Shumlin re-elected as Vermont governor
Vermont’s state legislature wrapped up this election cycle’s longest-running gubernatorial contest Thursday when it voted to keep Gov. Peter Shumlin around for another two-year term.
The result is in keeping with a trend seen in gubernatorial races nationwide in 2014, in which the candidates who benefitted from more spending on TV ads than their opponents won at the ballot box.
In an unusual twist in Vermont, though, state lawmakers got the final say in the race when neither Shumlin, a Democrat, nor Republican Scott Milne received a majority of the votes cast on Nov. 4.
Thursday’s decision makes Shumlin one of 29 candidates for governor in 2014 who won their races after being bolstered by more spending on TV ads than their opponents, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of media tracking firm Kantar Media/CMAG data. In six of the other seven races, the winners were incumbents who didn’t need as much help from the airwaves. Only Maryland Republican Larry Hogan won after being outspent by ads favoring former Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown, a Democrat.
Before voters went to the polls on Nov. 4, the campaign to re-elect Shumlin spent roughly four and a half times what Milne’s campaign did on TV ads and more than 36 times what Libertarian Dan Feliciano’s campaign spent. The other five candidates on the ballot did not air ads captured by Kantar Media/CMAG.
Shumlin also received more votes in the November election — 46.5 percent to Milne’s 45.3 percent. But with eight candidates vying for the governor’s mansion, none received more than 50 percent of the votes cast, a requirement in the state’s constitution. As a result, the Vermont legislature cast the deciding votes Thursday in a secret ballot: 110 for Shumlin, 69 for Milne and none for the third-highest vote-getter in November, Feliciano. (Democrats dominate both chambers with 104 of the 180 seats.)
Related: Who's calling the shots in the states?
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This story is part of Who’s Calling the Shots in State Politics?. The Center exposes the powerful special interests that drive elections and policy in the states. Click here to read more stories in this blog.
Copyright 2014 The Center for Public Integrity. This story was published by The Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit, nonpartisan investigative news organization in Washington, D.C.
