Free Republic

The more serious problem for Democrats is the drubbing they’ve taken in the states, the breeding ground for future national talent and for policy experimentation. Republicans have unified control — the governorship and the legislature — in 23 states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Democrats control just seven. Democrats hold 18 governorships, but only a handful are in the most populous states. In California, Gov. Jerry Brown won again at age 76, his fourth, non-consecutive term in the governor’s office. His victory means that younger Democrats will have to wait until 2018 to compete for one of...

<p>Update (11-11-14): According to the Alaska Division of Elections Sullivan has picked up approximately 5,300 votes to 4,650 for the BigItch thus far.</p> <p>That’s 10,000 previously uncounted ballots, and the Sullivan gain has extended slightly. Dems were hoping for ridiculously lopsided BigItch votes for a comeback. So far so good. I thought you may want to refresh this thread in breaking since we have hard numbers to update.</p>

Joni Ernst's feat this week was one that many thought was impossible: a Republican victory in a blue state that Obama won twice, and the first woman ever elected to Congress from Iowa. Not only did Ernst win a U.S. Senate seat, she clobbered her Democratic opponent by an 8-point margin.. So how did she pull it off in a state that has so long resisted making women its top leaders? A weak opponent, a breakthrough ad in the hog barn that went viral, and a carefully cultivated image that female politicians from Hillary Rodham Clinton to Sarah Palin have...

"Finally, after 40 years, our community made history today," Orange County Supervisor Janet Nguyen said on Tuesday night at Azteca Mexican Restaurant in Garden Grove. Nguyen's touching statement came as the Orange County Election Authority showed her leading in the Senate District 34 race at 62 percent of the vote by 10pm, with her Democratic rival Jose Solorio trailing behind at 38 percent. This is the first time the United States has had a state senator of Vietnamese descent. The state's 34th District includes parts of Long Beach and Orange County.

Republicans, who have already blocked a Democratic super-majority in the California Senate, have also succeeded in defeating a Democratic super-majority in the Assembly.

With the walloping Republicans gave Democrats in the midterm elections, the GOP stands one Louisiana Senate runoff away from completely controlling Southern politics from the Carolinas to Texas. Only a handful of Democrats hold statewide office in the rest of the Old Confederacy. The results put Southern Republicans at the forefront in Washington—from Senate Majority Leader-in-waiting Mitch McConnell of Kentucky to a host of new committee chairmen. Those leaders and the rank-and-file behind them will set the Capitol Hill agenda and continue molding the GOP’s identity heading into 2016. In statehouses, consolidated Republican power affords the opportunity to advance conservative...

A headline on the Cut announces that the midterm election results were “Bad News for Women.” Under it, Ann Friedman argues that even though there were several “prominent victories” for Republican women this week—including combat veteran and hog castrator Joni Ernst in Iowa, black Mormon Mia Love in Utah, and youngest woman to ever be elected to Congress Elise Stefanik in New York—because they do not support abortion rights and are pro-gun, that means their wins are not a boon for women. I’m not sure I agree. If you are against everything Joni Ernst or Mia Love stand for, then...

Yesterday, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals struck a reverberating blow on behalf of natural marriage and the Constitution by upholding bans on sodomy-based marriages in its jurisdiction.It is impossible to overestimate the importance of this ruling.It means, for one thing, that the issue is now on the fast track to the Supreme Court. If the Court accepts a marriage case by January, a decision will almost certainly be issued by next June.From a constitutional standpoint, the 6th Circuit’s ruling is a model of sound jurisprudence. The ruling observes that the Supreme Court has already settled the question of the...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democrats' campaign committee on Thursday began canceling plans for television ads in Louisiana's major markets to help Sen. Mary Landrieu's runoff campaign...

GAITHERSBURG, Maryland — The Associated Press declared Democratic Rep. John Delaney the winner in Maryland's 6th Congressional District on Thursday night after election officials announced absentee ballot counts in four of the district's five counties.

