Medford voters cast 23,768 ballots on November 3, about 55 percent of the city’s 43,535 registered voters, and returned Representative Paul J. Donato to the 35th Middlesex seat by more than four to one while rejecting Questions 3, 5 and 8, according to the unofficial precinct-by-precinct totals the Elections Commission posted on its election results page. The totals are unofficial; the commission also lists official results for past elections on the same page once they are certified.
Senator Edward J. Markey received 17,299 votes in Medford to 4,818 for John Deaton, 426 for Shiva Ayyadurai and 834 for Joe Tache, with 341 blanks. Governor Maura Healey and Lieutenant Governor Kim Driscoll won 17,181 votes to 5,427 for Minogue and Oliver and 827 for James and Kittredge. Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell took 17,837 to 5,234 for Michael C. Walsh; Secretary of State William Francis Galvin 18,905 to 4,062 for Anne R. Brensley; Treasurer Deborah B. Goldberg 17,460 to 5,190 for Elizabeth Dionne; and Auditor Diana DiZoglio 18,981 to 2,659 for Al Ozonoff, with 2,039 voters leaving that race blank.
Three House districts, one contest
Medford is split among three House districts, and only one was contested. In the 35th Middlesex, Donato received 8,105 votes to 1,843 for James C. Seibel, 81 to 18 percent, with 66 write-ins and 880 blanks on 10,894 ballots cast in those precincts. In the 34th Middlesex, shared with Somerville, Somerville Councilor-at-Large Will Mbah, unopposed, received 5,797 Medford votes with 121 write-ins and 1,420 blanks on 7,338 ballots. In the 23rd Middlesex, Representative Sean Garballey, also unopposed, received 4,218 votes with 71 write-ins and 1,247 blanks on 5,536 ballots. Representative Katherine M. Clark, unopposed in the Fifth Congressional District, received 18,402 votes with 604 write-ins and 4,762 blanks. Senator Erika Uyterhoeven, unopposed in the Second Middlesex Senate district, had 17,785 votes; Governor’s Councillor Terrence W. Kennedy 17,912; District Attorney Marian T. Ryan 18,049; and Register of Probate Tara E. DeCristofaro beat Tara Martorella 17,942 to 1,905.
The ballot questions
Medford approved six of the nine questions. Question 1, applying the public records law to the Legislature and the governor’s office, passed 20,342 to 2,682, 88 percent, with 744 blanks. Question 2, collective bargaining for Committee for Public Counsel Services employees, passed 17,097 to 5,743. Question 3, the single all-party primary, failed 8,228 to 14,855, 36 to 64 percent. Question 4, election day registration, passed 15,821 to 7,216. Question 5, the state revenue limit and rebate question, failed 8,557 to 14,113, 38 to 62 percent. Question 6, the natural resource conservation fund, passed 14,922 to 7,784. Question 7, single-family homes on small lots, passed 13,975 to 8,736, 62 to 38 percent. Question 8, prohibiting retail sale of adult-use marijuana, failed 4,799 to 18,649, 20 to 80 percent. Question 9, the referendum on the 2024 firearms law, passed 18,239 to 5,143, 78 percent, a yes vote keeping the law in place.
The margins in percentages
Measured against the votes cast in each race, Healey and Driscoll took about 73 percent of Medford’s governor vote, Markey about 74 percent for Senate, Campbell about 77 percent for attorney general, Galvin about 82 percent for secretary of state, Goldberg about 77 percent for treasurer and DiZoglio about 88 percent for auditor. Deaton’s 4,818 votes were about 21 percent of the Senate vote and Tache’s 834 about 4 percent. On the questions, the yes share ran from 88 percent on Question 1 down to 36 percent on Question 3, with Question 7 the closest to even at 62 percent yes.
What each question asked
Questions 1 through 8 were laws proposed by initiative petition: expanding the public records law to the Legislature and the governor’s office, collective bargaining for Committee for Public Counsel Services employees, a single state primary in place of party primaries, election day voter registration, a change to the state revenue limit and the rebate tied to it, a natural resource conservation fund, single-family homes on small lots, and a prohibition on the retail sale of adult-use marijuana. Question 9 was a referendum on the 2024 firearms law; a yes vote kept the law. Medford’s ballot did not carry the non-binding tenth question on legislative stipends that appeared in Melrose and Lynnfield.
Reading the precinct table
Each precinct column in the commission’s spreadsheet carries the tabulator count, with hand-counted ballots in a separate column, and Ward 7 appears three times, as precincts 7-1, 7-2 and 7-2A, so the sheet has 17 precinct columns before the total. The table runs from Ward 1 Precinct 1 through Ward 8 Precinct 2, with hand-counted and auxiliary ballots in extra columns and a total at the right edge. The registered-voter line shows 43,535 names on the rolls, and the ballot line for most contests shows 23,768 cast; Questions 8 and 9 show 23,889, a difference of 121 ballots that the official canvass will reconcile. Blanks ran highest in the uncontested down-ballot races, 5,486 for governor’s councillor and 5,537 for state senator, and lowest for governor, where 295 voters left the race blank.
What it means at City Hall
The City Council spent much of the fall in a dispute with Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn over legal spending, the city charter and the Boston Avenue zoning, and the council’s own October 13 override of her veto came three weeks before the vote. None of that was on the November 3 ballot, which carried no municipal offices or local questions; Medford’s next city election is in November 2027. Statewide outcomes are certified by the Secretary of the Commonwealth and are not asserted here.
The Elections Commission’s results page is here and the unofficial precinct table is here.
