In November, things didn’t go so well for the Democrats. One of the unexpected under-performances of the election came in Delaware. Democrats came out ahead in the state’s Senate by just one vote, and a vacancy in a Democratic seat had arisen in the down state area. This meant that Saturday’s special election in that district was for control of the chamber. Democrats managed to win by a larger-than-expected 58–42% margin. The result put Stephanie Hansen in the State Senate, and Democrats in charge of a body they should be in charge of anyway.
Democrats have a lot to be happy about in this victory. For one, they avoided a real embarrassment in Joe Biden’s home state. Secondly though, this was a seat they won by 2% in 2014, and they won it by 17% in a Special Election held on a Saturday in February, in a district that was not downtown Wilmington. While they absolutely should win this seat, this was the kind of race Democrats had been losing in the Obama-era. They won it, and they won it by a bigger than normal margin.
Even with all of that, let’s not write the stories about 2018 being our 2010 yet. Yes, there are some promising signs, but off-year Special Elections don’t always tell us much. Republicans lost nearly every Congressional Special Election over the course of the first ten months of 2009, and really didn’t show any signs of the 2010 wave they were bringing until the November elections of Republican Governors in Virginia and New Jersey, and of course, Scott Brown’s Senate victory a short-time later in Massachusetts. All the Democratic wins in early 2009 didn’t mean a whole lot when the 2010 mid-terms came splashing onto the short, delivering big Republican majorities in the U.S. House and in state houses across the country. Democrats might get a similar wave in 2018- but there’s absolutely no proof of that right now.
Feel free to celebrate, because winning is better than losing. Don’t get too comfortable though. Democrats could win or lose in the next big special election, the Georgia Special Election to fill Tom Price’s seat. It’s truly up in the air, because of the weird-ness of any Special Election. If they win, it doesn’t mean 2018 is going to be our year. If they lose, it doesn’t mean it won’t be. It matters though, because the winner will get a seat in Congress to vote on our laws, so pay attention and get involved- these races matter.
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