“This is our time and our place,” said an ebullient Michael Nutter W’79 on the evening of May 15. “We can do better as a city; we will do better as a city.”
Nutter, a four-term city councilman widely regarded as a reformist candidate in the Philadelphia mayoral race, had just won a resounding victory in the primary election over a field of Democratic candidates that included businessman Tom Knox, United States Representatives Chaka Fattah GPU’86 and Bob Brady, and State Representative Dwight Evans. The victory was considered something of an upset, in that Nutter lagged well behind Knox in the polls as recently as a month before the election.
It’s not the final verdict, of course; there is the matter of the general election in November, when he faces Republican candidate Al Taubenberger. But while we don’t want to jinx his chances or sound overly partisan, given the political realities of the city of Philadelphia—where Democrats have won every mayoral election since 1952 and enjoy a large registration advantage—it is fair to say that he has the inside track.
After the results were announced, the other Democratic candidates offered their support. Even Knox, who had spent nearly $10 million of his own money in the campaign, had kind words for his victorious opponent: “I always said, if I didn’t win, it should be Michael Nutter.”—S.H.
