NEW YORK (AP) – Yusef Salaam, who as a child was part of a group of teenagers wrongfully accused, convicted and imprisoned for the rape of a woman jogging in Central Park, took a major lead Tuesday in a primary democrat for a city council. seat in New York.
Salaam faces two veteran politicians, New York Assembly members Al Taylor, 65, and Inez Dickens, 73, in the race for a seat that represents part of Harlem. Incumbent and Socialist Democrat Kristin Richard Jordan dropped out of the race in May, but remained on the ballot.
The contest came more than two decades after Salaam and four other men, known as the Central Park Five, were exonerated by DNA evidence in one of the city’s most notorious and racially charged crimes.
The Associated Press has not declared a winner in the race, and the outcome of the election could be uncertain for days because of New York’s voting rules. This system is activated if no candidate claims more than 50% of the total votes.
It was unclear early Wednesday whether Salaam would remain above that threshold. With around 95% of the votes counted, Salaam had just under 51% of the vote, with Dickens trailing substantially in second place.
However, Salaam declared victory in a speech to supporters on Tuesday afternoon.
“What has happened in this campaign has restored my faith in knowing that I was born for this,” he said.
Salaam likened his juvenile incarceration to being “kidnapped,” but also called his nearly seven years in prison a gift that allowed him to see a racially unjust criminal justice system from the “belly of the beast.”
“I’m here because, Harlem, you believed in me,” he said.
Dickens conceded Tuesday afternoon, but vowed to “continue to fight for what my community needs.”
If Salaam were to prevail in the primary, it would virtually assure him of a general election victory in a district unlikely to elect a Republican. It is the first time that he seeks public office.
While all three candidates focused on promoting affordable housing, controlling gentrification and alleviating poverty in Harlem, Salaam leveraged his celebrity in neighborhoods that see the Central Park Five, also known as the Exonerated Five, as living symbols of injustice. that black and Latino residents face. which represent approximately three-quarters of the district’s population.
Salaam was 15 when he was arrested in 1989 and accused, along with four other black and brown teenagers, Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise, of beating and raping a woman in Central Park.
Members of the group served between five and 12 years in prison before prosecutors agreed to reexamine the case. DNA tests and a confession eventually linked a rapist and serial killer to the attack. The convictions were overturned in 2002, and the city eventually agreed in a legal settlement to pay the exonerated men $41 million.
“When people look at me and know my story, it resonates with them,” Salaam told The Associated Press in an interview before the election. “But now here we are 34 years later, and I’m able to use this platform that I have and repurpose the pain, help people as we move out of despair.”
New York City voting rules allow voters to rank candidates in order of preference. Due to the complexity of the system, it has become difficult to predict a winner.
If a candidate is the first choice of a majority of voters, more than 50%, that person wins the race outright, just like in a traditional election. But if this threshold is not met, the final winner will be determined by a ranked choice vote. This means that the counting of votes is done in rounds. The candidate with the lowest number of first-choice votes is eliminated and that person’s votes are redistributed to those voters’ second choices.
This analysis cannot be conducted until all absentee ballots have been received, a process expected to take about a week.
