Critics say it would have taken budget decisions away from Mississippi lawmakers and given the courts too much power.
In Houston, the nation’s fourth-largest city, efforts to secure non-discrimination protections for gay and transgender people failed by a 2-to-1 margin. Now that same-sex marriage is legal, such laws have become a priority for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender groups. Opponents, including a coalition of conservative pastors, said the measure would have infringed on their religious beliefs.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott praised the voters who defeated the measure, saying they “showed values still matter.”
In the race for Houston’s next mayor, veteran state Rep. Sylvester Turner and Bill King, a former mayor of a Houston suburb, will meet in a Dec. 12 runoff. It was one of more than 300 mayoral races happening across the country. In Philadelphia, former longtime Councilman Jim Kenney was elected mayor on a promise to fight poverty and push for universal pre-kindergarten education.
The Salt Lake City mayoral race featured a tight race between two-term incumbent Ralph Becker, one of President Barack Obama’s appointees on a climate change task force, and former state lawmaker Jackie Biskupski. The race remained too close to call, as thousands of mail-in ballots that were dropped off at polling places Tuesday remain to be counted. If Biskupski wins, she will be the city’s first openly gay mayor.
State judicial elections in recent years have become a focal point for political parties and interest groups seeking to influence the courts. Tuesday’s election to fill three open seats on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court was the latest judicial contest to attract heavy attention and spending.
Campaign contributors poured at least $11.5 million into the race, which saw Democrats win all the seats.
San Francisco voters rejected a citizen-backed initiative to restrict the operations of Airbnb, the room-rental site. A separate measure to authorize a $310 million bond package for affordable housing in the city required a two-thirds vote and had yet to be decided.
In Washington state, voters overwhelmingly approved a measure to add state penalties for anyone who imports certain animal products for commercial purposes, such as elephant ivory or rhino horns
And Colorado voters decided to let the state keep $66 million in tax revenue generated from the sale of recreational marijuana. An existing state law requires excess tax revenue to be returned to taxpayers, but on Tuesday voters agreed to make an exception with the marijuana revenue and direct it instead toward public education and drug-prevention programs.
