Morelle re-elected to third term in Congress, Singletary concedes NY-25 race
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Democrat Joe Morelle fended off a challenge from Republican La'Ron Singletary for a third term representing Rochester in New York's 25th congressional district, according to unofficial returns.
Morelle had 53 percent compared to 46 percent for Singletary, a margin of about 20,000 votes, according to the state Board of Elections.
Morelle was conciliatory in remarks early Wednesday morning, thanking Singletary for running and saying he hoped to work together with him and others.
"At the end of the day, we all want the same things: stability, security and opportunity," he said.
The race was initially seen as a safe Democratic hold but appeared to tighten in the month before the election as the national trend turned Republican. National political action groups on both sides spent an unexpected amount of money in the last month.
Morelle, of Irondequoit, spent nearly 30 years in the state Legislature before successfully running for Congress in 2018 following the death of Louise Slaughter. He has been a solid centrist in the party and loyalist to President Joe Biden. He campaigned on health care reform, gun control and access to reproductive health.
Singletary is a career police officer, culminating in a term as chief of the Rochester Police Department. He resigned and then was fired in the aftermath of the death of Daniel Prude at the hands of Rochester police.
He ran on a platform of public safety, family values and job creation, but struggled to escape the stain of the Prude incident and to explain his position -- pro-choice but opposed to Roe v. Wade -- on abortion.
Singletary did not speak Tuesday night. In a statement released after 1 a.m. Wednesday, he said the race was "not over" and called for an investigation regarding "unprecedented irregularities." He did not describe what he meant except to say: "Throughout the evening, several issues came into question regarding the validity of ballots and how they were accounted for and recorded."
However, Wednesday afternoon, Singletary conceded, saying the explanation from elections commissions satisfied his concerns.
The Monroe County Board of Elections failed to post results online as usual Tuesday night due to what the Democratic and Republican called a software problem with the reporting system. Final figures posted early Wednesday morning showed Morelle ahead by about 20,000 votes.
Lisa Nicolay, the Republican election commissioner and a Singletary supporter, said there was "no question that those are the results."
This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Joe Morelle defeats La'Ron Singletary in NY-25
