At least it is around here. And possibly a few other places in the US.
In this “special” election, our small corner of the country is choosing someone to represent us in the Virginia House of Delegates1. Made necessary by the previous delegate accepting a position in the administration of the new governor, elected in the last “regular” election.
I suppose any one of these very local campaigns don’t make much difference on their own. But, as has become apparent over the past decade or so, they all add up in the end.
And based on what I’ve read about the many special elections that have taken place over the past year, there appears to be two positive trends.
First, when Democrats win, the margin of victory has been much greater than in past elections. When Republicans win, the margin has been much smaller, with far more “flips” than in the past.
Second, the number of voters participating has also been far higher in most cases.
In other words, there seem to be fewer indifferent “voters”. Those people who, for whatever reason, decide not to participate in this democracy. The largest slice of that pie in the graphic at the top.
It’s hard to know if this will be a continuing trend, but it is a hopeful one. Maybe more people are waking up to the idea that not voting, even at the hyper-local level, has consequences that actually impact lives.
We’ll see if the trend continues in our little election today.
The graphic was posted on social media by a someone I trust and I’ve since seen other statistics that verify the concept. I don’t know who originally created it.
1. Virginia is not a state. This is a “Commonwealth”. The members of the lower house are not representatives; they are “delegates”. Oddities left over from a government organized long before the Constitution was written. History is interesting.