Category Archives: House

NM-1: New Vacancy

By Jim Ellis

Dec. 21, 2020 — Late last week, President-Elect Joe Biden announced that he is nominating New Mexico US Rep. Deb Haaland (D-Albuquerque) to be Interior Secretary. Upon confirmation, Rep. Haaland will resign her seat in the House, which will become the body’s third vacancy.

Biden has already chosen Reps. Cedric Richmond (D-LA) and Marcia Fudge (D-OH) to run the White House Office of Public Engagement and become Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, respectively.

Special elections will be held in all three districts and scheduled once the member officially resigns to accept his or her new position. Democrats will be prohibitive favorites in Louisiana and Ohio, but it’s possible the New Mexico seat could become competitive.

Haaland was first elected to what was an open district in 2018 when then-Rep. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) risked the 1st District House seat to wage an ultimately successful campaign for Governor. Grisham was first elected to the House in 2012 in an open seat campaign. She succeeded then-Rep. Martin Heinrich (D), who won a Senate seat in the same election.

Prior to Heinrich’s initial House win in 2008, the 1st District congressional seat, anchored in Albuquerque, had been in Republican hands for 40 consecutive years in the person of Reps. Manuel Lujan, Steve Schiff, and Heather Wilson, consecutively. Though the district has significantly changed politically, it has largely kept its same basic geographic context during the entire aforementioned stretch. Prior to the 1968 election, New Mexico’s representatives were chosen in at-large elections.

Once Haaland, one of the first Native American females to be elected to the House, resigns, Gov. Grisham will schedule a special election. Under New Mexico procedure, the political parties will caucus to choose their nominees, so there will be no primary election. Therefore, it is probable to see a contested convention process for both parties, particularly for the Democrats since their eventual nominee will begin the special election campaign in the favorite’s position.

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Florida Data

By Jim Ellis

Dec. 18, 2020 — Continuing with our project this week of analyzing statewide data now that official final election results are being published from around the country, today we look at the Sunshine State of Florida, another key redistricting state.

Though having only three-quarters of Texas’ population, the Florida presidential turnout came within only a few hundred to equaling that of the Lone Star State (FL: 11,067,366; TX: 11,315,056).

On the statewide tally, President Trump carried Florida with a 51.2 – 47.5 percent margin over former vice president Joe Biden. The result represents a net 2.2 percentage increase for the president when compared with his 2016 statewide total, while Biden’s performance registered a decline of 0.3 percent from Hillary Clinton’s Sunshine State aggregate vote.

The House performance detected in California and Texas, showing that the average victorious congressional candidate performed better within their particular district than President Trump, was not nearly as pronounced in Florida.

On average, Texas US House Republican candidates ran 2.8 percentage points better than Trump, and the average California GOP House candidate ran 4.2 points ahead of the president’s statewide percentage. In Florida, however, the number was virtually equal to the president’s, with the average House Republican contender running just 0.2 percent above Trump’s statewide total.

Because two of the Republican incumbents, Reps. Neal Dunn (R-Panama City) and Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Miami/Hialeah), ran either without Democratic opposition (Dunn) or totally unopposed (Diaz-Balart) the Florida Secretary of State does not record votes in such a district. Therefore, for purposes of this exercise, a projected result of 65-35 percent for the two congressional districts was added as an estimated total. This percentage spread was extrapolated when comparing the performance of Republican and Democratic congressional candidates in similar Florida districts.

To review, in California, Democratic House incumbent performance fell below their 2018 recorded vote in 33 of 44 districts, while results improved for four of the six Republican incumbents on the ballot. In Texas, vote percentages for 11 of the 16 Republican incumbents seeking re-election improved from 2018, while the Democratic incumbent performance index declined for all 13 who ran for a succeeding term.

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Texas Data

By Jim Ellis

Texas US House Districts

Dec. 17, 2020 — Yesterday, we analyzed the California official 2020 Statement of the Vote and today we turn out attention to voting statistics from the Lone Star State of Texas, a particularly interesting domain for the coming redistricting process. Estimates project that Texas will gain three congressional districts from reapportionment, which should become official at some point in January.

