RANDOLPH — Vermont’s state chapter of the Democratic Party has a new leader — and he’s taking the helm at a challenging moment for the party in Vermont and across the country. 

Lachlan Francis, a political consultant from Westminster and former chair of the Windham County Democratic committee, was elected state party chair on Saturday at Vermont Democrats’ biennial reorganization meeting. Francis beat out one other candidate for the job — Justin Willeau of Vershire, the former secretary of Orange County’s Democratic committee and owner of a coffee business — by 33 votes to 12.

The two candidates were vying to succeed outgoing party chair Jim Ramsey, who’d held the job on an interim basis since February but opted not to seek it again. Ramsey took on the role with less than a full, two-year term left after former chair David Glidden resigned.

Also on Saturday, the party reelected its current vice chair — Amanda Gustin of Barre City — to another two-year term, as well as a slate of other statewide officers who oversee the party’s electoral strategy and manage its finances.

Only the race for chair was contested. The roughly four dozen people who voted in Saturday’s election, held on the Vermont State University campus in Randolph, were largely members of county Democratic committees from across the state. 

Francis steps into the job a week after Vermont’s Republican Party also elected a slate of top officers for the next two years. A key focus for Democrats — who are likely to maintain control in the 2026 election of both the state House and Senate — will be winning back seats the party lost in 2024. That’s when the state GOP flipped a historic number of seats in both chambers, dismantling powerful Democratic supermajorities.

Many of those races were colored by voters’ concerns over the cost of living and how safe they feel in their communities. The extent of Democrats’ success in 2026 will hinge on the party’s ability to find messages that resonate with many of the voters who spurned its candidates — some of them incumbents — in races a year ago. 

Meanwhile, at the national level, Democrats are grappling with what flavor of left-wing politics could appeal to the most voters as they attempt to win back control of both houses of Congress next year and set the stage for a White House win in 2028. 

The national party has also been divided in recent days over decisions by some members of its Congressional caucuses to break ranks and join most Republicans on a spending deal that ended the federal government shutdown, but without a guaranteed extension of enhanced health insurance tax credits. (All three members of Vermont’s congressional delegation voted against the measure.)

“Obviously, we’ve got a lot on our plate — to say the least,” Francis said Saturday in brief remarks after the results of the vote were announced. He added in a press release issued later Saturday that, as chair, he would “strengthen our grassroots infrastructure across the state, support candidates who put people first, and ensure that we make Democratic values winning values in every election, in every community.”

Francis previously managed now-U.S. Rep. Becca Balint’s first campaign for Vermont state Senate and worked on one of former Vermont Attorney General TJ Donovan’s campaigns for that office. More recently, he has worked as a researcher at Global Strategy Group, a national Democratic polling firm based in New York City.

At age 29, Francis also brings more youth to Vermont Democrats’ ranks. His election Saturday makes him one of the youngest state Democratic Party chairs in the country, according to May Hanlon, the Vermont Democrats’ executive director. Hanlon herself is 26, which makes her the youngest Democrat in her role in the country, she said. 

To be sure, much of the state GOP’s success in last year’s election was thanks to campaigning by Republican Gov. Phil Scott, who continues to be among the country’s most popular governors. In recent polling Scott also remains popular with Vermont Democratic voters who have a propensity to split their tickets on Election Day. 

A major question facing the state Democratic Party in the first half of 2026 is whether it will run a challenger to Scott, assuming he runs for reelection, who would make for substantial competition. In the last two election cycles, Scott trounced his Democratic opponents, both of whom had relatively little name recognition across the state. 

Two state Democratic heavyweights — Treasurer Mike Pieciak and Attorney General Charity Clark — have been rumored to be eyeing the Fifth Floor job though have not publicly said yet whether they’re running.

Both Pieciak and the state party have been especially critical of many of Scott’s responses to actions taken by President Donald Trump’s administration in recent months.

Willeau, in his pitch to the room on Saturday, suggested the party take a less offensive stance against Scott — whom he called “our favorite punching bag” — because of the five-term governor’s popularity with Democratic voters.

“I think the question is, does this committee represent Democratic voters the way they actually vote?” he asked. “And, if it doesn’t — how well do we know ourselves?”

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Ryan Miller learned of Zeno Mountain Farm a half-dozen years ago from his Guster bandmate Luke Reynolds, who had recently moved to Lincoln in Addison County.

It was a camp in town, Reynolds told Miller, geared toward helping people with disabilities. Year-round, folks with and without disabilities worked on an even plane to put on shows, all for free. Miller went to one of Zeno Mountain Farm’s annual plays, the musical “Best Summer Ever,” and discovered a “gateway drug” that has kept him in the world of Zeno Mountain ever since.

“When I walked in there and saw the play and saw this place and saw this community, I was like, ‘Well, this is the most magical thing on earth,’” said Miller, who lives in Williston. “It feels like science fiction.”

Miller corralled many of Vermont’s highest-profile musicians to perform Nov. 16 in a 12-hour dance marathon at Zeno Mountain. The fundraiser was expected to raise about $100,000, said Peter Halby, who founded the nonprofit camp with his family. That totals roughly a sixth of the organization’s annual budget.