A few things of note happened yesterday, December 9th:
Miami Mayor run-off election: Democrat Eileen Higgins was elected mayor with 60% of the vote, the first woman in the city’s history to hold the job and the first Democrat in 28 years. Higgins, a former county commissioner, defeated Republican Emilio González, an ex-city manager who had the endorsement of Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Georgia House District 121 special election: Democrat Eric Gisler defeated Republican Mack Guest IV in this lean-Republican district. Gisler’s victory is a major upset, as Trump won the district last year by 12 points.
Georgia House District 23 special election: In an all-party election featuring five Republicans and one Democrat in this very red district, none reached the 50% required to win, so there will be a run-off Jan. 6th between the Democrat, Scott Sanders, who polled yesterday at 26.74%, and Republican Bill Fincher (27.4%).
Florida House District 90 special election: Delray Beach Vice Mayor and City Commissioner Rob Long defeated Republican candidate Maria Zack with 63% of the vote. This was not a red-to-blue flip, but the winning margin was impressive.ADDENDUM: Night of the Dummymander
The heavily gerrymandered House District 121 was part of a four-pronged Republican gerrymander that had split Athens, Georgia, into four districts and attached three of them to rural red counties to dilute their votes. Here you can see how HD-121 took a “cracked” Athens population from the southeast part of the city and mixed it in with a bunch of red votes—but it wasn’t enough! This Trump +12 district moved 13.8 points bluer, and Gisler won in a close race.
Looking at these results from last night, GOP map drawers have cause to worry. Did they unintentionally create a “dummymander” that wrongly assumed there wouldn’t ever be a double-digit shift against the GOP? That assumption just lost them HD-121, and it could lose the neighboring districts as well.
1 comment:
Charlotte Talks (WFAE in Charlotte) claimed Thursday (Dec. 11) you should be prepared to pry defeat from the jaws of victory (The Potential Chaos of 2026 Midterms). Public radio is going Heidegger.
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