Despite predictions of a “blue wave” hitting Texas and putting the state in play for Joe Biden, Republicans once again swept the competitive races. Though President Trump’s margin did decline from 2016, his 52-46 percent margin was still more than comfortable, especially when considering he was simultaneously losing the nationwide vote.

As was the case in California, down-ballot GOP candidates, as a rule, performed better than President Trump. Sen. John Cornyn (R) was re-elected, and the GOP won 23 congressional races in the state, accounting for almost 11 percent of their party’s national total.

Sen. Cornyn topped 53 percent of the vote in recording a nine-point win over his Democratic opponent, retired Army helicopter pilot M.J. Hegar. In the 23 victorious Republican House races, the winning GOP candidate outpaced President Trump in 19 districts most of which were competitive at least to a degree.

Compared with the Democratic improvement in elections two years ago, the GOP rebounded in 2020. A total of 16 Republican incumbents sought re-election, and 11 of those improved their vote percentages from 2018. Additionally, all five of those falling below their previous benchmark did so by less than one percentage point.

For the Democrats, all 13 of their House incumbents saw a downgrade in their voter support from 2018. Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Laredo), who fought off a tough Democratic primary challenge in early March, saw the biggest drop for any Texas House incumbent, falling from 84.4 percent in 2018 to a 58.3 percent win in November. The more serious drop, however, was for Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D-McAllen) who won re-election to a third term from his South Texas district with just 50.5 percent of the vote against an opponent who spent only $404,000. Gonzalez’s victory percentage slipped from 59.7 percent in 2018.

The TX-15 district is largely a Mexican border seat that starts just east San Antonio in the Seguin area and travels south all the way through the city of McAllen in Hidalgo County. The latter entity hosts three-quarters of the 15th District’s population. Republicans, including President Trump, improved their standing throughout the Mexican border area in the 2020 election, which was a principal reason that Democratic gains in the Dallas, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio metropolitan areas were somewhat offset.

Statewide turnout was up a strong 23.7 percent when compared to 2016, enabling the state to exceed 11 million voters (11,315,056) for the first time. The Texas population grew 3.9 percent during that same time interval.

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Biden Elected; Calif. Data Published

By Jim Ellis

Dec. 16, 2020 — The Electoral College met in the various state capitols Monday, as scheduled, and the electors cast their ballots in the exact correlation with the state election data. Since the Electoral College increased to 538 members in time for the 1964 presidential election, we’ve seen faithless electors — those who vote for a candidate other than whom the state voters supported — in seven presidential elections.

No faithless elector appeared in Monday’s vote, however, meaning the final official count is Joe Biden, 306; President Trump, 232; the exact numbers produced on election night. The Supreme Court issued a ruling earlier in the year codifying that the states have the right to bind their electors. A total of 29 states and the District of Columbia had previously taken such action, so the court’s July 6, 2020 ruling in the Chiafalo v. Washington State case meant that these 30 entities’ votes would be forced to directly follow their respective electorates.

The remaining 21 states do not bind their electors, so those electors were still free to vote for someone outside of the Nov. 3 election totals. Monday, however, none did.

The action now means that Joe Biden is officially the President-Elect. The Electoral College will now report their results to the Congress on Jan. 6, 2021, where the votes will be counted and recorded. At that point, Biden will be officially elected and ready to take the oath of office as the 46th president of the United States on Jan. 20, 2021.

The California delegation is the group that put Biden over the top, allowing him to first clinch a majority vote in the Electoral College. Also coming from the Golden State is the official Statement of the Vote from the 2020 election, and it contains some interesting numbers to analyze.

Biden received more than 11.1 million votes in California, or 63.5 percent of the total ballots cast. President Trump obtained just over 6 million votes, good for 34.3 percent. Though the latter percentage is small, it is almost three full points beyond than his 2016 showing within the state.

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LA-5: Letlow Wins Runoff

Luke Letlow, Louisiana (LA-5) Republican

By Jim Ellis

Dec. 8, 2020 — Luke Letlow, who had served as chief of staff to Louisiana 5th District incumbent Rep. Ralph Abraham (R-Alto) up until the time he announced his candidacy to replace the retiring congressman, convincingly won Saturday’s double-Republican runoff election to claim the open seat contest as we noted yesterday.

