Marc Elrich is the official winner of the Democratic primary for Montgomery County executive, after the county certified the results of the election on Saturday.
Elrich, the sitting county executive, beat businessman David Blair by 35 votes, or .03%, according to Maryland's State Board of Elections. Elrich received 39.20% of the vote and Blair received 39.17%.
Elrich declared himself the winner on Aug. 6 with a tweet that read, "I love this county and care about our residents so very deeply."
Blair has not conceded the race. On Saturday he reiterated his intention to request a recount.
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"Given the extremely close margin, we will be requesting a full recount and are hopeful that the outcome will be in our favor," he said in a statement last week.
Blair and Elrich faced off in the predominantly Democratic county in 2018, with Elrich winning then by just 77 votes.
After the primary election July 19, Blair and Elrich traded slim leads in the race, sometimes with just dozens of votes between them. Tens of thousands of mail-in ballots were counted.
Decision 2022
Coverage of the 2022 elections
Poll workers needed to handle ballots with check marks and X’s instead of filled-in circles, plus web-delivery, which requires poll workers to duplicate an official ballot and fill in the voter’s exact candidates.
Gilberto Zelaya of the county board of elections previously described high voter participation.
“The last time we had this more than what we had today was during the 2020 presidential election,” he said.
Elrich will face Reardon Sullivan, the Republican primary winner, in November. Sullivan beat opponent Shelly Skolnick 63.03% to 36.97%, results show.
Stay with NBC Washington for more details on this developing story.
