D.C. primary voters picked nominees in several council races on Tuesday, putting at least two new faces on the D.C. Council in January. The biggest contest was the at-large race for Anita Bonds’ seat, where nine Democratic candidates were on the ballot and the winner is all but certain to take the job in a city where Democrats make up nearly 75% of registered voters.
Polls were set to close at 8 p.m., and the results being watched most closely were the races that could decide who joins the council after the next round of voting in November. In a District primary, that is often the election that matters most, because the Democratic nominee is usually the one who ends up with the seat.
Bonds’ seat drew a crowded field that included Kevin B. Chavous, whom Bonds endorsed, along with Dyana Forester, Fred Hill, Greg Jackson, Leniqua’dominique Jenkins, Candace Tiana Nelson, Oye Owolewa, Dwight Davis and Lisa Raymond. The race also reflected how much the council is already changing: Muriel Bowser and Eleanor Holmes Norton’s departures pushed four council members to chase those offices, opening up space that will reshape the panel when the new term begins.
Ward 1 had its own turnout test, with five Democratic candidates seeking to succeed Brianne Nadeau. Nadeau backed Rashida Brown, a social worker and 10-year ANC commissioner, in a contest that also included Jackie Reyes Yanes, Terry Lynch, Aparna Raj and Miguel Trindade Deramo. Those results matter because they will decide who carries the ward’s voice into January, and because the same primary is likely to settle the battle before the general election ever becomes a factor.
The most unusual race centered on Doni Crawford, who was appointed in January to fill Kenyan McDuffie’s at-large seat after he vacated it to run for mayor as a Democrat. McDuffie had won that council seat as an independent under rules requiring some nonmajority-party members, a reminder that the vacancy Crawford inherited came from a political arrangement built to keep the council’s balance from tilting too far in one direction. Crawford, who was the director for the D.C. Council’s Committee on Business and Economic Development before her appointment, ran against Jacque Patterson, the president of the D.C. State Board of Education, and Elissa Silverman, a former at-large council member, to finish the term.
That structure is why the primary results already carry so much weight. Two additional members are headed to the council in January, and November will formally determine who fills the open seats. But in a city where Democrats dominate registration, Tuesday’s winners are the ones most likely to be sworn in, leaving the real question not whether the council changes, but how much of it changes at once.
