BreakDown: The Election Results

We know what happened. Let’s talk about why it happened with a BreakDown that you’ll never get from any other media source.

We’re going to stick to races that affected Southside, because that’s what we mostly cover.

US Senate: Mark Warner appears to have barely survived an amazing challenge from Ed Gillespie. I missed the closeness of the race just like most independent analysts. As of 2PM Wednesday, Warner is ahead by about 16,000 votes. Let’s BreakDown what Southside did…

• Danville: Warner won Danville by 1825 votes (58% to 41%). No surprise there.
• Pittsylvania County: Gillespie won BIG by 4700 votes (61% to 36%). That cancels out Danville completely and turns the entire county red on the map. If Bill Stanley keeps that going, Kim Adkins is going to have a big uphill battle against him next year.
• Halifax County: Gillespie won by 412 votes (52% to 47%). That’s less of a margin than expected and way less of a margin than Pittsylvania County. You might as well call Halifax County an even split.
• Martinsville: Warner won by 826 votes (61% to 37%). Totally expected.
• Henry County: Gillespie won by 1867 votes (61% to 35%). Henry Voters flipped the entire county just like Pittsylvania County did.

5th district US House: Lawrence Gaughan was outgunned from the beginning. Robert Hurt knew he had no chance of losing this race and pretty much coasted from start to finish. His campaign was so confident (and rightfully so) that he never ran TV advertisements. Gaughan had little money to campaign with and no support from state or national Democratic organizations.

• Danville: Hurt won Danville by 365 votes (51% to 47%). That means a lot of Danville voters supported Mark Warner & Robert Hurt. That says a lot.
• Pittsylvania County: Hurt blew out Gaughan by 7778 votes (72% to 23%). That cancelled out Charlottesville’s 5252 vote Gaughan advantage, and that was Gaughan’s only stronghold. Lots of other regions racked up Pittsylvania County’s margins, too. Charlottesville has been and remains irrelevant to the 5th District.
• Halifax County: Hurt won by 2549 votes (64% to 34%) Same analysis as Danville, noting the big Warner/Hurt crossover voting choices.
• Henry County: Hurt won by 799 votes (60% to 38%). Only the eastern half of Henry County is in the 5th District, but the strong Hurt showing was repeated there.

Now let’s BreakDown the races in the specific counties and cities.

Martinsville: They had a city council race where 5 people were running for 2 seats. Gene Teague was the only incumbent running. He deserved re-election and he won it. The surprise came when 25-year old Jennifer Bowles won the second seat. She won that seat thanks to the “bullet voting” technique that I detest. Her supporters cast votes for only her and passed on the second vote in one precinct. It’s a legal tactic, but it stinks.

Halifax County: Hoo Boy. Let’s talk about the Clerk of Court race that turned bizarre in the last week. Cathy Cosby had the experience to deserve the special election win over Donnie Amos. However, some local people decided to stick their opposition of gay marriage into the race. They said that since Cosby married a gay couple earlier in October, they couldn’t vote for her. Seriously. Donnie Amos, Cosby’s opponent, immediately rolled over to this group of people and said he wouldn’t perform any marriages if he won the office (which is perfectly legal because clerks have to be certified by the Circuit Court to do so). Not only did he declare that, he then went on to say that his was against gay marriage because of his religious convictions. So there! Hilarity ensued as that small group of people proclaimed Amos to be the only acceptable candidate.

Those people lost. So did Amos. 5816 to 2358 (71% to 29%). Sanity prevailed and religion never should have been the single-factor issue for an elected office that mainly consists of record-keeping of important documents. Donnie Amos also appears to be melting down after his defeat. It’s not pretty.

That’s the BreakDown for Tuesday’s elections. We’ve got more coming up on SouthsideCentral!