SF district attorney, District 5 supe races neck and neck

Chesa Boudin looks like he’s celebrating Tuesday. Although San Francisco’s progressive candidate for district attorney is leading with less than 2,000 votes, he is so far beating out mayor-appointed Interim District Attorney Suzy Loftus, according to a Department of Elections update around 11 p.m.

Nancy Tung is coming in third place with 22,329 votes — Leif Dautch is ranking last with just a little more than 15 percent.

Loftus was appointed interim DA last month by Mayor London Breed when former DA George Gascon suddenly resigned. The mayor’s move to put Loftus in the position so near the election received wide criticism. Some called it “political favoritism.”

Loftus said at her election night party Tuesday night:

“This campaign has been all heart and it’s been all San Francisco.”

She added:

“The night is young. We are going to watch very closely. We’re all going to be hitting refresh.”

Vallie Brown is losing the District 5 supervisor race to Dean Preston by a small margin. Brown, also a Breed appointee. is less than one percentage point behind Preston, who’s drawn more than 47 percent of the first-ranked votes.

Among other priorities, Preston has run on a platform of free Muni for all and 10,000 affordable housing units in 10 years.

Update: As of midnight, Suzy Loftus has a 240-vote lead over Chesa Boudin after factoring in ranked choice voting. In the Distrct 5 race, Dean Preston leads Supervisor Vallie Brown by 218 votes.

Jerold Chinn

Jerold serves as a reporter and San Francisco Bureau Chief for SFBay covering transportation and occasionally City Hall and the Mayor's Office in San Francisco. His work on transportation has been recognized by the San Francisco Press Club. Born and raised in San Francisco, he graduated from San Francisco State University with a degree in journalism. Jerold previously wrote for the San Francisco Public Press, a nonprofit, noncommercial news organization. When not reporting, you can find Jerold taking Muni to check out new places to eat in the city.