What to expect in West Virginia’s primaries
West Virginia voters head to the polls Tuesday for a party-only primary election that includes federal, state legislative, municipal and judicial contests, with polls scheduled to close at 7:30 p.m. ET. The Associated Press will provide vote results and declare winners in contested primaries for the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House, the state Senate and House, and the mayor of Charleston, as well as in general elections for the state Supreme Court and the state Court of Appeals.
The races reflect competing political influence inside the state Republican Party even though Republican Gov. Patrick Morrisey is not running. Fresh off a period when the governor worked to remove several Republican Indiana state senators President Donald Trump viewed as disloyal, Morrisey is also using the West Virginia primary to test his own sway over the state’s legislature.
One example is a state Senate contest in District 10, where Capito has endorsed incumbent Republican state Sen. Vince Deeds while Morrisey is backing the district’s challenger, Jonathan Comer, who is described as a pastor. The decision notes also describe the relationship between Capito and Morrisey as one that has previously played out against each other in Republican nomination fights, including a 2024 contest in which Morrisey defeated Capito’s son, Moore Capito, for the GOP gubernatorial nomination.
In the U.S. Senate Republican primary, Capito faces five challengers, including state Sen. Tom Willis. Willis has endorsements from six fellow Republican state senators, including Senate President Randy Smith, while Capito has endorsements from 15 state senators, including a key endorsement from Trump described as potentially neutralizing attacks on her record.
Charleston’s Democratic mayoral race also features a matchup that is set up to test the strength of incumbency and prior campaign results. Democratic Mayor Amy Goodwin is seeking a third term but must clear a primary challenge from Martec Washington, a community advocate who placed second behind Goodwin in the 2022 mayoral primary; on the Republican side, Brian Hunt is unopposed for the GOP nomination.
In judicial races, special elections will determine whether Supreme Court justices Tom Ewing and Gerald Titus remain on the high court. Both Ewing and Titus were appointed in 2025 to fill vacancies, and the primary includes opposition to keep them serving, alongside a separate Court of Appeals contest in which Chief Judge Dan Greear faces a challenge from Jim Douglas in a bid for a 10-year term.
Poll access depends on party registration, and the rules are designed to keep voters inside their own party’s primary. West Virginia voters registered with a political party may vote only in their party’s primary, so Democrats cannot vote in the Republican primary and Republicans cannot vote in the Democratic primary. Independent or unaffiliated voters may vote in the Democratic or Mountain Party primaries but not the Republican primary, and voter ID is required.
Election officials and voters are also operating with sizable registered-voter totals. As of April 23, West Virginia had about 1.2 million registered voters, including about 520,000 Republicans, 327,000 Democrats and 302,000 voters unaffiliated with any party. The decision notes describe that in 2024, GOP primaries for president, governor and U.S. Senate each drew about 225,000 total voters, about 19% of registered voters at the time, while turnout in Democratic primaries ranged from about 90,000 for governor to about 102,000 for U.S. Senate.
Absentee and early voting can also affect what Tuesday night looks like. About 30% of the vote in the 2024 primaries was cast before Election Day, and as of May 5, about 36,000 ballots had already been cast in Tuesday’s election—more than 17,000 from Republicans, about 13,600 from Democrats and about 3,600 from voters unaffiliated with any party. Roughly 60% of West Virginia’s 55 counties tend to report all or nearly all of their early and absentee vote results in the first vote report of the night.
For the timing of how vote counts typically move, the AP’s decision notes point to the pace of the 2024 Republican U.S. Senate primary, when the AP first reported results at 7:41 p.m. ET, 11 minutes after polls closed. The notes say the vote count surpassed the 90% mark at about 10:06 p.m. ET and that the final vote update came at 12:40 a.m. ET, with more than 99% of total votes counted.
The AP will declare winners only when it determines there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap, and it does not make projections. If a race is not called, the AP will continue covering newsworthy developments such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory while making clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explaining why.
Recounts are not automatic in West Virginia, but candidates may request and pay for one regardless of the margin of victory. The decision notes say the cost is refunded if the recount changes the outcome, and the AP may still declare a winner in a race subject to a recount if the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the result.