State Legislative Election Watch- July 1st, 2025
Unveiling the first set of ratings for this year's State Legislative elections in New Jersey & Virginia!
STATE LEGISLATIVE ELECTION WATCH- July 1st, 2025
INTRO:
Hello everyone and welcome to Uncrewed’s State Legislative Election Watch! I’m Uncrewed/Chris and this is your one-stop-shop to everything you need to know about state legislative elections from around the country. Welcome to July everybody! We’re starting to get into the thick of things when it comes to state legislative elections this year, so I feel like it’s time to launch the initial set of ratings for this year’s state legislative elections in New Jersey and Virginia. Unlike some of our competitors, I won’t be hiding these ratings away behind a fancy fundraiser that costs over $100 to attend and forcing y’all to wait a month to find ‘em out. Nope, the State Legislative Election Watch is powered by the people, for the people, so you’ll find out the ratings right now! So, without further ado, let’s get to it!
DISCLAIMER:
These are just going to be brief overviews of the districts. I’ll go more in depth on the districts when we get closer to November, but for now, just a brief overview of the state of play in each state
NEW JERSEY:
New Jersey Republicans are feeling optimistic this year. They nearly won the Governorship in 2021 and President Trump came within six points of flipping the state in 2024. However, this is still a Democratic-leaning state in a year where President Trump’s approval ratings are not the best. This puts Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill as the prohibitive favorite to win the Governorship and the Democrats favored to keep control of the State Assembly. Here are the initial ratings:
The Democrats currently have a 52-28 majority in the State Assembly and if the election were held today, they would keep that majority. The Republicans have room to grow though and are the early favorites to flip AD-03 in southwestern New Jersey. They surprisingly won that district back in 2021, but the Democrats surprisingly flipped it back in 2023. But now the Democrats have to defend a Trump+7 district in a year where the south Jersey machine is at its weakest. It’s going to be an uphill battle for them to keep it.
Other Republican flip opportunities come in the neighboring AD-04 (which backed Harris by two in 2024) and AD-11 in northern Monmouth County (which backed Harris by four last year). They also have a chance to win back the other AD-08 (Harris+1) seat they lost in 2023. The Republicans also have two reach districts in north Jersey that could get competitive if the environment gets better for them, AD-36 & AD-38. Those two districts backed Trump by four points and 130 votes respectively, but have entrenched Democratic incumbents who outperformed expectations in 2023 (when Republicans targeted both). If the environment gets a lot better for Republicans, watch out for AD-14 (Harris+11), AD-16 (Harris+14), and AD-19 (Harris+0.1) to come on the board. That’s the only way they even get close to a majority though.
As for the Democrats, they have several major targets. AD-21 backed Harris by 12 points last year, but is a lot more Republican downballot (Jack Ciattarelli won it by 0.3% in his nearly successful 2021 Governor run for example). Still, we’ve seen a lot of places this year where downballot Republican leanings have just completely faded, so this is pretty much a pure tossup. I already talked about AD-08 in the Republican target list, but the Democrats are hoping to achieve a clean sweep there. They’re also hoping to flip two Biden-Trump districts in north Jersey in AD-25 & AD-39. Both are heavily college-educated and have a lot of high income voters, so the Democrats are hoping to regain some lost ground from 2020 there. Further down the list, AD-02 in Atlantic City is a Harris+2 seat, but the Republican incumbents are really strong and usually outrun the top of the ticket. Finally, AD-40 in North Jersey is a Trump+7 district, but the Democrats landed a really strong candidate in a local Borough Council President, so they might have a shot at flipping one of the two seats. If the environment continues to get better for the Democrats, watch out for the other AD-40 seat to come on the board, but they’re pretty maxed out otherwise.
CURRENT PREDICTION: 53-27 DEM
OVERALL CHAMBER RATING: SAFE DEM
VIRGINIA:
The Democrats look like they’re going to have a good year in Virginia. With a strong ticket for the three statewide offices and Trump having bad approval ratings in the state (mostly thanks to cutting federal jobs), they look favored to make gains in November. Former Democratic Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger is the early favorite to become Governor, while the Democrats in the State House are also poised to make gains. Here are the initial ratings:
The Democrats currently have a 51-49 majority in the State House and if the elections were held today, they’d probably expand that majority by 4-5 seats. They are currently favored in one Republican-held seat, HD-57 in the western Richmond suburbs. They lost the district by four points in 2023, but that was only after they abandoned their nominee because they found out she performed sexual acts online with her husband. They probably won’t have that problem this year though and are currently favored to flip the Harris+9 district.
