Republicans can celebrate two convincing wins in special congressional races, chalking up convincing victories in both Wisconsin and California. The predictive value of these special elections is always uncertain, but in both instances Republicans handily defeated their Democratic opponents.
In California’s 25th congressional district, Republican Mike Garcia, a first time politician former navy pilot, ran a very strong campaign against his Democratic challenger Christy Smith, a Democratic state assemblywoman, and ended up winning by a margin of 56% to 44% (with 85% of the vote in). The margin was much wider than projected although Republicans had high hopes to reclaim the seat after the incumbent Democratic congresswoman had resigned due to a personal scandal. Democrats outnumber Republicans in party registration by 7% in the district which had gone decisively for Hillary Clinton in 2016. So this win by Garcia highlights that the Republican party is not dead and gives hopes that Republicans can claw back seats that they lost in 2018 when they lost the House. The Cook Political Report had called this a “toss up” so the margin of the win is quite unexpected. Garcia and Smith will face off again in November when turnout is expected to be higher.
In Wisconsin’s 7th congressional district, Republican Tom Tiffany defeated Democrat Tricia Zunker by a margin of 57% to 43% replacing a Republican congressman who had stepped down for personal reasons (no scandal). The 7th Congressional district used to be a solidly Democratic district held by a Democrats for over 40 years until the Trump era. Obama had won the district by 8% in 2008, but in the past four years the working class district with few college educated voters had turned Republican. Most observers had this race as “lean Republican,” Tiffany’s 14% margin was again much wider than anticipated.
Going into the night, 538 political commentary said the following: “Still, pay attention to the final margin, both here and in California. When a party consistently overperforms its usual partisan baseline in special elections, it bodes well for that party in the general election as well. So even a narrow loss by Zunker, if paired with a comfortable Smith win, would add to the evidence that another Democratic wave is building.” Not only did that narrative not take place, it seems the opposite occurred. At least this week, the Republican base seemed much more energized which should give hope for Republicans to make gains in November.
NewEnglandPolitics.com 