As we’ve been hearing this week -- Tuesday’s state-wide elections will determine Virginia’s lawmakers for the next two years. Also at stake: which party will control Virginia’s State Senate. But just what is the effect of who controls the state senate?
Virginia’s Governor is a Democrat, and it’s legislature is controlled completely by Republicans. But, if Democrats win just one extra seat on Tuesday.. that could change.
“Democrats and the Governor need a foothold in the legislative branch and a tied senate would give them that because Ralph Northam, the current Lt Governor, would cast tie-breaking votes, presumably in favor of Democratic initiatives,” says Quentin Kidd, a political analyst at Christopher Newport University.
“What they would get is the ability to have legislation that’s important to Governor McAuliffe’s agenda, get a hearing in the senate, and more likely than not get passed out of the Senate.
It’s not exactly a bold proclamation of power-- Legislation would still have to get through the Republican-controlled House of Delegates. But, for Democrats, it’s still better than the alternative.
“If republicans control the state senate and the House of Delegates, it’s very unlikely that anything that’s important to the governor gets out of either chamber.”
Legislation that’s likely to be important to the governor in the upcoming session includes gun control measures and another pass at expanding medicaid in the state.
“The governor would like Medicaid expansion to come back up even though he’s tried two years in a row. I don’t think he’s going to give up on that.”
But there’s a far cry between not giving up and being successful, and with new-found leverage being the only difference between previous attempts to expand Medicaid, that seems unlikely to go anywhere.
But leverage isn’t the only thing at stake next week.
“We are now just a little bit over a year away from the 2016 presidential race. Virginia’s going to play an important role in that as one of the most critical battleground states.”
And so a win this year is momentum for next.
Because, in politics, you don’t have to wait for one race to finish before you start campaigning for the next.
