Why Should Delaware Care?
While eyes were on the presidential election, Delaware voters chose a slew of candidates on Tuesday who will make decisions across the state about how they can live their lives, where they can build homes, and how the government will spend their money.
Voters across Delaware cast ballots on Tuesday with their eyes locked on the race for U.S. president, even as the election also decided the state’s next governor, two of its members of Congress, and legislative races that would determine whether Democrats achieve a supermajority in the state House of Representatives.
In conversations with Spotlight Delaware, voters in each of Delaware’s three counties spoke about how the presidential race was the driving force behind their participation in the election – as well as a palpable anxiety around it.
By the end of the night, the outcome of the presidential race’s electoral college count was predictably not yet known
But, in Delaware’s local races, initial results had arrived within an hour after polls closed.
They indicated that Democrats would continue their previous dominance in statewide races for the U.S. House, U.S. Senate, governor, lieutenant governor, and insurance commissioner.
Those early results showed the Democratic candidates capturing 55% to 59% of the votes – commanding margins, though slightly smaller than in elections in past years.
Those margins were also remarkably consistent across the statewide races – as well as in Delaware vote for president – indicating that few voters chose candidates from more than one party.
Statewide races making history
For many political observers, Delaware’s statewide races were effectively decided during the Sept. 10 primary. The comfortable leads in the vote tallies by Democrats on Tuesday appear to bear that out.
Still, notable history will be made in their formal general election victories.
State Sen. Sarah McBride of Wilmington will become the first transgender member of Congress in its history.
And, U.S. Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester will become the first Black person from Delaware, and only the fourth Black woman overall, to serve in the U.S. Senate.
At an election watch party Tuesday night, McBride said the results of the vote showed that “our democracy is big enough for all of us” – a clear allusion to the historic nature of her candidacy.
During her speech, McBride also expressed her pro-choice bonafides and called for guaranteed “paid leave and affordable child care for every family.”
At the same watch party, New Castle County Executive and Governor-elect Matt Meyer said his gubernatorial campaign was previously regarded as a longshot by what he called the “old Delaware Way.”
He asserted that his record on homelessness, youth coding programs, and affordable housing convinced enough voters to choose his candidacy. In September, Meyer won a viciously fought primary against Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long, who had been endorsed by nearly all major Democratic Party leaders in the state.
Meyer becomes the first county executive to win Delaware’s governorship in its history.
“We can all agree that for far too long, there was a Delaware Way that served insiders and ignored the talents and potential of so many who’ve been left behind,” Meyer said during his speech.
During the weeks after the September primary, there were rumors that notable supporters of Hall-Long – including the current Gov. John Carney – might vote for Ramone in the gubernatorial election.
Asked on Tuesday after he left the polls, Carney said “Obviously, I’m a Democrat, so I voted for the Democrat.”
Rounding out the statewide victories were State Sen. Kyle Evans Gay who is headed to the lieutenant governor’s office, and Trinidad Navarro, who will hold onto his seat as insurance commissioner.
It marks the fourth consecutive election cycle that Democrats have swept statewide races on the ballot.
Toss-ups for the statehouse
While Democrats dominated statewide, Republicans fared better in statehouse races that were predicted to be hotly contested prior to the election.
In three of those four contests, Republicans incumbents successfully defended their seats despite registrations that were dominated by Democrats or at least trending blue.
Republican Rep. Bryan Shupe won a decisive victory in a race to represent Mildford’s District 36, an area with rapid growth that has been fueled by new immigrant communities. Shupe leads his Democratic Party challenger, Rony Balatazar-Lopez, in the race by a 25-point margin.
That lead comes despite Shupe narrowly winning a bruising primary election in September amid opposition from a political action committee funded by area developers.
In two other closely watched races, Republican incumbent Rep. Mike Smith defeated Democrat Monica Beard for District 22 in Hockessin, and Rep. Kevin Hensley beat Democrat Terrell Williams for District 9 in the Middletown-Odessa-Townsend area.
Hensley has said his past political success came, in part, by cultivating a boots-on-the-ground reputation that has carved significant support from Democrats.
The single Democrat who successfully flipped a seat was Frank Burns who ran against Republican Brenda Mennella for the seat currently held by the Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Ramone.
Ramone had won narrow victories in the district in past years, despite a Democratic Party voter registration advantage there.
The Republican wins prevented Democrats from capturing a supermajority in Delaware’s House of Representatives, which would allow them to unilaterally reshape the nature of state politics for years to come.
Right now, House Democrats require two Republican defectors to approve any constitutional amendment – a scenario that requires approval by two-thirds of all legislators.
Past failures to meet that threshold have stalled discussions on adding early voting, mail-in balloting and abortion rights measures to the Delaware Constitution in recent years.
Still, the likely addition of Burns’ seat in the House will allow Democrats to safeguard their three-fifths majority for enacting tax increases and overriding vetoes by the governor.
Local changes
Beyond the state races, there will be a number of changes at the county and municipal levels in Delaware, including current Gov. John Carney moving to become mayor of Wilmington – the first time a sitting governor has ever left for municipal office in modern American history.
Carney will be tasked with working with a Wilmington City Council that has two new progressive faces in Coby Owens and Christian Willauer. Winning the city’s four at-large seats on Tuesday were Democrats Tish Bracy, Alex Hackett and Maria Cabrera along with Republican James Spadola.
In New Castle County, Marcus Henry is set to become county executive and he will work with new County Council President Monique Johns, who defeated a challenge from Republican Melissa Brayman on Tuesday.
Finally, in Sussex County, Democrat Jane Gruenebaum unseated Sussex County Councilman Mark Schaeffer. That loss means that the southernmost county will have a whole new majority bloc on the five-member county government, after Council President Michael Vincent and Councilwoman Cynthia Green were ousted in the September primary.
Gruenebaum, a co-founder of the Sussex Preservation Coalition, was able to harness locals’ dissatisfaction with the explosive pace of growth in the county to an 8-point win.
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