After some losses in Tuesday’s election, the Wyoming State Legislature’s Democratic count is down from 13 to 12. However, there were a couple of victories over Republican incumbents, like Debbie Bovee’s defeat of Gerald Gay in Casper.
Wyoming Democratic Party Chairwoman Ana Cupril says Democrats were hoping to gain more seats in the legislature. One of the party’s major losses includes the defeat of five-time incumbent Mary Throne, who recently served as the House Minority Floor Leader. Cupril says the losses are difficult to accept, especially after the party’s heavy campaign efforts.
“I feel we pretty much did everything right,” said Cupril. “We recruited great candidates for their communities, did the work, put out the field work, did the fundraising needed, talked about values and the message of Wyoming, and it still didn’t get the votes that we needed.”
Cupril says they will be ready to try again in two years.
“The great stuff that happened is we did have a lot of supporters and a lot of field work that was done,” said Cupril. “So, we have great data on what people are thinking, who our supporters are, where people are at.”
Cupril says they were also hoping to defeat Liz Cheney in the race for Wyoming’s sole U.S. House seat but she outspent her rival Ryan Greene ten to one.