Maryland held a special election to fill the vacant 4th district U.S. House seat, on June 17. The results: Democratic 79.6%; Republican 19.3%; Libertarian 1.1%.
In November 2006, the vote in this district had been: Democratic 81.2%; Republican 18.8%.
Turnout was less than 5% of registered voters, many of whom apparently thought that Donna Edwards, the winner of the special election, was already the incumbent. The district obviously leans heavily Democratic anyway.
There was an interesting wrap-up of this race in today’s Washington Post which mentioned that the Republican candidate is a libertarian-leaning fellow who tries to minimize his interaction with government — no driver’s license and no credit cards, among other things.
According to a blog post that I read, the incumbent, Al Wynn, lost the Democratic primary to Donna Edwards and then resigned, necessitating the special election.
The legislature, as a cost-cutting measure, eliminated special party primaries to fill this seat. Edwards and the winner of the regular Republican primary were also candidates in the one-round special general election, which Edwards won. The two of them, of course, will face off again in November.
This situation sounds similar to the recent special election in Mississippi’s US House District 1, in that the regular party primaries occurred shortly before the first round of the special election. The difference is that all of MS’s special elections are nonpartisan, with 50%-plus required to win.
In MS, the winners of the Democratic and Republican primaries, respectively, were also the top two finishers in the first round of the special election; since neither had 50%, they had a runoff three weeks later, with the Democrat winning. The same two candidates will, of course, face off again on Nov. 4.