WASHINGTON — The people of Bridgeport, Connecticut, casted their ballots for mayor Tuesday knowing there’s a chance the results won’t actually settle an election thrown into uncertainty by allegations of voting irregularities.
A state judge last week ordered a redo of the Sept. 12 Democratic primary in Bridgeport, the state’s largest city. In that contest, incumbent Mayor Joe Ganim defeated challenger John Gomes by 251 votes out of 8,173 cast.
The Gomes campaign later sued the city, demanding a new primary after obtaining evidence of possible illegal ballot box stuffing days before the original primary.
That set up the most bizarre of the mayoral contests being held across the state.
The candidates in Tuesday’s mayoral election in Bridgeport are Ganim; Gomes, who filed to run as an independent after losing the primary; Republican David Herz; and independent Lamond Daniels. The Associated Press will tabulate vote results of the Tuesday election but will not declare a winner until the legal challenges have been resolved.
Ganim is seeking an eighth term as mayor. He previously served from 1991 to 2003 before spending seven years in federal prison for corruption and extortion charges stemming from his time in office. Voters returned him to the job in 2015 and 2019. Gomes served in Ganim’s second administration as the city’s acting chief administrative officer until he was demoted in 2016 and later as an assistant chief administrative officer until his termination in July 2022.
Gomes has suggested publicly that his ouster was in retaliation for being rumored as a possible mayoral hopeful. Ganim previously faced a primary challenge in his reelection bid in 2019, when he narrowly defeated state Sen. Marilyn Moore by 270 votes. That result was also challenged in the courts, but a judge ultimately upheld the victory.
On Tuesday afternoon, absentee ballots were handled under police guard and the mayor insisted the rules were being followed.
In the town of Derby, located about 10 miles (16 kilometers) west of New Haven, incumbent Mayor Richard Dziekan is running as an independent for a fourth term after losing the Republican primary to alderman Gino DiGiovanni Jr., who was charged by federal prosecutors in August with illegally entering the U.S. Capitol during the riot on Jan. 6, 2021. DiGiovanni, who was elected alderman 10 months after the attack, has acknowledged being at the Capitol that day but has denied any wrongdoing.
The Democratic nominee is former alderman Joe DiMartino. In 2021, Dziekan narrowly won reelection over DiMartino by a 48-vote margin. Republican Donald Trump outperformed Democrat Hillary Clinton in Derby in 2016 – 52% to 45% – despite losing statewide by almost 14 percentage points. Joe Biden won back Derby for Democrats in the 2020 general election with 51% of the vote.
Other notable mayoral races will be held in Hartford and New Haven. Bridgeport, Hartford and New Haven are Democratic strongholds. Biden carried all three cities in the 2020 presidential election with vote margins of at least 60 percentage points.
RELATED | Leaked footage raises questions of ballot fraud in Bridgeport mayoral race
CT court hears arguments in absentee ballot fraud caseA woman in Connecticut is allegedly accused of stuffing absentee boxes with fraudulent ballots. Marcus Solis has more from Bridgeport.
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The post What to expect in Connecticut’s mayoral elections, most notably Bridgeport appeared first on WorldNewsEra.