Two days after Election Day, the most current tallies show Republicans managed to take a tiny bite out of Beacon Hill’s Democratic supermajority, with a net gain of one legislative seat.
Taunton City Councilor Kelly Dooner flipped a state Senate district that retiring Democrat Sen. Marc Pacheco had represented since 1989. In the House, Republicans flipped two seats red, but Democrats also picked up two seats held by Republicans who are not seeking reelection.
Dooner said in a Facebook post she will be the first woman to hold the Senate seat. Her win over Raynham Democrat Joe Pacheco (who is not related to the current senator) will also make her the first Republican woman to serve as a state senator in Massachusetts since 2004, when Walpole’s Jo Ann Sprague opted not to run for reelection.
It’s the second Senate seat Republicans have picked up in two years, after Sen. Peter Durant’s special election win last year in central Massachusetts. When Dooner takes her oath of office, the Senate’s minority caucus will grow to five out of 40 senators.
“Despite the fact that some people might look at five and still see it as a super-minority, which it is, it’s always great to have another voice and another person to really lean on and try and exchange ideas and get stuff done,” Sen. Patrick O’Connor, a Weymouth Republican, told GBH News at the State House Thursday.
The Massachusetts Republican Party pursued a targeted approach in this year’s legislative races, focusing largely on swing districts where Democrats were not seeking reelection. Party chair Amy Carnevale said that with Dooner’s victory, the two House wins, and the reelection of all GOP incumbents who faced challenges Tuesday, the “results send a clear warning to Democrats on Beacon Hill that the days of ‘business as usual’ are over.”
Democrats will still hold veto-proof majorities in both legislative chambers, as well as every statewide and federal office in Massachusetts.
As Republicans celebrate their wins, the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate are preparing to once again adopt a legislative agenda that could be dominated by responses to federal policies emerging from a Trump White House.
House Speaker Ron Mariano said he anticipates a “heightened importance” around the House’s ability to “step up in the face of federal mismanagement.” Senate President Karen Spilka said the body under her leadership “stands ready to fight for the fundamental values our commonwealth holds dear once again.”
O’Connor, the Weymouth state senator, was first elected in a 2016 special election, and said his whole political career has played out against “a backdrop of what’s happening in Washington, whether it was the Trump administration or the Biden administration.”
“I think that in the face of uncertainty of what’s going to happen in Washington, D.C., I think that the Legislature, both Democrats and Republicans, are prepared to do what’s right for Massachusetts, if that’s in opposition to what’s going on in Washington or if it’s in support of what’s going on in Washington,” O’Connor said. “But I would hope at this stage in the game that we really look towards D.C. as a partner, because unfortunately, dysfunction in the House and the Senate in Washington has really prohibited them from being a partner.”
In the state House of Representatives, the balance of power between Democrats and Republicans is set to remain unchanged from the start of this session.
In Somerset, Republican Justin Thurber defeated longtime Rep. Patricia Haddad, a Democrat who formerly served in House leadership as speaker pro tempore. Also in the southeastern part of the state, Pembroke Republican Ken Sweezey claimed a vacant seat last held by Democrat Josh Cutler, who left the House to serve in the Healey administration.
Republican Rep. Mathew Muratore of Plymouth gave up his House seat to run for state Senate, losing to fellow Rep. Dylan Fernandes, a Falmouth Democrat, in a big-spending race. Plymouth Democrat Michelle Badger won Muratore’s seat.
In Raynham and Bridgewater, now represented by outgoing Republican Rep. Angelo D’Emilia, Democrat Dennis Gallagher eked out a win over Republican Sandra Wright.
Wright had announced plans to seek a recount in Raynham when a ballot count had Gallagher ahead by just 178 votes. But she said Thursday that updated totals from both communities that “reflected more accurate mail in and provisional ballots” had “further improved Mr. Gallgher’s numbers, making the need for a recount obsolete.”
Produced with assistance from the Public Media Journalists Association Editor Corps funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.
