The Tsunami in the State Houses
Republicans now hold 3,735 state legislative seats to 3,119 state legislative seats held by Democrats, a stunning reversal of power from 2006 and 2008. Republicans have more seats in state legislatures than at any time since Reconstruction. These gains in state legislative seats led to a number of state legislative changes flipping from Democrat to Republican. In those 87 state legislative chambers contested on November 2, Republicans captured control from Democrats in at least nineteen chambers. In stark contrast, Democrats failed to gain a single state legislative chamber from Republicans.
Bruce Walker explains why the election of 2010 was so much worse for Democrats than just the loss of the House. Redistricting is also coming and Walker says the GOP should run at 260 House members through the end of the decade. Democrats could lose many more Senate seats, enough to give the GOP an LBJ-era majority. Read it.
