With 98 percent of the precincts reported as of midnight, several Pima County races can be called, but a few key ones remain undecided.
One of the most contentious races in Pima County in recent years is that for Sheriff, which pits the current sheriff, Mark Napier, against the previous sheriff, Chris Nanos. Late Tuesday, Nanos was ahead by 11,500 votes out of nearly 444,000.
Nanos had a margin of more than 32,000 votes based solely on early balloting results but it shrunk to 19,000 and then less than 12,000 as in-person voting was tabulated.
One race that is still too close to call is that of County Treasurer, where Democrat Brian Bickel is about 3,500 votes ahead of longtime incumbent Beth Ford as of press time. As with the sheriff’s race, Ford, a Republican, cut into Bickel’s lead by receiving a much large number of the in-person votes.
And on average those who voted in-person cast votes for Republican candidates by almost a 2 to 1 ratio in Pima County, Arizona’s Democratic Party stronghold.
On a national level, the Biden/Harris ticket had received more than 100,000 votes above those cast by Pima County residents for Trump/Pence as of press time, while U.S. Senator Martha McSally was outvoted by almost 110,000 in her highly watched race against Mark Kelly.
For local offices, Rex Scott, Matt Heinz, and Adelita Grijalva were elected to the board of supervisors as expected, while incumbent Sharon Bronson was reelected. Incumbent Steve Christy is in a tight race with Steve Diamond; Christy would be the only Republican on the county board if his lead holds.
Come January, Pima County residents will have a new county recorder in Gabriella Cazares-Kelly and a new assessor in Suzanne Droubie, both Democrats. There will also be a new county attorney when Laura Conover is sworn in, although she ran as a Democrat unopposed in the general election. Incumbent County School Superintendent Dustin Williams retains his office, also unopposed.
A large majority of Pima County voters approved Proposition 407 (legalizing personal use of marijuana) and Proposition 408 (income surcharge to fund public education). They also approved a permanent adjustment to the base expenditure limit for the Pima County Community College District.
Arizona Daily Independent will update the Pima County election results on Wednesday as more information is made available.