Five midterm races to watch in Delaware statehouse

Why Should Delaware Care?
Delaware has one of the smallest state legislatures in the nation, which gives each legislative seat an outsized significance. With the state’s legislature and governorship firmly under Democratic control for 20 years, voters will decide this year whether to give Democrats a new supermajority power. 

While there are 77 seats up for grabs in federal, state and county races in Tuesday’s general election, there are a handful of races that will draw outsized attention due to their close electorate, campaign spending or controversial candidates.

Democrats are aiming to protect their incumbents and flip at least one Republican seat in the state House of Representatives, which would give them a two-thirds supermajority that would allow them to amend the state Constitution without bipartisan support.

That fact has become a cause for Delaware Republicans as they look to protect their seats and find at least one flip of their own.

Every election cycle has its surprises, but these are the five statehouse races that we’ll be keeping a close eye on Tuesday night.

Senate District 15

Of the 11 State Senate races on ballots this year, there is really just one race that pundits in both parties are watching: District 15, which hugs the Maryland border from Cheswold to Harrington in Kent County.

That seat is open this year following the retirement of longtime Republican Sen. Dave Lawson, and the race to succeed him in the 21-member chamber has become the most expensive local race of the year.

Two newcomers, Democrat Nisha Lodhavia and Republican Emily Thompson, have raised or are supported by more than $200,000 in the campaign. 

The district’s voter registration split favors Republicans by more than 1,300 voters, and voters there overwhelmingly chose President Donald Trump in the 2024 election, but Democrats view the district as the only real potentially flippable Senate seat, and Lodhavia holds a roughly 2-1 fundraising advantage over Thompson in the race.

Both Lodhavia and Thompson said affordability, from housing costs to electricity bills and rising business costs, is the No. 1 issue they hear about from voters on the campaign trail. But beyond just hearing those concerns, each has tried to convince voters that they are better equipped to bring solutions.

Lodhavia pointed to her decades of community service experience — she currently serves on the University of Delaware Board of Trustees — as proof that she is a seasoned solver of complex problems. 

A self-described moderate, Lodhavia said she would not be afraid to reach across the aisle to search for bipartisanship. The problems facing the 15th District affect people across party affiliation, so the solutions should also come from a place of common ground, she said. 

When it comes to addressing affordability concerns, Thompson homed in on electricity costs, burdens on the district’s farmers and helping small businesses.

She said the state should focus on generating its own energy in order to bring down importing costs. To help out farmers plagued by rising operating costs, Thompson said she would support creating tax exemptions for certain agricultural structures. She also said she would oppose any fee increases proposed by the Department of Corporations in order ease the burden on small businesses.

House District 9

After years of trying to flip District 9 in the Middletown-Odessa-Townsend corridor, Democrats have perhaps their best odds yet after longtime incumbent Republican Rep. Kevin Hensley is retiring.

Hensley was among the last two Republican state legislators representing a New Castle County district and has held the seat for 12 years despite the area now giving Democrats a roughly 2-1 registration advantage.

The district also features two political newcomers in Democrat Ayanna Khan-Flowers and Republican Jamar Money. Outside fundraising has boosted the candidacy of Khan-Flowers, the founder of the Delaware Black Chamber of Commerce and winner of a three-way September primary, with $15,000.

On the campaign trail, Khan-Flowers said affordability is the top concern she’s heard from residents, from back-to-back school tax increases in the Appoquinimink School District to rising utility bills for residents on fixed incomes. Seniors have also raised concerns about healthcare access, with some having to travel out of state to see specialists, and others frustrated by poor planning around growth and increased traffic. 

Khan, who has lived in the district for 15 years, also added that parents want stronger educational resources, more special education support and better teacher retention. If elected, Khan said her priority would be increasing education resources, an issue she has already begun discussing with legislative leadership. 

“I’ve been a servant leader in this community long before my name was on the ballot, so you know this is what I do,” she said.

Her opponent, Middletown resident and longtime educator Jamar Money, echoed hearing many of the same concerns, especially about property taxes after the county’s reassessment and the school district’s increases. He also said roads and services haven’t kept up with the area’s growth.

Like Khan, Money named education as his first priority. But the former public school teacher, who now teaches college, said if he was elected his focus would be providing schools with more funding for teacher retention, so the district can remain competitive. He also wants to make sure classrooms are getting the most of the dollars that are already being allocated.   

“We’re not getting the return on investment as far as academic performance,” he said.

House District 20

The House seat in District 20 may be Republicans’ best shot of flipping a seat of their own and thwarting Democrats’ push for a supermajority.

That’s because the Lewes and Milford-area district has the narrowest Democratic registration advantage anywhere in the state with fewer than 1,000 voters. A Republican held the seat as recently as 2020, but redistricting helped to shift the voter advantage toward Democrats in the 2022 election.

