Tag Archives: four26dc

News, The Daily Feed
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From the Nine, One: DC Elects Vincent Orange

Orange

For many 6 of DC’s 8 wards, yesterday’s lightly attended special election had just one question on the ballot: who should serve as At-Large Councilmember for the District, and offered a slate of candidates.  As was expected, the populace was fractured in their voting, and no single candidate took more than 30% of the vote.  In the end, Vincent Orange needed just 12,216 votes to capture the seat.

Republican Pat Mara had a very strong showing, surprising many, with 11,096 votes.  Interim At-Large Councilmember Sekou Biddle disappointed many with just 8,842 votes.  Bryan Weaver rounded out the top four candidates with 5,665 votes.

Full election results are available from the DCBOEE.

The Daily Feed
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Special Election Update: Campaign Finance Reports

Photo courtesy of
”
courtesy of ‘Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie’

Last week when the final numbers came in for the latest reporting period in the At-Large Council seat election, I was on assignment down in sunny Florida. These money numbers tend to be a barometer for successful campaigning, and with just 44 days until the election, how quickly these candidates can spend their cash effectively becomes the biggest part of the question. Here’s the breakdown thanks to the new top expense management software.

Sekou Biddle: Raised $47,000, On Hand $15,000 (potentially needs to be refiled)
Patrick Mara: Raised $29,000, On Hand $19,000
Jacque Patterson: Raised $15,000, On Hand, $18,000
Bryan Weaver: Raised $21,000, On Hand $20,000
Josh Lopez: Raised $16,000, On Hand, $19,000
Arkan Haile: Raised $4,000, On Hand, $11,000
Vincent Orange: Raised $191,000, On Hand, $191,000

Wait. $191,000 for Vincent Orange? Yep, had to look at that PDF filed by his campaign twice. So, what does it all mean?

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News, The Daily Feed, WTF?!
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Petition Challenges Bear Fruit for Biddle

Photo courtesy of
‘Signature’
courtesy of ‘tbridge’

Councilman Sekou Biddle (D-At Large) has succeeded in the first part of his challenge to at least one of his challengers’ ballot petitions, and has preliminarily knocked Jacque Patterson off the ballot for the upcoming April election.  Today’s preconference hearings were an “opportunity for the candidate and the challenger to review the staff findings on each challenge and decide whether they want to proceed with a formal request for a public hearing,” according to DCBOEE’s Alysoun McLaughlin.

Preliminary results from DCBOEE showed today that Mara submitted 3,182 valid signatures, Weaver submitted 2,948 and Patterson submitted 2,217.  Each campaign was also furnished with a list of signatures that could be found to be valid, provided DCBOEE receives a change of address form within 10 days of today.  Mara submitted 992 of those, Weaver 261 and Patterson 565. Mara needs none of those potentially valid signatures to qualify, while Weaver would need 52, and Patterson would need a miracle.

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News, The District, The Features
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Campaign Update: 54 Days Until Election Day

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‘Candidates for DC Council At-Large Seat’
courtesy of ‘luisgomezphotos’

There are 54 days until election day in the At-Large special election to fill Kwame Brown’s empty At-Large seat, but that’s not the only deadline left.  This past week, the public had the opportunity to inspect the signatures gathered by each candidate and decide if they were valid, or if they deserved a challenge.  The deadline for challenges was Monday at the close of business, and several petitions were challenged.

Lawrence Guyot, nominally of the Lopez campaign, challenged signatures gathered by the Mara campaign.  Bandele McQueen, nominally of the Biddle campaign, challenged signatures gathered by the Mara, Weaver and Patterson campaigns.  The moves are high risk (could alienate voters), but also high reward (could disqualify strong competition), and won’t be ruled upon until the 15th.  It’s been revealed in the last day or so that some of the signatures that have come under scrutiny are themselves interesting. DCist has a fairly fun list which includes Bryan Weaver’s own wife, ANC Commissioner Bob Summersgill, Mayors Fenty and Williams.  In total, 6,516 signatures have been challenged.

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