Politics & Government

Kabir Officially Beats Nagle by Two Votes for Council Seat

Absentee and provisional ballots swung the vote count in favor of Fazlul Kabir, who beat incumbent Christine Nagle by two votes.

“There’s only one thing worse than being a politician — an ex-politician,” Chuck Smolka joked with former College Park Councilwoman Maxine Gross. 

“How about a reformed politician?” Gross joked back.

The two election supervisors were in the midst of counting votes from Tuesday’s District 1 race, and in the presence of an almost-new politician.

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“It’s like a drama,” said of the experience late Wednesday afternoon, watching the Board of Election Supervisors count the votes from the District 1 council election. After several recounts, it was decided Kabir beat incumbent , 306 to 304 votes.

It was a flip-flop from the unofficial vote count the night before, when absentee and provisional ballots were not factored. As of the end of the night Tuesday, Nagle was ahead of Kabir by nine votes.

Find out what's happening in College Parkwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Nagle said on Tuesday night that if she lost, she would still be involved with the city, specifically to weigh in on the Greenbelt Metro Sector Plan, which will impact North College Park.

“I’m definitely not going to fade away,” she said.

Nagle said that an election like this really shows how important it is that people make it to the polls.

“I hope they appreciate, in an election like this, every vote counts,” she said.

Of the 33 absentee ballots issued by deadline for District 1 voters, 25 were returned and valid. Three provisional ballots for the district were also factored in.

Kabir was cautiously optimistic that Wednesday’s count would be in his favor. He said that last night, he counted about 20 neighbors who said they submitted absentee ballots and voted for him.

As District 1 votes were counted and re-counted for two hours, his son, a junior business student at the University of Maryland, sat next to him.

“It was really nerve-wracking,” Arif Kabir said. “I had to leave at one point because it was too much.”

was the top vote getter in District 1 for the third year in a row, earning officially 356 votes.


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