Comitta’s lead in 19th holds up for win
State Rep. Carolyn Comitta declared victory on Saturday, after vote totals that included a heavy dose of mail-in ballots showed her with a significant lead over her two rivals for the Democratic Party’s nomination to run for the 19th state Senate District in the fall.
“Although the election has yet to be certified and provisional ballots remain to be counted, and no one knows better than I that every vote counts, it is apparent that I have won the Primary for Senate District 19,” Comitta said in a post on her campaign Facebook page.
“The 2020 General Election will be the most consequential election of our lives,” Comitta said. “We are facing four major national issues at once: a pandemic; a protest movement against police brutality toward people of color as a result of systemic racism; the sharpest economic downturn in decades; and an autocratic president who threatens the very fundamentals of our democracy and our Constitution.
“Now more than ever we need to come together, respect each other, stand together and rebuild our country to reflect the vision of our founding fathers and mothers,” she said.
Unofficial results from the Chester County Office of Voter Services showed Comitta of West
Chester leading the field of three, with 18,615 vote, or 51 percent of the total, to Senate staffer Don Vymazal’s 11,502, or 31 percent, and Tredyffrin-Easttown School Board member Kyle Boyer’s 6,046 votes, or 16 percent.
Her vote totals were impressive. She won almost every municipality in the district — losing to Vymazal only on his home turf around Phoenixville and to Boyer in Tredyffrin, where he is a well-known member of the school board. She carried precincts in rural southern and western Chester County, won in urban areas such as Coatesville, Downingtown and West Chester, and in suburban townships such as West Bradford and East Whiteland.
She even won every precinct in West Whiteland, the backyard of current state Sen. Andy Dinniman, who backed her opponent Vymazal.
Comitta, a two-term West Chester mayor, and member of the state House of Representatives for the 156th Legislative District since 2017, had led the race since Election Night.
But because of the low turnout from in-person voters on Tuesday — fewer than half of the total number of votes were cast by that method — and the large number of mail-in and absentee ballots — as many as 20,947 remained outstanding on Wednesday morning — she had held back on declaring herself the winner until all but the last of the votes were tallied.
She will now face Republican Kevin Rumey in the fall for the 19th state Senate seat. Rumey, a township supervisor from London Grove, received 18,976 votes running unopposed on the GOP ticket. Democrats hold the voter registration edge in the district, 81,264 to 69,759, with 32,034 registered independents or voters in third-parties.
Results are not official until they are certified by the county Board of Elections.
Comitta’s comment about knowing the value of every vote counting refers to her first election to the state House, when the race between her and incumbent Republican Dan Truitt was too close to call and went through a laborious recount process. She was not declared the winner until more than a month after the election.
The unusual “coronavirus campaign” began in early February when Dinniman made the surprise announcement that he had decided not to seek another term to the seat he had held since 2006. He cited a desire to concentrate on his family life as he enters his late 70s.
Dinniman was quick to announce his support for Vymazal, his longtime assistant who holds the title of government relations and policy director. The Chester County Democratic Committee, later in February, gave its endorsement to Vymazal over Boyer, who had announced his candidacy even before Dinniman quit the race, and Comitta. But Comitta was quick to add important endorsements of her own, including Gov. Tom Wolf and several county elected officials.
The 19th District is the largest of the four state Senate districts in the county,
Comitta
its boundaries holding 40 of the county’s 73 municipalities, from the rural areas of southern Chester County to urban areas including Coatesville, West Chester and Phoenixville and suburban strongholds like Tredyffrin and East and West Whiteland.
Comitta’s opponents both have campaign experience of their own — Boyer winning election to the T/E School Board in 2017 and Vymazal having worked for a number of candidates before launching his own campaign, including Dinniman.
Boyer, 32, of Tredyffrin is a teacher in the Norristown
Area School District. An ordained minister at the Mt. Carmel Church of God In Christ, he also serves as the president of the West Chester NAACP. On his campaign Facebook page, Boyer said he would wait until the votes in the race are certified before making comment but had already congratulated Comitta on her nomination.
Vymazal, 38, of Phoenixville is a graduate of Gettysburg College and West Chester University, where he teaches as an adjunct professor. As Dinniman’s staff liaison and aide since 2006, he has worked on a host of public projects with community, business, non-profit and government groups. He is a member of the Phoenixville Planning Commission.
His Facebook page showed no comments on the election results.
Comitta, 68, worked as a teacher of special education and gifted students in the Octorara Area School District for 12 years, and for her family planning business. She first ran for elective office in 2005, taking over for former state Rep. Barbara McIlvaine Smith when she was elected to the state House.
Comitta also ran in Tuesday’s election for nomination to the 156th Legislative seat, winning unopposed. She said on Saturday that she would soon withdraw from that race and allow the Chester County Democratic Committee members fro the district to select a replacement candidate who will face Republican Len Iacono, of West Goshen.
In her statement, Comitta thanked her campaign volunteers and voters for their commitment to the election, despite the enormous challenges posed by the COVID-19 outbreak.
“The great pandemic of 2020 necessitated that we initiate a virtual campaign which kept us from knocking on your doors, but allowed us to communicate via phone, text, social media and mail,” she said. “There is nothing that can replace being together face to face! But for now, I will continue to reach out and to listen in the safest and most meaningful ways I can.”