Less than two days after the Washington Post's declaration that “Mayor Adrian Fenty, late in tough reelection campaign, tries to make amends,” the Mayor apparently declined to participate in a major public forum in influential Ward 5 -- a largely black, middle-class part of the city that has determined election winners in the past.
The Post's Michael DeBonis tweeted, "Greetings from the Ward 5 straw poll, where the only question is whether @grayformayor wins by a lot or wins by a whole lot t"
Council Chair candidate and former Ward 5 councilmember Vincent Orange took the opposite approach, blanketing the forum and the surrounding area with supporters and signs. DeBonis tweeted, "Secondary questions actually are interesting: Will Vincent Orange get enuf votes to win in his own backyard (literally)?" against opponent At-large Councilmember Kwame Brown.
In the end, the tweets and bloggers had it right: Gray polled an extraordinary 818 votes to Fenty's 106. Orange "managed to squeeze out a slim victory, 471 votes to Brown's 433."
3 Comments For This Article
I attended the straw poll and witnessed hundreds of voters coming out to express their displeasure with the Fenty administration. Ward 5 contains the highest voting democratic precinct (66) in the city. Because of the disrespect shown by the Fenty green team by not showing up, he will lose in a landslide when the official voting commences august 30th and ends sept.14th. Based on the pride and intensity shown by voters for Chairman Gray in the ward 5 straw poll, he will come out of this ward with 75% to 80% of the upcoming democratic primary votes. The turnout will exceed previous turnouts for democratic primaries there. This ward is located next door to ward 4, which will also end up in the Gray column.
Despite the spending of over 2 million dollars by the Fenty green team and the running of negative advertisements against Gray, it has backfired and motivated hard core democratic voters to come out and show the door to the Fenty administration early. Chairman Gray will win seven wards and lose only one, it will be an early evening on sept.14th for the Fenty green team and the WP editorial team.
Given that the Mayor did not bother to show up, 1:8 is not that bad. I heard that there were some shenanigans with the details on the Ward 5 straw poll announcement that left the Fenty campaign in the dark until the last minute and never given directly to the campaign, but everyone else clearly had advance notice to prep volunteers, signs, and campaign trucks and tents.
These are nice feel good circuses, but the election will give a fair accounting of who is supporting whom. There wont be burgers and chicken dinners, snow cones and soda pop next door at the polls.
They were "NOT" left in the dark. It's over!!! Don't you understand that?? He's arrogant and nasty as hell. Study the facts about Fenty. The honest facts. His (frat) boys have gotten paid (big time). Ronald Moten of the spendaholics um I mean peaceaholics have gotten millions from the city. Bids are not put out fairly. Sub contractors that work for his (frat) boys have not been paid.Riding his bicycle on the G.W. parkway(illegal),ordering folks out of a pool because "HE" needed the pool to take laps (that's just wrong). Trying to give the SE tennis center to one of his (frat) boys.
Dude (Fenty),back in the day I use to buy some of my sneakers from your father's store As a matter of fact my uncle is a friend of your father. When you ran for mayor, I was impressed. You said you would work hard for the city and be fair. You even claimed to have walked a hole in the soles of your shoes. What you definitely did was walked all over us and now out of our lives.
P.S.
Bloonberg from NYC ??! C'mon now