Virginia turned over one House Congressional seat in Tuesday’s midterm elections, an outcome expected as vulnerable Democratic incumbent Elaine Luria fell to state senator Jen A. Kiggans in the 2nd district while Democrat Abigail Spanberger held on to her GOP House seat in the 7th District.
No real surprise in Floyd County, where Republican Rep. Morgan Griffith easily beat Taysha DeVaughan. Griffith’s margin of victory district-wide was 73.5% to 26.5% for DeVaughan. In Floyd County, however, the margin was 68% for Griffith to 32% for DeVaughan.
DeVaughan won in Montgomery County and Martinsville.
In the only contested election in local races — an unspecified write-in brought 82 votes for Locust Grove Supervisor but Levi Cox easily held on to the seat he was appointed to when Lauren Yoder resigned a couple of years ago.
A number of cities and counties in Virginia had referendums on whether or not to switch the selection of school board members to direct election. Floyd County already has such a system but in other jurisdictions, appointments are appointed by boards of supervisors or town or city councils.
Covington and Lexington voters approved such a switch overwhelmingly.
Nationwide, a predicted sweep of races by Republicans came up short with the outcome of Congressional control of the Senate depends largely on the sight race in the Georgia Senate contest between Democratic incumbent Warnock and challenger Hershel Walker likely headed for a runoff in December.
Speaking of coming up short, the endorsements by disgraced and criminally seditious former president Donald Trump came up short in Pennsylvania, where Democrat John Fetterman beat Mehmet Oz, endorsed by Trump.
Several election deniers embraced Trump’s “big lie” that he won his re-election campaign, but the dozens of court cases he filed were dismissed because Joe Biden won the race legally. Many of the election deniers lost Tuesday.
“This is a time that Donald Trump is now in the rear-view mirror and it’s time to move on with the party, it’s time to move on with candidate quality,” said Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, who defeaed a Trump-endorsed candidate and also had terse things to say about Senate candidate Hershel Walker.
“I didn’t respect Herschel Walker yet, and he did not earn my vote,” Duncan said, adding that he did not vote for incumbent Democrat Raphael Warnock. Walker and Warnock are headed for a runoff in December.
” I’m ready to move on. I think Donald Trump is moving from a movement to a distraction for the Republican Party now,” Duncan told CNN Wednesday.”
In the most heartening news for Democrats, John Fetterman flipped a Republican-controlled Senate seat that is key to the party’s hopes of maintaining control of the chamber. It was too early to call critical Senate seats in Wisconsin, Nevada, Georgia and Arizona that could determine the majority. In the House, meanwhile, Democrats kept seats in districts from Virginia to Kansas to Rhode Island, while many districts in states like New York and California had not been called.
Democrats also were successful in governors’ races, winning in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — battlegrounds critical to Biden’s 2020 win over former President Donald Trump. But Republicans held on to governors’ mansions in Florida, Texas and Georgia, another battleground state Biden narrowly won two years ago.
With votes still being counted across the country, Republicans still had the opportunity to win control of Congress. But the results were uplifting for Democrats who were braced for sweeping losses, and raised questions about the size of Republicans’ governing majority if they win the House.
Donald J. Trump wasn’t on the ballot Tuesday, but he’d spent the past two years behaving otherwise, aiming to deliver key victories to a Republican Party from which he’s likely to seek, once again, a presidential nomination.
Several battleground races remained too close to call early Wednesday, but it was clear there would be no “giant red wave” that Mr. Trump had spent weeks pleading with his supporters to deliver.
In some key states, Trump-backed candidates lost or were faring poorly. In Pennsylvania, the Democrat Josh Shapiro won the governor’s race against the Republican Doug Mastriano, while the Democrat John Fetterman defeated Mehmet Oz, a Republican, to flip control of a U.S. Senate seat. In Michigan, Tudor Dixon, Mr. Trump’s pick in the governor’s race, came up short in her bid to unseat Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
In Arizona, where Kari Lake and Blake Masters had campaigned together as “America First” candidates in Mr. Trump’s mold, both were behind in their races for governor and Senate, respectively, although results were too close to call.
With so much remaining to be called, we will keep an eye on the results.