Roundup of 2025 off-year elections 

This week’s 2025 off-year elections resulted in two new governors, solidified legislative Democratic majorities in New Jersey and Virginia, and the approval of significant ballot measures in California and Texas. While the gubernatorial campaigns centered on affordability and tapped into an electorate’s concerns about state and national economies, they also kick off speculation on the 2026 midterms.  

Tuesday’s (Nov. 4) election also was the culmination of groundbreaking and disruptive mayoral campaigns in New York City and Seattle, which, like the gubernatorial elections, had centered around affordability and progressive agendas. All of these elections resulted in historic candidates’ victories and massive voter participation at a level unseen in over five decades and almost unheard of in off-year contests. 

Virginia Governor 

Former U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger defeated incumbent Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears to become the state’s first female chief executive and the commonwealth’s 75th governor. Her victory flips control of the state from Republican to Democrat and secures the state as a Democratic trifecta (when one party controls the governorship and holds majorities in both legislative chambers), in 2026, and the first time in 40 years that a Democratic governor will take office with trifecta control. 

Spanberger’s roughly 15-point margin of victory came as Democrats swept all three statewide positions up in this year’s election: Ghazala Hashmi won the Virginia lieutenant governor’s race and will become the nation’s first Muslim woman elected to statewide office. And in the attorney general’s race, Jay Jones beat the incumbent Republican State Attorney General Jason Miyares. 

As part of Spanberger’s economic platform, called the “Growing Virginia Plan,” she offers an administration that will be focused on economic pragmatism and bipartisan appeal, emphasizing workforce development, small business support, and affordability for families. The agenda is designed to position Virginia as a top state for business while improving quality of life for residents. The core pillars of her plan include:  

Workforce Development—expanding apprenticeships and job training programs to prepare Virginians for 21st-century careers, making greater investments in community colleges and technical education centers to create pathways into high-demand industries, and promoting mentorship and career readiness initiatives for high school and college students. 

Infrastructure & Innovation—continuing to invest in broadband expansion, especially in rural areas to support remote work and education, and promoting clean energy jobs and infrastructure upgrades to modernize Virginia’s energy grid (related to lowering energy costs for Virginians)  

Small Business & Local Economy—providing grants and low-interest loans to small businesses, especially those in rural and underserved areas, streamlining licensing and permitting processes to reduce bureaucratic hurdles for entrepreneurs; and supporting local manufacturing and trade by maintaining and expanding Virginia’s trade relationships. 

Affordability & Family Support—addressing cost-of-living concerns by focusing on housing affordability and utility costs through proposed legislation and initiatives, advocating for paid family leave, affordable childcare to help working families, and retirement security measures, including expanded access to savings plans for workers without an employer-sponsored option. 

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New Jersey Governor 

Democratic U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill defeated her Republican opponent, former state assembly member Jack Ciattarelli in his third attempt at the seat, by double digits.  Although Sherrill led Ciattarelli during the campaign, polling had shown a much closer race than her securing 56% of the vote.   

Sherrill will be the state’s first Democratic female governor, and by retaining the seat from the term-limited Gov. Phil Murphy, it also marks the first time since 1961 that New Jerseyans chose the Democrats to hold the governor’s office for more than two full consecutive terms.  

Sherrill ran a campaign offering a moderating platform that includes an “Affordability Agenda,” that will prioritize making New Jersey more livable for its working families and more responsive to New Jerseyans’ concerns by: 

Clean Energy & Infrastructure—positioning clean energy as both an economic and environmental solution, working on grid reliability through greater investments in modernizing New Jersey’s aging power grid to reduce outages and improve efficiency, proposing renewable energy expansion, prioritizing solar and wind development to lower long-term energy costs and create jobs, and focusing on transportation upgrades and infrastructure improvements, especially in transit and regional connectivity. 

Business Growth & Innovation—providing technical assistance and reducing red tape for entrepreneurs—especially in underserved communities—to grow the state’s innovation community and continuing to invest in initiatives designed for workforce development, job training, and partnerships with local colleges to prepare workers for high-demand industries. 

Trade & Innovation—expanding and supporting New Jersey’s role in global trade and fostering innovation through public-private partnerships. 

Affordability First—expanding housing access and streamlining development to reduce costs for renters and homeowners, declaring a state of emergency on energy costs on her first day in office, signaling aggressive action to curb rising bills, and taking efforts to ease the burden of property taxes. 

Additionally, she is emphasizing restoring trust within the government and has promised transparency measures that will make the state’s government more accountable and responsive to residents’ needs. 

State Legislatures 

In Virginia, all members of the House of Delegates were up for re-election. Going into Tuesday’s election, the Democrats held a two-seat majority; by the end of the evening, they had expanded their majority by 13 seats. When the 2026 legislative session starts, the House of Delegates will hold a 64-35 majority. The Democrats also will retain their majority in the Senate, which held no elections this year.  

Like Virginia, all 80 seats of the New Jersey General Assembly were also up for re-election. Democrats held 52 of the seats going into the election and, by the end of the evening, had expanded their majority to 55, with the possibility of flipping an additional four seats, depending on the tallying of provisional and mail-in ballots that remain. The victories give Democrats a two-thirds supermajority in the lower chamber for the first time since 2019 and will expand their majority to its largest since the party won 66 seats in 1973. Mississippi Democrats have broken the Republican Party’s supermajority in the Mississippi Senate. After 13 years, voters elected Democrats to two seats previously held by Republicans, reducing the number of Republican senators in the upper chamber from 36 to 34—one fewer than necessary to constitute a supermajority. The victories followed Tuesday’s special legislative elections. Six Senate seats were up for a special election, along with one House seat. Republicans have held a supermajority in the Senate since sweeping the state government in 2011. 

TBED-related ballot measures in Texas 

Texas voters strongly approved (69% to 31%) Proposition 14, which authorizes the state to spend $3 billion from the state’s surplus to create the Dementia Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (DPRIT). The DPRIT is modeled after the state’s cancer research fund, and once established, the institute will receive up to $300 million in state funding annually.  

Proposition 1, a ballot measure to amend the Texas Constitution to establish a Permanent Technical Institution Infrastructure Fund and the Available Workforce Education Fund as special funds outside of the state’s General Revenue Fund for the support of the Texas State Technical College System, also garnered large voter support, with 69% approving to 31%.