Fox has slim lead over Brannan in 43rd District City Council race

November 3, 2021 Jaime DeJesus, Brooklynreporter.com

Republican challenger Brian Fox led Councilmember Justin Brannan by about 250 votes on election night. Photos courtesy of Brian Fox and Justin Brannan

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It’s a nail-biter.

Republican challenger Brian Fox held a thin lead over Democratic incumbent Justin Brannan in the 43rd District’s City Council race as of Wednesday.

The district includes Bath Beach, Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst and