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State of the Races: Governor 2016
Competitive chief executive races on the ballot in North Carolina, West Virginia
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
(CFP) — In 2016, just two Southern states will be holding races for governor, and the races in both North Carolina and West Virginia are expected to be close, hard-fought affairs.
Heading into the election, Republicans hold 11 of 14 governorships in the South, in all but Louisiana, Virginia and West Virginia.
Here are this year’s races:
McCrory
Cooper
North Carolina: Incumbent Republican Gov. Pat McCrory is running for a second term against the Tar Heel State’s Democratic attorney general, Roy Cooper. McCrory rode a GOP wave into office in 2012, but the Republican-controlled legislature’s passage of a controversial voter ID law and measures favored by religious conservatives have made the governor a lightning rod. The issue dominating the race is McCrory’s decision to sign a law requiring transgendered students to use bathrooms that match their gender of birth, rather than their gender of identity. Cooper not only opposed the measure, but he also refused to defend it in court. Expect massive amounts of outside cash to be poured into this race, which has become the latest battle in the culture wars. RATING: TOSS-UP
Justice
Cole
West Virginia: Democrats in the Mountaineer State, who have seen their once dominant hold on state politics slip away, are hoping to revive their fortunes with Jim Justice, a billionaire coal mine owner best known for his efforts to revive the state’s famed Greenbrier Resort. He faces Republican State Senate President Bill Cole, who became leader of the chamber in 2015 after the GOP captured a Senate majority for the first time in 83 years. Cole, an auto dealer from Bluefield, is hoping to become the first Republican elected governor in West Virginia since 1996. To get there, he’ll have to overcome Justice’s deep pockets. This seat is open because Democratic Governor Earl Ray Tomblin is term-limited, putting this race near the top of the GOP’s target list. RATING: TOSS-UP
Bernie Sanders cruises to big win in West Virginia primary
Democrat Jim Justice wins Democratic governor’s race, will face Republican Bill Cole in November
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
CHARLESTON, West Virginia (CFP) — U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont easily won the Democratic presidential primary in West Virginia, notching a rare victory in the South.
Sanders took 51.4 percent of the vote in Mountaineer State, compared to just 35.9 percent for Hillary Clinton. On the Republican ballot, Donald Trump–now unopposed for the nomination–scored an easy victory, taking 77 percent in the May 10 vote.
Meanwhile, in the state’s gubernatorial primaries, political newcomer Jim Justice won the Democratic nomination and will face Republican State Senate President Bill Cole in the general election. The incumbent Democrat, Governor Earl Ray Tomblin, is term limited.
A Republican hasn’t won the governorship in West Virginia since 1996. However, the state’s recent GOP trend, which including capturing the state legislature in 2014, has given Republicans high hopes for taking the state’s top office.
But they will have to get past the deep pockets of Justice, a billionaire farmer and coal mine owner who was a registered Republican until 2015. Justice has gotten the coveted endorsement of the politically powerful United Mine Workers of America and other labor groups., as well as conservative Democratic U.S. Senator Joe Manchin.
Sanders’ victory in West Virginia is just his second win in the South this primary season. With only Kentucky left to vote on May 17, Clinton has swept everything in the region except Oklahoma, most by wide margins.
Speaking to jubilant supporters in Salem, Oregon, as the results came in, Sanders pointedly noted that Clinton carried West Virginia by more than 40 points when she ran against Barack Obama in 2008
“West Virginia is a working class state and like many other states … in this country, working class people are hurting,” Sander said. “And what the people of West Virginia said tonight, and I believe the people of Oregon and Kentucky will say next week, is that we need an economy that works for all of the people, not just the 1 percent.”
Clinton was dogged by a remark she made in March that “we’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business,” which went over badly in coal-producing West Virginia. She later apologized for what she termed a “misstatement.”
Kentucky, the last Southern state left in the Democratic primary calendar, is also a coal-producing state. Both Sanders and Clinton have been campaigning hard in the Bluegrass State.
West Virginia was the final Southern stop for Republicans. Trump won every state in the region except for Oklahoma and Texas, which went to U.S. Senator Ted Cruz.
Southern Politics 2014: The Year In Review
2014 was a much better year for Republicans than for reality stars revamped as politicos
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
A congressman man caught kissing. Reality stars trying to remake themselves as politicians. A snowstorm that threatened to torpedo a sitting governor. A top U.S. House leader unceremoniously unseated in a primary. And a flap over a fan during a heated debate.
Those were just some of the strange and unlikely events in Southern politics in 2014, a year that ended with Republicans roaring through the region like Sherman in reverse. Here are some of the memorable moments:
Loose Lips Sink More Than Ships — Republican U.S. Rep. Vance McAllister, a married Christian conservative from northeast Louisiana, was caught on videotape passionately kissing a female staffer who was, ahem, not his wife. He refused to resign but decided not to run for re-election. Then, he changed his mind and ran again, with his wife’s vocal support. But his constituents were less forgiving than the missus, and he finished a distant fourth in the primary.
Snowmageddon — When a January snowstorm paralyzed metro Atlanta, Republican Governor Nathan Deal took the heat for a sluggish state response and his initial attempt to shift the blame elsewhere. But Democratic hopes that this snowy debacle might bury Deal had melted by November, when he was comfortably re-elected.
Taking Aim At Obamacare — Alabama Republican U.S. House candidate Will Brooke posted a YouTube video, entitled “Let’s Do Some Damage,” in which he fired bullets into a copy of the Obamacare bill. The gambit gained him a bit of attention, though, alas, not enough to win the primary in his Birmingham-area district.
Strange Bedfellows — Bill Clinton and Rudy Giuliani both waded into the Florida governor’s race this year, cutting ads for Democrat Charlie Crist and Republican Rick Scott, respectively. However, their shoes were on the other feet in 2006, when Crist was a Republican (before becoming an independent and then a Democrat.) Back then, it was Crist who enjoyed Giuliani’s support, while Clinton backed his Democratic opponent.
Overheated Debate — Speaking of the Florida governor’s race, a televised debate between Crist and Scott came to an abrupt halt when Crist insisted on putting a small fan at his feet under the podium, in apparent violation of the debate rules. Scott first refused to take the stage until the fan was removed, but he eventually relented — after seven awkward minutes of scrambling by the debate moderators. In the end, Scott won a narrow victory.
Real Mean Politics — Three reality TV stars — American Idol Clay Aiken, former Louisiana Governor Edwin Edwards and former South Carolina Treasurer Thomas Ravenel — all vied for political office this year. But political reality proved harsh, as all three lost badly. However, Aiken is turning his unsuccessful U.S. House campaign in North Carolina into — wait for it — a new reality show.
Biggest Upset — In an outcome that shocked the political world, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia lost his Richmond-area seat to Dave Brat, a little known college professor who ran at Cantor as a Tea Party insurgent. Weep not for Cantor, though. He bounced back with a job on Wall Street.
Worst Campaign — Texas State Senator Wendy Davis tried to parlay her filibuster against a bill restricting abortions in the Lone Star State into the governor’s mansion. But a series of gaffes — including questions about the veracity of her rags-to-riches story as a single trailer-park mom made good — sunk her chances, and she lost by a staggering 20 points.
Weirdest Campaign Appearance — Matt Bevin, who was challenging Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in a GOP primary in Kentucky, appeared at a rally hosted by a group that supports legalizing cockfighting. While insisting he didn’t condone cockfighting, Bevin didn’t help himself when he told a radio reporter that the Founder Fathers were “very actively involved” in the blood sport. Perhaps not surprisingly, McConnell won rather handily.
Best Don Quixote Impression — Mississippi State Senator Chris McDaniel — peeved that he was defeated in a GOP U.S. Senate runoff by crossover votes from Democrats and independents — launched a three-month court fight to overturn the result. Alas, his windmill tilting came to naught, and U.S. Senator Thad Cochran kept the seat.
Best Houdini Impression — Republican U.S. Rep. Scott DesJarlais of Tennessee faced voters for the first time since lurid details emerged from his bitter 2001 divorce during which he admitted a string of extra-marital affairs and — perhaps even more damaging for an avowed right-to-life lawmaker — encouraging his first wife to have two abortions. However, GOP voters in his district proved surprisingly forgiving, handing DesJarlais a narrow primary victory. He went on to win re-election in November.
If You Can’t Override, Indict — Texas Governor Rick Perry was indicted on charges of abuse of power and coercion over his veto of a funding bill for an Austin prosecutor who refused his demand that she resign after being arrested for driving with a blood alcohol level nearly three times the legal limit. A defiant Perry vowed to fight the charges, noting that in America, “we settle our political differences at the ballot box,” rather than in criminal court.
Double Dipper — Kentucky U.S. Senator Rand Paul announced he would run for re-election in 2016, even as he is also considering a White House bid. One pesky little problem, though: Kentucky law doesn’t allow somebody to be on the ballot for two offices at once. Paul’s supporters are trying to find a way to work around that technicality.
Democrat Dam Breaks in Upper South — While the general election was grim for Democrats across the South, the news was especially depressing in Arkansas and West Virginia, which had been places where the party of Jackson was still competitive. In Arkansas, Republicans took all seven statewide constitutional offices and every congressional seat for the first time since Reconstruction. In West Virginia, the GOP took all three U.S. House seats and captured control of the state legislature for the first time since 1931.
“D” Is The New Scarlet Letter — Three sitting Southern Democratic U.S. senators — Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Kay Hagan of North Carolina and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana — all went down to defeat, paving the way for Republicans to take control of the Senate. Republicans also took away an open seat in West Virginia that they hadn’t won since 1942.
Analysis: Midterms a show of woe for Southern Democrats
GOP has a particularly strong showing in the upper South, where Democrats have recently been competitive
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
(CFP) — One look at a color-coded map of midterm election results in any Southern state tells the story – there’s a tsunami of red and a shrinking pool of blue.
Take Texas, for example, with its 254 counties. Republican U.S. Senator John Cornyn carried 236 of them; the Republican candidate for governor, Attorney General Greg Abbott, carried 235. The only blue is found in Dallas, El Paso, Austin and along the Mexican border.
But that’s still more blue than in Oklahoma, where both Republican U.S. Senate candidates swept all 77 counties, and in West Virginia, where GOP Senate candidate Shelley Moore Capito swept all 55, despite the fact that Democrats have a 350,000-person lead in voter registration.
A deeper look at the numbers from the midterm elections shows just how far Democrats have fallen from the halcyon days when they had an iron grip on the solid South. They’re not just losing; lately, they’re not even competitive.
And perhaps even more troubling for Democrats is the fact that the dam seems to have burst in states in the upper South, where the party had been holding its own at the state level.
This year, 13 of 14 Southern states — all but Florida — had a U.S. Senate election, and two states — Oklahoma and South Carolina — had two. Setting aside Louisiana, which is headed to a runoff, and Alabama, which Democrats didn’t even bother to contest, GOP candidates won by an average of nearly 21 points.
Democrats couldn’t crack 30 percent in either Oklahoma race. They failed to crack 40 percent in six others. In fact, Republicans won by double digits in 10 races. Only Virginia, Georgia and North Carolina were close, with the GOP taking the latter two.
Things were just about as bad in races for governor, where the GOP margin of victory was about 18 percent. Republicans won by double digits in six of the eight governor’s races. Only Florida and Georgia were even remotely close.
The news was particularly bad for Democrats in three upper South states that were politically competitive a decade ago – West Virginia, Arkansas and Tennessee.
In West Virginia, Democrats not only lost the U.S. Senate race, but they lost all three U.S. House seats, and Republicans took control of both houses of the state legislature for the first time since 1931.
With Democratic U.S. Senator Mark Pryor’s loss, Arkansas will have an all-Republican congressional delegation for the first time since Reconstruction. Heading into the election, Democrats held five out of the seven statewide constitutional officers. In the midterm, they lost all seven.
Tennessee used to be split between Republicans in the east and Democrats in the west. Now, the GOP is winning everywhere, holding seven of the state’s nine U.S. House seats. Both Alexander and Governor Bill Haslam, re-elected with 71 percent of the vote, carried Shelby County, which includes the Democratic bastion of Memphis.
Increasingly, Democrats seem to be doing better in the deep South, where they can rely on the support of black voters, than in the upper South, where black populations are smaller.
For example, Republican U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, despite being a long-time incumbent in a very red state, won by a smaller margin than did Republican Tom Cotton, who beat Pryor like a rug in Arkansas.
Some might attribute Graham’s narrower margin to his Tea Party problems. But Alexander — who faced a similar Tea Party dynamic — managed to win by 30 points in Tennessee.
What is clear from the midterms is that despite recent gains at the presidential level in states such as North Carolina and Virginia, Democrats are becoming less competitive across the region, and the South is becoming more monolithically red.
Indeed, the midterm results support the argument that in most of the South, the two-party system is becoming a relic of the past.
Republicans make gains in statehouses across the South
GOP takes control in West Virginia for the first time in 80 years, makes strong gains in Arkansas, Florida
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
ELECTION CENTRAL (CFP) — Republicans made gains in statehouses across the South in the November 4 midterm election, taking complete control in West Virginia and padding their numbers in Arkansas and Florida.
U.S. Senator Rand Paul
However, Democrats managed to keep their majority in the Kentucky House, which could doom plans by Republican U.S Senator Rand Paul to run for both the White House and his Senate seat in 2016.
Of the 21 legislative chambers up for election, the GOP picked up seats in 15, while five others saw no change. The only place Democrats made a gain was in North Carolina, where they added a net of three seats in the House. However, Democrats also lost three seats in the Senate.
The biggest shift came in West Virginia, where despite having a 350,000-person advantage over Republicans in voter registration, Democrats hemorrhaged seats.
In the House, the GOP gained a net 17 seats and now has a 64-36 advantage. In the Senate, Republicans gained seven seats to create a tie, then took control when a Democrat switched parties after the election.
Republicans have not controlled the Mountaineer State’s legislature since 1931.
In Arkansas, where the GOP had a slender one-vote majority in the House, Republicans gained a net of seven seats. They also added three Senate seats, giving them a two-thirds majority for the first time.
In Florida, where Governor Rick Scott narrowly won re-election, Republicans down the ballot did better, gaining a net of eight seats to capture an 82-37 majority over Democrats.
The GOP also picked up six House seats in Alabama, and in the Oklahoma Senate, Democrats lost four seats, leaving them with just eight senators in the 48-member chamber.
Republicans also made small gains in Texas, Tennessee and Georgia.
Kentucky law currently prohibits Paul from running for re-election to the Senate while also pursuing the Republican presidential nomination in 2016. With Democrats in charge of the House for the next two years, that law is not likely to be changed.
Paul has said he thinks that Kentucky law is unconstitutional.
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