Southern State Legislative Chambers Up in 2012

[Frodo]

The Courier-Journal has been kind enough to provide articles on the races for the Kentucky House, and the Kentucky Senate.  

[Frodo]

Post election results for the region here.  It will be far easier than having multiple threads for each state clogging up this board. 

[Frodo]

It seems Arkansas Republicans have won control of both houses of the legislature, with a 21-14 majority in the Senate, and, pending further election results, are on course to have a narrow majority in the House as well. 

Republicans also gained seats in both chambers in Kentucky, but the House remains in Democratic hands. 

And in the Mountain State, Republicans have just gained 11 seats in the House, and has another 3 members in the Senate. 

[Frodo]

Republicans in North Carolina have just gained a veto-proof majority in the legislature, with their Georgia counterparts within reach pending further results. 

[tmthforu94]

Can't find a link, but Republicans now have a quorum-proof majority in the House and Senate. Back in 2011, House Democrats made national headlines by participating in a walkout. That's no longer an issue.

Before the 2010 elections, Democrats controlled the Indiana House 52-48. Next January, Republicans will have a 69-31 advantage. There is also a 37-13 advantage in the Senate - I don't think there was any change there, though I could be wrong.

[Frodo]

The GOP has also gained a supermajority in the Tennessee legislature for the first time since Reconstruction. 

[Barnes]

The GOP in the Georgia Senate are one seat shy of a supermajority, while their bitter rivals (the House and Senate Republicans have long resented each other here) are five seats short.  However, the sole independent in the House, Rusty Kidd, has raised the possibility of switching to the Republicans.  Stacey Abrams, the House Minority Leader, has said that wouldn't be such a smart move considering his district voted for Obama.

[greenforest32]

It's pretty hard to have enough ticket-splitting to hold the state legislature when the opposing party gets 60%+ of the vote on the federal level. West Virginia will probably flip to Republicans in the next 2 or 3 cycles if things continue as they have been.

[Mr.Phips]

Its very interesting looking at these Southern state legislative results.  It looked like a repeat of 2010 in most of these states, save Florida. 

[Frodo]

What the pro-coal Dems who went along with the War on Coal talking points in WV/KY don't quite realize is that the coal companies want to replace those Dems with Republicans sometime real soon. And with the Rs up to 46 in the West Virginia House, they're very close to pulling that off. They're just pawns in the game.

And while they fell short of taking the chamber outright this year, Republicans are now within striking distance of carrying the Kentucky House as well. 

Can anyone explain why they did so well in the West Virginia House, but not in the West Virginia Senate? 

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

The South Carolina Senate will still be in the hands of the moderate Republicans. (i.e., The Democrats get to pick which Republican leads the Senate.) The exact results of the election however are still not known and will not be known for some time thanks to the cluster[Inks] that Richland County made of the elections.  They didn't provide enough voting machines to all the precincts, even tho they had machines left unused in their central office. (SC law requires 1 machine be available per 250 registered voters.)  One judge ordered the state election commission do a recount with the county election commission to be kept from doing more than watch.  Then the State Supreme Court blocked that recount before it could finish and had the ballots locked up pending what it would decide to do.  Richland has already missed the Friday deadline for sending their official results to the state election commission as a result.  I'm doubtful that if there is a recount that it will be completed before the state election commission is supposed to vote to certify the results on Wednesday.

This primarily affects two races, House District 75 which was a contest for an open seat that the unofficial numbers have the Republican barely winning, and a referendum on a local option sales tax to fund transportation. The referendum passed fairly handily, but opponents are calling for a revote because the illegal lack of the required number of machines may have affected turnout.

[bore]

What the pro-coal Dems who went along with the War on Coal talking points in WV/KY don't quite realize is that the coal companies want to replace those Dems with Republicans sometime real soon. And with the Rs up to 46 in the West Virginia House, they're very close to pulling that off. They're just pawns in the game.

And while they fell short of taking the chamber outright this year, Republicans are now within striking distance of carrying the Kentucky House as well. 

Can anyone explain why they did so well in the West Virginia House, but not in the West Virginia Senate? 

I'm not sure why, but the same thing happened in 2010 in west virginia, with the republicans gaining 10 seats in the house, but actually losing one in the senate. Maybe to do with the multiplte member districts, or the power of incumbency in the senate (only one democratic senator lost re election)

[Frodo]

The West Virginia GOP has just elected a new chairman -considering how everyone views this state party to be an utter mess, could this be the beginning of a turnaround?  Could Conrad Lucas be the Reince Priebus of the West Virginia GOP?  Or more of the same?

Given the election results, that's a pretty good start for him.  A party that makes the gains it did (and likely laying the groundwork for future progress in taking over the state) doesn't look like quite the mess that some here have made it out to be.