With 29 Days to Go Until June 11 Primaries, “Not Larry Sabato” Makes Some Predictions for House of Delegates, State Senate

We’re just over four weeks to go until the June 11 Virginia primary elections, and long-time Virginia political guru Ben “Not Larry Sabato” Tribbett is weighing in with a bunch of predictions. See below for audio of Ben on the John Fredericks Show this morning. Also, Ben has given me some more predictions that he didn’t make on the show. I’ll post them all below the video, along with my commentary.

• I agree with Ben that in Democratic primaries, the electorate tends to be older…definitely not what you see on social media. Which, of course, is why Joe Biden is doing MUCH better than you’d ever think if you just looked at your Facebook feed all day.
• I’m thinking that Sen. Rosalyn Dance (D-SD16) holds on and defeats Joe Morrissey, but agree with Ben that it could be “a very competitive primary.” For the record, I most definitely support Dance in this one!
• Ben believes that Senators Barbara Favola (D-SD31) and Dick Saslaw (D-SD35) remain strong favorites. I have no particular reason(s) to disagree with that.
• Ben sees Del. Alfonso Lopez (D-HD49) as on track to win in a “landslide”/”walk” over challenger J.D. Spain, and again I have no particular reason(s) to dispute that.
• On HD-50, I agree with Ben that Del. Lee Carter is likely to win his primary against challenger Mark Wolfe, and I hope he does.
• Ben predicts no upsets over incumbents in any Democratic legislative primaries. I’m not sure I’d go that far; specifically, I think (and hope) that Andres Jimenez (who I’ve endorsed) could defeat Del. Kaye Kory in HD38. We’ll see.
• Ben predicts that Debra Rodman will “overwhelmingly win” in the SD12 Democratic primary against Veena Lothe. I think it could be closer than “overwhelmingly,” but I also expect Rodman (who I’ve endorsed) to win.
• In the SD7 Democratic primary, I agree with Ben that Cheryl Turpin is “up against a Navy veteran who is very well equipped, Kim Howard,” and that he doesn’t know who will win that one.

Ben gave me a bunch more predictions for State Senate, as follows. I mostly agree with these, but would quibble a bit in SD10 (I’d say that’s a tossup between Eileen Bedell and Ghazala Hashmi), and SD11 (I’d say that’s LIKELY Pohl), SD16 (I’d say that one leans Dance).

06:  Safe Lewis
07:  Tossup (Howard and Turpin)
10:  Leans Bedell
11:  Leans Pohl
12:  Likely Rodman
16:  Toss Up (Slight Lean Dance)
17:  Likely Laufer
28:  Tossup
31:  Likely Favola
33:  Safe Boysko
35:  Likely Saslaw

For other House of Delegates Democratic primaries, I’m thinking that HD18 leans Laura Galante over Tristan Shields, that HD26 is a tossup, that HD52 is likely for Del. Luke Torian, that HD57 leans to Sally Hudson over Kathy Galvin, that HD62 leans to Lindsey Dougherty over Tavorise Marks, that HD87 is going to be close (most likely between Suhas Subramanyam and Hassan Minhaj Ahmad, with Johanna Gusman a wild card), that HD88 is likely for Jess Foster over Kecia Evans, that HD91 leans to Martha Mugler over Michael Wade, and that HD96 could be very close between Mark Downey, Rebecca Leser and Chris Mayfield. What do you think?

P.S. I think the Arlington/Falls Church Commonwealth’s Attorney’s race could be closer than I’ve been thinking, given this weekend’s WaPo endorsement of Parisa Tafti over Theo Stamos. That endorsement could – we’ll see if it actually does – give Tafti’s campaign a big boost over the next few weeks…