Will Hurd Tuesday night was an historic night for the Republican Party in a lot of ways. Mia Love became the first black Republican woman elected to Congress. Joni Ernst became the first woman elected to represent Iowa in U.S. Senate history. Elise Stefanik, at the age of 30, is the youngest woman ever elected to Congress, representing New York’s 21st congressional district. It appears that Carl DeMaio, who ran for Congress in California, will be the first openly gay Republican ever elected to Congress. And, Tim Scott became the first black Senator elected in the South since Reconstruction. But,...

On the eve of this week’s election, HBO comedian John Oliver delivered a hilarious reminder of how important -- yet ignored -- state legislatures are. Democratic donors didn’t seem to get the message, as they dumped almost 16 times more money into the party organization that waged a handful of Senate campaigns than into the organization that runs their national campaign for state legislatures. According to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) raised more than $146 million in the 2014 election cycle. In that same time, the party’s group that finances state...

In the 2014 midterm elections, the Republican Party enlarged its majority in the U.S. House of Representatives with continued strong support from white evangelicals and people who attend religious services regularly. In addition, the GOP appears to have made inroads among some religious constituencies that traditionally have not been as supportive of Republican candidates.

David Brat, the Republican who unseated ex-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in June, cruised to victory Tuesday night, according to multiple news outlets. Brat, who faced off with Democrat Jack Trammell, won the race for Virginia’s 7th congressional district. Despite both teaching at Randolph-Macon College, the two presented a different vision for America’s future while courting voters. Brat rode a wave of tea-party backed support to a stunning upset of Cantor last summer and is favored to win the heavily Republican 7th Congressional District in central Virginia, which includes the Richmond-area suburbs. Brat repeatedly played up his role as an...

The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) offers our warmest congratulations to the Jewish Republicans who won their races yesterday in the important election of 2014. We are especially delighted that Lee Zeldin won his congressional race in New York’s first district, making him the Jewish Republican in the 114th U.S. Congress. We are also pleased that the Jewish Republicans in state offices around the country won their reelections. Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens, Ohio State Treasurer Josh Mandel, South Dakota State Senator Dan Lederman, Texas State Representative and House Speaker Joe Straus and Texas State Representative Craig Goldman all won reelection....

Low Democratic voter turnout has been blamed for the decisive Republican victory in Tuesday’s midterm elections. It has quickly become the scapegoat, even though the Democrats invested millions of dollars in an expansive effort to persuade young and nonwhite voters who do not usually participate in midterm election to head to the polls. There is no question that turnout among core Democratic groups was lower in 2014 than it was in 2012 or even 2010. Many Democrats would have won if turnout had resembled a presidential election year. But Democrats also lost in states where turnout surpassed 2010, according to...

Arkansas elected Republican Rep. Tom Cotton to the Senate on Tuesday, sending incumbent Mark Pryor packing. You might not be surprised that a Republican won in Arkansas in a heavily GOP year, but Cotton's victory is a much bigger deal than you probably think. His election is a significant step for the future of GOP foreign policy, and thus perhaps for American foreign policy. Cotton, you see, is the golden child of the Republican party's hawkish establishment. He still calls the 2003 Iraq invasion a "just and noble" war. He's young — just 37 — and fervently backed by some...

After Republicans easily clinched a Senate majority on Tuesday night, we knew the run-off election in Louisiana wouldn't go well for Democrat Mary Landrieu against her Republican opponent Bill Cassidy and now, it just got a lot worse. POLITICO is reporting the DSCC has pulled funding for television advertising in the state. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee is canceling at least some of its advertising reservations for Sen. Mary Landrieu ahead of the December runoff in Louisiana. The committee canceled buys planned from Monday through December 6 in the Lafayette, Baton Rouge and New Orleans markets, three sources tracking the...

Barack Obama's reaction to Tuesday's big election loss for the Democrats was mocked at the Country Music Awards by Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley. If their act looks somewhat familiar, they were the same duo who mocked ObamaCare last year at the same show. They also took some potshots at Taylor Swift for seeming to have abandoned country music which they worked into the routine:

This map, which originated with National Journal, has been making the rounds on Twitter. It it similar to the one that was popular a few years ago that showed the United States as red or blue, by county. But this map shows the Congressional districts based on the just-completed election: