Election officials in Texas met on Tuesday evening to vote for former Houston mayor Sylvester Turner to fill the vacant seat left by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas), who died on July 19 of pancreatic cancer.
Turner defeated five other candidates for the slot and will likely be elected in November as the 18th district skews Democrat. His primary competition came from former Houston city council member Amanda Edwards, who had unsuccessfully opposed Jackson Lee earlier this year in Texas’s primary election.
Seventy-eight Democrat precinct chairs participated in the election, which was held at Houston’s Wheeler Baptist Church.
Turner edged out Edwards in the first round of voting, taking 35 votes over her 34. Since no candidate received a 51 percent majority, a runoff was triggered between the top two candidates. He won the full victory 41–37 in the final vote. Turner was favored to win Jackson Lee’s spot on the ballot, and had already received the endorsement of her two children….
