Good morning and welcome back to the Tip Sheet, a weekly newsletter from Tom Dudchik’s Capitol Report written by Mike Cerulli.

Oh, boy.

What a week! No use in writing any preface.

Let’s dive right in…

Lamont and the Democrats surf the tsunami

The cheers at Dunkin’ Park rolled like thunderclaps. 

One after the other.

First came Jon Ossoff and Roy Cooper. Their races were called by the Associated Press roughly half an hour apart, just as polls were closing in Connecticut. The pair of wins set the vibe at Ned Lamont’s soon-to-be victory party. The night was off to a good start for the crowd gathered in the stadium’s well-appointed event suite to watch the governor cruise to a third term. 

The AP call for Lamont came slightly later than most expected – toward the start of the 9 o’clock hour rather than minutes after 8:00 – but the win was resounding nonetheless.

By then, the drinks were flowing in Hartford. The music was loud, seemingly growing louder with each round of whoops and hollers. 

Then came the majority-makers and the victories that defined not just a “good night” but a historic wave. Dr. Annie Andrews at 10:39. Around 11:00, the live reports of the local news crews reporting from Lamont’s party were interrupted by two rounds of deafening applause – the first for James Talarico and the second for Gina Hinojosa.

At one point, on one of the many television screens at the Lamont party, the seemingly-superhuman Steve Kornacki exclaimed, “I’m seeing things I’ve never seen on this board before.”

Kornacki’s observation about Texas was applicable to the Nutmeg State, too.

Throughout the night, cellphones at Dunkin’ Park were abuzz with things no one in Connecticut had seen before. Districts across the state that few thought were in play were falling left and right.

Word of upsets in Shelton, Bristol, and beyond surged through the room like a wildfire.

Harding, Perillo, Cicarella, Pavalock-D’Amato, Lauretti, Howard…on and on.

By the time the AP reported that Troy Jackson and Dr. Abdul El-Sayed had triumphed, many of the younger (and young-at-heart) attendees at the Lamont party had begun scattering to a variety of Hartford haunts – Pig’s Eye, Vaughn’s, and at least a couple apartments.

The developments that came over the next few days were mostly expected, though they pointed to larger questions that will confront a party with historically large ranks in the legislature and a governor eyeing an unprecedented run with undivided control at the Capitol.

Keith Phaneuf was the first to publicly flesh out one of those questions.

“Blue wave in CT legislature may test Lamont on taxing the rich,” reads the Phaneuf headline.

On Thursday afternoon, Bob Duff and Gary Winfield were unanimously endorsed as the next Senate president pro tempore and majority leader, respectively. That evening, Matt Ritter and Jason Rojas were re-elected for additional terms in their current leadership roles. 

The mood inside both caucus meetings was jubilant. Premonitions of intraparty battles over taxation seemed far from the private rooms where the Democrats met. Loud cheers could be heard through the walls of both. Looming over the gathering of the House’s 116-strong majority was the fact that another round of caucus voting may soon be needed if all the talk of Matt Ritter heading over to UConn pans out.

News broke last week that UConn’s current president, Radenka Maric, is a finalist to be the next chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. During a WTNH video podcast, Joe Aresimowicz relayed what many insiders have been hearing: the Wisconsin gig isn’t the only one Maric has interviewed for.

Aresimowicz also laid out another behind-the-scenes conclusion many have reached: if there is a snap election called to replace Ritter, Rojas easily has the support to be the next speaker and Cristin McCarthy Vahey is currently considered the frontrunner to be majority leader.

Kate Farrar and Maria Horn are considered the two other candidates in a hypothetical majority leader race.

In the executive chambers, Lamont told Mark Pazniokas that he intends to keep his chief of staff Matt Brokman on the job. That pronouncement seemed to squash rumors that Brokman might've been looking to move elsewhere. Changes to other senior roles at state agencies, however, might be in the cards. The governor has made a formal ask for resignation letters from his entire cabinet – a mostly symbolic order that gives him the option of replacing some commissioners as he moves into a third term.

Beneath Brokman in the rank-and-file of the governor’s office, there are various rumors of potential departures from the legislative team, as well as possible new roles for some of the governor’s closest aides.

Republicans endure a “worst-case scenario”

While the Democrats basked in the euphoria of a historic wave election, Connecticut Republicans experienced a form of shell shock without comparison in the modern political age.

Vincent Candelora described the night as a “worst-case scenario.”

Not only did Steve Harding, a widely liked and respected leader, go down, his caucus suffered an event likened to an extinction-level event. The three survivors – Rob Sampson, Henri Martin, and Eric Berthel – met on Saturday to discuss the next steps. Sampson emerged as the leader.

Sampson will meet with Harding and the Senate Republican Office’s staff today. Broad layoffs are expected in a caucus that, despite all its drama, has cultivated a tight-knit group of young staffers who now face an uncertain future. Bob Duff responded to the selection of Sampson with a measured statement, saying that the degree to which Senate Republicans have a “seat at the table” will be determined by how well they “communicate and be a good-faith partner with our new majority.”

Leaders of the state’s Republican Party will meet Tuesday to conduct a post mortem. There have been widespread calls for change atop of the organization, though party chair Ben Proto has said he will not resign before his term ends in June. 

Any number of names have been floated as potential Proto successors. Sampson said Sunday that he is not among those who are agitating for an early departure by Proto but threw his support behind Harding in the event the position opens up. Though Harding has yet to give any public indications of his intentions, the coalition of people who think he’d be a good party chair spans the spectrum of the GOP from Sampson to Liz Kurantowicz.

That’s all for this week. We’ll be back next week with another edition of the Tip Sheet!