Only 15% of registered Southborough residents participated in the state primaries.
If you’re interested in the results, you probably already know who the big winners were. This post is my deeper look at how Southborough votes shook out versus overall results. You can also see who will be on our ballots for the general election this November.
Of those who took part, 75% voted in the Democratic primary, 24% in the Republican primary, and 7% on the Libertarian ballot.
Primary participation for each party was equivalent to 52% turnout for Southborough Democrats, 35% of Southborough Republicans, and 1% of Libertarians. (With no candidates on the 3rd party ballot for any of the races, there wasn’t much incentive to vote in that primary.)
Those figures include non-party members who voted. (67% of Southborough voters were free to participate in any of those primaries, since they aren’t enrolled in any of those parties.)
The biggest difference between Southborough voters and the overall state tallies was in the Democratic race for the Governor’s Councillor for the Third District.
Southborough voters stuck with the longtime incumbent, Councillor Marilyn Pettito Devaney, giving her 56% of their votes. (35% voted for challenger Mara Dolan and 9% left the choice blank*.) According to the Boston Globe, Dolan won the overall race with 52% of the votes vs 48%.
On the Republican ballot, Southborough voters reflected similar preferences to the statewide totals for the US Senate Race. 70% selected John Deaton to challenge Senator Elizabeth Warren. (That’s even higher than the 65% statewide result reported by Axios.) Robert Antonellis came in 2nd place with 20% (vs 26% statewide) and Ian Cain received only 8% (vs 9%).
Warren was one of the two uncontested candidates on Southborough’s Democratic ballot to receive the most support for keeping her seat. In first place (by one vote) was US Congressional Rep Jim McGovern. 94% of voters cast a show of support for them with only 6% leaving the choice blank.*
Since the Senate race was the only seat Republicans ran for in their primary, it will be the only race between the official parties on the general election ballot in November other than the Presidential election.
The one other race I’m aware of is a Westborough resident (Boyd Conklin) who, according to the Patch, qualified through signatures to run as an independent candidate against our incumbent State Rep. Kate Donaghue (D), also from Westborough. In early August, Conklin posted on Facebook that he is still planning to run.
Conklin’s August message quoted a purported message by Donaghue in which she quoted his May 17th post that began, “So can we bring back the patriarchy now? Take the vote away from women.” In his response, his defense included, “Anybody that thinks that I am going to be able to take the vote away from Massachusetts women is delusional. The point of the statement is not to run the state by empathy (feelings) as we see the current financial suicide in full swing. As far as women are concerned I would rather have MTG as president than Trump. I would posit on average it would be best that woman did not vote”.
*Last night’s unofficial results show blanks that may actually include write-ins yet to be officially vetted. But the number is too negligible to make a difference in any of the races.
