2019: An Election Year in Review

Earlier this year, I unveiled my rubric for the 2019 election; highlighting the best and worst-case scenarios for Republicans.  With the election in the rearview mirror, the time has come for me to actually score the election using the rubric.  I have bolded the scenarios that actually bore out. 

Grade	State Races	Congressional Races
A	-Republicans sweep all three governorships -Republicans maintain control of both houses of the Virginia legislature	-Republicans sweep all three special Congressional elections
B	-Republicans win two of the three governorships, leaving no net change in the number of governorships -Republicans maintain control of both houses of the Virginia legislature	-Republicans win two of the three special Congressional elections
C	-Republicans win one of the three governorships, giving Democrats a net gain of one seat -Republicans lose control of one house of the Virginia legislature	-Republicans win one of the three special Congressional elections
F	-Republicans lose all three governorships -Republicans lose control of both houses of the Virginia legislature	-Republicans lose all three special Congressional elections

Upon further inspection, my rubric needed to elaborate more when it came to “state races.” Rather than give the whole election one grade, it seems more logical to give each subcategory of races that took place their own separate grade and then average them all together.

Congressional Special Elections: A (3-0)

As far as federal races go, Republicans did excellent.  They swept all three of the special Congressional elections that took place this year.  The first one, which took place in a deep-red Pennsylvania district, barely raised any eyebrows.  The other two elections, which took place on the same day, gave Republicans some concern.  Republicans should have had no trouble winning one of the districts, North Carolina’s 3^rd Congressional District, which President Trump carried with more than 60 percent of the vote. While President Trump carried North Carolina’s 9^th Congressional District with nearly 55 percent of the vote in 2016, the regularly scheduled 2018 election came down to the wire.  A “do-over” had to take place because of allegations of voter fraud. A visit to the state from President Trump appeared to make a difference in the outcome of the two elections.  Republican Greg Murphy won the special election in North Carolina’s 3^rd Congressional District by roughly the same margin that the President did while Republican Dan Bishop won the special election in the 9^th District by a margin of two points.   

Statewide Races: C+ (1-2 in governorships, 100% success in all other statewide races)

Statewide races took place in three of the reddest states in the union this year; as voters in Kentucky, Louisiana, and Mississippi elected candidates for Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, Treasurer, and other statewide races.  Not surprisingly, political prognosticators paid the most attention to the gubernatorial races.  President Trump headed to all three states with gubernatorial races this year to campaign on behalf of the Republican candidate and the whole Republican ticket. 

As a whole, Republicans performed best in Mississippi; which actually has the smallest Republican lean of the trio of states because of its large African-American population.  Republicans swept every single statewide office; including the office of Attorney General, which they had not won in more than a century.

As Republicans enjoyed the sweet taste of victory in Mississippi, the elections in Kentucky yielded mixed results. While the media liked to play up Republican Governor Matt Bevin’s loss as an embarrassment for the President who worked to secure his victory, his rally in Kentucky seemed to propel every other Republican running for statewide office to victory.  Bevin’s election loss reflected more on his terrible approval rating than the President’s influence or lack thereof.

The idea of gubernatorial elections as referendums on the incumbent, not the President, also played out in Louisiana. Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards had a decent approval rating going into his re-election bid.  Unlike the far-left Democratic Party at the national level, which has become beholden to the abortion lobby, Edwards actually signed into law a Heartbeat Bill. Republicans had reason for optimism when Edwards failed to clinch the magic number of 50 percent to avoid a runoff during the October 12 “jungle primary,” where all candidates ran on the same ticket regardless of party affiliation.  Edwards won 46.6 percent of the vote while the Republican candidates received a combined total of about 52 percent.  Edwards ended up facing off head-to-head against one of the Republican candidates, Eddie Rispone, in a runoff election that took place on Saturday.  Had the turnout in the runoff matched the turnout in the primary, Rispone could have won by consolidating the Republican vote. The turnout in the runoff ended up increasing to the benefit of Edwards, who pulled off a narrow victory. Just like what took place in Kentucky, Republicans ended up winning every other statewide race in the Pelican State.

State Legislative Races (C-, F in Virginia, B in Louisiana and Mississippi)

As for state legislative races, Republicans definitely could have done better but they also could have done worse. They lost both houses of the Virginia State legislature but that should not have come as much of a surprise.  All of the losses came in districts that Hillary Clinton carried in 2016 and Republicans managed to hang onto a handful of Clinton-won seats.  In other words, the Democrats made absolutely no inroads into Trump country. 

Check out the tables below, which I created when laying out the stakes for the Virginia elections a couple of weeks ago.  Bolded districts flipped from red to blue following the 2019 election, underlined districts became more Republican as a result of court-ordered redistricting, while italicized districts became more Democratic as a result of redistricting. 

