Alright, I'm finished bitching and whining about last night's election results, no matter how disappointing they were.
Since no one's really bothered to go in-depth about this, I figured as a resident, I may as well cover the results of the election in my home state. Ironically, I'd say this was one of the
least disappointing states for dems.
First, the congressional districts. In my home district of UT-02, Incumbent Chris Stewart defeated Luz Robles (who happens to be my state senator) 60-33, which is disappointing, but not entirely unexpected.
The real contest, however, was UT-04. Mia Love winning this doesn't seem that remarkable at first glance - but there's the fact that despite the nationwide wave, she only won the district by three points in what was long assumed to be an easy republican pickup. So what happened? I'd say it's a combination of Mitt Romney's coattails from 2012 dropping off somewhat, assumption that the race would be won by a very large margin, and Love just not being a particularly good campaigner herself (my fellow Utahn Zioneer elaborated on this in explaining why she lost to Matheson). I do not believe that race was a major factory, contrary to what some have stated. As both a very left-wing individual and an atheist, I will say that despite what the Book of Mormon says about black people, that they church and the very large majority of its followers have moved on from this, and I don't think it's fair to associate them with racism in this day and age.
Now for the state legislature races. While the GOP certainly could have picked up a couple of seats, as demonstrated by how close some of the races were in 2012, the democratic incumbents, by the looks of it, have managed to hang on by the slimmest of margins (though that could change in the next couple weeks, who knows). The dems also managed to win back the Price-based 69th state house district after losing it in 2012 (And the democrat who lost it then, Christine Watkins, decided to become a republican to get back in. Well, look how that turned out. Good riddance to her). As such, this is the only district in the legislature
not based in Salt Lake County to be represented by a democrat. So, it may not be much, but things certainly could have been worse for the dems at the state level.
Last are the Salt Lake County elections. Considering that this is the largest county in the state, with a population larger than the state of Montana, and that the races here got a great deal of local coverage, I think that these are worth noting. Despite what happened nationwide, most of the seriously contested races here were won by democrats, with the dems holding on to an open at-large county council seat, and the incumbent democratic D.A., Clerk, and Sheriff all winning reelection in fairly publicized campaigns. The only competetive race the dems lost was County Auditor, by the slimmest of margins. At this point, I believe that the current balance of power in countywide offices is 6 R, 6 D, with the dems holding all the offices I mentioned, plus another At-Large County Council seat and County Mayor. The pubs hold a 5-4 majority on the County Council, but since they didn't pick up any seats, they did not get a veto-proof majority.
Why did they win? They won because they stood by what they did and engaged voters, rather than running away at the first sign of trouble.
As for other counties, the dems hold the majority of countywide offices in, to my knowledge, two counties: Summit and Carbon. Salt Lake has, as I mentioned, countywide offices evenly split and the dems hold a few token elected positions in a few of the rural counties, but for the most part, republicans dominate.
So yeah, I'm probably just grasping at straws here, but considering the circumstances of this election, I'll consider the fact that my vote helped several county officials win their elections something of a minor miracle.
Feel free to comment on this. You can read more about Utah election results
here.
