Garrett County Commissioner and MACo Board Member Jim Hinebaugh prevailed in the Republican primary election to represent District 1A in the Maryland House of Delegates.

Commissioner Hinebaugh bested Tim Thomas, Andy Adams, and Kenneth Linn Sisk to secure the nomination. According to unofficial early voting and election day results, Hinebaugh has 58 percent of the vote. Hinebaugh will face Robert Spear, who ran unopposed in the Democratic primary, in the general election on November 8.

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Please note that vote counts are incomplete. Election officials still have to count mail-in and provisional ballots. For context, more than 500,000 Marylanders requested a mail-in ballot for this year’s primary, and those remaining votes are likely to be material to many contested races. However, local boards of elections cannot begin to canvass mail-in votes until Thursday, July 21. Therefore, for editorial purposes, MACo coverage will describe any races where the top runner-up remains within 10 percent of the apparent winner(s) as “pending” and those results as “apparent.”

MACo’s election coverage and analysis rely on unofficial results published by the State Board of Elections. Official results will follow after a full accounting of pending votes. Given delays in processing an unprecedented number of mail-in ballots, MACo advises readers that any close unofficial results are subject to realignment in the days ahead.