DOVER, Del. (AP) — Delaware in November could elect the first openly transgender member of Congress and the state’s first Black U.S. senator.
On Tuesday, voters in the Blue Hen State were deciding their fall nominees in several political contests, including picking Matt Meyer, the chief executive of Delaware’s most populous county, in the Democratic primary for governor.
State Sen. Sarah McBride, meanwhile, won the Democratic primary for Delaware’s lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives and now has the chance to make history as the first openly transgender person elected to Congress.
McBride won Tuesday’s primary over businessmen Earl Cooper and Elias Weir, neither of whom reported raising any money for their campaigns. Cooper is a political newcomer, while Weir finished dead last in a 2016 congressional primary with less than 1% of the vote.
McBride, meanwhile, raised almost $3 million in contributions from around the country. McBride achieved national recognition at the 2016 Democratic National Convention as the first openly transgender person to address a major party convention in the United States.
McBride will go up against either Donyale Hall, a Dover businesswoman and a Gulf War-era veteran of the U.S. Air Force, or James Whalen IIII, a retired state police officer and construction company owner from Millsboro, who are facing off in the GOP primary. Democrats have held the seat since 2010.
The House seat is being vacated by Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester, who has no primary opponent as she seeks the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Democratic Sen. Tom Carper, who held the seat since 2001. With a victory in November Blunt Rochester would be the state’s first Black U.S. senator.
Here’s a closer look at other key races:
Meyer defeated Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long and former state Environmental Secretary Collin O’Mara in Tuesday’s election. Meyer led all candidates in fundraising, but his campaign also was helped by a scandal involving Hall-Long.
Meyer will likely be considered the favorite in a November general election contest to succeed Gov. John Carney, given Democrats’ advantage in voter registration numbers.
Hall-Long has held public office since winning a state House seat in 2002, but she has been enmeshed in a campaign scandal that led several top staffers to resign and prompted election officials to commission a forensic audit.
The audit found that, during seven years as his wife’s campaign treasurer, Dana Long wrote 112 checks to himself or cash. The checks totaled just under $300,000 and should have been reported as campaign expenditures. Instead, 109 were not disclosed in finance reports, and the other four, payable to Dana Long, were reported as being written to someone else. Hall-Long has said the checks reflect repayment of loans that she made to her campaign but did not report.
“I think Delawareans are looking for a new way forward,” Meyer told The Associated Press on Tuesday night before addressing supporters at a watch party in Wilmington.
Meyer said Delaware voters are looking for leaders with “honesty and accountability,” though he declined to speculate on how much of an effect Hall-Long’s campaign finance scandal played in the Democratic primary.
“We’re looking forward, not back, and we know that our state’s future is brighter together,” he said.
Meyer will face the winner of the GOP primary, a three-way race between Jerrold A. Price, a retired New York police officer, businessman and state Rep. Mike Ramone, and businessman Bobby Williamson.
Carney is prohibited by law from seeking a third term as governor, but he wants to remain in public office as a chief executive and is seeking the Democratic nomination for mayor of Wilmington, Delaware’s largest city.
His opponent is Velda Jones-Potter, a former Wilmington city treasurer who lost a bid for mayor four years ago. Potter served a two-year stint as Delaware’s state treasurer after being appointed to that post in 2008, but she lost an election for a four-year term as treasurer in 2010.
The winner of Tuesday’s primary will face no opposition in November. Carney has said as mayor he would build on the investments his gubernatorial administration has made in Wilmington, with a focus on improving public schools, expanding affordable housing and helping small businesses.
