Washington, D.C. – The Democrats lost another elected official Monday as West Virginia State Delegate David Elliott Pritt left the party and joined the GOP.
The move was announced in a statement issued by West Virginia Republican Chair Elgine McArdle welcomed Pritt, who represents Fayette County in the legislature, into the GOP.
“I want to welcome Delegate Elliott Pritt to the Republican Party. Like so many West Virginians, Delegate Pritt has recognized that the Democratic Party of today is not the Democratic Party that our parents grew up with,” McArdle said.
With Pritt changing parties, Republicans now occupy 89 of the House of Delegate’s 100 seats to the 11 the Democrats hold.
In fact, there are now more committees in the House of Delegates than there are serving Democrats, which may help explain why Pritt was the ranking Democrat on the Committee on Fire Departments and Emergency Medical Services while serving as minority vice-chair of the Committees on Education, Jails and Prisons, and Pensions and Retirements as well as a member of the Committee on Economic Development and Tourism before he switched.
Pritt is the second West Virginia Democrat to switch in the last year. In December, Sen. Glenn Jeffries, who represents parts of Kanawha and Putnam counties, changed his political affiliation from Democrat to Republican.
Another prominent party switcher is Gov. Jim Justice, who was elected as a Democrat but changed parties midway through his first term. He won his second term as a Republican and, because he is term-limited, is believed to be given considerable thought to running for the seat in the U.S. Senate currently occupied by Democrat Joe Manchin.
An electoral battle between the two men, both of whom were popular West Virginia governors, would be considered by many analysts to be a marquee race in 2024.
West Virginia Democrats, meanwhile, were not pleased by Pritt’s decision.
“The only thing you can be sure of with Elliott Pritt is that there’s nothing he won’t do in the name of political expediency. There is no line he won’t cross, no ideal he won’t reverse and no principal (sic) he won’t violate if he thinks it will help him at the ballot box. In the end, the only thing you can count on with Elliott Pritt is that you can’t count on him,” West Virginia Democratic Party Chair Mike Pushkin said in a release.
Over the last several months, state legislators in North Carolina and Louisiana have also crossed the aisle, creating GOP supermajorities in the lower chambers of both legislatures.