Last Tuesday, Danny Alvarez won the primary for his judicial race in Kentucky. As the top vote-getter, Alvarez was set to square off against the second-place finisher, Tanisha Hickerson, in the fall general election. Hickerson herself secured second place by only seventeen votes over third-place finisher Karen Faulkner.
Tragically, Alvarez died suddenly on Wednesday. While his family and friends understandably grieve, the election officials were faced with an unexpected problem: what to do about the general election. Confessing that there is no recent precedent for this situation, the Secretary of State’s Office has announced that Hickerson would be the sole candidate on the ballot in November. Given how close Hickerson and Faulkner were in the primary, it seems likely that Faulkner will ask for a re-canvassing of the votes already cast. But even if the re-canvassing does not change the result, one can only imagine that Hickerson did not want to win a judgeship in this manner.
