Dan Gecker has won the Democratic primary for Virginia’s 10th Senate District, an open seat encompassing all of Powhatan County and parts of Chesterfield County and Richmond City.
Unofficial results of the primary election held on Tuesday, June 9 have Gecker, a Chesterfield Board of Supervisors member and developer, winning with 46.5 percent of the vote with 100 percent of the ballots counted, according to results posted on the Virginia Department of Elections’ website.
Gecker beat out Emily Francis, who had 34.26 percent of the vote, and Alex McMurtrie Jr., who had 19.24 percent.
In Powhatan County, 287 people (41.59 percent) voted for Gecker over 230 votes (33.33 percent) for McMurtrie and 173 votes (25.07 percent) for Francis.
Shortly after his victory was announced, Gecker released a statement saying he was humbled by the support he has received in the past few weeks and considered hearing from so many District 10 constituents “one of the greatest gifts of this campaign so far.”
“And from Richmond to Chesterfield to Powhatan our regions’ priorities are clear: We need to continue to ensure every child has the same access and opportunity to education, we need to grow our local businesses and our local economy by ensuring the rules of the road are stable, fair and that we are matching skills to jobs,” Gecker said. “And we must put aside ideological differences in order to make government work for people.
“In eight years on the board of supervisors, I have gone to great lengths to work across the aisle to improve the quality of life for our residents, and I am looking forward to doing the same for Virginia’s 10th Senate District. Our community and our region deserve nothing less,” he said.
Senate District 10 is currently held by Sen. John Watkins, R-10, who announced in late 2014 that he was retiring at the end of his term. At the end of his career, Watkins will have represented Powhatan at the state level for 34 years. He was first elected in the House of Delegates in 1982 and served there until 1998. He has served in the 10th senatorial district since 1998.
Democrats need to pick up only one seat in order to regain control of the 40-member chamber, in which Democratic Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam casts tie-breaking votes.
Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe endorsed Gecker and the party is hoping Gecker can defeat Republican Glen Sturtevant in the fall and swing the Senate into Democratic control.
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