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Five state legislators have switched parties since Nov. 3

Our historical tracking of party switches shows it's common for politicians to change their partisan affiliations after an election. So far, Ballotpedia has identified five state legislators who switched their party affiliation since Nov. 3. Three switched from Democrat to independent, one from Republican to Libertarian, and one from Democrat to Republican.

Two Minnesota state Senators—David Tomassoni and Thomas Bakk—left the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party and formed an independent caucus on Nov. 18. Both won re-election as Democrats on Nov. 3. The post-election partisan composition of the Minnesota state Senate is now 35 Republicans, 30 Democrats, and two independents.
Georgia Rep. Valencia Stovall announced on Dec. 7 that she was leaving the Democratic Party to become an independent. Stovall was first elected in 2012 and did not run for re-election this year. The post-election partisan composition of the Georgia House of Representatives is 105 Republicans, 73 Democrats, one independent, and one vacancy.
West Virginia Rep. Jason Barrett announced on Dec. 11 that he was leaving the Democratic Party to join the Republican Party. Barrett was first elected in 2016 and won re-election on Nov. 3 as a Democrat. The post-election partisan composition of the West Virginia House of Delegates is 77 Republicans and 23 Democrats.
Maine Rep. John Andrews announced on Dec. 14 that he was leaving the Republican Party and joining the Libertarian Party. Andrews was first elected in 2018 and won re-election on Nov. 3 as a Republican. The post-election partisan composition of the Maine House of Representatives is 80 Democrats, 66 Republicans, four independents, and one libertarian.

Party switching can also happen at the federal level. U.S. Rep. Paul Mitchell (R-Mich.) announced on Dec. 14 he was leaving the Republican Party and changing his affiliation to independent, citing differences with party leadership. Mitchell, who did not run for re-election this year, is the second member of Michigan’s congressional delegation to leave the Republican Party during the 117th Congress. U.S. Rep. Justin Amash (L) became an independent in July 2019 and joined the Libertarian Party in April.

Since 1994, Ballotpedia has identified 131 state legislators—37 state senators and 94 state representatives—who switched parties. Seventy-two switched from Democrat to Republican, 19 switched from Republican to Democrat, and the remainder switched to or from independent or other parties.

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Where are Georgia’s Senate runoff candidates campaigning?

Our team covering the Jan. 5 U.S. Senate runoff elections in Georgia presented a really neat feature in yesterday’s Runoff Report newsletter that I just had to share with Brew readers. We looked at which regions the four runoff candidates have been campaigning in since the Nov. 3 elections.

Georgia's regular and special Senate runoff elections will determine partisan control of the next U.S. Senate. Republicans have secured 50 seats, and Democrats have 48. Incumbent David Perdue (R) and Jon Ossoff (D) are running in the runoff of the state’s regular election, and incumbent Kelly Loeffler (R) and Raphael Warnock (D) are running in the special election runoff.

Ballotpedia emailed the campaigns for their events schedules and analyzed social media posts, events pages, and news articles to document the candidates' campaign stops. Using The Washington Post's breakdown of the state into six distinct political regions, we allocated each event to either: Atlanta, Atlanta Burbs, Black Belt, North Georgia, Piedmont, and South Georgia.

The table below shows the number of individual days we found so far that a candidate held or plans to hold one or more in-person campaign events in each region through Dec. 20. The most-visited regions for each candidate are highlighted in yellow.

Campaigning

To read more coverage and analysis like this about these two battleground Senate races, you’ll definitely want to subscribe to our free Runoff Report newsletter. Best of all—it’s free! Click the link below to instantly subscribe.

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Voters approved 74% of statewide constitutional amendments in 2020

We’re continuing our review of this year’s elections with a look at state constitutional amendments. Every state but Delaware requires voters to ratify proposed changes to its constitution. This year, voters decided 84 proposed statewide amendments and approved 62 of them, or 74%.

Here are five more facts about state constitutional amendments:

Of this year’s 84 amendments, state legislatures referred 69 to the ballot, and petition drives were used for the other 15.
There are multiple ways that proposed constitutional amendments can make the ballot—state legislative referral, through citizen initiatives, or constitutional convention. Florida also has a Constitution Revision Commission that reviews and proposes changes to the state constitution and refers amendments directly to the ballot for a public vote. It meets every 20 years and last met in 2018.
From 2006 through 2020, a total of 1,016 constitutional amendments were proposed and put before voters. This figure doesn’t include certain constitutional amendments that only apply to local jurisdictions. Of the 1,016, voters approved 733 amendments, or 72%.
Since 2006, the even-numbered year with the most proposed amendments on the ballot was 2006 with 148. This year had the fewest proposed amendments. The average number of amendments in even-numbered years since 2006 is 109.
Among states that allow voters to propose constitutional amendments, Florida and Colorado had the most such measures on the ballot between 2006 and 2020. Florida had 56, and Colorado had 52. Florida voters approved 37, and Colorado voters approved 21.

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