Houston mayoral race heads to Dec. 14 runoff between incumbent Sylvester Turner and Tony Buzbee


Incumbent Mayor Sylvester Turner and former Texas A&M Board of Regents member Tony Buzbee advanced from Tuesday’s election to a Dec. 14 runoff election for mayor of Houston, Texas. Turner received 47 percent of the vote to Buzbee’s 28 percent. The runoff will take place as no candidate received a majority.
 
Ten other candidates ran in the general election. In third place was Bill King with 14 percent of the vote.
 
Turner has said his accomplishments during his first term in office include balancing the city’s budget, leading the recovery effort after Hurricane Harvey, reforming the city’s pension system, improving infrastructure, and strengthening the economy.
 
Buzbee, who served on the Texas A&M Board of Regents, has pledged to self-fund his campaign and proposed independent financial audits, process audits, and zero-based budgeting to improve the efficiency and transparency of the city’s resource allocation.
 
Houston is the fourth-largest city in the United States, with a population of 2.2 million.