State Senate: Peter Durant wins Republican primary in Worcester & Hampshire District

Republicans in the Worcester and Hampshire District voting in the special election Tuesday made their choice, casting the majority of their ballots to elect Peter Durant of Spencer.

Durant, now a state representative, will vie for the Senate seat left vacant when Anne Gobi accepted a position with the Healey/Driscoll administration as the director of rural affairs for Massachusetts.

The primary pitted Durant against Bruce Chester, a retired U.S. Army captain now working as an adjunct professor at Fitchburg State University and a driver.

Durant has served in the House since 2011 and serves as the ranking minority member of the Joint Committee on the Judiciary.

"I am very happy the voters decided to send me to the general election in November," Durant said Wednesday. He thanked Chester for a "spirited race," and believes he has a lot of momentum going into the fall. Durant accepted Chester's offer of support for his candidacy.

In discussing his campaign, Durant said two issues were front of mind for voters he spoke with during his door-knocking and public events: the influx of migrants into the state and the proposed overhaul of Massachusetts gun laws.

"The right-to-shelter law in Massachusetts is an enormous issue," Durant said, predicting that the cost of sheltering migrants will affect residents directly in personal ways. According to his calculations, sheltering the thousands of migrants and their families coming to the Bay State could cost $6 billion a year, a funding level that he believes will be impossible to sustain given a looming recession and shortfalls in tax revenue.

Adjusting the right-to-shelter law to include only residents who have lived in Massachusetts for at least three years, Durant believes, could stem the migrant flow to Massachusetts.

Durant garnered 2,340 votes, while Chester received 1,649 votes, unofficially. The vote tally is preliminary; absentee ballots have yet to be counted and the election has to be certified by the Secretary of the Commonwealth.

"I am so appreciative of everybody," Chester said in an interview after results were in. "Running for office is a humbling process."

The general election is Nov. 7.

Durant will face state Rep. Jonathan Zlotnik, the lone Democrat to throw his hat in the ring. Zlotnik, a Gardner resident, is serving his sixth two-year term as the city's representative in the House of Representatives.

Chester conceded the race and called Durant at 9:47 p.m. In that conversation, he pledged his full support to Durant.

In other elections Tuesday, Gardner voters set up a mayoral election between incumbent Michael Nicholson and Kimberly Blake. The preliminary vote resulted in a third candidate, Martin Gray, being eliminated.

In Marlborough, the four-way preliminary election for mayor resulted in City Councilors Samantha Perlman and Christian Dumais finishing one-two, setting up a showdown Nov. 7. Patrick Hogan and Michael Baker were ousted in Tuesday's voting.

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Ballots cast, Durant will face Zlotnik for vacant senate seat