Congressman Seth Moulton and State Senator Joan Lovely are projected to both continue their positions in Congress after claiming victory Tuesday night in their respective races.
With 23 percent of votes counted as of press time Tuesday night, Moulton was projected to win the race for Sixth Congressional against Republican Bob May by approximately 16,000 votes and Libertarian Candidate Mark Tashjian by about 46,000 votes.
In an afternoon interview Tuesday, Moulton said that although he felt confident in his congressional race, he was concerned that a number of soon-to-be elected Republican senators and congressmen believe that Donald Trump had won the 2020 Presidential Election.
“I’m worried for the country — because it looks like there are a number of Republicans who are going to win office who are just perpetuating a big lie from Donald Trump, undermining our democracy,” Moulton said.
Moulton added that he was concerned that losing Republican candidates might not accept election results.
“We didn’t even have to worry about this, even four years ago,” Moulton said. “The idea that we would have to pass some legislation to reaffirm something so fundamental as the results of an election. I am concerned not just about tonight, but about the next couple of weeks when I expect the Republican losers will contest the results.”
Moulton, who won by more than a 20 percent margin in both the 2018 and 2020 elections, said that in his own race for the Sixth Congressional District, he did not want to “count his chickens before they hatched,” but that he was generally hopeful for the night.
May also said that he was optimistic in the hours before the election. He said that he thought Massachusetts voters would want a change from Democrat leadership in the House of Representatives.
“I feel quite positive,” May said. “People are tired with what the Democrats have done to this country and are looking for a change.”
As for Lovely, the Associated Press called the race in favor of Lovely at 1:26 a.m on Wednesday, November 9th. With 95 percent of the votes counted as of 9:23 a.m on Wednesday, Lovely had more than double the votes of her Republican challenger, Damian Anketell. 43,454 votes (67.6 percent) have been cast for Lovely, and Anketell has received 20,808 (32.4 percent).
Lovely said that she was able to visit 20 out of the 22 polling locations earlier in the day, and was happy to see the number of people that took to the poles to cast their votes. While at the polls, Lovely greeted poll workers and noted that there was a lot of energy amongst voters.
“It was a great turnout,” she said. “People are really engaged in this election.”
According to her campaign, Lovely won in Danvers, and was waiting for a number of other results from towns across the 2nd Essex District as of pressed time.
Lovely’s campaign said that they expected official results to come in throughout the morning as votes continued to be counted well into the evening. In an interview Tuesday night, Lovely said that she had not declared victory, but was feeling confident as votes came in.
“We are feeling very good,” said Lovely. “From what we see, we have a win.”
Ryan Vermette can be reached at [email protected], Anthony Cammalleri can be reached [email protected].
