A special canvassing committee has formally certified the results of last week’s Primary election. State Election Director Will Senning distributed the results of all statewide races to leaders of the Democratic, Republican and Progressive Parties. After they reviewed and signed the documents, the results became official.
Write-in campaigns got a lot of attention this year. In a high profile effort, Progressive Lt. Governor
"Feliciano did well in my opinion and I think he is going to be a threat to Scott Milne in the general election campaign," Retired Middlebury College political science professor Eric Davis commenting on the General Election race for governor.
candidate Dean Corren received just under 4,000 votes in the Democratic primary. This represents 60 percent of the votes in this contest.
At the same time, a group of Democrats opposed to Corren supported incumbent Republican Lt. Governor Phil Scott. Scott got roughly 1,900 votes or 30 percent of all ballots cast in the Democratic primary.
Corren is now the Progressive/Democratic candidate for Lt. Governor and the Democratic State committee will decide in several weeks if it will endorse his candidacy. Dottie Deans is the Party’s chairwoman.
“People have choices and it’s important that we have the ability to endorse a person who is seeking our endorsement,” said Deans. “As you know as well as everybody else, we have some division in the Party about that endorsement and how to best proceed and that’s how we’ll do it.”
If the Democrats endorse Corren, they will then decide if they are going to include Corren in all of their get out the vote activities and mailings.
Retired Middlebury College political science professor Eric Davis says that’s a critical decision that could affect the race. He says he’ll also be watching to see how many elected Democrats decide to support Republican Phil Scott.
“So far they are colleagues of his in the Senate, senators like Dick Sears, and Dick Mazza and John Campbell,” said Davis. “Again I’m interested to see whether there are other prominent Democrats beyond Scott’s colleagues in the Senate who would be willing to come out publicly in favor of Scott opposed to Dean Corren.”
In the Republican gubernatorial primary, Libertarian candidate Dan Feliciano received roughly 14 percent of the total as a write-in candidate and he finished in second place. Scott Milne won the primary with just over 71 percent of the vote.
GOP chairman David Sunderland isn’t concerned about Feliciano’s presence in the general election.
“There are lots of reasons for write-in votes, you know people voting cross party, all kinds of explanations for it,” said Sunderland. “But I think the bottom line is that Vermont Republicans voted with a very strong voice in support of Scott Milne as their nominee.”
But professor Davis thinks it’s possible that Feliciano will draw a sizeable number of votes away from Milne in November.
“He didn’t begin his effort for write-in votes until seven or 10 days before the primary so Feliciano did well in my opinion and I think he is going to be a threat to Scott Milne in the general election campaign,” said Davis. “And I would not at all surprised if Dan Feliciano were to get as many as 10 percent of the vote.”
The turnout for the Primary was just under nine percent. That’s the second lowest turnout rate in more than 34 years.
