‘A summer fight.’ An attorney and a Marine face November runoff in Fresno City Council race

Two Fresno City Council members appear safe from challengers after preliminary results from Tuesday’s presidential primary election, while the four-way race for the seat of another incumbent terming out came with some surprises that will likely result in a runoff this November.

Attorney Roger Bonakdar and United States Marine Corps reserve officer Nick Richardson were the top two vote-getters in the race for the city’s District 6 seat, which current Councilmember Garry Bredefeld will term out of this year.

Bonakdar, who received endorsements from several top county and city officials and outraised his three opponents by hundreds of thousands of dollars, took home about 36% of the vote.

Richardson, who didn’t receive major endorsements and only a fraction of the funds, trailed Bonakdar by fewer than 1,000 votes, taking home almost 28%.

Specifically, Bonakdar amassed over $311,000 to Richardson’s roughly $15,000, according to a Fresnoland analysis of campaign contributions through early February. Bonakdar’s contributions were largely from business, developer, and labor groups while Richardson received support from a mix of individuals and business leaders.

Richardson said in an interview Wednesday he’s confident he’ll face Bonakdar in a runoff in the fall.

“My supporters so far are the only reason that I was even on the ballot in the first place, so I’m grateful to them,” he said, “but it’s about to be a summer fight. We’re going to do twice the work that we did before, and we’re about to be joined by a lot more support that we didn’t know we had before the primary. This tent’s about to get a lot bigger.”

Bonakdar couldn’t be reached for comment.

The other two candidates in the District 6 race – small business owner Molly Fagundes-Johnston and banker Raj Sodhi-Layne – trailed with about 23% and 13% of the vote, respectively.

Other Fresno City Council election results

Meanwhile in District 2, incumbent Mike Karbassi took to social media Tuesday night to declare victory with about 74% of the vote over his sole challenger Matthew Gillian, who took home just under 26%. 

Karbassi didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

Tyler Maxwell, the District 4 city council incumbent who ran unopposed, received 98% approval Tuesday.

Low turnout so far in Fresno County’s March primary election

These results are based on the decisions of only about 16% of eligible voters whose votes were tallied Tuesday – a turnout far below the average of 40% for presidential primaries in Fresno County.

The Fresno County Clerk’s Office estimated that at least 38,000 vote-by-mail and 400 provisional ballots remain uncounted late Tuesday, which would raise turnout to about 24%.

Even that’s not final, however, as the clerk’s office is still required to process mailed-in ballots that were postmarked on Election Day and received through the Tuesday following the election.

Fresno County Clerk James Kus told Fresnoland the low turnout numbers matched counties across California. 

He also said it likely has something to do with the presidential candidates this time around. 

“I’m not a political scientist … but, I mean, I do know that when the top of the ticket contests are not exciting, that hurts turnout,” he said. “The presidential contests, a lot of people feel, are decided. That could have hurt turnout.”