Election Day is next week and all 35 seats in the Idaho Senate and all 70 seats in the Idaho House are on the ballot. That means opportunity for change in the body that makes state policy.
But how much variation will we actually see? And how competitive are this year's races? Those are questions Boise State University Political Science Professor Emeritus Gary Moncrief has been considering. Moncrief says many of the state's legislative races just aren’t that competitive this year.
He studies state legislatures and says there’s a trend across the country where more and more seats are uncontested.
He says almost half of the Idaho Senate seats are already decided and there is basically no competition. It’s not much different in the House.
“Together if you count the House and Senate we’re talking about roughly 42 percent of the races are uncontested for the Legislature, going into the general election,” says Moncrief.
Nationwide, 43 percent of the state legislative races this year are uncontested. He says that can make it hard to hold lawmakers accountable, when almost half are running without opposition.
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