Mail-in ballots delay naming winner of District’s mayoral primary

Batches of uncounted mail-in votes left D.C. residents without a clear answer Wednesday to the question of who will be the city’s next mayor.

A Board of Elections spokesperson said staffers are working through the mail-in ballots that were dropped off on Tuesday’s election day, and expected to provide an update to their initial results sometime on Wednesday.

This is also the District’s first go-around using ranked choice voting. Some residual delays were anticipated as poll workers adjust to the tiered system that can involve two rounds of counting before a winner is determined.

With roughly three-quarters of the ballots tabulated, D.C. Council member Janeese Lewis George held a commanding lead with 53% of the vote while her main contender, former Councilman Kenyan McDuffie, trailed with 37%.

The primary winner will replace Mayor Muriel Bowser, who opted not to seek reelection at the end of her third term.

Ms. Lewis George, a self-described democratic socialist, would provide a major shakeup to city hall if she can seal the win. She promised to build more than 70,000 units of housing over the next five years, expand rent control in the District and ensure no family pays more than 7% of their household income for childcare.

Those policy goals will come to life, in part, from a proposed tax on business owners who live in Virginia and Maryland.

President Trump threatened to “take over” the District if Ms. Lewis George did win the District’s crucial mayoral primary, which all but guarantees who will come out on top in the general election this fall in the Democratic-heavy city.

But Ms. Lewis George acknowledged on election night that the president’s comments benefited her political ambitions.

“It motivated people to get to the polls,” she told a press gaggle at Howard Theatre late Tuesday. “I heard that today when I went to the polls, that residents came up to me and said, ’You know what? If Trump doesn’t like you, I love you.’”

But Mr. McDuffie, who billed himself as the pro-business, crime-fighting candidate in the primary, has not lost hope for a comeback.

“As results continue to come in, I urge residents to remain patient because every vote matters and every vote must be counted,” the former at-large D.C. Council member said in a statement. “Every ballot cast by a DC resident deserves to be heard and they will. We respect that process, and we are going to see it through.”

The race for the District’s nonvoting congressional representative was the lone office decided on election night.

D.C. Council member Robert White trounced his council colleague Brooke Pinto by winning 63% of the vote to her 22%. The seat became open after incumbent Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, who first took office in 1991, chose to retire from politics.

Mr. White campaigned on showing some teeth to the Trump administration and preserving the District’s autonomy.

“My election means we’re going to keep our independence and we’re going to get statehood. People know I’m not going to lay down. I’m going to fight,” Mr. White told The Associated Press after his win was declared.

Elsewhere on the ballot, democratic socialist Aparna Raj leads the race for the Ward 1 council seat and Oye Owolewa leads for the at-large Democrat seat.