THE WEEK’S ALMOST OVER, but two of Tuesday’s legislative races remain unsettled.
Candidates in a pair of Democratic primaries are pursuing recounts in their races for state Senate and House seats.
Elections have come down to just a few votes in the high-profile showdown between 19-year legislator Sen. William Brownsberger and challenger Daniel Lander to represent a district of northwestern Boston neighborhoods and surrounding suburbs, and the battle for an open seat in one of Massachusetts’s most purple districts on the South Coast.
In a race with a reported difference of just three votes out of 24,261 by the AP’s latest unofficial numbers, Brownsberger and Lander have both pulled petitions with the Secretary of State’s office for district-wide recounts, according to the office’s spokesperson. Lander is leading with 12,132 votes to Brownsberger’s 12,129.
A separate petition is needed for each ward or precinct where a recount is wanted, each with its own signature threshold — 10 for Watertown, Belmont, and Cambridge, and 50 for Boston precincts, all from registered Democrats.
One or both of the candidates would have to file the districtwide recount paperwork with local clerks by 3 p.m. Thursday, which would then head to the secretary’s office on Friday.
To qualify for a district-wide recount, a race must be within a half a percentage of the total number of voters who cast ballots. It appears this race would qualify, though the AP’s unofficial count does not include provisional or hand-counted ballots.
If official results show by Saturday that it is within a half a percent, the secretary would order a district-wide recount to take place next week. Candidates can also collect petitions to recount on just a precinct or ward level if the election doesn’t qualify district-wide.
“Thousands of voters braved everything from the rain to moving trucks to make their voices heard yesterday,” Lander’s campaign manager Will Woodring said in a statement on Wednesday, “and every single one of their ballots must be counted. We trust the process—and we look forward to a thorough, fair, and accurate count that reflects the will of the people.”
The race has been in the spotlight as Lander, a former senior policy adviser to Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, framed his challenge around generational change to the status quo and the divide between Brownsberger’s suburban Belmont base and Lander’s Boston home in Fenway.
It has also been a proxy for tensions over property tax policies between Wu and Senate leadership.
Brownsberger is the highest-ranking member of the Legislature facing a challenger this year, the Senate’s third-in-command.
Lander entered the final stretch of the campaign with a coalition of support, backed by major labor organizations, the Massachusetts Working Families Party, Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Wu.
There is no Republican running for the Senate seat in November’s general election, so whoever comes out on top in the primary is likely heading for Beacon Hill in January.
While close to 25,000 votes may be re-tallied in the Suffolk & Middlesex District, local election officials on the South Coast may also be recounting ballots next week.
The 9th Bristol House district, covering Dartmouth and parts of New Bedford, was the only legislative election this cycle with contested primaries in both major parties for the seat that Democrat Rep. Christopher Markey is vacating. In an increasingly purple area, it’s one of the Republican’s best pickup opportunities.
Political newcomer Chester Tam won the Republican primary over New Bedford City Councilor Henry Bousquet, but Democrats are still locked head to head.
Democrats Edward Pacheco and Stephen Medeiros are competing for their party’s nomination, with Pacheco 14 votes ahead of Medeiros at last count.
Both campaigns confirmed to the News Service they are collecting signatures ahead of the deadline to return them to local clerks at 3 p.m. Thursday afternoon.
The AP showed Pacheco with 2,469 (50.1 percent) votes to Medeiros’s 2,455 (49.9 percent).
Pacheco said in an email, “Unfortunately, I am only up by 14 votes, my opponent is refusing to concede and is seeking counsel to pursue a recount.”
“Every vote deserves to be counted,” Medeiros said. “And the voters deserve the true count when it is this close.”
Pacheco is a bartender, transportation manager for a community nonprofit in Fall River and former Dartmouth High School security guard. He’s said he decided to run to “bring a working class person’s perspective to the State House.” His campaign has focused on housing, public safety and funding, and he’s listed priorities such as sealing eligible juvenile criminal records, establishing universal early childhood education, and adjusting local public safety funding formulas.
Medeiros is a real estate agent, and has focused his campaign on affordable housing for first-time home buyers and retirees, affordability more broadly, infrastructure improvements, and growing small businesses. He’s talked about creating tax-benefited savings accounts for first-time homebuyers and reforming affordable housing laws like Chapter 40B.
While both Democrats have positioned themselves as moderate, they’ve disagreed on certain issues such as rent control (Pacheco is open to the idea, Medeiros calling it a “Band aid” solution).
The primary winner will face Tam, who has emphasized cost of living and the legislative audit during his campaign.
Tam also unsuccessfully ran for the Dartmouth Board of Health last year, according to the New Bedford Light, and said he was interested in legislating on health issues after he was let go from his job at Mass General Brigham Hospital for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine.
For now, both races remain unresolved. If the recounts move forward they could determine what comes next in both races: who takes the Senate seat, and who faces Tam in November.
