Democrat Jennifer McClellan easily won the special election for Virginia’s 4th Congressional District last week. The fact that a Democrat comfortably retained a Democratic seat in a district President Joe Biden would have won under its new lines by 36 points in 2020 is not surprising.
What is notable is that McClellan didn’t just win, she outperformed Biden’s 2020 margin by 13 points. It’s part of a pattern in special elections this year that suggests that the national environment may be friendlier to Democrats than Biden’s sub-50% job approval rating would indicate.
So far in 2023, besides McClellan’s race, there have been 12 special elections for state legislative seats in which at least one Democrat ran against at least one Republican. And in those 12 races, Democrats have been outperforming Biden’s 2020 margins by an average of 4 points.
Now, 12 isn’t a particularly large sample size when examining special state legislative elections, so that 4-point average swing could shift somewhat as more special elections are held.
Still, a sample size of 12 isn’t nothing, especially considering these elections have taken place in areas ranging from red to blue and across six states, from New Hampshire all the way down to Louisiana.
And this 4-point swing to the Democrats is very much unlike what we saw in the state legislative special elections during the 2022 cycle before Roe v. Wade was overturned. In those elections, Democrats were underperforming Biden’s margin by an average of 4 points.
The change in special elections reminds me of what happened in early 2019. Democrats were coming off a big 2018 midterm campaign in which the special elections leading up to it were the first indication that the party was in for a big night.
In state special elections in the first half of 2019, Democrats continued to outperform…
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