A nice little coda to the 2014 Republican wave, courtesy of the Associated Press:
Republicans will have their largest U.S. House majority in 83 years when the new Congress convenes next month after a recount in Arizona gave the final outstanding race to the Republican challenger.
Martha McSally won a House seat over Democrat Ron Barber by 167 votes out of about 220,000 cast, results released Wednesday show.
Barber was a staffer for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords when he and the congresswoman were wounded during a political event in Tucson in January 2011. Barber then won a special election to fill out the remainder of Giffords’ term. He defeated McSally in 2012 to win a full term in Congress, in a race separated by fewer than 2,500 votes.
McSally, a former Air Force combat pilot, won their rematch in a year that saw the GOP make big gains across the country. The results of the mandatory recount mean Republicans will hold their largest House majority since the administration of President Herbert Hoover, controlling 247 seats to 188 for Democrats.
The 2nd District was the last outstanding congressional race from the Nov. 4 general election.
It was another one of those messy recount smackdowns, following a razor-thin 161-vote win for McSally on Election Day. Too bad the Republican leadership already gave away the store to the 2014 losers and neutralized the incoming freshman class for a year.
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