With more than 78 percent of first-choice votes, St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman sealed his re-election Tuesday night, defeating three challengers by a wide margin.
Coleman was highly favored for re-election, touting endorsements from the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party and the St. Paul Area Chamber of Commerce Political Action Committee and the support of all seven St. Paul City Council members.
The victory makes Coleman the first St. Paul mayor in 23 years to serve more than two terms.
“I’m just very excited to have another four years to keep on moving the city of St. Paul forward,” Coleman said. “[I’m] very glad for the strong showing we’ve had.”
Tim Holden, Kurt Dornfeld and Sharon Anderson opposed Coleman, who has been in office since 2005.
While Minneapolis’ mayoral race included 35 candidates and more than two dozen debates, Coleman’s road to re-election was much smoother. Just one of his challengers ran an active campaign, and there were only two scheduled debates in the mayoral race.
Holden, Coleman’s main opponent and a small-business owner, captured 16.3 percent of first-choice votes Tuesday. He did not immediately respond to requests for comment after results were posted.
According to campaign finance reports, Holden spent about $23,000 on his campaign. Coleman spent a little more than $100,000.
Anderson ran against Coleman in the last St. Paul mayoral election but received less than 4 percent of votes in the primary.
This election, she received 2.9 percent of first-choice votes. In past years, she has unsuccessfully run for state Senate and Minnesota Attorney General.
Like Minneapolis voters, St. Paul voters used the ranked-choice method Tuesday.
Anderson said she plans to challenge the election results because she believes ranked-choice voting is unconstitutional.
Dornfeld, a city street maintenance worker who was running for the first time and appeared on the ballot as “Dirty Kurty,” received 1.76 percent of the vote. He didn’t run an active campaign, filing no campaign finance reports.
Coleman said his No. 1 priority for his next term is closing the achievement gap in St. Paul.
“We’re glad that we can focus our energy now past the election and get to the work we have ahead of us,” he said.
