Election 2020: Preliminary Votes Counted In BOE, County Races

Update 3: Final certified results were posted on November 20, with no changes in the preliminary results.

With 65,996 votes counted in the Board of Education race, the final results were as follows:

• Michael Smith: 14,108, 21.4 percent.
• Bill Grippo: 13,277, 20 percent
• Nishita Desai: 13,134, 19.9 percent
• Parul Patel: 12,052, 18 percent
• Karen Master: 6,006, 9 percent
• Thomas Palczewski: 4,182, 6 percent
• Devakumar Villuri: 2,741, 4 percent.

Somerset County Surrogate:

• Bernice “Tina” Jalloh: 96,095, 54 percent
• Frank Bruno: 82,256, 46 percent.

Somerset County Freeholder:

• Paul Drake: 95,331, 26.8 percent
• Douglas Singleterry: 95,093, 26.7 percent
• Brian Levine: 82,413, 23.2 percent
• Brian Gallagher: 82,127, 23.1 percent.

Update 2: More ballots have been tallied, but that didn’t result in any changes in the elections.

With 64,408 votes cast in the Board of Education race, the results as of November 18 are: Smith, 13,767; Grippo, 13,006; Desai, 12,810; Patel, 11,746; Masters, 5,875; Palczewski, 4,086, and Villuri, 2,671. There were also 447 write-in votes.

In the County Surrogate race, the current totals are: Jalloh, 93,949 and Bruno, 80,423. There were 128 write-in votes.

In the County Freeholder race, the current results are: Drake, 93,189; Singleterry, 92,969; Levine, 80,592, and Gallagher, 80,308.

Update 1: Mail-in and provisional ballots have been counted, resulting in another 5,476 votes being tabulated in the Board of Education race.

The current Board of Education totals as of November 11 are: Smith, 12,942; Grippo, 12,188; Desai, 12,051; Patel, 11,057; Masters, 5,576; Palczewski, 3,862; Villuri, 2490, and write-in, 179.

With another 29,048 ballots in the county races having been counted, the current Surrogate totals are: Bernice Jalloh, 87,717, and Frank Bruno, 74,455.

The current Freeholder totals are: Drake, 87,032; Singleterry, 86,869; Levine, 74,616; Gallagher, 74,424, and write-in, 68.

Original Story: With about two-thirds of the total votes counted, two school board incumbents and a newcomer lead in that race, and a former township mayor is losing his bid for county level re-election.

Mail-in ballots, plus all provisional ballots cast on November 3, have yet to be counted, but will be by November 10. Somerset County Clerk Steve Peter said in an email that those votes comprise about one-third of all ballots cast.

In the Board of Education race, incumbents Michael Smith and Nishita Desai and newcomer Bill Grippo lead a pack of seven candidates.

The preliminary results show Smith with 10,956 votes, Desai with 10,235 votes and Grippo, a former school principal, with 10,040 votes.

Trailing the pack are challengers Parul Patel, 9,387 votes; Karen Masters, 4,717 votes; Thomas Palczewski, 3,194, and Devakumar Villuri, 2,080 votes.

The preliminary results also show former township Mayor Brian Levine trailing in his bid for re-election to the county Board of Freeholders.

Preliminary results show Levine with 59,720 votes and his running mate, incumbent Brian Gallagher, with 59,492 votes. The two Democratic challengers, Paul Drake and Douglas Singleterry, garnered 75,191 and 75,141 votes, respectively.

Township Prosecutor Bernice “Tina” Jalloh leads in her bid to unseat incumbent county Surrogate Frank Bruno, 75,720 votes to 59,551 votes.

If the county level numbers hold true through the final vote tabulations, it will represent a complete takeover of county elected positions by Democrats.

Votes will continue to be counted and the tally will be updated periodically until certification on November 23, according to a statement on the Clerk’s web site.

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