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The Big Recall Election Flop

December 30, 2021 · 2:07 pm ET · Leave a Comment

Joshua Spivak: “This year saw the most recalls attempted since this blog started in 2011 — at least 609 attempts. But unlike most years, when the recall gets to the ballot about one-quarter to one-third of the time, this year, most of the recalls went nowhere. Only 66 went to the ballot and 17 others resigned.”

“Even more unusual, for the first time more officials survived the vote than lost. Most recalls result in removal — about 60% of the time (plus 6% resignations). This year, 40 officials survived the vote and only 26 were removed.”

2021 Campaign, Election Administration

Seattle Councilmember Defeats Recall

December 16, 2021 · 8:17 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant has thwarted an effort to recall her from office after a 10-day vote count,” the Seattle Times reports.

“Supporters of Sawant — Seattle’s only socialist council member and the first in the city’s history to have a recall ballot against her — narrowly outdid those in favor of a recall, claiming 50.4% of the vote.”

2021 Campaign

Seattle Councilmember Pulls Ahead In Recall Effort

December 9, 2021 · 8:47 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant pulled ahead of a ballot measure to recall her in Thursday’s vote count, earning 50.3% of the total counted votes,” the Seattle Times reports.

“Sawant has gained ground two days in a row, overcoming a 53% lead held by the recall effort on Tuesday.”

2021 Campaign

Effort to Recall Seattle Council Member Leads

December 8, 2021 · 10:40 am ET · Leave a Comment

“An effort to recall Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant led in Tuesday night’s vote count with about 53% supporting her removal from office, as voters in her district took part in a historic election to decide whether the outspoken socialist politician should be ousted or retained,” the Seattle Times reports.

“Additional votes will be counted in the coming days.”

2021 Campaign

Virginia GOP Completes Sweep of Elections

December 3, 2021 · 5:10 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“A three-judge panel overseeing a recount in a close Virginia Beach state House race upheld the Republican candidate’s victory on Friday, a decision that also reaffirms the GOP’s takeover of the chamber and completes the party’s sweep of last month’s elections,” the AP reports.

2021 Campaign

Nearly $1M Pours In from Each Side in Seattle Recall

December 2, 2021 · 9:54 am ET · Leave a Comment

As the campaign to recall Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant draws to a close, financial contributions and endorsements help shed light on city and outside forces influencing the recall,” the Seattle Times reports.

“Both sides of the recall were closing in on $1 million in contributions on Tuesday, one week before the end of voting.”

2021 Campaign, City Hall

Democrats Roar Back In Georgia

December 1, 2021 · 12:43 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“After a lackluster general Election Night in November, Democratic leaning candidates roared back Tuesday to flip at least seven local races across Georgia Tuesday, including mayors’ races in Sylvester, Forest Park, and Brunswick,” the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.

2021 Campaign

Democrats Flip Seat In Massachusetts

December 1, 2021 · 9:51 am ET · Leave a Comment

Jamie Belsito (D) won a Massachusetts House seat in a special election, the first Democrat to do so in the district 163 years, the Ipswich Local News reports.

2021 Campaign

Andre Dickens Elected as Mayor of Atlanta

November 30, 2021 · 11:17 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“Andre Dickens, the Atlanta native who first beat an incumbent eight years ago for a spot on the City Council, defeated Felicia Moore in Tuesday’s runoff election to become Atlanta’s 61st mayor,” the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports.

“Dickens will succeed Keisha Lance Bottoms, who did not run for a second term and endorsed Dickens to replace her as mayor, a job Dickens said he has wanted since he was a teenager.”

2021 Campaign

Primary to Replace Alcee Hastings Decided by 5 Votes

November 12, 2021 · 10:58 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“By the narrowest of margins — just five votes — businesswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick appears to have won a South Florida Democratic primary to replace the late US Rep. Alcee Hastings in Washington,” CNN reports.

“The outcome in the November 2 election had been up in the air until Friday evening, when the Broward County canvassing board reviewed more than a dozen overseas ballots that were postmarked on Election Day and arrived within the 10-day window to be legally counted.”

