2023 Philadelphia mayoral election megathread

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Anyone but Amen or Jeff Brown.

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Not sure if anyone has been paying attention but there's been a pretty large scandal for Helen Gym. Not sure if it's enough to cost her the nomination, but she appeared at a cocktail party at the Union League, just a few days after going after them for giving an award to DeSantis.

I liked Gym and probably would've voted for her, though there's more than a few candidates I do like. But this does come off really hypocritical of her, and disappointing to say the least

Ugh I haven't been keeping up with the news but that's disappointing.

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Fmr Mayor John Street endorses Rhynhart for Mayor

“You get a sense of the requirements of the job,” Street said. “It has not gotten easier — it has gotten more complex. There is only one person I know who is a candidate for mayor, who worked in two distinct administrations, who was a city controller for five years. She has looked at the operations of every single department for half of a decade.”

“I am going to be in meetings. I’ll go to the wards,” Street said. “I will be helping with public policy. I am going to do whatever I can.”

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Maria Quiñones Sanchez has suspended her campaign.

Former city councilmember Maria Quiñones Sánchez announced she will be suspending her campaign for mayor.

Maria Quiñones Sánchez was running for the Democratic nomination in the Philadelphia mayoral race. This announcement comes ahead of the May 16 primaries.

"I am sorry to be suspending my campaign. I ran for mayor because I've lived every challenge this city faces, and with my policy and legislative experience, I felt I could tackle our city's challenges head-on," said Maria Quiñones Sánchez in a statement sent out on Easter Sunday.

Unfortunate, especially because she was the only Latina in the race.

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Maria Quiñones Sanchez has suspended her campaign.

Former city councilmember Maria Quiñones Sánchez announced she will be suspending her campaign for mayor.

Maria Quiñones Sánchez was running for the Democratic nomination in the Philadelphia mayoral race. This announcement comes ahead of the May 16 primaries.

"I am sorry to be suspending my campaign. I ran for mayor because I've lived every challenge this city faces, and with my policy and legislative experience, I felt I could tackle our city's challenges head-on," said Maria Quiñones Sánchez in a statement sent out on Easter Sunday.

Unfortunate, especially because she was the only Latina in the race.

Shes not the only one, there’s Sandra Cano (Colombian) and Sabina Matos (Dominican). Ana Quezada (Dominican too) has filed paperwork to run

Might have your threads mixed up here

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Ed Rendell has endorsed Rhynart. She now has the last 3 Philly mayors endorsements (outside of Kenney of course)

Jeff Brown has seemingly imploded even more, given his anti-union comments the other night.

At this rate, I seriously think it's between Parker and Rhynhart. Gym seems to have hit a ceiling and feels like she constantly gets more backlash than anything. But we'll see what the poll says tomorrow!

This is all good. I was driving through the city last week when I was going to a show and I was upset with how many Jeff Brown yard signs I saw. I think if I lived in the city, I would probably vote for Parker at this point.

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First nonpartisan poll from SurveyUSA!

With leaners:

Rhynhart 19%
Parker 17%
Gym 16%
Domb 15%
Jeff Brown 12%
DeLeon/Amen Brown/Bloom 2% each

https://www.surveyusa.com/client/PollReport.aspx?g=25ef4518-2905-426f-8cd0-ce19aa81acb0

In the full results, 20%(!) are still undecided. With these margins, it is quite literally anyone's race to win.

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McPhillips is Gym's campaign manager and D4P was Fetterman's internal pollster, so I'm assuming this is a Gym internal

https://twitter.com/BrendanMcP/status/1654463837398073346

Big grain of salt but this is encouraging. I'd be happy with any of these top 3 winning.

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Two canvassers for OnePa, one of the key progressive organizing groups in town, got into a shootout that led to one tragically dying. One of the guns was illegal too.
https://www.inquirer.com/news/philly-gun-violence-onepa-shooting-homicide-20230508.html

Good god that's upsetting. This seems like it was purely personal, but it's so emblematic of the gun issue as a whole...so tragic.

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Yeah anyone's guess here is as good as mine. I think if I lived in Philly and they had RCV, I'd go Gym, then Parker, then Rhynhart. I'd be happy with any of them winning.

My absolute GUESS, though, is that things might end looking like this:

Gym - 22.9%
Parker - 22.5%
Rhynhart - 21.8%
Brown - 15%
Domb - 14%

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Well, congrats to Mayor-elect Parker. I didn't expect the margin of victory to be as large as it was, but nevertheless I am excited to see how she governs. I don't necessarily agree with her approach on crime, but I am curious to see how it works and I wish her the best.

She's only 50, by the way, so she could have a pretty lengthy career ahead of her still.

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I assume Parker is the heavy favorite? Does Oh have any chance? I've heard rumors he might.

No. Not a chance.

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Reading some post-mortems written by some Philly local journalists and it has been quite interesting to say the least.

I think there are a couple major takeaways from this race: Philly voters are apathetic and the candidates are to blame. I think this race should be a good reminder that politics will always be local first and national last. The candidate who tried the hardest to nationalize the race (Gym) ended up crashing and burning the hardest.

Parker won because people know her, and she was able to court black voters very well, which is paramount in Philadelphia.

She also won because turnout was abysmal. People were just flat out not enthusiastic with the candidates they had and I think the dogfight between the candidates who ultimately did not win contributed to voter apathy. People are really tired of negative ads and finger pointing. They want someone who can govern, who can deliver, and will not get bogged down promising things they cannot realistically deliver.

This should be a major takeaway for Democrats. As someone who considers themselves progressive, but a pragmatic progressive, I was hoping Gym would win but I held major skepticism that, even if she did win, she wouldn't be able to do much as Mayor.

Ultimately, the establishment won here. Maybe that's a bad thing, but progressives ought to learn to work with the establishment at the local level and pull the party left.

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Well and it's all about coalitions. Parker also won because she got a huge share of the black vote, while Domb got the whiter northeast moderate/conservative vote, and Rhynhart and Gym basically split the white/progressive/young vote.

Parker did horrendously with white voters it looks like, but black voters were unanimously with her, which helped her break out.

I thought it was pretty funny that a majority of wealthy voters split between Gym and Rhynhart.

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Who would’ve won the Democratic primary if runoffs were required in Philadelphia elections?

Parker still

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I was driving through North Wales (about 25 miles north of Philadelphia) the other day and saw a David Oh for Mayor sign. I haven't even seen one in Philadelphia proper.