Do Uncontested Races Hurt Democracy?

Seats in state legislatures across the country are going uncontested by both Republicans and Democrats, with 30-50% of state seats uncontested in the past three elections. Charles Hunt, a political scientist at Boise State University, warns that lack of competition hurts democracy.  He points to a trend over the last 50 years called partisan sorting, where people of like-minded politics have moved closer to one another…

“That is what I think is probably most responsible for the difficulty in drawing districts that are truly competitive, including at the state legislative level. And so one of the reasons that you’re seeing more uncontested races is that there are just fewer competitive seats between the parties than there used to be.”