After a transformative election ousted most of Fairfax City Council’s experienced members, Mayor Catherine Read is pushing for election reforms to improve stability and representation.
Her plan includes adopting ranked-choice voting (RCV) and extending council terms to four years with staggered elections. Read says the changes are needed to prevent the kind of turnover seen this year, which she worries could disrupt long-term city projects.
All three incumbents vying for seats on Herndon’s town council this year are on track for reelection after all.
Councilmember Naila Alam secured a spot on the council based on the final tally of votes from this year’s Nov. 5 general election, pushing out Herndon Board of Zoning Appeals Vice Chair Stevan Michael Porter, who had an edge in preliminary election night results.
After reporting record turnout levels in 2016 and 2020, Fairfax County saw a noticeable dip in voter participation for this year’s general election.
The county reported a voter turnout of 68.35%, with 561,368 of its 821,347 registered voters casting a ballot either on Tuesday (Nov. 5) or during the 45-day early voting period, according to unofficial results that will be certified after noon tomorrow (Friday), the deadline for the county’s elections office to receive mail-in ballots.
In the wake of Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 presidential election, Fairfax County Democrats are confronting a more competitive Virginia, where heightened Republican mobilization has raised alarms about their hold on power in the purple state.
While Vice President Kamala Harris won Virginia by more than 5 percentage points, her margin was notably lower than President Joe Biden’s in 2020, when he won the state by over 10 points. Similarly, in Fairfax County, Harris captured 65.44% of the vote, down from Biden’s 69.85%.
The Town of Herndon has elected a new mayor and town council.
Councilmember Keven LeBlanc will be Herndon’s first openly gay mayor after defeating fellow Councilmember Pradip Dhakal with 55.3% of the vote to his opponent’s 43.5%, according to unofficial returns from the Virginia Department of Elections.
The polls have closed, and the results of the 2024 general election are in.
While the results in Fairfax County and elsewhere won’t be certified for days, unofficial returns indicate that Republican nominee Donald Trump will once again be president of the United States, defeating Democratic nominee and Vice President Kamala Harris in a high-stakes race that will shape the country’s direction on issues from abortion and immigration to climate change, health care and, according to many voters, the very future of democracy.
Results from today’s general election are starting to trickle in, and Fairfax County’s initial batch of tallied votes strongly favor Vice President Kamala Harris in the presidential race.
As of 9:24 p.m., Harris has about two-thirds or 66% of the votes that the county has counted so far, which include some early votes and Election Day results from 127 of the county’s 264 precincts, according to unofficial results from the Virginia Department of Elections.
More than 60% of registered voters in Fairfax County have cast a ballot so far in this year’s general election.
As of 12:30 p.m., 18.7% of voters have cast a ballot on Election Day since polls opened at 6 a.m. today. Combined with the 43% of voters who participated in early voting or sent in an absentee ballot by mail, the county has seen a total turnout of 61.7%, the Fairfax County Office of Elections reported.
Fairfax County saw high early voting turnout for this year’s presidential election, though the numbers didn’t reached the levels seen during the last presidential cycle.
Since early voting began on Sept. 20, over 322,000 residents, or 43% of the county’s 748,492 registered voters, have cast a vote, as of Friday (Nov. 2), the last day of in-person early voting, the Fairfax County Office of Elections posted on Twitter.
Halloween has arrived, but this year, the real scares might still be lurking around the corner, as Election Day approaches.
Thousands of Fairfax County voters have already cast a ballot, either in person at one of the county’s 16 early voting sites or by mail.
