MARTINSBURG, W.Va. — West Virginia House Democrats are bringing the Kitchen Table Tour to Martinsburg.
A press release says their intent is to “to hear directly from the community about the most important issues facing families — electric rates, child care, healthcare, clean drinking water, education, and more.”
“We’re inviting everyone — Democrats, Independents, Republicans, and everyone in between — to join the conversation and share what matters most at your kitchen table.”
Former state delegate John Doyle made the invitation last week on Panhandle Live.
“Monday, 6 p.m., at the Purple Iris, the House of Delegates Democrats, it’s a corporal’s guard of nine people out of 100, but they have organized what they call a kitchen table tour of 10 cities around the state. It’s a two-hour period of a town hall style meeting where whoever shows up is encouraged to ask whatever question they want and make any statement they want.”
Doyle said Democrats in the Eastern Panhandle are under-represented. “The closest Democrat in the legislature to us over here is from Morgantown,” he said. “I think hurts the state that the minority party isn’t spread more evenly. Across the state, I think if you had just a couple of Democrats from over here, it would, I think, get the Republicans more attuned to “we got to represent the Eastern Panhandle, not the state as a whole.'”
As to whether Democrats have a chance at winning some seats given the Republican super majority, Doyle said, “Absolutely. And the reason is our issues and our and our views when it comes to state issues are very different than those of much of the rest of the state. And one of the reasons that I think that the Republicans got such a foothold over here is that while the Republicans were in the minority in the legislature, they advocated ideas. Like locality pay, that resonated with folks over here, but when they got in power, they abandoned those ideas. So I think that the Democrats now have the same opportunity that Republicans had about 25 years ago.”
He talked about getting candidates to run on the Democrat ticket. “We already have more people signed up for delegate races in delegate districts than we had on the ballot in 2024. We had like about 35 empty seats. And we, the Democrats, I’m Speaking of the Democrats, could have won two or three of those seats if we had a warm body on the ballot. But this time I think we’ll have at least 80 filled, maybe more than that. So it’ll be better this time than last time.”
As to whether his name will be on the ballot, Doyle said the only seat he would realistically run for would be for the house of delegates in the 97th district, but he said on Panhandle Live that if Lucia Valentine, who ran in the 2024 election for that seat puts her hat back in the ring, he would not run but instead would throw his support behind her as a candidate.
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Monday’s tour will be the second of ten stops on the Kitchen Table Tour.
