Hardesty heads to runoff in Portland City Council race, will face Gonzalez or Mozyrsky
PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) -- Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, a big critic of Portland Police Bureau, attracted a slew of challengers for the Position 3 seat on the Portland City Council. Now, one of the candidates will take her on in a runoff.
Despite her commanding lead, Hardesty will head to a runoff in November because has not gained 50% of the vote -- she currently has garnered 43% of the vote. Commissioner Ryan, running for re-election in Position 2, has over 57% of the vote.
Who Commissioner Hardesty will face in November has yet to be determined since votes are still coming in by mail. Rene Gonzalez currently has just over 1,000 more votes than the next closest competitor, Vadim Mozyrsky.
Hardesty's challengers pushed a more pro-police platform. But whether the opposing candidate is Mozyrsky or Gonzalez, the challenger will have to double their support in the runoff.
"With a lot more voters, there's a lot more people to reach. That actually helps an incumbent because the challengers are going to have more of a difficulty raising money. They don't have the same financial networks, the same fundraising networks. And there's name recognition," said Jack Miller, senior instructor of political science at Portland State University.
This runoff will happen during the general election, and Miller says that means there will be a lot more voters taking part in it.
Elizabeth Dinh contributed to this story.