Tuesday’s state legislative elections did little to change the political landscape that shows a divided electorate.
Democrats and Republicans find themselves stuck as they try to wrestle control of America’s legislatures. The Nov. 2 election gave each party hope, but ultimately they remain locked in political parity.
“The parties are in a perpetual game of political tug of war,” Tim Storey, political analyst for the National Conference of State Legislatures, said in a news release. “For the past three years, one side has moved the flag an inch, only to lose that ground the next election. It is hard to imagine this parity could get any tighter, but it appears that it has.”
On Tuesday, nearly 80 percent of the 7,382 state legislative seats in the country were up for grabs. Elections took place in every state except Alabama, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, New Jersey and Virginia.
Election night appears to have given Democrats a slight edge in gaining political ground, picking up a few more legislative chambers than their Republican counterparts. They also may have reduced the GOP’s slight 64-member majority of state legislators.
By the slimmest of margins, Democrats claimed the most political chamber switches. Democrats wrestled control of the North Carolina and Vermont houses, the Washington and Oregon senates and both chambers of the Colorado Legislature, Storey said.
Senates in Iowa and Montana, which had been controlled by Republicans, are now tied, he added.
Republicans, meanwhile, won house chambers in Georgia, Indiana and Oklahoma, and the Tennessee Senate.
Republicans now control 20 state legislatures, Democrats hold 19, and 10 are divided.
Before the vote, the GOP controlled 21 legislatures, Democrats held 17, and 11 were split. Nebraska’s single-chamber Legislature is nonpartisan.
Storey said the near-perfect division among the parties nationwide means leaders will have to govern from the center.
“I think that means the states are going to have to seek compromise. Neither party is going to have the upper hand,” he said.
