2007 San Francisco mayoral election explained

Election Name:2007 San Francisco mayoral election
Country:San Francisco
Type:presidential
Ongoing:no
Previous Election:2003 San Francisco mayoral election
Previous Year:2003
Next Election:2011 San Francisco mayoral election
Next Year:2011
Election Date:November 6, 2007
Image1:File:Gavin Newsom (1).jpg
Candidate1:Gavin Newsom
Party1:Democratic Party (United States)
Popular Vote1:105,596
Percentage1:73.66%
Candidate2:Quintin Mecke
Party2:Democratic Party (United States)
Popular Vote2:9,076
Percentage2:6.33%
Mayor
Posttitle:Reelected Mayor
Before Election:Gavin Newsom
Before Party:Democratic Party (United States)
After Election:Gavin Newsom
After Party:Democratic Party (United States)
Image4:File:Harold Hoogasian (1646356056).jpg
Candidate4:Harold Hoogasian
Candidate5:Wilma Pang
Party4:Republican Party (United States)
Image5:File:Wilma Pang.png
Party5:Peace and Freedom Party
Popular Vote4:8,400
Popular Vote5:7,274
Percentage4:5.86%
Percentage5:5.07%

The 2007 San Francisco mayoral election occurred on November 6, 2007. Voters elected a Mayor of San Francisco and several local officials. Incumbent Mayor Gavin Newsom was re-elected by an overwhelming margin. There were 12 candidates on the ballot as well as 6 write-ins.

Besides Newsom, other notable candidates included Josh Wolf, a journalist who was jailed for refusing to testify and turn over video evidence to a federal grand jury. Another candidate, "Chicken" John Rinaldi, qualified for public financing of his campaign but ran into procedural difficulties with San Francisco's Election Commission.

It was the first mayoral election in San Francisco history to use instant-runoff voting, also known as ranked-choice voting, so that there would be no need for a run-off, but a majority was reached in the first round and votes were not redistributed. The results of the election were not known for weeks because every ballot had to be hand-counted due to the long-running feud between the Elections Department of San Francisco and the California Secretary of State.[1]

Issues

Many ongoing and emerging issues might have influenced this election, including:

Results

Municipal elections in California are officially non-partisan, though most candidates in San Francisco do receive funding and support from various political parties.

References

  1. John Wildermuth, Counting S.F. ballots will take a record amount of time, San Francisco Chronicle, November 7, 2007
  2. http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2006Oct30/0,4670,CityCrimeListGlance,00.html The Most, Least Dangerous U.S. Cities
  3. Patrick Hoge, Newsom apologizes at press conference, San Francisco Chronicle, February 1, 2007

External links

Candidate Web sites