With his victory, Letlow becomes the 212th Republican heading toward the new session of Congress with one campaign uncalled (NY-22) and another being challenged (IA-2). Majority Democrats currently have 222 clinched seats.

Letlow defeated state Rep. Lance Harris (R-Alexandria), 62-38 percent, winning all but one of the district’s 24 parishes. At total of 79,309 voters participated in the runoff election, a 15 percent turnout of the district’s 528,278 registered voters. The Letlow victory margin was just over 19,000 votes.

In the original “blanket primary” election on Nov. 3, Letlow placed first with 33 percent of the vote as compared to Rep. Harris’ 17 percent to create the double Republican secondary election. Harris slipped past Democrat Candy Christophe by 428 votes in the original vote in order to qualify for the runoff and effectively secure the seat for the Republicans. The Nov. 3 election saw a 5th District turnout rate of 70.1 percent.

The “blanket primary” is the phrase Louisianans use to describe the system more commonly described as a “jungle primary.” That is, all candidates appear on the same ballot regardless of political party affiliation and the top two advance into a runoff election if no one receives majority support in the original vote. The Bayou State was the first to adopt this system and originally did so in 1978.

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Friday’s LA-5 Runoff

https://youtu.be/1BUfn_Iia6oLouisiana state Rep. Lance Harris (R-Alexandria) attacks opposing candidate and fellow Republican Luke Letlow over enriching himself during his career in politics.

By Jim Ellis

Monday, Dec. 7, 2020 — The Jan. 5, 2021 Georgia US Senate runoffs are not the only post-election secondary campaign contests, even though they dominate the national political attention since their outcomes will determine the chamber majority. The nation’s other runoff election was scheduled for this past Saturday in northeastern Louisiana for the state’s 5th Congressional District.

A little background on the race: Unlike Georgia, there was no suspense as to which party wins the seat – both Louisiana contenders are Republicans – but the identity of the winning candidate was in question up till Friday.

Luke Letlow finished first on Nov. 3 (33.1 percent) from a field of nine candidates in what is termed a “blanket primary” in Louisiana but a “jungle primary” elsewhere. He also finished first Saturday, Dec. 5. More analysis tomorrow from that. The candidate field Nov. 3 consisted of five Republicans and four Democrats, and Letlow doubled the vote total of his nearest competitor. State Rep. Lance Harris (R-Alexandria) finished second (16.5 percent), qualifying for the runoff by just 428 votes over third-place finisher Candy Christophe, the top Democratic contender.

Letlow is a former chief of staff to retiring Congressman Ralph Abraham (R-Alto), who is honoring a term-limits pledge to only serve three terms. Dr. Abraham was a 2019 Republican gubernatorial candidate, losing the Republican nomination to businessman Eddie Rispone by three percentage points. Rispone would then fall to Gov. John Bel Edwards (D) in the November ’19 runoff on a 51-49 percent count.

Letlow served as Rep. Abraham’s chief during his entire congressional career up until the time he (Letlow) declared his own candidacy. Prior to that, the 2020 top 5th District vote-getter held a position in Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration.

Lance Harris is a convenience store chain business owner and farmer who was elected to the state House of Representatives in 2011. He was unopposed in his succeeding re-election campaigns, those in 2015 and 2019.

Harris’ parents were missionaries in China and became prisoners of the Communist regime. They survived captivity and were released, only to be killed in a car accident in 1984 after returning to Louisiana. Harris explains that his parents’ experience drives him to fight socialism, which is why he entered elective politics after establishing his career in business.

While the contest was fairly quiet in the blanket primary, the runoff turned combative. Harris attacked Letlow for his career in politics (see ad at top), citing in his ads that his opponent has made “over $1 million in working for politicians including Bobby Jindal” and then worked as a lobbyist.

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IA-2: Hart Petitions the House

By Jim Ellis

IA-2 Republican congresswoman-elect Mariannette Miller-Meeks – or is she?

