According to the preliminary election results posted by the Escambia County Supervisor of Elections office, the county only had 48,304 people vote in the Aug. 20 primary, for a 23.4% turnout percentage.
- This is the lowest primary turnout in a decade. In 2014, only 33,362 votes were cast (16.78%).
Steve Stroberger won the District 1 GOP Commission primary, defeating incumbent Jeff Bergosh by 1,533 votes. In this race, 5,269 fewer votes were cast than four years ago.
| Bergosh | 3,260 | 36.84% |
| Casey | 795 | 8.99% |
| Stroberger | 4,793 | 54.17% |
| Total | 8,848 |
Ashlee Hofberger took an early lead and built on it, walking with 37.67% of the votes in the three-person race. This race also had a lower turnout than the last primary in 2022. That year, the GOP primary saw Robert Bender defeat Stan “Quick Draw” McDaniel with 9,027 votes cast – 656 more than this primary.
| Hofberger | 3,153 | 37.67% |
| Mitchell | 2,483 | 29.66% |
| Wilson | 2,735 | 32.67% |
| Total | 8,371 |
In other Escambia County races:
ECUA D1: Vicki Campbell won with 70% of the vote
ECUA D3: Larry Williams won with 81% of the vote
School Board D4: Rich Holzknecht won with 31% of the vote, edging out Carissa Bergosh by 101 votes in the four-person primary.
School Board D5: Tom Harrell won with 59% of the vote
I will have more analysis later when the precinct results are released. We did see County Clerk Pam Childers’ and State Rep. Michelle Salzman’s endorsements prevail in the commission races. Childers backed Stroberger, and Salzman supported Hofberger.
- I suspect we will see more attack mailers in future Escambia races.