St. Petersburg, Florida mayoral election, 2013

St. Petersburg mayoral election, 2013

← 2009 November 5, 2013 2017 →
Nominee Rick Kriseman Bill Foster Party Democratic Republican Popular vote 29,687 23,412 Percentage 55.91% 44.09%
Mayor before election Bill Foster Republican Elected Mayor Rick Kriseman Democratic

Bill Foster
Republican

Rick Kriseman
Democratic

The 2013 St. Petersburg mayoral election took place on November 5, 2013 to elect the Mayor of St. Petersburg, Florida. A non-partisan primary election was held on August 27, 2013. No candidate won a majority of the vote, so the top two finishers, incumbent Mayor Bill Foster and former State Representative Rick Kriseman, advanced to a runoff.

After a campaign described as "nasty", "partisan", "contentious" and "the costliest in [St. Petersburg] history", Foster lost to Kriseman by 56% to 44%, becoming the first incumbent Mayor of St. Petersburg to lose a race for re-election in more than 26 years.

Adam C. Smith of the Tampa Bay Times wrote that although 70% of voters approved of where the city was heading and Foster was "a good man who presided over no corruption scandal, no violent racial unrest", he only proved to be "adequate" at the job. He also "underestimat[ed] voters' intelligence, talking about a secret plan to keep the Tampa Bay Rays in St. Petersburg", had an "ever-shifting" position on the St. Petersburg Pier and alienated African-American voters in Midtown. Kriseman, Smith wrote, capitalized on this to win "considerable" African-American support and ran as a "safe, credible alternative for those unimpressed with the incumbent", promising to govern like popular former Mayor Rick Baker.

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