District 8 Race Still Undecided
Prince George’s County Council Special Election Count Continues, Slowed By High Numbers Of Drop Off Ballots, Winter Storm
By Tiffany Young
The special election race for a new county councilmember to represent District 8 remains undecided at Prince George’s Suite Magazine & Media met deadline Jan. 6.
Prince George’s County Council held a special primary election on Jan. 4 for the District 8 County Council member seat left vacant by Monique Anderson-Walker.
Anderson-Walker abruptly resigned from her role on the council and joined Peter Franchot, the state comptroller, in his campaign for governor. She will focus on the gubernatorial ticket as the candidate for lieutenant governor.
But the votes are still being tallied in the process.
The county’s Board of Elections Office reported that it received an unexpectedly high number of ballots—over 5,000 mail-in ballots alone. Monday’s winter storm also caused delay in the counting.
The field of candidates include: Former county councilmember and state delegate Tony Knotts, Edward Burroughs III (of Temple Hills, he currently works as legislative affairs director in the Prince George’s County State’s Attorney’s office) and Jerry Mathis, who owns a real estate firm as well as Vernon Wade, Marjorie Smith and Sidney Gibson.
District 8 includes constituent areas of Andrews Air Force Base, Camp Springs, Clinton, Forest Heights, Fort Washington, Glass Manor, Marlow Heights, Oxon Hill and Temple Hills. After the votes are officially tallied, the winner will move on to the special general election slated for Feb. 1 to represent District 8.
Whomever wins will need to run again in the June 28 primary to secure a full, four-year term. Provisional ballots are scheduled to be counted Jan. 12 and to continue through Jan. 14. The total number of mail-in ballots received as of 3:00 p.m. Wednesday, January 5 is 5,308. “This number includes ballots collected from our four drop boxes,” according to the Prince George’s County Board of Election website.
