5 takeaways from the 2022 RI Election results

After all the ads, all the mailers, the door-knocking and the millions of dollars spent, the Rhode Island political landscape on Tuesday remained almost entirely as it had been: with Democrats controlling every statewide and federal office plus overwhelming General Assembly majorities.

The biggest news of the election was what didn't happen: any voter pushback at the party controlling the White House that would put more Republicans in office.

Change will always be more exciting than the status quo, but here are some of the implications of the results.

2022 RI Election coverage recap: Who won, who lost, and where you can sell marijuana

Where does the Rhode Island GOP go from here?

Post-election soul-searching is familiar to Rhode Island Republicans, but this week's face-plant may leave a bigger mark than most.

If the party can't win in a year when so much seemed aligned – a surprise open congressional seat, governor with low approval numbers and unpopular president in the White House – when will they?

GOP leaders were quiet Wednesday about charting a path forward.

GOP gubernatorial candidate Ashley Kalus spent $4.7 million of her own money to lose by 19 points to Gov. Dan McKee, one of the most expensive losing campaigns in state history.

The 39% of the vote she received was less than GOP general treasurer candidate James Lathrop (46%,) lieutenant governor candidate Aaron Guckian (43%) and secretary of state candidate Pat Cortellessa (40.5%.) She just beat attorney general candidate Charles Calenda's 38.5% finish.

Acknowledging Rhode Island's leftward lean, one option would be to move to the center.

But both Kalus and Fung ran as moderates. She even hit McKee from the left on several issues such as her plan to suspend utility rate hikes.

If moving to the center doesn't win, the party could alternatively move right and try to play to its conservative base, as the Massachusetts GOP has.

But that hasn't led to election wins in Massachusetts. Republican gubernatorial nominee Geoff Diehl took 35% of the vote in his loss to Democrat Maura Healey on Tuesday.

Brown University political science Prof. Wendy Schiller: "The RI GOP has to build an infrastructure that supports and encourages its rising stars to make the leap to run for higher office. Both Jessica de la Cruz and Blake Filippi might have fared better than Allan Fung and Ashley Kalus, respectively, if they had more funding and organizational outreach. But it is very difficult to sustain a strong party in the electorate when you do not control state government at any level. RI has pockets of more local GOP strength, but that is not enough to convince voters that they would be better off under Republicans than Democrats."

Congressional District 2:How did Fung come so close to flipping a seat Democrats held for 30 years?

Did voters deliver a mandate?

Back on the Democratic side, both moderates and progressives are, as usual, likely to claim the 2022 results as reason to pursue their policy goals going forward.

The left can point to the fact that an expected backlash from Democratic rule and the social-justice movement of 2020 failed to materialize.

And after everything shakes out, the membership of the General Assembly looks to be on net inching to the left again this year.

"If there’s a lesson to be taken from Rhode Island tonight, it’s that there are voters in every corner of our state who want leaders who not only will stand up to fear-mongering Trump Republicans, but also will go all-in at the State House to defend workers, clean up our environment, lower costs for families and protect the right to abortion access," Working Families Party New England Regional Director Georgia Hollister Isman said in a news release about the results.

On the other hand, moderates can point to the fact that they crushed the progressive Rhode Island Political Cooperative and won races by avoiding issues like police defunding, vaccine mandates or proposals to raise taxes.

Speaking of taxes and Massachusetts

In the Bay State, voters approved, 52% to 48%, a referendum to charge a 4% tax on income above $1 million.

Rhode Island doesn't have the same ballot-question system as Massachusetts, but the idea of raising taxes on the wealthy has been debated here for several years and will likely come up again in the legislature.

Expect not only the business community but State House moderates to push back on a tax increase, but the politics of it could change if, as is expected, the economy slows, tax revenue dips and the state all of a sudden needs money.

Staying competitive with Massachusetts' business climate is often a powerful motive at the State House, so Tuesday's vote could increase the odds of something similar happening in Rhode Island.

Were the polls wrong?

The last public poll in the Second Congressional District gave Allan Fung an 8-point margin over Seth Magaziner, which ended up being off by double digits.

Even Democratic internal polling showed the race basically even with independent William Gilbert taken out of the equation.

What happened?

On election night, Magaziner declined to say whether he thought he had come from behind or had always been in a good position not reflected by the polls. And there is a good chance we'll never know.

Former congressional candidate and teachers union leader Robert Walsh predicted Magaziner and Fung would roughly split the district outside of Providence and Magaziner would win by his margin in Providence. That turned out to be fairly close.

As it happens, Fung won all but one of the dozen Second District communities he won in his 2018 campaign for governor against Gina Raimondo. (Raimondo narrowly won Hopkinton.) In both years, Fung won Richmond, Exeter, West Greenwich, Coventry, West Warwick, Cranston, Scituate, Foster, Glocester, Burrillville and Johnston.

What's next: 2024 and beyond

If Fung had won, the jockeying among Democrats to run against him in two years would have begun instantly. And if Kalus had become governor, it would have gone to another level.

Now, ambitious Rhode Island Democrats find themselves in the familiar position of looking at a limited number of openings to run for higher office, especially if McKee runs for a second full term in 2026 and there are no other retirements in the congressional delegation.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: 5 Takeaways from the 2022 RI Election Results, not much changed