Midterms Missouri General Assembly Analysis and Results
November 14, 2018
During the election on November 6, all 163 seats of the Missouri House of Representatives were up for re-election, along with 17 of the 34 seats in the Missouri Senate. The General Assembly, which for its last session was controlled by a large majority of republicans, except for two vacant seats picked up by the republicans in the house.
In the senate, 10 of the 34 seats will be controlled by democrats during the next session. The minority leader, senator Gina Walsh was not up for reelection. The republicans maintained the majority with 24 seats. There currently is no majority leader, but the assistant majority floor leader, senator Bob Onder, did win reelection.
“I did not like that, but with the [US] congress being a majority of democrats, I feel a lot better,” junior Gus Barnett said.
Onder, who represents district two which covers the Wentzville area, was able to see off the challenge of democratic nominee Patrice Billings. Onder got 59 percent of the 87,364 votes cast, whilst Billings got 41 percent of the vote. Onder originally represented district 13 from 2007 to 2009. He later ran in district two in 2015, and has held the seat since.
“To be honest with you I am not saying that I am a democrat but I support some of the democratic ideas, but I honestly do not have an opinion about it, and I’m just going to see how that plays out,” sophomore Tayonna Henderson
In the house of representatives, the republicans picked up two vacant seats giving them 116 of the seats in the house. Democrats maintained control of their 47 seats, though not every district. The acting minority leader Gina Mitten won reelection in district 83, but in district 97, democratic representative Mike Revis lost to his republican challenger Mary Coleman.
This loss was offset by the narrow democratic pickup of district 70, where democratic candidate Doug Clemens defeated the incumbent representative Mark Mattheisen. Clemens won by .5 percent of the vote, meaning less than 100 of the 15,913 votes cast separated the two candidates.
“I do like that the state legislature is overwhelmingly controlled by republicans because they support bills and laws that are the best for my family,” sophomore Courtney Ledbetter said.
Representative Brian Spencer who represents district 63 which covers the Wentzville area, won his reelection by a wide margin, taking 63 percent of the vote. His challenger, Janet Kester acquired 35 percent of the votes and Carl-herman Freese, a libertarian candidate, picked up one percent of the vote in district 63.
For full results, click here.
This story was updated to say that the acting house minority leader was up for reelection and held their seat, instead of the house minority leader not standing for reelection, as well as to say that the republicans did have a net gain of 2 in the house, instead of no net gain in any chamber.