Turn on the news and you’ll see wall-to-wall coverage of the presidential election. Cable news lavishes attention on the current and former presidents, with analysts from both parties providing intimate details of national party machinations. But this ignores a key point: While the presidential race is important, state legislative races often impact Americans’ lives more deeply.
Just look at the numbers: As of June, the 118th Congress of 2023-24 had passed 60 bills that became laws; in the same period, state lawmakers had passed 30,161 measures that became laws on everything from AI and health care to education and the workforce—and a wide range of issues in between. The point: If you care about public policy, look to the states.
Here are three questions relating to these all-important legislative seats.
1. Will Republicans maintain their edge in legislative control?
Going into the election, Republicans hold 55% of the nation’s 7,386 state legislative seats, Democrats control 44%, and the remaining are held by independents or third-party representatives. There are currently 22 vacancies in legislatures across the country. (These figures do not include the territories, where the political parties are not directly analogous to those in the states.)
The GOP’s edge extends to the nation’s 99 legislative chambers: Republicans control 57, the Democrats 41. (Nebraska’s unicameral legislature is officially nonpartisan.)
That lead of 402 seats and 16 chambers gives Republicans a sizeable advantage heading into November. The situation isn’t new. Republicans have held most of the nation’s legislative seats and chambers since the GOP wave of 2010, their longest edge in both measures since at least 1900.
Looking back at a century of data, the nationwide lead in chamber control should be up for grabs. On average, party control changes in 12 chambers in each general election cycle; this year, the Democrats would need to flip fewer than nine chambers to take the lead nationwide. But in recent years, the trend has halved; in the last three election cycles, the average dropped to just six chamber flips.
Partisan Control of Legislatures Since 2000 Election
2. What do governors have to do with it?
Going into this election, Republicans have a 27-23 edge in governors over Democrats. Only 11 governorships are up for election in this cycle. Despite the small number of races, analysts with the Cook Political Report believe only three seats fall outside the “Solid D” or “Solid R” camps, with just one toss-up: the open seat in New Hampshire. The other non-solid seats are also open— the race to fill the seat of Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a Democrat, earned a “Likely D” rating, while the one to replace North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, also a Democrat, was rated “Lean D.” If Democrats sweep those three races, they will trim Republicans’ edge in gubernatorial control to 26-24.
States With Governors Races in 2024
3. Will the number of veto-proof majorities increase?
Anyone who watched “Schoolhouse Rock!” knows a bill becomes a law if it passes each chamber of the legislature and is signed by the executive. But what if the executive vetoes it? The bill goes back to the legislature, where it can still become law if there are enough votes to override the veto. For Congress, a veto override takes a two-thirds vote in each chamber.
But the number can be lower in the states, with some requiring three-fifths or a simple majority. Attaining veto-proof status can be as impactful for parties as having a so-called trifecta—controlling both legislative chambers and the governor’s office. If the governor and legislature are controlled by different parties, a veto-proof majority gives the legislature a powerful way to pass laws regardless of the governor’s position. And even if the governor and legislature are of the same party, they don’t necessarily march to the same drummer. Any legislator will tell you having a “D” or an “R” beside one’s name doesn’t mean policymakers hold the same views. If—and it’s a big if—the legislature can marshal its veto-proof majority to vote in unison, it can singlehandedly run the show in certain states.
Currently, 28 states have veto-proof majorities, 19 Republican and nine Democratic. This is significant, as we wrote in 2022. And it could increase. Six additional legislatures—Colorado, Connecticut, Iowa, Nevada, New Mexico and South Carolina—will have vetoproof majorities if just a handful of seats change from one party to the other. On the flip side, five states—Illinois, Missouri, New York, North Carolina and Vermont—have very narrow veto-proof majorities, where the minority could deprive the majority of veto-proof status by winning a handful of seats in either chamber.
Current Veto-Proof Majorities
If the queries above spurred more questions than answers, there’s good news: NCSL is tracking these and many other questions on the State Elections 2024 webpage. For the latest information between now and election night, visit ncsl.org.
This story was first published in the Summer 2024 print edition of State Legislatures Magazine.
Ben Williams is the associate director of NCSL’s Elections and Redistricting Program.