Jesse Scheckner
Palm Beach County voters, Democratic Rep. Katherine Waldron and her Republican challenger, former Wellington Mayor Anne Gerwig, will have to wait a while longer to know who will occupy the seat representing House District 93.
Gerwig leads slightly in the current count, with just 0.46 percentage points (356 votes) separating her and Waldron after mail-in and in-person ballots were fully tallied. That lead is inside the threshold to trigger a machine recount.
Secretary of State Cord Byrd ordered a recount for the race Thursday. It commenced at 10 a.m. Friday, with the Palm Beach County Canvassing Board conducting a public logic and accuracy test at Supervisor of Elections Wendy Sartory Link’s main office.
“I expect to be successful at this point,” Gerwig told Florida Politics late Tuesday. “Nothing would surprise me, but I’ve received many congratulations tonight.”
Florida Politics contacted Waldron for comment but did not immediately get a response. This report will be updated upon receipt of one. Late Thursday, the Palm Beach Post reported that incoming House Speaker Daniel Perez had already ordered that Waldron’s access to the state computer network be blocked as early as Wednesday.
While Gerwig performed strongly in fundraising and campaign messaging ahead of Election Day, she faced an uphill battle. By the Division of Elections’ latest count, 37% of the voters in HD 93 are registered Democrats, 31% are Republicans, and 32% are third- or no-party voters.
Waldron, 64, raised $311,000 this cycle, with about $72,000 in cash on hand heading into the race’s home stretch.
Gerwig, 61, raised $163,000 and had $75,000 left. She also received nearly $44,000 worth of in-kind aid from the Republican Party of Florida for staff, polling and research costs.
Waldron reported no such help from the Florida Democratic Party.
By her count, Waldron passed the most bills of any freshman House Democrat since the 2022 election while bringing home millions in appropriations.
In a second term, she promised she’d fight to reverse legislation that blocked one-way attorneys fees in the state so homeowners can better battle insurance malfeasance and revive a measure she carried last Session to classify firing a bullet onto someone else’s property without permission as trespassing.
Her platform also prioritized helping localities mitigate climate change effects, expanding access to mental health and addiction services, and extending the deadline for condo owners to comply with Florida’s new post-surfside safety law.
Gerwig, who served as Mayor from 2016 to 2024 after a six-year stint on the Wellington Village Council, had an ambitious list of policy proposals. She vowed to push for creating a Florida insurance bill of rights, establishing an insurance fraud task force to root out abuses and lower rates, and making holiday sales taxes permanent.
A self-described education advocate, she also promised to fight to increase teacher pay and classroom funding and to require that financial literacy be part of Florida’s public education curriculum.
Waldron supported the pro-abortion Amendment 4. Gerwig said she prefers a 15-week ban, which the state had in place (without exceptions for rape and incest) before GOP lawmakers pushed through the current six-week ban in 2023.
Campaign ads in the race grew uglier as Election Day approached. A 30-second spot by the House Republican Campaign Committee labeled Waldron as “wacky,” citing her votes for bills expanding a Florida law that limits LGBTQ inclusion in public schools and another banning gender-affirming care for minors as signs she supports “sexually explicit books in grade schools” and “taxpayer-funded sex changes for minors.”
Waldron’s camp ran several digital ads describing Gerwig as an “absent Mayor” because she recused herself from Village Council votes — a move necessary when there are potential conflicts of interest — and bashing her for going negative in campaign ads after saying she wouldn’t.
HD 93 covers Wellington, parts of Greenacres and a western portion of Boynton Beach. Waldron won in 2022 by 1 percentage point (864 votes) against Republican Saulis Banionis, a medical doctor who raised and spent about 60% of what Waldron did, though Waldron previously faced three Democratic Primary opponents.
According to MCI Maps, the district swung widely Democratic in 2018 and 2020, siding with Andrew Gillum for Governor by 15 points and Joe Biden for President by 11 points, respectively.
But it swung Republican in 2022, with voters picking Gov. Ron DeSantis by 3.7 points and U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio by 0.2 points.
One comment
It's Complicated
November 11, 2024 at 10:59 am
Can anyone cite an election in Florida in the past dozen years where a recount changed more votes than can be counted on one hand, much less the outcome of an election? Florida elections run smooth and timely these days.
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