Political context of state legislative elections, 2016

2016 State Legislative Elections
2017 » « 2015
Part 1: Overview
Part 2: Battlegrounds
Part 3: Competitiveness
Impact of term limits
Part 4: Elections by state
Election dates

Democrats had lost a total of 913 state legislative seats since President Barack Obama (D) took office in January 2009. That figure may be reduced in the 2016 election, but as it stood, that would have been a historic number of legislative seats lost by a two-term president's party during his term.

Most of the seats lost during Obama's term were during the 2010 midterm elections. The 2010 elections, which is referred to as a Republican wave election, saw the GOP picking up more than 660 seats. In 2012, Democrats gained back some of the ground lost in 2010, gaining control of five additional chambers to bring their total up to 41. Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean (D) announced in early 2013 that his political action committee, Democracy for America, would focus on flipping state legislatures through data-driven campaigns on behalf of candidates in key states.^[1] However, Democrats suffered additional losses in 2014. All 11 chambers that flipped control in 2014 went into Republican hands. Since 2008, the Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC) has launched multiple iterations of the Redistricting Majority Project, or REDMAP. REDMAP 2020 targets state legislative elections in an effort to control the redistricting process after the 2020 national census.^[2]

Background[edit]

Less than 20 percent of voters can identify their state legislator. A 2013 study, authored by Steven Rogers and published in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, argues that, in part because of this knowledge gap, voters tend to vote along party lines, driven by their opinion of the current president and the rest of the federal government. In the past 100 years, there were only five elections in which the party that gained seats in Congress did not also gain seats in state legislatures.^[3][4]

Democrats lost a total of 968 seats since President Barack Obama (D) took office in January 2009. Geoffrey Skelley at the University of Virginia Center for Politics notes that the average number of seats lost by the sitting president's party has been 450 since World War II. President Ronald Reagan (R) was the only president to net seats during his two terms, gaining six seats total across all 50 state legislatures.^[5]

Historically, the party that wins the presidency typically sees coattails down-ballot. In 2000, Republicans saw gains in state legislative seats, while Democrats saw gains in 2008. Regardless of who won the White House in November 2016, it was unlikely that Democrats would lose many state legislative seats, because many of the seats held by Democrats were in districts that have historically been Democratic strongholds. Donald Trump's (R) win in November likely reinforced Republican gains in state legislators. Those gains were relatively minor, if only because Republicans held a large number of seats in state legislatures going into the election.^[4]

Although the pattern described above had been largely consistent in recent presidential elections, it was possible that the 2016 election may not have been affected by presidential preference to the same degree as in others. Because Democrats lost so many seats since Obama took office, there was a higher likelihood for the party to regain some of those seats than there was of losing more seats to the Republicans. This idea is referred to as partisan risk.^[6][7]

Click here for more context on the forces affecting party control of state legislatures »

Purple to Blue Project[edit]

In 2013, Democracy for America (DFA) started the "Purple to Blue" project, a national multi-year effort to flip Republican state legislative chambers across the country to Democratic. Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean (D) founded the political action committee in 2004 to "elect more progressive candidates to local, state and national office by providing the tools to create change."^[8][9]

In 2016, DFA targeted state legislative chambers in Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, and Washington State.^[10]

Advantage 2020[edit]

Through hybrid PAC Advantage 2020, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee aimed to flip key state legislatures with the end goal of controlling the redistricting process in 2021.^[11] The PAC was set up to spend a minimum of $70 million between 2014 and 2020 on state-level races.^[11] However, on June 6, 2016, Advantage 2020 filed termination paperwork with the FEC, thus terminating the group.^[12] In 2015, Advantage 2020 made several contributions to several groups and campaigns, including $250,000 to the Democratic Party of Virginia and several in-kind contributions with the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, totaling almost $70,000.^[13] Those efforts yielded little results, as Democrats only picked up one seat in the Virginia House. There was no change to the partisan balance of the Virginia Senate after 2015.

REDMAP[edit]

After 2008, the Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC) launched a strategy called the Redistricting Majority Project, or REDMAP. The strategy shifted GOP focus towards state legislative elections in an effort to control the redistricting process following the 2010 Census. The RSLC raised more than $30 million for the election cycle, with nearly half of that being put towards 20 key states. In one case, fundraising efforts neared $500,000 for a single race that ousted Wisconsin State Senate Majority Leader Russ Decker (D).^[14]

On July 16, 2015, the RSLC launched REDMAP 2020. The new iteration of the strategy mirrored the 2010 efforts, with added focus on redistricting data acquisition. The initial fundraising goal was set at $125 million for state legislative elections through 2022.^[2]

Republicans won up and down the ballot in 2010; not just in the state legislatures. The GOP enjoyed gains in the U.S. House, U.S. Senate, governors, lieutenant governors, attorneys general, and secretaries of state.

