Dem
47
GOP
53
In a result that comes as a surprise to absolutely nobody, James Walkinshaw won the special election held in Virginia yesterday. He will replace his former boss, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D), who died of cancer in May.
We presume that anyone who reads this site, even sporadically, knows the two immediate implications of Walkinshaw's win. But, just for the sake of thoroughness, here they are. First, as soon as Walkinshaw is sworn in, the Republicans will control 219 seats in the House to 213 for the Democrats. That means Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) can afford just two defections on legislation—like, say, the upcoming budget bill(s)—and still get things passed. If three Republicans defect, and the Democrats all hang together (and everyone on both sides votes), that's 216-216. And a tie means that a bill is NOT adopted.
Second, as we have already noted this week, there are (reportedly) 217 signatures now for Rep. Thomas Massie's (R-KY) discharge petition to compel the Department of Justice to release all the Epstein files it has. This assumes that Walkinshaw is a "yea" like all the other Democrats (a safe assumption) and also that the four Republican apostates (Massie; Nancy Mace, R-SC; Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-GA and Lauren Boebert, R-CO) don't change their minds (a less safe assumption). If these conditions do hold, then the 218th signature will come on Sept. 23, when Raúl Grijalva's daughter Adelita (D) wins the special election to replace her deceased father.
For anyone who is interested in the tea leaves here, Democrats have to be pretty happy about yesterday's result. The district, VA-11, is D+18, which should translate into Democratic wins by a 60% to 40% margin. In his last two elections, Connolly won 66.7% to 33.0% (2022) and 66.7% to 32.9% (2024). Walkinshaw won yesterday by just shy of 50 points, 74.9% to 25.1%. That means he overperformed the district's baseline by 30 points, and he overperformed Connolly by 16-17 points. We would caution, of course, against reading too much into a wonky special election in a very partisan district, where there was no pressing need for Republican voters to show up. That said, there was no pressing need for Democratic voters to show up, either. So, it could be a small-ish data point that suggests Democratic enthusiasm for the federal elections in 2026, or the Virginia state elections later this year.
Meanwhile, Boston held its mayoral primary yesterday, as the city decides whether to give Michelle Wu another term. Ostensibly, the jungle-style primary is nonpartisan but... everyone knows, of course. Wu, a Democrat, advanced to the general, as did Josh Kraft, another Democrat, and one who used his family's large supply of money (they own the New England Patriots) to generously fund his campaign. There was a third Democrat, Domingos DaRosa, who finished a distant third. And the only Republican in the race, perennial candidate Robert Cappucci, brought up the rear, collecting just 2,050 votes out of 90,193 cast (2.3%). This is not a surprise; Boston has been a one-party town for a very long time. The last time Beantown elected a Republican to the mayoralty, local-boy-who-made-good Calvin Coolidge was the president.
Wu's vote share was enormous; she took 71.8% of the vote, compared to 23.3% for Kraft. We are not close followers of Boston municipal politics, but with a result that lopsided, it's hard to envision a scenario, outside of some sort of scandal, where Wu does not go on to win another term. One clear lesson here is that all the money in the world can only get you so far (something that followers of Los Angeles mayoral elections or followers of Wisconsin Supreme Court elections know well). A second possible lesson is that Bostonians approve of Wu's standing up to Donald Trump, something she's been doing with some frequency, as he has threatened her city with ICE raids.
That's the major election news for now. Next up is that special election in Arizona in a couple of weeks. After that, only two House seats will be unfilled, and they will remain that way until early November (when the Democrats gain back another seat, in Texas) and then early December (when the Republicans will probably gain back a seat, in Tennessee). (Z)