Early voting this week started under a shadow. As the Washington Post explained, last week Jeffrey Thompson pled guilty to various federal and DC campaign finance law violations, and now DC residents are concerned that Mayor Vincent Gray may be indicted. Gray has said he does not plan to leave office if indicted and he remains in the mayoral race.
Given the situation, a closer look at DC’s election law relating to independent candidates is in order. The law allows an independent candidate to enter the race as late as 90 days before the general election. That means independent candidates have until the beginning of August to announce a run.
Under these circumstances, we are likely to see a large independent field of candidates who enter late in the race.
But the outcome of the Democratic primary–still unknown–could change everything.
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