Following the mid-term election, the political makeup of Kentucky's 100 member House will remain the same. The news pleases House Democrats but is disappointing for GOP supporters.
Republicans have made gains over the years in adding members to the Kentucky House. GOP leaders were hoping this would be the year when the House flipped its majority. But, after all the results came in Tuesday, the breakdown was the same: 54 democrats and 46 republicans. Lexington GOP Representative Stan Lee says a closer look at results will occur.
"I think at this point we need to take a look at how the races were run, where the resources were spent, in what fashion and basically just do a postmortem on this," he said.
Fellow House Republican Kevin Bratcher in Louisville was involved in a tough race. He says incumbency is hard to overcome, particularly when representatives are asked to help with local issues.
Richmond Democratic Representative Rita Smart agrees: "It comes down to the districts, the local, it's people that people know."
Smart says House democratic leaders are planning to push for more private-public partnerships to help deal with monetary constraints. Lee says his caucus is still in play, particularly in revenue matters.
"We'll be relevant and hopefully there will be better cooperation, although with a governor's race coming up and depending on who's all running, that may not be the case," he said.
Considering the wide margin of victory by Mitch McConnell over Alison Lundergan Grimes, Lee says it's a bit of a 'head scratcher' as to why republicans didn't pick up seats in the House. ?