Incumbent Rep. Alonna Berry won a special election last year by just 117 votes following the resignation of Stell Parker Selby, but she easily won a pitched primary election last month that will give her campaign momentum heading into Election Day.

Republican Gene Dvornick, the town manager for Georgetown, the Sussex County seat, brings a strong resume to the race and has raised enough funding to at least keep the race close into the dying days.

Both Berry and Dvornick said they have consistently heard concerns from voters about growth in the rapidly growing area, and a need for infrastructure to keep pace. 

Berry also said voters are focused on the challenges accessing healthcare in Sussex County, while Dvornick said residents want to ensure the amount of realty transfer tax – the tax a buyer pays when purchasing their home – generated in the 20th district is being reinvested by the state into local community, instead of being spent in New Castle County. 

Dvornick cited his “strong financial background” and 20 years spent balancing fiscal and infrastructure needs as Georgetown town manager as well-preparing him for elected office. 

Meanwhile, Berry said she has brought a practical approach to “expanding healthcare access, improving road safety, and advocating for accountability and smart growth,” over the past year, which she would continue if reelected. 

House District 22

The other New Castle County House seat held by a Republican that has bedeviled Democrats is District 22.

Rep. Mike Smith, a pro-business Republican with a reputation for constituent services, has bucked the nearly 1,900-Democratic voter advantage in the Pike Creek and Hockessin area for more than a decade.

He faces a challenge from Democratic newcomer Alex Green, a land surveyor and local volunteer, but perhaps his biggest challenge is questions about his own impending job. Earlier this month, the Delaware State Chamber of Commerce announced that it has selected Smith as its next president and CEO.

How Smith would manage representing more than 20,000 constituents and the needs of Delaware’s business community, which has long been among the most active lobbyists in Legislative Hall, remains to be seen.

Smith holds a campaign war chest of more than $80,000, along with outside support, that makes a Democratic flip a tall task though.

Green said the news of Smith’s new job, which he called a conflict of interest for the representative, took his grassroots campaign to new heights. He has attempted to leverage voters’ concerns about Smith’s impending chamber position through conversations when door-knocking as well as targeted advertising, he said. 

The cost of living has been top of mind for many voters, Green said. And it has been challenging, he said, to address some of those concerns with voters when the Democratic Party has long held statewide majorities. 

Instead, Green said he has worked to convince voters that issues key to his campaign, education and healthcare, are things that are worth paying for. 

As Smith rounds out what he said will be his final campaign for the statehouse, he said he has prioritized daily door-knocking and meaningful conversations with voters that have been key throughout his time in office.

He, too, said voters have told him that affordability is a top concern. He has leaned on the relationships he has built with constituents over the years, which have created a level of trust where voters know he will work for them and to address their concerns in Dover. 

House District 41

No race in Tuesday’s election may draw more attention than House District 41, but that is less about the political calculus and more about who is running.

The Sussex County seat that includes Millsboro, Dagsboro and Selbyville, left open by the retirement of Republican Rep. Rich Collins, features a match-up between former Republican Rep. John Atkins and Democratic newcomer Ryan Stuckey.

The district, which has a more than 2,500-Republican registration advantage, would typically be considered a longshot by Democrats, but Atkins’ nomination has spurred unforeseen interest in the race.

Atkins has a checkered past of domestic violence convictions and flip-flopped political parties amid fall-out from several troubling incidents. His candidacy has led some Republicans to pledge to vote for his opponent, a Democrat who supports gun rights and has put solving Sussex’s infrastructure woes at the top of his platform.

Stuckey is benefiting from roughly twice as much campaign fundraising and outside support in the last few weeks of the campaign, but the prospects of a flip in the deeply red district are still considered by many insiders to be a longshot.

Both Atkins and Stuckey said they are hearing from voters primarily about concerns with traffic and overdevelopment in the Millsboro area. 

Atkins said his opponent, Stuckey, has allowed more development in Dagsboro as a member of the town’s Planning and Zoning Commission, while he has “never stopped working for the people” since he represented the district in the early- to mid-2000s. 

Atkins added that he has the advantage of better name recognition, because of his previous tenure as a state representative, which would also allow him to be “ready on day one” in Dover. 

Stuckey, however, said he has been effective at “rewriting laws to control development” as a Planning Commissioner, and has stayed better focused on the local issues than Atkins, who he said is focused on national talking points, like gender politics and socialism. 

“I just try to stay focused on the issues,” he said. “At the end of the day, we all want the same things. We all want to know that the things we love about this place are going to stay that way.”

Atkins said his final campaign push is to continue knocking on doors, and trying “to turn Republicans and conservative Democrats and conservative Independents out.” Stuckey similarly said he is door-knocking and talking with voters at poll sites before Nov. 3. 

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