Kentuckians went to the polls to vote on a lengthy ballot for a midterm election that saw a few surprising developments:
1. Constitutional Amendments BOTH were Voted Down
2. 5 State House Incumbents Beaten (All Democrats)
3. GOP supermajorities GROW in State House by 5 seats & State Senate by 1 seat
4. TWO New Faces on State Supreme Court
5. GOP sweeps Federal Races; Except for McGarvey
See below for the unofficial election results available at the time of this writing.
Constitutional Amendments
Both constitutional amendment proposals approved during the 2022 Regular Session were on the ballot today and both appear to be narrowly defeated.
Amendment 1 (NO 53.5%-YES 46.5%)
Would have changed the legislative session’s meeting dates and allowed the General Assembly to call themselves into a special session. This ballot question was very long and may have confused voters as there was a campaign in opposition to the amendment that linked it to higher pay for legislators.
Amendment 2 (NO 52.4%- YES 47.6%)
Would have provided that nothing in the state constitution protects or secures a right to abortion. There were active media and initiative GOTV campaigns on both sides of this issue.
State Legislative Elections
Going into the election results, most were predicting the GOP to grow their supermajorities in the State House and Senate, but the size and the number of incumbents that might lose were the big unknowns.
Pre-election, Republicans controlled the House (75-25) and the Senate (30-8). Those margins increased today, with Republicans gaining 5 Seats in the House, giving them an 80-20 supermajority, and gaining 1 Seat in the Senate, giving them a 31-7 supermajority.
Republicans managed their gain in House seats by beating 5 Democratic incumbents and winning one open seat previously controlled by a Democrat. On the other side Democrats flipped one seat, a GOP open seat that was newly redistricted to Lexington. This Senate spreadsheet and House spreadsheet has a full list of winners in bold, but a few of those key House races to bring to your attention:
20th – Jackson (R) flip over Minter
28th – Bauman (R) flip over C. Miller
31st – Witten (R) flip in (D) open seat
37th – Callaway (R) flip over Donahue
65th – Dietz (R) flip over Wheatley
93rd – Swann (D) flip in open seat
94th – Justice (R) flip over Hatton
TAKEAWAYS: After the incumbent losses in the primary and a large number of legislative retirements this year we have 31 new members of the 138-member General Assembly (25 in House & 6 in Senate). We all have a lot of new people to get to know.
After this election, more than 80 percent of the House and over 70 percent of the Senate are members with less than 10 years of experience in the Kentucky General Assembly. A major loss of institutional knowledge comes with young blood, and while we’ll see many new ideas come with the new members, much groundwork will need to be done to educate the caucuses.
Now that elections are over, the House and Senate caucuses will meet in the next few weeks to elect their new leadership teams. The House Republicans will be electing a new Majority Whip with the retirement of Rep. Chad McCoy; the House Democrats will need to fill two vacancies left by retiring Minority Floor Leader Joni Jenkins and Minority Whip Angie Hatton, who lost her election; and the Senate Democrats are losing leaders with Minority Floor Leader Morgan McGarvey’s election to Congress and the retirement of their Minority Whip Dennis Parrett.
Supreme Court Races
Kentucky has a seven-member Supreme Court elected in individual districts so a majority–four of the districts–were up for election tonight and there will be some new faces on the court.
– 1st District: Justice Nickell was unopposed.
– 2nd District: Thompson defeated Alcott; open seat
– 4th District: Bisig defeated Bowman; open seat
– 6th District: Incumbent Keller defeated Fischer
We would encourage you to review this spreadsheet for more information but wanted to highlight this as the Supreme Court can often have a huge impact on issues affecting your business or organization.
Federal Races
In most states, a U.S. Senate race and an open Congressional seat would lead the headlines on election night, but an anticipated strong win for U.S. Senator Rand Paul and easy win in the 3rd Congressional District for Morgan McGarvey, Kentucky’s newest congressman didn’t make for much drama. Here are the Federal race unofficial winners:
U.S. Senate: Republican incumbent Rand Paul
U.S. House District 1: Republican incumbent James Comer
U.S. House District 2: Republican incumbent Brett Guthrie
U.S. House District 3: Former state senator Democrat Morgan McGarvey; won open seat
U.S. House District 4: Republican incumbent Thomas Massie
U.S. House District 5: Republican incumbent Hal Rogers
U.S. House District 6: Republican incumbent Andy Barr
Looking Ahead
Stay tuned for additional updates about the results of caucus leadership elections, 2023 committee makeup, and more in our 2023 Session Preview.
