London Breed, the president of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, will be the city's next mayor after eight days of ballot-counting all but eliminated rival candidate Mark Leno, who conceded the race Wednesday afternoon. As of Wednesday, Breed led Leno by 2,177 votes with only about 6,700 left to count. Breed, 43, will become San Francisco's first black female mayor and the city's second female mayor, after Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.); San Francisco will become the largest U.S. city currently led by a woman. Leno would have been San Francisco's first openly gay mayor. All three frontrunners were Democrats.
Breed briefly took over as mayor when Mayor Ed Lee (D) died of a heart attack in December, but a month later, her board colleagues gave the job instead to interim Mayor Mark Farrell. On Wednesday, Farrell offered his "sincere congratulations to Mayor-elect London Breed on her election victory." Breed, who was raised in San Francisco public housing by her grandmother, said "the message that this sends to the next generation of young people growing up in this city is that no matter where you come from, no matter what you decide to do in life, you can do anything you want to do."
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Book reviews: 'Moral Ambition: Stop Wasting Your Talent and Start Making a Difference' and 'Is a River Alive?'Feature A rallying cry for 'moral ambition' and the interwoven relationship between humans and rivers
-
'King of the Hill' actor shot dead outside homespeed read Jonathan Joss was fatally shot by a neighbor who was 'yelling violent homophobic slurs,' says his husband
-
DOJ, Boulder police outline attacker's confessionspeed read Mohamed Sabry Soliman planned the attack for a year and 'wanted them all to die'
-
Depleted FEMA struggling as hurricane season beginsspeed read FEMA has lost a third of its workforce amid DOGE cuts enforced by President Donald Trump
-
White House tackles fake citations in MAHA reportspeed read A federal government public health report spearheaded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was rife with false citations
-
Judge blocks push to bar Harvard foreign studentsspeed read Judge Allison Burroughs sided with Harvard against the Trump administration's attempt to block the admittance of international students
-
Trump's trade war whipsawed by court rulingsSpeed Read A series of court rulings over Trump's tariffs renders the future of US trade policy uncertain
-
Elon Musk departs Trump administrationspeed read The former DOGE head says he is ending his government work to spend more time on his companies
-
Trump taps ex-personal lawyer for appeals courtspeed read The president has nominated Emil Bove, his former criminal defense lawyer, to be a federal judge
-
US trade court nullifies Trump's biggest tariffsspeed read The US Court of International Trade says Trump exceeded his authority in imposing global tariffs
-
Trump pauses all new foreign student visasspeed read The State Department has stopped scheduling interviews with those seeking student visas in preparation for scrutiny of applicants' social media