They also have a lot of targets to expand their majority, 12 by my count. Starting with the toss-ups, HD-22 in Prince William County backed Harris by one point in 2024, but elected a Republican State Delegate in 2023 by five points. The Democrats landed a strong recruit there though, so it’s going to be competitive. HD-41 in the Blacksburg area backed Trump in 2024 by a few points, but the Democrats nearly won it in 2023 and their candidate that year is running against (and has easily lapped the Republican incumbent in fundraising already). This one will probably come down to how well Democrats are able to turn out voters from Virginia Tech. HD-71 in the Williamsburg area is a similar story to HD-41, but it’s a Harris+5 district instead of a Trump district. Democrats nearly won it in 2023, their candidate is running again (and pulling in some strong fundraising numbers), and it’ll probably come down to how well they’re able to turn out college students (this time from William & Mary University!). HD-75 in the Hopewell area backed Harris by six points in 2024, but the Republican incumbent there is a strong candidate, winning by six points herself in 2023. The Dems will need strong Black turnout out of Hopewell in order to win. Similar story in HD-82 in the Petersburg area, which the Democrats only lost by 78 votes in 2023. Again, they’ll need strong Black turnout in Petersburg if they want to stand a chance of winning. I was torn back and forth between rating HD-86 in Poquoson/eastern Hampton as either a Toss-Up or Lean GOP, but went with Toss-Up because it is a Harris-won district (albeit only a one point win) and the Democrat is heavily out-pacing the Republican incumbent in fundraising. Finally, HD-89 in Suffolk/Chesapeake is open because the Republican incumbent retired and the new Republican nominee is a former ICE agent who is being lapped in fundraising by the Democratic nominee. It’s only a Harris+3 district that needs decent Black turnout in order to go Democratic though, so it’s a Toss-Up.
Further down the target list for the Democrats, HD-30 in Loudoun County backed Trump by one point in 2024, but it was competitive in 2023 and has been trending Democratic otherwise. HD-73 in the southern Richmond suburbs is probably the fastest Democratic-trending district in the state, swinging from Trump+16 in 2016 to Trump+7 in 2020 to Harris+1 in 2024. Combine that with a decent Democratic nominee (who ran for VA-01 in 2024), it’s going to be an interesting district to watch. HD-64 & HD-66 are a pair of Strafford County districts that are on the edge of competitiveness, both having backed Trump by two points, but being more Republican downballot. Finally, HD-69 backed Trump by just two points in 2024, but the Democrats actually left it uncontested in 2023. They’ve got a candidate this time around though, but he’s lagging behind the Republican incumbent in fundraising. If things continue to get worse for the Republicans, watch for HD-34 (Trump+8), HD-49 (Trump+8), HD-52 (Trump+9), and HD-99 (Trump+5) to potentially get on the board.
As for the Republicans, they only have two targets. HD-97 in Virginia Beach is probably the only major target for the Republicans. It backed Harris by eight points last year, but only backed the Democrats in 2023 by five points. The Republicans also nominated a former State Delegate who’s kept pace in fundraising, so they’re keeping it somewhat competitive. Finally, HD-21 in Prince William County, which was the closest Democratic win in 2023, only backing the Dems by four points. However, this year, it’s probably not going to be the closest win. Thanks to a combination of having a decent amount of federal workers and the Republicans nominating a candidate with only $100 on hand (the Democratic incumbent has over $300,000 on hand), the Dems are favored here. If things start to turn around for the Republicans, watch out for HD-65 (Harris+9.5) and HD-84 (Harris+14.5) to become competitive (both feature Democratic incumbents who underperform).
CURRENT PREDICTION: 55-45 DEM
CURRENT CHAMBER RATING: SAFE DEM
And that’s it for this edition of Uncrewed’s State Legislative Election Watch! I’ll be back in either August or September for a special edition of the State Legislative Election Watch covering an older state legislative election(s) and then I’ll be back in October to go over, in detail, the New Jersey, Virginia, & numerous special elections going on in November. Until then, I’ve been Uncrewed/Chris, you can follow me on Twitter @Uncrewed (same on BlueSky!), and don’t forget to stay awesome!