West Virginia State Profile

Election Schedule

Election Vitals

Presidential Race

Despite a nearly 2-to-1 Democratic advantage among voters, Barack Obama became the third consecutive Democratic presidential nominee to lose West Virginia to his GOP rival. John McCain won the state's five electoral votes by a 56 percent to 43 percent margin, according to unofficial results.

Exit polling suggested that McCain won over nine in 10 voters from his party as well as a slight majority of the independent vote, which accounts for 20 percent of the total. Obama kept seven in 10 Democrats.

The survey of 1,039 voters found that six in 10 said the economy was the most important issue to them. Voters were split on which candidate could handle the problems better. About a third of voters said they wanted a candidate who shared their values, and those people overwhelmingly chose McCain. Another third said it was important the candidate be able to create change, and nine in 10 of them went with Obama.

West Virginia has one of the smallest minority populations in the country, U.S. Census figures show, but nine out of 10 voters surveyed in the exit poll said race was not important.

Both campaigns had paid scant attention to the state. McCain paid three closed or limited-appearance visits during the general election season, mostly while en route to more involved campaign appearances in the neighboring battleground of Ohio. While running mate Joe Biden headlined at a late October 2008 rally in Charleston — the most prominent event by anyone on either major party ticket — West Virginians did not see Obama in person after the state's May 2008 primary.

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Governor

Gov. Joe Manchin attracted the highest percentage of the vote of anyone seeking the governor's office in modern West Virginia history with his 2008 win over Republican Russ Weeks and a third-party candidate.

A Democrat, Manchin received nearly 70 percent of the vote to trounce Weeks, a former legislator, and Mountain Party nominee Jesse Johnson. Exit polling found support at that level or higher for Manchin across all age, income and education levels and among both men and women. Even a majority of Republicans surveyed said they supported him, as did self-described conservatives.

Manchin has courted both the business and labor vote since campaigning for his first term in 2004. Highlights from his first term include privatizing the oft-troubled workers' compensation system, modest and gradual tax cuts benefiting both consumers and employers as well as mine safety and rescue measures pursued in response to several high-profile mine fatalities including 2006's Sago disaster.

The administration's fiscal conservatism, coupled with a booming energy market, kept West Virginia among a handful of states able to avoid budget shortfalls following the 2008 economic downturn.

The recession caught up with West Virginia in 2009 and Manchin found himself asking lawmakers to cut $200 million out of the 2009 fiscal year budget. As of early April 2009, Manchin was still working on his proposal to trim state spending for the budget year that starts July 1.

Some consider Manchin a likely successor to Sen. Robert C. Byrd if the Democrat is unable to complete his ninth six-year term. Manchin downplays such talk, saying he is concentrating on his second term and making West Virginia more open for business investment.

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U.S. Senate

Democratic Sen. Jay Rockefeller handily won a fifth term in a rematch against Republican Jay Wolfe, slightly improving his outcome over their 2002 contest with nearly 64 percent of the vote.

Rockefeller was also poised to take over the influential Senate Commerce Committee in 2009, in the shuffling destined to follow the decision by fellow West Virginia Democrat and Sen. Robert C. Byrd to step down as chairman on that chamber's Appropriations Committee.

Although he initially supported the Iraq war, Rockefeller used his previous position as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee to criticize the Bush administration for its failure to listen to early intelligence reports involving the consequences of going to war.

Byrd also has criticized the war. Unlike Rockefeller, Byrd opposed the war from the start. Republicans had hoped his early opposition to the war would make Byrd vulnerable in 2006, but he easily won a record ninth term with more than 64 percent of the vote.

Already the Senate's longest serving member, a milestone he reached June 12, 2006, Byrd also secured the leadership posts of Appropriations Committee chairman and President Pro Tempore when the Democrats returned to the majority in Washington.

Byrd spent much of 2006 fending off suggestions that he's too old or frail for the Appropriations post. He relies largely on scripts during hearings, and had taken to a wheelchair after a February 2008 fall that prompted two stays in the hospital.

Even while the ranking Democrat on Appropriations during GOP control, he maintained his status as a prince of pork. Byrd has helped earmark an estimated $2.2 billion in federal funds for West Virginia in the last decade alone.

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U.S. House

Democrat Alan Mollohan attracted no primary or general election opponent for the 1st District in 2008. Despite a reported federal probe stemming from his congressional dealings, Mollohan coasted to a 13th term in 2006 with 64 percent of the vote despite a GOP opponent.

The FBI had subpoenaed financial records from nonprofit groups Mollohan helped establish with federal funds. While the GOP tried unsuccessfully to tar Mollohan with the probe, it did cost him his seat as ranking Democrat on the House ethics committee. Mollohan is chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies.

Rep. Shelley Moore Capito, the state's lone Republican in Congress, fended off a challenge from Democrat Anne Barth with 57 percent of the vote. Buoyed by strong fundraising and third-party ads supporting her bid for a fifth term, Capito weathered the election's anti-Republican climate to defeat Barth, a former longtime staffer for Byrd.

Rep. Nick Rahall won his latest term with 69 percent of the vote over Republican Marty Geaheart, a Bluefield businessman who had lost the GOP nod in the two previous 3rd District elections. Representing West Virginia's southern coalfields, Rahall chairs the House Resources Committee.

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Legislature

The Democrats continued their dominance of the House of Delegates and state Senate that dates back to the 1930s, picking up three seats in the latter but losing one in the House. The party entered 2009 with 71 of 100 House seats and 29 of 34 seats in the Senate.

The entire House and half the Senate was up in 2008. Only about half the races featured contested primaries. Thanks to a dearth of general election opponents, four Senate candidates and 45 candidates for the House of Delegates essentially won their November races by surviving the primary. Of those uncontested seats, 41 will go to Democrats, including 38 in the House of Delegates, and eight to Republicans, all save one in the House.

The GOP had previously sought to field candidates in all legislative races. The minority party also lost ground in both chambers in 2006, and the 2008 results set back its goal of capturing at least one chamber in time for the redistricting that will follow the 2010 Census.

(Last updated by Brian Farkas on April 6, 2009.)

Past Presidential Elections

Previous Election Results, other races

State Demographics