After today's primary, US Rep. Martin Heinrich and former congresswoman Heather Wilson will meet in November to battle it out for US Sen. Jeff Bingaman's seat. Santa Fe County results after the jump.
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Both Heinrich and Wilson were expected to carry their respective races, but tonight's big upset comes in the battle between 2010 candidate Carl Trujillo and Santa Fe Mayor David Coss for the seat vacated by former House Speaker Ben Luján, HD 46.
While Coss seemed to have an early lead and strong late fundraising, the involvement of a Republican-connected super PAC, Reform New Mexico Now, in Trujillo's campaign may have given him the edge. (All speculation, of course.) Trujillo garnered 2,500 votes to Coss' 2,295.
Coss issued the following statement:
With 100 percent of Santa Fe County precincts reporting, we can call the Santa Fe County races:
- Dist. 2 County Commissioner:
- Miguel Chavez
- , former city councilor, with 40.5 percent of the vote (1,112 votes). Maria-Ester De Anda came in second, with 31.5 percent.
- Dist. 4 County Commissioner: incumbent
- Kathy Holian
- defeated challenger Victor Baca with 72 percent of the vote.
- County Clerk:
- Geraldine Salazar
- swept a four-candidate field with 46.4 percent;
- Letitia Montoya
- came in second with just over 25 percent.
- County Treasurer:
- Patrick Varela
- defeated recently fired deputy treasurer Oliver Garcia with 77 percent of the vote.
In the race for 1st Judicial District Attorney, incumbent Angela "Spence" Pacheco looked poised to carry the day even before Rio Arriba results came in. As of 10 pm, Pacheco had 73.7 percent of the vote, one of the widest margins of any race.
Although the race for PRC Dist. 3 (formerly Jerome Block Jr.'s seat, now occupied by Martinez appointee Doug Howe) appeared close for most of the night, outgoing Santa Fe County Commissioner Virginia Vigil pulled away from outgoing County Clerk Valerie Espinoza . Since there's no Republican challenger, the primary winner will run unopposed for the seat in November (unless an independent enters the race). Updated 7 am: After additional precincts reported, Espinoza pulled out the win.
Not all counties have reported results, but as of around 11 pm, an interesting trend was emerging in incumbent state Sen. Phil Griego 's Dist. 39: While Griego led challenger and former Santa Fe County Commissioner Jack Sullivan statewide with about 43 percent of the vote to Sullivan's 33 percent, Sullivan carried Santa Fe County, likely because of his history here, winning exactly twice as many votes (840) as Griego did (420). Unfortunately for Sullivan, that's only a fraction of what he needs...
In HD 50, Stephen Easley defeated Patricia Lincoln by a comfortable margin in the Democratic primary; in the Republican race, as did Charles Larry Miller won.
Last but not least, Republican Jefferson Byrd won the Republican primary in Congressional District 3, which means he'll face incumbent US Rep. Ben Ray Luján in November.
Disclaimer: All of the numbers we're reporting here come straight from the New Mexico Secretary of State's website, and they're unofficial , and won't be official until near the end of June.
Now for November! Are you ready? Karl Rove is.
