We hope everyone took time to vote in Delaware’s general election. We wanted to provide you with a brief recap. For a full look at all the results, please click here.
Statewide races:
No changes occurred in Delaware. Incumbents U.S. Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester, Attorney General Kathy Jennings and State Treasurer Colleen Davis all won and Democrat Lydia York was elected as state auditor.
Senate races:
Democrats added one seat to their majority, with Russ Huxtable defeating Republican Steve Smyk in the open seat that was vacated by the retirement of Republican Ernie Lopez. It now sits at 15 Democrats and 6 Republicans. Democrat Kyra Holden defeated Republican Mark Pugh in the open seat vacated by the retirement of Democrat Bruce Ennis. All other incumbents held their seats.
House races:
Democrats maintained their majority of 25 – 16 in this chamber. The seat previously held by Republican Smyk in the House was then flipped on Tuesday night by Democrat Stell Parker Selby, a former Cape Henlopen School Board president. She defeated Republican Dallas Wingate.
Voter turnout, overall, was down this year. About 42.68% of registered voters cast a ballot on Tuesday. In 2018, the last midterm election cycle, 52.2% of eligible Delawareans voted. If you have any questions, please let me know.
ABC members gathered at our Georgetown office for the annual Delaware Returns Day Parade. Return Day is a traditional festival for the state of Delaware that is held on the Thursday after Election Day. It is used to celebrate the announcement of the election results in Georgetown, Delaware.
ABC Chair Chris Baker with State Representative Lyndon Yearick
The festivities started with a concert and a traditional free ox roast in the town circle. The festival events included food vendors, competitions, musical entertainment, arts and crafts, and a parade of the winning and losing candidates from both parties.
ABC Chair Chris Baker with ABC Lobbyist Lisa Goodman and Judson Malone from Pallette Village
The candidates ride in horse pulled carriages or antique cars around the town circle, followed by the ceremonial "bury the hatchet" - where the Sussex County chairmen of the Democratic and Republican parties meet on stage, clutch the hatchet and together plunge it into a box of sand from Lewes - that signifies the end of the competition. The town crier reads the results of the statewide and Sussex County elections during the ceremony, and afterward, all attendees receive a free roast beef sandwich.
The ABC-led Coalition for a Democratic Workplace has created a grassroots toolkit to tell the National Labor Relations Board to abandon its radical joint employer proposed rule. The toolkit provides an explanation of the rulemaking and a ready-to-send letter to the NLRB explaining why the new joint employer standard would be disastrous. Take action now before the Dec. 7 comment deadline! ABC will also be submitting comments opposing the new rule.
On Sept. 29, ABC joined the Coalition for a Democratic Workplace and several other organizations in urging the NLRB to extend the comment period to Jan. 6, stating, “Given the expansive nature of the proposed standard and the complexity of issues relating the standard’s impact on employers and other entities in different industries, employers and other parties will require more time to engage in a meaningful evaluation of the proposed standard and to formulate comments that will benefit the Board when giving further consideration to the proposed rule and during any development of a final rule.”
In a press release issued on Oct. 14, the National Labor Relations Board announced it is extending the comment deadline on the joint employer proposed rule from Nov. 7 to Dec. 7 in order to allow sufficient time for parties to file initial comments.
On Oct. 20, ABC participated in the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy virtual roundtable on the proposed rule. ABC expressed disappointment that the NLRB is once again revising its standard for determining joint-employer status, which will cause great confusion among construction contractors, specifically small business owners.
During the roundtable, convened to gather input from small businesses on the proposed rule, ABC explained that the construction industry has long consisted primarily of specialized, separate employers who come together on specific construction projects to achieve the highest degree of productivity, while maintaining their separate status from project to project. Owners, developers, design firms, construction managers, general contractors, subcontractors and staffing agencies, to name only the most common specialties, each play unique roles in the construction process on individual jobsites. Their functions routinely overlap, but they typically remain separate entities with their own workforces.
Further, ABC stated its new proposal is a radical departure from the 2020 final rule, which focused on “direct and immediate control,” providing clear and consistent criteria for companies to apply when determining joint employer status. The new proposal will greatly expand joint-employer liability by trying to make indirect or even just reserved, unexercised control sufficient to trigger joint employer status. This overbroad joint-employer standard will not only have an adverse impact on our member contractors, but the overall economy.
Today, ABC joined with more than 400 organizations in a letter calling on Congress to intervene in an ongoing railroad labor standoff that threatens a stoppage of rail service extremely damaging to American families and our economy, costing an estimated $2 billion dollars per day. The letter asks Congress, absent a preferred voluntary agreement, to use their authority in the Railway Labor Act and take immediate steps to prevent a national rail strike.
This effort comes one week after the largest U.S. rail union, the transportation division of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers (SMART-TD), voted down the National Tentative Agreement reached in September, raising the likelihood of a year-end strike and subsequent shutdown - which the Association of American Railroads estimated would idle more than 7,000 trains daily and cost the economy more than $2 billion a day.
The “status quo” period during which the union will reengage with the National Carriers Conference Committee, as well as the Presidential Advisory Board, will end on December 9, however, many businesses will see the impacts of a national rail strike well before Dec. 9 – through service disruptions and other impacts potentially as early as December 5, as detailed by the Association of American Railroads’ hour-by-hour breakdown of railroad suspension of operations.
Before the National Tentative Agreement was reached in September, ABC released a statement urging Congress to take immediate action to bring about a resolution to this extremely dangerous threat to our economy. On October 28, ABC joined with 322 organizations in signing a letter to the White House and key administration officials urging them to continue to work with the railroad unions and railroads to ensure that the tentative agreement is ratified by the parties and to avoid a rail shutdown would have a significant impact on the U.S. economy and lead to further inflationary pressure.
Read more about the letter and the looming rail strike in Reuters.
The U.S. Department of Transportation recently announced the expiration on Nov. 10 of a general waiver to Buy America requirements imposed by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. With this expiration, the IIJA’s expanded Buy America requirements are now in effect for most federally funded infrastructure projects. The DOT proposed two narrower waivers that will exempt a limited number of projects from these requirements.
However, projects that fall under the two new waivers will be exempt from enforcement of these expanded preferences. The first proposed waiver would waive these requirements for contracts entered into prior to the general waiver’s expiration, specifically:
Any contract entered into before Nov. 10, 2022
Any contract entered into before March 10, 2023, if the contract results from a solicitation published prior to May 14, 2022
The second proposed waiver would waive these requirements for small grants, de minimis costs, and minor components.
ABC submitted comments in support of the waivers, stating that while ABC supports strategies to expand domestic jobs and manufacturing to avoid global supply chain disruptions and capture economic benefits within America, Buy America requirements must be balanced with safeguards against increased costs and delays of infrastructure projects funded by taxpayers.
