State Legislature Special Election Megathread v3

[Roll Roons]

I still think the MA Dems are more incompetent than the MA Reps. Seriously, why else would they let Baker win in a 33.48 point rout in a 27.20 point Clinton state and in a heavily Democratic year.

Because he wouldn't have lost even if they had seriously contested it.

[Roll Roons]

Any news on these?

[Roll Roons]

Georgia has two legislative special elections on June 15, both in House districts formerly held by Republicans.  HD-156 is safe R, but HD-34 looks like it could potentially be interesting; it's a suburban district (Cobb County) where the former incumbent, Bert Reeves, won 56-44 in 2020, a decline from his winning percentages of 58% in 2018 and 64% in 2016.  There are two Republicans, two Democrats, and one Libertarian running.  If no one gets a majority on June 15, there will be a runoff between the top two on July 13.

Does anyone local have more insight on this race?

I'm curious what the Biden-Trump numbers are in HD-34

According to CNAnalysis, it was Trump +4. Though I'm sure Biden improved there a ton compared to Hillary. And even though it's a suburban Atlanta district, I think the fact that Trump won it should be enough to keep it in Republican hands.

[Roll Roons]

Kind of interesting to note. Oregon State Rep. Mike Nearman was expelled because he let armed far-right protestors into the State Capitol back in December. Oregon has got to be one of the most polarized states in the country. You have the far-left DSA types in Portland and the far-right militia types in the rural areas.

https://mobile.twitter.com/CamilaOrtiTV/status/1403190491378642949

[Roll Roons]

The Aug. 17th CT-SD-36 special will be one to watch. With the Dem-leaning Independent candidate in the race the Republicans have a serious shot at retaking this previously Republican seat. Along with the Republican advantage we've seen in CT special elections the seat is ripe for a Republican flip.

That's in Greenwich right? I actually really like the Republican who's running there. He ran last year and actually got pretty close even as Biden carried the district by a solid amount.

[Roll Roons]

is this a suburban district?

Yes. A very fast-growing one, at that.

[Roll Roons]

It seems like Democrats consistently underperform in Texas specials.

[Roll Roons]

The dem won 65-34

Substantial over-performance from Biden’s +16 win

Wonder what happened here?

Highly educated New England special election voters don't follow national trends. In 2017–18, special elections in Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island were among the strongest trends toward Republicans in the country. They all still swung strongly to Democrats in both 2018 and 2020.

Also there was the special Senate election in Greenwich where a Republican flipped a seat that Biden carried by over 20.

[Roll Roons]

Is there a particular reason dems couldn’t crack this seat in previous cycles?

Massive ticket splitting is still fairly common in New England. There's a GOP State Rep in Vermont who won by 16 points even as Biden got nearly 80% of the vote in her district.

For this seat, I think the previous incumbent was personally popular and went unopposed most of the time. Democrats hold such huge legislative majorities in Massachusetts that they probably felt there was no point in challenging him.

[Roll Roons]

Republicans hold AR-SD-07 in Washington County, Arkansas, by just 34 votes (!), or 0.84%. This seat went for Trump by 14%. Jim Bob Duggar ran in the R primary earlier but lost.

I'm sure the turnout was very low, but that's absolutely insane. Special elections really can be weird. Who said all politics was national?

[Roll Roons]

On April 5th, there'll be a special for a GOP-held State House seat in East Cobb and North Fulton, with a possible runoff on May 3: https://apnews.com/article/georgia-special-elections-elections-house-elections-0bf78e85e04327c9ca0803995e381874

I think I saw that Biden narrowly won the district, but the former State Rep won by 10 in 2020. Still could be an interesting indicator of what might happen in Georgia this fall.

[Roll Roons]

It’s so weird, you would expect Dems to be getting slaughtered given the polls and VA/NJ.

Special elections usually have very low turnout that can cause weird results. Like that one in Northwest Arkansas where a Trump +14 district ended up being a squeaker.

Plus at that level, campaign/candidate quality will matter more.

[Roll Roons]

Dems won HD42 in kentucky 95-4. Lol

Guys, Rand Paul's race is a tossup!

[Roll Roons]

There are two other special elections going on in VA tonight -- one in a safe D area, and one in a safe R -- how are they doing?

I think the Dem in Fairfax is doing worse than McAuliffe, let alone Biden. The Republican in Appalachia is also underperforming Trump by a decent amount.

[Roll Roons]

https://twitter.com/tencor_7144/status/1628220096521945089?cxt=HHwWgoC-1aLjzJgtA...

Not only did Trump endorse the crazy lady, but Democrats spent money to boost her.

[Roll Roons]

https://twitter.com/StephenJ_Caruso/status/1631020447142752256

Zabel won his last race by 30 points so the district is not in danger of flipping, but if he resigns it would result in the PA House being temporarily tied.

[Roll Roons]

Republicans won the MA State Senate race by over 8 points. I guess there's nowhere to go but up when you're at rock bottom, but it's a start.

Apparently the new state GOP chair put a serious effort into flipping it. According to my buddy who used to work for Baker's campaign, former chair Jim Lyons was basically the Kelli Ward of MA in that he totally destroyed the state GOP apparatus, but got no attention because the state is already so blue. It's good that they're at least trying to turn things around now.

It won't become competitive at the federal level anytime soon, but down the road, I think MA is way more likely to elect another Republican governor than MD is.

[Roll Roons]

Obviously this is a very underwhelming result for the GOP, but it's worth noting that Florida's rightward shift isn't just because of Miami-Dade County.

[Roll Roons]

Obviously this is a very underwhelming result for the GOP, but it's worth noting that Florida's rightward shift isn't just because of Miami-Dade County.

The cause of the shift in Miami-Dade; Hispanic Clinton-Trump voters, is the same as the cause of the shift statewide.

In some places like Osceola and parts of Tampa, yes. But it's more because of the conservative white retirees flooding into the state.

Democrats have collapsed in counties like Volusia, Pasco and Hernando. Others like Collier, Lee, Sarasota, Manatee, Lake, Brevard, Sumter aren't getting worse for them percentage-wise but are continuing to produce bigger raw vote margins for Republicans that favorable trends in the Jacksonville metro and Seminole just can't overcome.

[Roll Roons]

Looks like an underperformance in minnesota

Not everything's reported yet, but yes. I'm surprised. I figured this is the exact kind of district where Democrats would hold up very well.

[Roll Roons]

Final MN SD-52B results: D +17.5. Was Clinton +18.3, Biden +29.1.

Eyeballing it, I would think this seat is at least 70-75% white and 55-60% college-educated. Considering that, pretty weak for Democrats.

[Roll Roons]

https://twitter.com/PoliticsPA/status/1735366990707986502
This is a Biden +10 seat in Lower Bucks County, although the incumbent (who was a Dem) was unopposed last year.

[Roll Roons]

https://twitter.com/samshirazim/status/1744915245015920887

[Roll Roons]

As a lover of NJ politics, I still can't get over the fact that the Democratic candidate here is named Tom Keen.

[Roll Roons]

I suppose Riverwalk deserves his accolades.