A handful of downballot elections at the outset of the new year will serve as the first tests of the political environment following Donald Trump and the Republicans’ victories in November.
In the opening months of 2025, there will be special legislative elections in Virginia, a race in battleground Wisconsin that will yet again determine the ideological balance of the state Supreme Court, and special elections for Trump’s current (and former) Cabinet picks.
While these contests are not as flashy as the presidential politics that have consumed Americans for the better part of the last two years, they will nevertheless attract plenty of cash and attention during an off-year in which the GOP looks to build on its momentum and the Democratic Party seeks to regain its footing.
Here are the key state and local races to watch during the early part of 2025.
Virginia legislative special elections
A pair of special elections in Virginia’s Loudoun County on Jan. 7 that will determine control of the state legislature will bring voters back to the polls just weeks after the presidential election.
Voters will select a new lawmaker to fill a seat vacated by state Sen. Suhas Subramanyam, who was elected to Congress in the November elections. They will also fill a vacant state House seat left open by a candidate who resigned to run for Subramanyam’s seat.
In the state Senate race, Democratic Del. Kannan Srinivasan is up against Republican Tumay Harding. In the state House race, Democrat JJ Singh will face off against Republican Ram Venkatachalam.
Democrats are favored to win both races, as the district areas went firmly for Kamala Harris in the presidential election, according to the Virginia Public Access Project. But the margins in the races, expected to be low turnout affairs, could offer a sense of which way the political winds are blowing in a state in which Republicans have managed to gain back ground recently.
Republican Glenn Youngkin won Virginia’s 2021 gubernatorial race just a year after Joe Biden carried the state by 10 points in 2020. Virginia will hold another closely watched race to succeed Youngkin in November 2025 following a presidential election in which Trump cut Democrats’ advantage to less than 6 points.
“Virginia is kind of the first out of the gate with elections after the big national election,” said National Conference of State Legislatures CEO Tim Storey.
“There’s a pattern of Virginia running counter to the previous national cycle,” he added, “so, if you’re Virginia Democrats … it probably gives you a little stronger hand going into the election.”
The two contests will also determine the partisan balance of each legislative chamber.
Following Subramanyam’s resignation, Democrats hold a 20-19 majority in Virginia’s state Senate. If Democrats lose the special election, control of the chamber would go to the Republicans, because GOP Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears holds tie-breaking authority.
In the House of Delegates, Democrats currently hold a 51-49 advantage because Srinivasan’s resignation doesn’t take effect until Jan. 7. A win by the Republicans would result in a 50-50 tie. A tie vote in the chamber results in a defeat. In similar situations in the past, both parties have entered into a power-sharing agreement in the state House.
Republicans winning control of either or both chambers could be particularly meaningful for Youngkin in the final year of his term as he potentially lays the groundwork for a bid for higher office.
Wisconsin Supreme Court race
Less than two years ago, liberals won control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court for the first time in 15 years.
In April, ideological control of the pivotal swing state’s bench is once again at stake.
As was the case in 2023, the April 1 election to replace 73-year-old liberal Justice Ann Walsh Bradley is likely to be an expensive and bitter race. And it promises to feature many of the same hot-button issues — such as abortion rights and redistricting — that defined the race two years earlier.
Susan Crawford, a Dane County judge, is running as the liberal in the race, while Brad Schimel, a former Republican state attorney general who serves as a Waukesha County judge, is running as the conservative. The court is technically nonpartisan, but candidates can take public stances on political issues and can receive backing from the state’s political parties during their campaigns.
That was the case in 2023, when liberal Janet Protasiewicz centered her successful campaign on support for abortion rights and opposition to the state’s gerrymandered maps, two issues that were due to come before the court after she was sworn in.
Republicans say they’re poised to make the race about the entire court and the power that comes with it.
“It’s not just one seat on the court. It’s a control of the court for three or four years,” Wisconsin Republican Party Chairman Brian Schimming said. Referring to a recent decision by a state judge to overturn a landmark anti-union law enacted by then-Gov. Scott Walker in 2011, he added that “reforms are on the chopping block, going back for decades.” That case is all but certain to end up before the state Supreme Court next year and is likely to feature prominently in the race.
There are not multiple candidates running on either side, allowing both Crawford and Schimel to train their sights on each other immediately ahead of the general election. (In 2023, multiple candidates ran on both sides, which resulted in a fractured conservative base).
Another key difference from the last Supreme Court race is Republicans are far more emboldened this time around after Trump’s victory in Wisconsin over Harris. In 2023, Democrats were coming off a string of statewide successes in the years since Trump’s win in the state in 2016.
Democrats have nevertheless signaled their intention to try to attach Schimel to a broader Trump-centered GOP brand in hopes that progressives will feel energized in the off-year election.
“It’s going to be a different electorate compared to a presidential year,” Wisconsin Democratic Party spokesperson Joe Oslund said, adding that a potentially low-turnout race would mean “we go after the Trump thing.”
Schimming, asked whether he felt Democrats could make Trump a vulnerability for Schimel, dismissed the notion.
“Frankly, they just got done making that mistake,” he said.
Special House elections
Meanwhile, a handful of special elections in safe Republican seats in the U.S. House will also occur next year to replace members of Congress whom Trump tapped for his Cabinet.
Those include the seats currently held by Rep. Mike Waltz, R-Fla., Trump’s pick to be his national security adviser, and Rep. Elise Stafanik, R-N.Y., Trump’s pick to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
There will also be a special election for the seat held by former Rep. Matt Gaetz. R-Fla., who resigned after Trump selected him to be attorney general. Gaetz eventually withdrew from consideration amid sexual misconduct allegations, which he denied.
Florida Secretary of State Cord Byrd announced that the special primary elections for both Waltz’s and Gaetz’s seats will be held Jan. 28 and that the special general elections for both seats will be held April 1.
Waltz is slated to resign from the House on Jan. 20, after Trump formally takes office. His nomination doesn’t require Senate confirmation.
Stefanik, whose position does require Senate confirmation, hasn’t disclosed the timing of her resignation. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul must set the date for the special election within 90 days of her departure under state law.
While all three districts are solidly Republican, the margins could provide a sense of how voters are feeling about the early weeks of Trump’s second term.
