Sobanja and Gamble, Doo-Kirk and Austin, Nolan and Cravaack to face each other in November

Rick Nolan has won the DFL’s three-way primary race to face Eighth District Congressman Chip Cravaack who faced no primary opposition.
 
On his way to winning the primary, the DFL-endorsed Nolan also captured Cook County by a strong margin.
 
In Cook County races, two candidates each were selected by voters to run in November for the District 2 and District 4 commissioner seats.
 
As of 9:30 the morning after the polls closed, the Cook County website showed that 45 percent of Cook County voters turned out for the primary with 1.548 votes being cast. The website reported there are are 3,473 voters in the County. The Gunflint and Maple Hill precincts had the highest percentages with 62 and 61 respectively.
 
Incumbent County Commissioner Fritz Sobanja was the top vote-getter in District 2 with 99 votes or 50 percent of the 195 votes cast. Garry Gamble also will be on the November 6 ballot after getting 76 votes, or 38 percent of the total. Kelly Swearingen received 20 votes even though she pulled out of the race early on, but not in time to take her name off the ballot.
 
Heidi Doo-Kirk received 217 votes, or 46 percent, of the votes in District 4 to move on to the November 6 ballot. She is joined by Rick Austin who got 160 votes, or 34 percent. Gail Anderson finished out of the running with 93 votes or 19 percent.
 
In the Eighth District Congressional race, Nolan turned in a strong performance to beat a highly financed Clark and Ely native Anderson.  
 
The Associated Press reports this morning that with 99 percent of the precincts reported, Nolan received 38 percent of the vote with 20,851. Clark got 17,542 for 32  percent while Anderson received 15,972 for 29 percent.
 
In Cook County, Nolan won the primary with 544 votes to 310 for Clark and 124 for Anderson. The percentages broke down to 55 percent for Nolan, to 31 percent for Clark and 13 percent for Anderson.
 
Congressman Cravaack had no GOP challenger so he will now face Nolan. US Senator Amy Klobuchar won the statewide DFL vote over three challengers with 91 percent of the vote. Her Republican challenger for the Senate seat will be high school economics teacher Kurt Bills who won 51 percent of the GOP vote.
 
In the other Congressional primary, Allen Quist beat Mike Parry by 54 to 44 percent in the First District. Quist now goes up against Congressman Tim Walz in November.
 
In one of two primary races for the Supreme Court, Chief Justice Lorie Gildea will be facing Dan Griffith for the chief justice seat. Gildea had 49 percent of the primary vote to 29 percent for Griffith and 20 percent for Jill Clark.
 
For the open Associate Justice 4 seat, David Stras received 48 percent, Tim Tingelstad received 29 and Allen Nelson received 21 percent. Stras and Tingelstad will meet in November.
 
In Cook County, Clark finished second to Gildea and Nelson finished second to Stras.
 
Again, the general election is scheduled for November 6.