Safe D 16	Likely D 3	Leans D 2	Tossup 3	Leans R 1	Likely R 3	Safe R 12
1, 2, 5, 9, 16, 18, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 39	6, 10, 25	13, 21	7, 12, 16	8	11, 22, 28	3, 4, 14, 15, 19, 20, 23, 24, 26, 27, 38, 40

Table 2: Virginia House of Delegates Races

Safe D 38	Likely D 5	Leans D 7	Tossup 10	Leans R 2	Likely R 7	Safe R 31
2, 11, 32, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 52, 53, 57, 63, 67, 69, 70, 71, 74, 76, 77, 79, 80, 86, 87, 89, 90, 92, 94, 95	13, 31, 40, 50, 75	10, 51, 66, 68, 72, 73, 93	12, 21, 27, 28, 62, 83, 84, 85, 91, 100	26, 81	14, 33, 54, 58, 82, 88, 96	1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 29, 30, 55, 56, 59, 60, 61, 64, 65, 78, 97, 98, 99

While Republicans lost seats in Virginia, they ended up gaining seats in a state that still looks like a lost cause at the presidential level: New Jersey.  The GOP picked up four seats in the New Jersey General Assembly.  In addition, the Republican candidate emerged victorious in a special election to complete the term of Democrat Jeff Van Drew, who gave up the seat when he became a member of the US House of Representatives.  The Republican victory in Van Drew’s former seat, as well as the Republican pickups in the two Assembly seats within Van Drew’s State Senate district, illustrate that South Jersey has become fertile territory for the GOP.  That might explain Van Drew’s decision to vote against proceeding with the impeachment inquiry; making him one of only two House Democrats to do so.  President Trump won Van Drew’s district with slightly more than 50 percent of the vote and the Cook Political Report changed the race rating for his district from “Leans Democratic” to “Tossup” following the 2019 election.

As Republicans picked up a supermajority in the Louisiana Senate but came up two seats short in their effort to secure a supermajority in the House of Representatives.  Had they successfully achieved a veto-proof two-thirds supermajority, that would have had guaranteed the creation of favorable redistricting plans. Because of Republicans’ failure to achieve a two-thirds supermajority in the House, Edwards can veto a map drawn by the legislature.   

Local Races and Referendums: Good News for the “America First” Crowd, Silver Linings for Soros and Friends

Ahead of the 2019 election, I paid very little attention to local races; i.e. mayoral races.  Since the nation’s largest city did not have a mayoral race, I figured it did not make much sense to focus on local races.  It looks like I may have made a mistake because, for the most part, the “America First” crowd has a lot to brag about when it comes to local elections and referendums.  In Aurora, Colorado, former Republican Congressman Mike Coffman beat the chosen candidate of open borders activists, Omar Montgomery.  Coffman set himself up as a defender of the immigration detention facility in the city; which has become a target of the progressive activists who like to chant “No borders! No wall! No USA at all!”

While I remain pessimistic about President Trump’s chances to win Colorado in 2020, Coffman’s victory in the mayoral race in Colorado’s third-largest city offers a reason for optimism. Coffman lost his re-election bid by double digits last year; likely because immigration has turned his formerly red district blue.  Foreign-born residents make up nearly one-sixth of the population in Colorado’s 6^th Congressional District.  Maybe that explains why President George W. Bush won the district with 60 percent of the vote in both of his presidential runs but John McCain only won 53 percent of the vote there in 2008. The Republican share of the vote in the 2016 Presidential Election shrunk to 41 percent.

Meanwhile, in two referendums that took place this year, voters said “no thanks” to the radical open borders policies championed by the extremist left. As The Federation for Immigration Reform (FAIR) reported, voters in Sussex County, New Jersey, “by a 2 to 1 margin supported an initiative that says the county freeholders should cooperate and make county resources available to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).  In other words, the people of Sussex County, which votes overwhelmingly Republican in presidential elections, gave the middle finger to “state Attorney General (AG) Gurbil Grewal’s sanctuary directive.” At the same time, the voters in Tuscon, Arizona defeated “a ballot initiative to declare it a sanctuary city by more than 71 percent.” Tucson-based Pima County votes Democratic; indicating that the desire for national sovereignty might extend into the belly of blue America more than liberals want to admit.

Not surprisingly, the victories enjoyed by the “America First” crowd did not extend to the liberal bastion of San Francisco.  The City by the Bay elected radical leftist Chesa Boudin, son of two domestic terrorists formerly associated with the radical left group Weather Underground, to the position of District Attorney. Voters in Albemarle, Fairfax, Loudoun, and Arlington County, Virginia also gave votes of confidence to SJW prosecutors backed by far-left billionaire George Soros.   

Averaging all the grades together, Republicans came out with a “B-” because strong performances in referendums, statewide races besides gubernatorial elections, and special elections canceled out weak performances in the Virginia legislative races, gubernatorial elections, and prosecutors’ races. Republicans will likely have to improve on their performances if they want to have a strong 2020 but I classify the 2019 election as “worse than what Republicans hoped for, better than the media advertised.”