Dive Brief:

• Higher education issues factored into several gubernatorial elections, including the defeat of Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett, who oversaw budget cuts to the state university system, and the re-election of Maine Gov. Paul LePage, whose state schools suffered similar cuts, Inside Higher Ed reported.
• In Wisconsin and Florida, governors who battled higher ed faculty groups won re-election.
• California and New York state also saw governors who presided over spending increases for state higher ed institutions re-elected.

Dive Insight:

In Pennsylvania, Democrat Tom Wolf beat Corbett with a campaign that criticized the state university cuts and championed new spending, including a program to help high-performing low-income students apply for college. In Georgia, Republican Gov. Nathan Deal beat challenger Jason Carter, a Democratic state senator, in a race where the two candidates tried to blame each other for cutting or capping education spending. In Tennessee, Gov. Bill Haslam, a Republican who won approval for two years of free tuition for community college for state residents, was re-elected by a wide margin.