West Virginia Republicans did very well at the ballot box last year, picking up a Senate seat, a House seat, and the state House (for the first time in over 80 years). But they fell one seat short of a clean sweep in the state Senate, which wound up in a 17-all tie on election night—until Democratic state Sen. Daniel Hall did the GOP a huge solid and switched parties, giving Republicans control of the chamber.
Now, though, Hall might wind up performing a very unintentional favor for his old party. Hall just resigned from the Senate to take a lobbying job with the NRA (how fitting), but Democratic Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin may be able to appoint a Democrat to succeed him. The law is in conflict, though: One provision states that the executive committee of the party of the departing legislator must provide a list of possible replacements, which would mean the GOP gets to decide. But another specifies that the list must come from "the party executive committee of the state senatorial district in which the vacating senator resided at the time of his or her election" (emphasis added), which could instead hand power to the Democratic Party.
That uncertainty initially prompted Hall to delay his resignation, which he announced shortly before the new year, "until any legal questions have clear resolution" (in the words of WOWK-TV reporter Rusty Marks). But Hall evidently changed his mind about waiting, because on Monday, he announced that he would indeed quit the legislature. (The NRA was apparently prodding him to decide.) State Senate Majority Leader Mitch Carmichael says, of course, that he thinks Tomblin should pick a Republican, but he also says he expects litigation no matter how the governor comes down.
But if Tomblin selects a Democrat and the appointment stands up, then we'll face a whole new set of questions, since the Senate would return to a 17-17 tie, and it's not at all clear who would run the show under such circumstances. We'll just have to see how things unfold.