AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Democrats made sweeping gains in state legislatures around the country, and they'll be looking to reverse recent history. In 2010, Republicans dominated state elections and used that power to advance their agenda for over a decade. So what are Democrats going to do this time around? We're going to hear from two of those states now, from two of our member stations with Colin Campbell of WUNC in North Carolina and Wayne Schutsky of KJZZ in Arizona. Welcome.
COLIN CAMPBELL, BYLINE: Thanks, Ayesha.
WAYNE SCHUTSKY, BYLINE: Hi.
RASCOE: Both your states have had Democratic governors and heavily Republican legislatures. Let's start in North Carolina. Colin, what's changed there?
CAMPBELL: So Republicans here have had what they call working supermajorities for much of the past decade. That's enough votes, sometimes with the help of a Democrat or two, to override most of the Democratic governors' vetoes. That's allowed them to pass new abortion restrictions after the fall of Roe v. Wade, expand private school vouchers and also gerrymander congressional maps.
But on Tuesday, Democrats not only flipped the state House but will have a comfortable majority in that chamber. In the Senate, there's still one election that's being counted - could be just a one-seat majority for the GOP or a tie. If it's a tie, that would be broken by the Democratic lieutenant governor.
RASCOE: So what could change for North Carolinians? What are Democrats hoping to do?
CAMPBELL: You know, if Democrats manage to control both chambers, that could mean a rollback of abortion restrictions or reversing power grabs that have weakened the governor's office, and a whole lot more. If the Democrats end up coming up short in the state Senate, we get divided government, and it's unclear what, if anything, gets done. Regardless of how it shakes out, Democratic Governor Josh Stein is already calling for lawmakers from both parties to cooperate on issues like affordability.
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JOSH STEIN: What I heard from the people of North Carolina is, do something for us, focus on our issues, listen to our concerns and work together. Don't be so focused on the partisan divide. Focus on producing for people.
CAMPBELL: A lot of the North Carolina voters I've talked with want to see that bipartisan progress.
RASCOE: Now to Wayne Schutsky in Phoenix. Bigger change there - Republicans had controlled both chambers of the legislature, but now it's a Democratic trifecta.
SCHUTSKY: That's right. With Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs easily winning reelection, Democrats will now hold both legislative chambers and the governor's office for the first time since 1966. And this was really part of that larger blue wave we saw across the country. I mean, just for example, not in the legislature, but even the Republican clerk of court in Maricopa County, the biggest county in the state, lost to a 19-year-old Democrat who's a philosophy student at ASU, who will now oversee hundreds of court employees.
So for years, the Republican-controlled legislature has blocked Hobbs, the Democratic governor, on her agenda, and she spent the last four decades playing defense, setting a state record with more than 500 vetoes. But now she'll be able to actually initiate changes that she wants to see in the state.
RASCOE: And what kind of changes are Democrats considering?
SCHUTSKY: Well, for years, Hobbs has tried to provide financial relief to Arizonans through things like rent and utility assistance, relief for first-time homebuyers, and increasing the amount the state spends to help families afford childcare. For instance, she sought around a hundred million to help with childcare assistance but only got a fraction of that, and we still have over 15,000 kids on the wait list for that program.
One thing we do know Democrats are going to do is try and crack down on Arizona's school voucher program, which is one of the biggest in the country. She sought to scale it back for years, as we've seen reports on families using public dollars for non-education items, things like jewelry and even lingerie. So this has been a huge issue, and Senate Republican John Kavanagh actually acknowledged to me in an interview that his party missed an opportunity to address some concerns about those vouchers, which we call ESAs here.
JOHN KAVANAGH: I think that in the area of, like, ESA reform, that was something that the voters very much wanted and that we weren't going along. I mean, that's one area that was problematic.
SCHUTSKY: Still, Republicans tell me they think their losses still had more to do with President Trump than anything they actually did.
RASCOE: Well, Colin, can you sum up a little about where there could be big changes in other states?
CAMPBELL: Yeah. This year's blue wave definitely had ripple effects through a lot of state Houses. Going into the election, Republicans had control of 28 state legislatures. Democrats had 18. A few others were divided. Now Democrats will control more than the GOP. The National Conference of State Legislatures projects this time around, Democrats will control 25, Republicans will control 21. In addition to that trifecta in Arizona, Democrats have new trifectas in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. In Nevada, they got a trifecta by winning the governor's office, and we'll see what happens here in North Carolina with this vote count.
In terms of some of the issues and what this all means, well, several of the states that haven't yet expanded Medicaid could do it next year, and that would obviously give more people access to health care. North Carolina here is one of several states where Democrats are already talking about increasing the minimum wage. And in other places, Democrats managed to flip one of the chambers. That number includes Texas and Georgia. So depending on how you look at it, that could be gridlock or Democrats putting the brakes on the sweeping powers that Republicans have had for years now. Of course, some Republicans, like the Republican state leadership committee that supports their campaigns - they're vowing to take back seats two years from now in the next round.
RASCOE: That's Colin Campbell in Raleigh and Wayne Schutsky in Phoenix. Thank you so much for joining us.
CAMPBELL: Thank you.
SCHUTSKY: Yeah, thanks for having me. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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