So far, voters appear more interested in San Antonio’s heated June 7 runoff contests than the first round of voting.
An overwhelmingly long ticket, voter fatigue and Fiesta celebrations were all blamed for depressingly low turnout in the May 3 election, where 10 council seats and a 27-candidate mayor’s race were on the ballot.
Now voters are down to a head-to-head mayoral contest between two ideologically opposite candidates, Gina Ortiz Jones and Rolando Pablos, as well as City Council runoffs in Districts 1, 6, 8 and 9, since no candidate took 50% of the vote in the first round of those races.
With the exception of District 6, all of the runoffs came down to left-right matchups, adding to the polarization of a nonpartisan election.
After three days of early voting, about 38,600 in-person runoff ballots had been cast — up roughly 80% from that same point in the general election, according to data compiled by San Antonio political firm Flagship Campaigns.
Flagship Campaigns owner Bert Santibañez has worked for Jones’ mayoral campaign, and shared the numbers at the request of the San Antonio Report.
Pablos’ campaign said it’s also observing growing interest from the first round.
The eight-day early voting window runs though June 2, with hours varying by day. Voters can choose from any of these early voting locations and don’t need to have had cast a ballot in the first round to participate.
Election day voting will take place on Saturday, June 7, with a much longer list of polls open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
In addition to in-person voting, Bexar County Elections Administrator Michele Carew said mail ballot requests were up too.
About 4,900 mail ballots were sent out for the May 3 race, compared to 5,700 for the runoff.
A focus on the Northside
The last time San Antonio had a mayoral runoff between Mayor Ron Nirenberg and conservative challenger Greg Brockhouse in 2019, runoff turnout also exceeded the first round.
Nirenberg won with 51.11% of the vote to Brockhouse’s 48.89%.
To succeed where no conservative mayoral candidate has in many years, Pablos’ campaign is focused on turning out his base on the city’s North Side — where turnout appears to be growing the most from the first round.
That’s also where two council runoffs, for District 8 and District 9, are on the ballot.
So far, the districts with the biggest turnout increases have so far been Northside Districts 9 and 10, Santibañez. (District 10 doesn’t have a council runoff on the ballot because incumbent Councilman Marc Whyte was reelected outright.)
Meanwhile turnout in Eastside District 2, where incumbent Councilman Jalen McKee-Rodriguez also outright, is slightly down from the first round.
Asked about the turnout so far on Friday, Pablos’ campaign was enthusiastic.
“As expected, with a stark choice between two candidates, we are seeing even greater enthusiasm among our voters for Rolando’s policy positions, his character, and his vision for leading San Antonio,” Pablos’ campaign consultant Justin Hollis said in a statement.
Santibañez, on the other hand, noted that even San Antonio’s reddest parts are competitive for both political parties, meaning bigger Northside turnout doesn’t necessarily mean an advantage for one candidate or the other.
For example, Northside Bexar County Commissioner Precinct 3 supported both a Democrat, U.S. Senate candidate Colin Allred, and a Republican, Bexar County Commissioner Grant Moody, on the same ticket in the November election.
“For most political observers locally, the knee-jerk assumption is that the North Side is solidly red, but in recent elections, both [former President Joe] Biden and Allred won County Commissioner Precinct 3,” Santibañez said.