2021 Campaign

New Jersey Democrats Call on Ciattarelli to Concede

November 8, 2021 · 12:42 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“New Jersey Democrats are calling on Republican gubernatorial nominee Jack Ciattarelli to concede last week’s election, saying that his silence since the race was called for Gov. Phil Murphy (D) is ‘an assault on the integrity of our elections,'” the Washington Post reports.

“As of Monday morning, Murphy led the Republican by roughly 2.6 percentage points, larger than the margin Virginia Gov.-elect Glenn Youngkin (R) won by last week. Democratic nominee Terry McAuliffe conceded that race on Nov. 3, the morning after the election, and Youngkin soon began the transition process by meeting with the state’s Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam.”

Jonathan Last: “Over the next 12 months it will be interesting to track what percentage of losing Republican candidates concede their losses and wish their opponents well.”

2021 Campaign

Minneapolis Hit Turnout Record for Municipal Election

November 8, 2021 · 11:53 am ET · Leave a Comment

“More Minneapolis voters cast bal­lots in Tues­day’s e­lec­tion than any oth­er mu­nic­i­pal e­lec­tion in re­cent his­to­ry,” the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports.

“The e­lec­tion drew a 54% turn­out of el­i­gi­ble voters — the most for a city-only e­lec­tion in more than four de­cades, smash­ing the 1997 re­cord of 46.5%.”

2021 Campaign

Democrats Not Sure What Went Wrong on Tuesday

November 7, 2021 · 12:18 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“The difficulty conducting a postmortem after an election like last week’s is that the losses were so widespread that it’s hard to pin defeat on any one thing,” Politico reports.

“Democrats were reading Virginia like a Rorschach test. Progressive Democrats saw the election as a rebuke of the corporate wing of the party and Clintonesque Democrats like Terry McAuliffe. Centrists saw it as a revolt against the ‘wokeism’ of the left. For rural Democrats, the election confirmed that Democrats need to focus more on voters outside of cities. For urban Democrats, it confirmed the need for Congress to pass legislation that might appeal to the party’s base.”

2021 Campaign, Democrats

Democrats Again Lament Their Weakness In Rural Areas

November 7, 2021 · 7:20 am ET · Leave a Comment

Dan Balz: “Democrats have seen this movie before. An election takes place, they examine the results and suddenly lament their poor showing with rural voters. It has happened time and again and yet the party has neither a solution to the problem nor, it seems, a commitment to solving it.”

2021 Campaign, Democrats

Michigan City Elects All Muslim City Council

November 6, 2021 · 11:31 am ET · Leave a Comment

“The six-member City Council of Hamtramck will consist of all Muslims starting in January, another historic first for the metro Detroit city known for its sizable immigrant population,” the Detroit Free Press reports.

2021 Campaign

Republican Wins Race for Seattle City Attorney

November 6, 2021 · 11:30 am ET · Leave a Comment

Seattle elected its first Republican to city office since at least 1991 as Ann Davison (R) defeated Nicole Thomas-Kennedy (D), a progressive in favor of “abolishing” the police, in the race for city attorney, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports.

2021 Campaign

Youngkin’s 17-Year Old Son Tried to Vote

November 5, 2021 · 3:24 pm ET · Leave a Comment

“The 17-year-old son of Virginia Gov.-elect Glenn Youngkin (R) tried to cast a ballot in Tuesday’s gubernatorial election twice despite being too young to vote,” the Washington Post reports.

2021 Campaign, Election Administration

Democrats Deny Political Reality at Their Own Peril

November 5, 2021 · 9:07 am ET · Leave a Comment

The New York Times editorial board issues a scathing warning for Democrats:

“Tuesday’s election result trend lines were a political nightmare for the Democratic Party, and no Democrat who cares about winning elections in 2022 and the presidential race in 2024 should see them as anything less.”

“Familiar takeaways like ‘wake-up call’ and ‘warning shot’ don’t do justice here because the danger of ignoring those trends is too great. What would do justice, and what is badly needed, is an honest conversation in the Democratic Party about how to return to the moderate policies and values that fueled the blue-wave victories in 2018 and won Joe Biden the presidency in 2020.”

2021 Campaign, Democrats

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Taegan Goddard

Taegan Goddard

Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.

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