CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The Republican supermajority in West Virginia’s House of Delegates turned extra lopsided Monday after Del. Elliott Pritt switched from the Democratic Party, the state’s GOP chief mentioned.
Pritt, a trainer, is in his first time period after defeating a Republican incumbent within the 2022 election.
“I want to welcome Delegate Elliott Pritt to the Republican Party,” West Virginia Republican Party chairwoman Elgine McArdle mentioned in a press release. “Like so many West Virginians, Delegate Pritt has recognized that the Democratic Party of today is not the Democratic Party that our parents grew up with.”
The transfer provides the GOP 89 members within the House, whereas the Democrats’ ranks dwindled to 11. Pritt’s choice was already accounted for by late morning on the West Virginia Legislature’s official House roster.
Pritt had been the final Democrat within the House within the state’s southern coalfields.
The 34-member state Senate additionally has a GOP supermajority with 31 Republicans and three Democrats.
The transfer continues a Republican wave within the state that began a decade in the past. After the 2014 election, the GOP took management of the state Senate and House from Democrats for the primary time in additional than eight many years.
Buoyed by criticism of former two-term President Barack Obama’s vitality insurance policies in coal-rich West Virginia, registered Democrats in 2014 fell beneath 50% for the primary time since 1932. There are actually about 456,000 registered Republicans, or 39.6% of all registered voters in West Virginia, in line with the secretary of state’s workplace. That compares with about 372,000 registered Democrats, or 32.3%.
U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin is the one Democrat to at the moment maintain statewide workplace.
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