Connors and Kuhnke win in Washtenaw County 22nd Circuit Court judicial races
Newly elected Circuit Judge Carol Kuhnke speaks to a crowd as she thanks them for their support through the election while at an election night party at Weber's Inn on Tuesday.
Courtney Sacco I AnnArbor.com
Woodyard, an assistant Wayne County prosecutor, was hoping to unseat Connors, but the final tally shows Connors with 75.7 percent of the vote.
Jim Fink gets an update on election coverage with his nephew Matthew Heddle at The Tap Room in Ypsilanti on Tuesday.
Daniel Brenner I AnnArbor.com
Kuhnke, a pro-choice Democrat from Ann Arbor, worked in the final days of the campaign to draw distinctions between her and Fink, a pro-life Republican from Ypsilanti.
"I'm the only person running in my race who believes in marriage equality," she told a crowd of Democrats at a rally on the University of Michigan campus Monday night. "I'm the only person running in my race who believes in a woman's right to chose what happens to her body."
According to PrideSource.com, this makes Kuhnke, an openly gay adoptive mother of two, the first lesbian judge elected in Michigan.
Connors came under fire in the finals days before the election for accepting thousands of dollars in campaign donations from attorneys with cases pending before him in court. Woodyard didn't make an issue of it, but others did, including his boss, Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy.
While Connors made headlines for donations to his campaign, Woodyard made waves on YouTube by posting a video of himself dancing to "Gangnam Style" in front of the courthouse.
Watch it below:
Ryan J. Stanton covers government and politics for AnnArbor.com. Reach him at ryanstanton@annarbor.com or 734-623-2529. You also can follow him on Twitter or subscribe to AnnArbor.com's email newsletters.
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