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Democrats dominate voting in most area towns

Democrats dominate voting in most area towns

Victor Flores was proud to return home to North Canaan from Harvard University (where he is a sophomore) to cast his ballot in the Nov. 3 election.

Photo by Tom Zetterstrom

Connecticut voters chose Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden over Republican President Donald Trump on Tuesday, Nov. 3. Although vote counts continued through this week, it has been generally acknowledged that Biden was the victor nationwide as well.

In total in Connecticut, the ticket of Biden and Kamala Harris received 1,070,195 votes, and the ticket of Trump and Vice President Mike Pence garnered 711,137 votes.

Incumbent U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes (D-5) beat GOP challenger David X. Sullivan for the 5th Congressional District seat, 171,891 to 142,678.

Incumbent state Sen. Craig R. Miner (R-30) won his reelection bid for the state Senate as of this writing. He led challenger David R. Gronbach, 28,684 to 23,115.

Incumbent state Rep. Maria Horn (D-64) won reelection, beating Republican Brian Ohler 7,144 to 6,638.

Voters in the six Region One towns went big for the Democratic presidential and vice presidential nominees, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

The six towns in the Region One School District are Canaan (Falls Village), Cornwall, Kent, North Canaan, Salisbury and Sharon.

In Cornwall, 760 preferred the Democrats to 250 for the incumbent Republicans, President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence.

In Falls Village, Biden won the vote with 437. Trump took 209 votes.

Kent went for Biden 1,249 to Trump’s 568.

The margin was much closer in North Canaan, where Biden beat Trump 842 to 786.

Salisbury was lopsided, with Biden getting 2,023 votes to a scanty 502 votes for Trump.

And Sharon went for Biden, 1,019 to 510.

Region One voters preferred incumbent Democratic Congresswoman Jahana Hayes to Republican challenger David X. Sullivan by similar margins. Hayes appeared on two lines on the ballot, the Democratic and Working Families lines. In Cornwall, Hayes received 758 votes to Sullivan’s 255.

Falls Village went for Hayes, 431 to 192.

Hayes took Kent, 1,263 to 566.

The challenger won in North Canaan, 716 to 491.

In Salisbury, Hayes won with 1,969 votes. Sullivan netted 525 votes.

And in Sharon, Hayes beat Sullivan 1,003 to 499.

The final results in the 30th District State Senate race was late in being announced. Incumbent state Sen. Craig Miner (R-30) said in a phone interview Wednesday afternoon, Nov.4, that the problem was a large number of absentee ballots in New Milford, as many as 5,000.

(New Milford is Gronbach’s home town, where he served as mayor.)

Gronbach conceded the race late Tuesday night.

Miner did not fare well in most Region One towns.

In Cornwall, Gronbach won, 682 to 317. In Falls Village he received 355 votes vs. 256 for Miner, and in Kent Gronbach cruised with 1139 votes to Miner’s 659.

Miner won in North Canaan, 954 to 601.

In Salisbury, Gronbach won handily, 1,754 to 667. It was a little tighter in Sharon, with Gronbach prevailing 906 to 579.

Nonetheless, Miner prevailed.

State Rep. Maria Horn (D-64) won reelection in a rematch from 2018 with Republican Brian Ohler. Ohler carried two Region One towns: North Canaan 1,138 to 512 for Horn, and Falls Village, where Ohler was ahead by 330 to 318.

Ohler is a North Canaan native son.

Horn dominated in the other four towns. In Cornwall, it was Horn 699 to 328. In Kent Horn received 1,154 votes to Ohler’s 690.

Salisbury went for Horn, 1,728 to 797, and in Sharon Horn won with 871-672.

Many voters took advantage of the relaxed restrictions on absentee ballots, because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Wednesday morning, Connecticut Secretary of the State Denise Merrill said the state should permanently relax the absentee voting rules.

“More than 650,000 voters cast an absentee ballot in 2020 — the people have spoken,” she said in a news release.

2020 Northwest Corner election results

Canaan (Falls Village) 2020.jpg

Cornwall 2020.jpg

Kent 2020.jpg

North Canaan 2020.jpg

Salisbury 2020.jpg

Sharon 2020.jpg

State and Regional 2020.jpg

Patrick L. Sullivan
Senior Reporter
Patrick Sullivan has been a reporter for The Lakeville Journal since 2004, covering everything from town meetings to local characters and the outdoors. He grew up in Northern Virginia but spent summers on Mount Riga in Salisbury, giving him a lifelong connection to the Northwest Corner. A graduate of Denison University, Patrick is also the author of Tangled Lines, the newspapers’ popular fly-fishing column—making The Lakeville Journal, as far as anyone knows, the only newspaper in Connecticut with a regular fly-fishing columnist. He once received a fan letter from England, which he considers sufficient evidence that his work has achieved international acclaim.

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