Dec. 4, 2020 — As things officially stand, Rita Hart, the Democratic nominee in the open IA-2 congressional district that occupies the southeastern part of the state, has lost to state Sen. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Ottumwa) by a grand total of six votes from more than 393,000 ballots cast, but the challenge process from the Democrat is apparently not over.

Though the state has certified the race, Hart is reportedly preparing to take the results directly to the US House of Representatives, asking the House Administration Committee to investigate the counting process. Ultimately, the House itself has the power to seat all of its members.

Normally, any individual possessing a duly authorized certificate of election from the state’s official election administrator, usually the Secretary of State, is seated. There is precedence, however, for denying duly elected candidates their seats.

Under Iowa election law and procedure, Hart had another way to challenge the results. Her campaign staff claims that certain ballots were not counted in the original or recount process, and there are enough, they say, to flip the final outcome in Hart’s direction.

In Iowa, such a disputed election goes to a judicial panel over which the state Supreme Court Chief Justice presides. In addition to the Chief Justice, the high court then chooses four other judges from around the state to comprise the special panel. In this case, the judges would have had to declare an official winner by Dec. 8 in order to comply with Iowa law. The Hart campaign contended that was not adequate time to consider the ballot challenges, so they opted to petition the House itself.

Rep. Zoe Lofrgen (D-CA) chairs the House Administration Committee, which includes five additional Democrats, two more from California, and three Republicans. The other members are: Reps. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), Susan Davis (D-CA), G.K. Butterfield (D-NC), Marcia Fudge (D-OH), and Pete Aguilar (D-CA). The Republicans are Ranking Minority Member Rodney Davis (R-IL) and Reps. Mark Walker (R-NC), and Barry Loudermilk (R-GA).

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Final House Tally: 223-212?

By Jim Ellis

Dec. 1, 2020 — The latest outstanding congressional race numbers suggest that the House may break 223 Democrats to 212 Republicans when some very close elections are finally decided. If this is indeed the final party division among the 435 seats, the GOP will only be six congressional districts away from re-claiming the House majority in the 2022 elections.

Currently, we see Real Clear Politics projecting California Rep. Mike Garcia (R-Santa Clarita) as the winner over state Assemblywoman Christy Smith (D-Newhall) in the state’s 25th CD, which lies in parts of both Los Angeles and Ventura Counties.

With still a small undetermined number of votes to be verified and counted, Garcia’s tight 405-vote margin appears to be holding. Our own rudimentary projections suggest that the freshman Republican congressman will hold by just under 400 votes. It is probable we will see a recount and potential ballot challenges, so the result may be challenged before and after certification. Under California election law, certification for all races must occur by Dec. 11.

We have seen several projections made suggesting former California Rep. David Valadao (R-Hanford) has defeated freshman Rep. T.J. Cox (D-Fresno) in the state’s Central Valley 21st CD. Valadao has a 1,820-vote lead according to the California Target Book organization’s in-depth analysis.

Our more rudimentary estimates suggest that Valadao will win the final count by approximately 1,400 votes based upon the potential number of outstanding ballots in the three counties, Kern, Kings, and Tulare, that are still verifying and counting mail votes. Fresno County has completed its count.

Later today, we expect to see the second certification of Iowa candidate Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R) in the state’s 2nd Congressional District. Under Iowa law, a certification had to be issued one week after the election, in this case Nov. 10, and Miller-Meeks, a state senator from Ottumwa who is in her fourth run for the US House, was originally certified as the winner with a 47-vote margin. The full recount finds former state senator and 2018 lieutenant governor nominee Rita Hart (D) gaining votes but still losing by a total of just six votes districtwide from more than 394,400 ballots cast, a Miller-Meeks winning percentage of 50.0008 percent.

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It’s Now Down to Three

By Jim Ellis

David Valadao (R)

Nov. 24, 2020 — Unofficial victory projections are being made for California’s 21st Congressional District in favor of Republican former Rep. David Valadao (R-Hanford). It is becoming clearer as more mail votes are being counted and the pool of remaining ballots diminishes to under 10,000, that Valadao has defeated freshman Rep. T.J. Cox (D-Fresno) in one of the few remaining undetermined congressional campaigns.

Real Clear Politics, the Cook Political Report, and the local Fresno Bee newspaper are all reporting that Valadao has won the race, though the former Congressman himself has yet to declare victory and Cox has not conceded defeat.

