Democrat Matthews Did Less Well Than Candidate a Year Earlier in Oconee County House Race

Democrat Dan Matthews ran slightly weaker in his home county of Oconee yesterday than did Democrat Suzy Compere from Morgan County in November of 2010, but Matthews managed to come in second in the special election for the 113th Georgia House seat by doing considerably better in Clarke County than Compere did.

Matthews got 18.7 percent of the vote in Oconee County in the race against three Republicans while Compere got 20.0 percent in her race against Republican Hank Huckaby last year in Oconee County.

In Clarke County, however, Matthews got 54.8 percent of the vote, compared with 47.9 percent for Compere in November of last year. Chuck Williams got only 15.9 percent of the vote in Clarke County, just ahead of Alan Alexander with 14.8 percent and Sarah Bell with 14.5 percent.

With the votes from Morgan and Oglethorpe counties included with those of Oconee and Clarke counties, Matthews finished with 26.7 percent of the vote, compared with Compere's 27.5 percent in 2010.

Williams and Matthews will meet in a runoff election on July 19.

For more analysis of the June 21 vote, go to Oconee County Observations.

Correction: The runoff election will be held on June 19.  The article has been updated.