount.

[Interlocutor is just not there yet]

https://twitter.com/Taniel/status/1601086473624690689?s=20&t=c5-dZmPo7OOoTbh...
Perhaps the tightest result in decades for the CA legislature. Will go to a recount.

It also looks like the Republican won the 47th Assembly District (Joshua Tree & Palm Springs) by a margin of 85 votes. I think I read that's the closest Assembly result in like 20+ years

[Anti Democrat Democrat Club]

https://twitter.com/Melanie4NH/status/1597303344946565120

Former state senator Melanie Levesque is running for Secretary of State.

As I've said, NH was very weird in that our SoS office is viewed as nonpartisan. In 2018, after Bill Gardner appeared on Trump's voting commission, he became the de facto Republican candidate. The "primary" was a formality - van Ostern had essentially ran a legal pay-to-play scheme, and Gardner and the other candidate both lost. While Dems controlled the state legislature, Gardner got enough Democrats to defect and win.

Gardner didn't get a challenger in 2020, but resigned due to health issues. His successor, David Scanlan, is a Republican, but has always been fairly close to Gardner. He's supported some of the suppression bills that the state GOP rammed through, but has expressed trepidation on the recent provisional ballot bill passed.

I'm tentatively calling this Likely Scanlan. Aside from the razor-thin House margin, Levesque is a political operative who is even more tied to Dems than Van Ostern was. Levesque also seems like a pretty weak candidate - even with 2020 she's consistently underperformed against a lunatic opponent. I'd have to imagine there are enough defectors to get Scanlan in.

Shockingly, Melanie Levesque lost, 237-175. That's about 34 defectors in total. Not nearly as disastrous as Van Ostern's performance but still pretty bad.

For all the wins that the NHDP has secured, they still don't know how to flip the SoS office. Literally all it takes to not get humiliated is to not nominate a blatant partisan.

[有爭議嘅領土 of The Figgis Agency]

Saw this elsewhere

https://twitter.com/krazgreinetz/status/1606681606403461121?

[ProgressiveModerate]

Saw this elsewhere

https://twitter.com/krazgreinetz/status/1606681606403461121?

Something def wrong with that Pheonix inset. The dropoff between "Yes" precincts to "No" + 40 precincts is way too abrupt.