Valadao, who previously served three terms in the House after his original election in 2012 before losing to Rep. Cox in a tight 862-vote margin two years ago, currently leads the 2020 outcome by 1,618 tabulations.

Cox has attracted 58.5 percent of the vote in Kern County, the district’s largest population entity, but with approximately 9,000-11,000 votes remaining at most even such a large percentage will likely leave him over 1,000 tallies short of Valadao’s total. Over 1,500 votes remain in Kings County, in which the Republican recorded 62.1 percent support. Tulare County, which finds only eight percent of the voting population contained within the congressional district, split almost evenly between the two men as Cox leads there by just 21 votes. Fresno County has fully reported.

The Valadao victory means the Republicans have now gained a net 10 seats with three races remaining outstanding. A fourth undetermined race, that in Louisiana’s 5th CD, is going to a post-election runoff on Dec. 5. While the winning candidate is yet unidentified, the secondary election is between two Republican candidates, former congressional aide Luke Letlow and state Rep. Lance Harris (R-Alexandria), so the GOP is assured of holding the seat.

Also, in California, freshman Rep. Mike Garcia (R-Santa Clarita) is claiming to have won the north Los Angeles/Ventura County 25th District. Though only leading by exactly 400 votes with what looks to be in the neighborhood of 4,500 ballots waiting for verification and counting, this razor-thin race looks to be coming down to the final few ballots.

Democratic opponent Christy Smith, a first-term state assemblywoman, accused Rep. Garcia’s victory declaration as being “dangerous to our democratic process.” She then immediately filed a 2022 congressional committee with the Federal Elections Commission. Therefore, if Garcia does in fact win the contest, it appears we will see the third edition of a Garcia-Smith campaign two years from now.

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Outstanding Races Near Conclusions

By Jim Ellis

Nov. 23, 2020 — We are now down to four undetermined US House campaigns and one that will go to a double Republican runoff on Dec. 5.

Last week, the NJ-7 race that was called for Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-Rocky Hill) on election night but rescinded when the post-election votes were drawing state Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean, Jr. (R-Westfield) close to dead heat range, has now culminated. Again, Rep. Malinowski was determined to be the winner when the number of uncounted votes became less than the margin between the two candidates.

The open 5th District in Louisiana is headed to a Dec. 5 runoff election. Here, Republicans Luke Letlow and state Rep. Lance Harris (R-Alexandria) will battle to replace retiring Rep. Ralph Abraham (R-Alto). Since both finalists are Republicans, the GOP keeping this seat is not in doubt.

The Iowa 2nd District race between state Sen. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Ottumwa) and former state senator and 2018 lieutenant governor nominee Rita Hart (D) continues in full recount. Miller-Meeks had a 47-vote lead as the recount began. Under Iowa law, the leader has been certified as the winner, but that would change should the recount produce a different result.

Hart filed recount petitions in all of the district’s 24 counties. The various election officials have 18 days to complete their additional canvass, which means we should see a conclusion here sometime near Dec. 1.

In New York, counting continues in the 22nd District where former US Rep. Claudia Tenney (R) continues to lead freshman Rep. Anthony Brindisi (D-Utica) by a relatively substantial margin as the number of uncounted ballots slowly dwindles. The latest count finds the former congresswoman and ex-state Assembly member leading Rep. Brindisi by 10,967 votes according to the CNN count, which appears to have the most updated data.

Almost 292,000 ballots have been counted with an estimated 26,000-plus votes remaining. To overcome the difference, Rep. Brindisi would have to attract approximately 71 percent of the outstanding ballots. In the 2016 election, 296,086 individuals voted in the congressional race. Therefore, if the estimated outstanding total of 26,000-plus is near correct, then turnout would have increased approximately nine percent from the last presidential election turnout model when compared to the current vote.

In the last group of approximately 25,000 votes, Congressman Brindisi garnered closer to 68 percent in reducing Tenney’s lead from 21,812 votes to the current number. Unless the remaining ballots are even more Democratic than the latest batch, Tenney will likely remain in the lead and soon claim victory.

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