Maine Dem Jared Golden Wins In Ranked Choice Finish

November 16, 2024 Democrats, Politics

The New York Times reports:

Representative Jared Golden, a three-term Democrat from Maine, has defeated his Republican challenger, Austin Theriault, a former NASCAR driver and northern Maine native, The Associated Press declared on Friday.

Mr. Golden’s narrow victory in his largely white, rural and working-class district — one of five Democratic-held districts that Donald J. Trump won in 2020 — was a bright spot for Democrats and will help ensure that the Republicans’ House majority in the next Congress remains exceedingly narrow.

Mr. Golden toiled throughout the campaign to distance himself from other Democrats, declining to endorse Vice President Kamala Harris or even say whether he would vote for her.

Bangor’s ABC affiliate reports:

Neither Democratic Congressman Jared Golden nor Republican challenger Austin Theriault received 50% of the vote, and there was an official declared write-in candidate, so the ranked choice voting tabulation was triggered.

The declared write-in candidate, Diana Merenda, received 420 votes (0.1%). Because she had the least amount of votes, she was eliminated in the ranked-choice tabulation. The second choice on more than 12,000 ballots with first choice blank were also included in the tabulation.

The ranked choice tabulation announced at 6:45 p.m. Friday showed Golden with 50.35 % compared to 49.65 % for Theriault. Golden had 197,151 votes to 194,445 for Theriault.

Golden appeared here in July 2024 when he declared that Trump was going to win and that “democracy will be just fine.” In addition to refusing to commit to voting for Harris, he had also refused to commit to voting for Biden. In September, Golden bucked fellow Democrats by voting for Johnson’s spending bill.



Tags

© joemygod.com 2024