Voters in Manchester re-elected their Mayor to a second two-year term.
NHPR correspondent Sean Frederick reports.
Manchester Mayor Frank Guinta won his first bid for reelection yesterday, defeating Democratic challenger Tom Donovan 54 percent to 46 percent.
The Republican's eight point margin of victory was comfortably larger than his 2005 upset, in which he became Manchester's youngest ever chief executive by unseating a three-term incumbent.
35 percent of city voters cast ballots to cap off a campaign dominated by the issues of crime, education and taxes.
Guinta: "It's clear tonight that people in our city do want tax relief, they do want accountability in our educational system, and they want a mayor who's going to work with our police department to make our streets safer each and every day."
Guinta's record was sharply attacked during the race, and the state Democratic Party flooded Manchester mailboxes with some of the harshest rhetoric of the campaign in recent days.
Guinta believes those tactics may have backfired, calling his win "a strong and clear rejection of partisan politics."
For NHPR News in Manchester, I'm Sean Frederick.
