Midterm Election Results Conclude as Expected for Dickinsonians

The Nov. 6 mid-term elections ended with Democrats taking control of the House of Representatives for the first time since 2011, and with Republicans keeping control of the Senate.

In Pennsylvania, U.S. Senator Bob Casey and Governor Tom Wolf kept their seats blue. Cumberland County voted blue for Wolf and red for Casey’s opponent, Lou Barletta. The 10th congressional district voted in Democrat U.S. Representative Scott Perry. He won by a margin of just over 5,000 votes, according to the County of Cumberland official website, ccpa.net.

Before voting on Tuesday, Nov. 6, the Los Angeles Times projected that Democrats needed to flip 23 seats to regain control of the House of Representatives. Instead, they surpassed that and flipped 32 seats, ending with 228 seats in total.

The Republican party kept a hold on the Senate. They could only afford to lose one seat before the election; instead, they gained two. Republicans now hold a slim majority with 51 seats compared to Democrats’ 46. Some votes are still pending as some ballots are being recounted in Florida and Georgia, as of print time on Tuesday, Nov. 13.

Madison Milaszewski ’19, president of the Dickinson College Democrats, helped with former democratic candidate for senate George Scott’s campaign, Perry’s opponent. She said she wasn’t too surprised that Carlisle went red. “Just being here for four years I know that’s kind of how it goes,” Milaszewski said. 

“If you look at the district map, Dickinson College is the small blue dot just in a sea of red,” Milaszewski said, “It was nice to see [Scott] come at least pretty close.”

Grant Shearer ’19, president of the College Republicans, said he expected the outcome. “From the stuff I was reading, I was a little concerned because they said 30 something seats were picked up by the Democrats [in the House of Representatives],” said Shearer. “I was very pleased with how many seats we picked up in the Senate.”

Shearer says policy can still be passed despite a divided congress. “I think the ball is in the Democrats’ court on this. If they want to pass meaningful legislation, there are things they can work on.” Shearer said “[President Donald] Trump and [Democratic Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy] Pelosi talked about decreasing the cost of prescription drugs, and that’s something both parties are behind. I think if they focus on the things we agree on, it will be good for both parties.”

Milaszweski said she thinks having division in Congress will lead to stalemate. “There might be a lot more [legislation] coming from the executive branch. There might also be judiciary [legislation] now that that’s definitely more swinged towards the right.”

Milaszweski also said the races led to more diversity: “We elected more women into Congress, so that’s a huge milestone. It’s nice seeing more female representation in politics especially after the unfortunate outcome of the 2016 election.”

Associate Professor of Political Science Toby Reiner says the results were generally what he was expecting. “Usually the President’s party does not do especially well in the midterms,” said Reiner. “But given the composition of the Senate seats up for re-election, there was only a very small chance of the Democrats flipping the Senate. Flipping the House was about as good a result as they could expect.”