Daily Brew: Nine seats have flipped in state legislative special elections

May 16, 2018

Two seats flip control in Pennsylvania House of Representatives special elections   Two seats flip control in Pennsylvania House of Representatives special elections District 48 went from Democratic control to Republican control. District 178 went from Republican control to Democratic control. While all of America watched the results from the statewide and federal primaries, two under-the-radar special elections were taking place in Pennsylvania. Two seats flipped - one in the Democratic Party favor and one for the Republican Party. In District 48, Timothy O'Neal (R) defeated Clark Mitchell Jr. (D) and Demosthenes Agoris (L). Unofficial results have O’Neal winning with 55 percent of the vote. District 48 was left vacant after Brandon Neuman's (D) appointment to the Washington County trial court. Neuman last faced general election opposition in 2014 when he won with 58.7 percent of the vote. He ran unopposed in 2016. In District 178, Helen Tai (D) defeated Wendi Thomas (R). Unofficial results have Tai winning by 96 votes. District 178 was left vacant after the resignation of Scott Petri (R) on December 31, 2017. Petri resigned from the state House after being appointed to the position of executive director of the Philadelphia Parking Authority. Petri won re-election in 2016 with 61.1 percent of the vote. In 2018, nine seats have flipped as a result of state legislative special elections. Eight seats flipped from Republican control to Democratic control. One seat, last night’s PA-48, flipped from Democratic control to Republican control. Pennsylvania State House District 68 remained a Republican hold after Tuesday’s election. Clint Owlett (R) defeated Carrie Heath (D) in the District 68 special election. District 68 was left vacant after Matthew Baker (R) resigned to become the regional director of the Office of Intergovernmental and External Affairs at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services office in Philadelphia. Learn more         Are more state legislative incumbents retiring in Pivot Counties? We’re continuing with day four in our series highlighting intriguing data points from state legislative candidate filing lists. Today, we take a deep dive into Pivot Counties. In 24 states where filing deadline and presidential election data was available, 305 of 3,254 legislative districts (9.4 percent) intersect with Pivot Counties, which are counties that voted for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 and for Donald Trump in 2016. Pivot County Democrats and Republicans both have higher retirement rates than their party averages, although the difference is greater for Republicans. The retirement rates for these different groups: 33.5 percent of Pivot County Republicans (63 retiring of 188 up for election); the retirement rate for the Republican Party as a whole is 20.2 percent. 17.1 percent of Pivot County Democrats (20 retiring of 117 up for election); the reitrement rate for the Democratic Party as a whole is 16.7 percent. Learn more→ Did you know Ballotpedia aggregates polling averages? We can’t get enough data here at Ballotpedia - and one of our favorite things to do is put it all together in a one-stop-shop so our readers can easily process the information. The chart above shows weekday approval and opinion ratings for the president, Congress, and regarding the direction of the country, and is based on an average of recent polls aggregated by Ballotpedia every weekday. The numbers express positive rankings, such as those who approve of the president, who approve of Congress, or who think the U.S. is heading in the right direction. For Ballotpedia's presidential approval, congressional approval, and direction of the country polling results, we take an average of the most recent polls (from the last 30 days, with some exceptions for major news events) on one or more of these topics conducted by a designated list of sources and polling firms. (See list here). We average the results and show all polling results side-by-side because we believe that paints a clearer picture of public opinion than any individual poll can provide. The data is updated daily as new polling results from the above sources are published. Learn more→