Midterm elections[edit]

Historically, the party in control of the White House fares poorly in midterm elections, consistently losing down-ballot elections. This has been the case in every midterm election since 1900, with 1934 and 2002 being the only exceptions.^[15] The 1934 elections were held during the First New Deal reforms and the turning point of the Great Depression. In 2002, U.S. armed forces had been in Afghanistan for just over one year and the Iraq War was to begin shortly thereafter. President George W. Bush (R) signed the Iraq War Resolution on October 16, 2002, just weeks before the 2002 elections. After Pres. George W. Bush signed the resolution, his job approval ratings stayed in the low to mid 60s for the rest of 2002.^[16] At the time, Bush's approval ratings mirrored the country's support of a war in Iraq.^[17][18] Bush earned the highest ever approval ratings for a president at 90 percent, which came after the attacks on September 11, 2001, and the lowest ever approval ratings for a president at 22 percent in his final term.^[19]

Voter turnout routinely drops off during midterm elections and, as conventional wisdom has it, Democrats suffer from low voter turnout during midterms. Presidential elections generally see voter turnout around 60 percent. The voter turnout in 2008 was at 61.6 percent, which was the highest voter turnout since Richard Nixon (R) was elected president in 1968. In midterms, that figure sinks to around 40 percent. In 2010, voter turnout was at 40.4 percent. The 2014 elections saw the lowest voter turnout since World War II, with just 36.3 percent of eligible voters participating.^[20][21]

Mid-2000s[edit]

Heading into 2010, Democrats were fresh off of a wave, albeit a much smaller wave than the one Republicans experienced in the election to follow. Prior to the 2004 elections, Democrats maintained control of both legislative chambers in 19 states. Democrats increased the number of states with total control to 27 by the time President Barack Obama (D) was elected in 2008. After 2008, Democrats controlled 60 legislative chambers and 55 percent of all state legislative seats.^[15] Republicans fully controlled just 14 state legislatures at that time; the fewest since the late-1980s.^[5][22][23]

Job approval[edit]

President Barack Obama (D) began his first term with a 68 percent job approval rating in the Gallup poll. By contrast, President George W. Bush (R) and President Bill Clinton (D) began their first terms with around a 57 percent job approval rating. President George H.W. Bush (R) and President Ronald Reagan (R) started off with lower ratings at 51 percent.^[24] Dwight D. Eisenhower (R) and John F. Kennedy (D) were the only presidents since WWII to begin with a higher approval rating than Obama.^[25]

In the Gallup poll that concluded on election day in 2010, Obama's job approval rating had slipped to 44 percent. That was lower than the approval ratings seen just before the first midterm elections of President Bush and President Clinton, with 63 percent and 45 percent ratings respectively. It was a significant drop in approval rating for Obama from the time that he had first entered office.^[24]

Obama's job approval rating had started to climb since hitting lows in late 2014, making its way back up to the range of 50 percent.^[24]

Footnotes[edit]

v • e State legislatures Legislatures Alabama (H, S) · Alaska (H, S) · Arizona (H, S) · Arkansas (H, S) · California (A, S) · Colorado (H, S) · Connecticut (H, S) · Delaware (H, S) · Florida (H, S) · Georgia (H, S) · Hawaii (H, S) · Idaho (H, S) · Illinois (H, S) · Indiana (H, S) · Iowa (H, S) · Kansas (H, S) · Kentucky (H, S) · Louisiana (H, S) · Maine (H, S) · Maryland (H, S) · Massachusetts (H, S) · Michigan (H, S) · Minnesota (H, S) · Mississippi (H, S) · Missouri (H, S) · Montana (H, S) · Nebraska · Nevada (A, S) · New Hampshire (H, S) · New Jersey (GA, S) · New Mexico (H, S) · New York (A, S) · North Carolina (H, S) · North Dakota (H, S) · Ohio (H, S) · Oklahoma (H, S) · Oregon (H, S) · Pennsylvania (H, S) · Rhode Island (H, S) · South Carolina (H, S) · South Dakota (H, S) · Tennessee (H, S) · Texas (H, S) · Utah (H, S) · Vermont (H, S) · Virginia (H, S) · Washington (H, S) · West Virginia (H, S) · Wisconsin (A, S) · Wyoming (H, S) 2024 State legislative elections (2024) • State legislative special elections (2024) • Primary dates and filing requirements • 2024 Session Dates 2023 State legislative elections (2023) • State legislative special elections (2023) • Primary dates and filing requirements • 2023 Session Dates Historical elections 2022 •  2021 • 2020 • 2019 • 2018 • 2017 • 2016 • 2015 • 2014 • 2013 • 2012 • 2011 • 2010 • 2009 • 2008 • 2007 • 2006 • 2005 • 2004 • 2003 • 2002 • 2001 • 2000 Features of state legislatures How vacancies are filled in state legislatures • States with a full-time legislature • State legislatures with term limits • Comparison of state legislative salaries • When state legislators assume office after a general election • Population represented by state legislators • State constitutional articles governing state legislatures • State legislative sessions • Resign-to-run law • State legislature candidate requirements by state • Official names of state legislatures • State legislative chambers that use multi-member districts • Factors Affecting Competitiveness in State Legislative Elections State senates Length of terms of state senators • State senators • Partisan composition of state senates • State senators sorted by year first elected State houses Length of terms of state representatives • State representatives • Partisan composition of state houses • State representatives sorted by year first elected Leadership positions President of the Senate • President Pro Tempore • Senate Majority Leader • Senate Minority Leader • House Majority Leader • House Minority Leader • State Speaker of the House