Republicans Get Stomped Everywhere in Voting

I suspect that if today Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson is asked about last night’s election results, he will claim not to be aware of them. Johnson has claimed ignorance of current events in almost every recent press appearance. Like many Republicans, he has preferred to stick his fingers in his ears and ignore signal after signal indicating that what happened yesterday was about to occur.

Two and a half weeks ago, 7 million Americans took to the streets to loudly proclaim that they would not accept a king ruling this country. Cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump’s reaction was to post a video of him dumping feces on the demonstrators. Johnson suggested that this was an effective use of satire and social media by Trump. Last night, voters responded to having shit dumped on them and their reaction was not metaphorical. It was as widespread a rout of Republicans that could have been imagined. According to data journalist G. Elliot Morris, "What we saw last night was a directional shift toward Democrats in 99.8% of counties that held partisan elections."

What Democrats are now demonstrating is that they are no longer willing to bring an olive branch to a gunfight. They will bring a gun and they will use it (that’s a metaphor, Speaker Johnson). Michelle Obama once said that when Republicans go low, Democrats go high. No more. Democrats might not like street fights, but they will no longer run from them. Last night, Democrats won just about everything that it was possible to win. They won elections that I didn’t even know were being held. They won in blue states and in red states. It was as complete of a repudiation of Trump and the lickspittles — Republican and Democratic alike — that cower before him as was possible to deliver. While Speaker Johnson will likely profess to having been too busy to hear about last night’s results, plenty of others heard loud and clear. No Republican seat is safe, and Trump has become an albatross from which Republicans cannot escape.

Let's review the results. In Virginia, Democrat Abigail Spanberger easily defeated Republican Winsome Earle-Sears to become the Commonwealth's first female governor. That was not too much of a surprise given that Earle-Sears was a controversial candidate whom even Trump refused to endorse.

In the Lieutenant Governor's race, Democrat Ghazala Hashmi defeated Republican John Reid. Both of these candidates were somewhat non-traditional. Hashmi became the first Muslim to win statewide in Virginia and the first Muslim woman elected to statewide office in any state in the United States. Reid, who is openly gay, was embroiled in a controversy involving nude photos, and Virginia's Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin, had asked him to withdraw from the race prior to the primary.

But what was a surprise was the race for Attorney General. This contest pitted Democrat Jay Jones against the incumbent Republican Jason Miyares. Jones gained some early notoriety due to a speeding ticket he had received. Miyares blasted Jones about the ticket when it was revealed that a criminal investigation of the incident remains open. Then, a Republican member of the House of Delegates leaked old text messages from Jones in which he referenced a joke from the TV show "The Office" involving a gun and two bullets. Jones had joked that he would use both bullets against the then-State House Speaker, a Republican. Jones then went on to suggest that the murder of the Speaker's two young children might be justified because that might cause the Republican to change his position regarding gun control. Miyares focused nearly his entire campaign on an allegation that Jones supported the murder of children. Voters either didn't believe Miyares or didn't care, because Jones defeated Miyares by more than 5 points. Also in Virginia, Democrats made huge gains in House of Delegates races, picking up 13 seats. Among the Republican delegates who were defeated was the one who had leaked Jones' texts.

In New Jersey, Democrat Mikie Sherrill defeated Republican Jack Ciattarelli. The nearly 13-point spread was probably a surprise to many because polls suggested that the race was much tighter. Trump had endorsed Ciattarelli, but that did not seem to have provided much help. To the contrary, Sherrill turned Trump into an election issue, using Trump's support against Ciattarelli.

In one of the most watched races, Democrat Zohran Mamdani easily defeated Independent Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa. Mamdani is a Democratic Socialist, a Muslim, and an immigrant. His opponents made an issue of all three of those characteristics, with Cuomo especially getting deep in the gutter with Islamophobic allegations. Trump frequently commented on this race, promising to punish New York City if Mamdani was elected and endorsing Cuomo. Trump may have moved some votes from Sliwa to Cuomo, but not enough to matter.

In upstate New York, Democrats flipped the Onondaga County Legislature, which has been held by Republicans for nearly 50 years. The Democrats won each of the legislative contests they challenged.

In Mississippi, where special elections were held, Democrats flipped two state Senate seats and one state House seat. The Senate victories broke the supermajority that Republicans have held in that chamber since 2011.

In Erie County, PA, a marginally Trump county, Democrats flipped the County Executive position by 24 points. In 2021, Conservatives took over the Bucks County, PA school boards on the strength of an anti-LGBTQ platform. Last night, Democrats ousted all Republicans from both of the county's school boards. Also in Pennsylvania, voters chose to retain three Democratic justices on the state's Supreme Court. A billionaire-supported effort to defeat the three failed.

In Georgia, Democrats have had success in federal races but had not won a statewide state-level contest since 2006. Last night they won two seats on the Georgia Public Service Commission. Both Democrats defeated their Republican opponents 62% to 38%.

Two Democratic District Attorneys who have become the targets of extreme Republican animosity, Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg and Philadelphia DA Larry Krasner, both retained their seats. Republican Cory Bowman, the half-brother of Vice President and Reply Guy JD Vance, lost his race for Mayor of Cincinnati.

In California, Proposition 50, which will redistrict Congressional seats, passed so overwhelmingly that CNN was able to call the race within seconds of polls closing. In Colorado, voters approved a ballot measure to raise state income taxes on households earning at least $300,000 annually in order to fund free meals for all public school students. The measure won by 16 points. In Maine, voters soundly defeated a well-funded attempt to greatly restrict absentee ballots and to require photo IDs to be shown before voting.

As I said in the introduction, many of these races were marked by defiance on the part of Democrats. There were several unmistakable themes, the most clear of which is that Trump is strongly disliked. His fixation on deportations and asserting dictatorial policies are not being received favorably. While he publicly describes the economy as doing great, the average voter seems to strongly disagree. Mamdani relentlessly focused his primary campaign on affordability, a theme that continued through the general election. That message spread throughout the country and was central to many races, including Spanberger's and Sherrill's. The second major theme was confronting Trump, which again was widely adopted by winning candidates. I will have more to say about the messages sent by yesterday's voting in a post tomorrow.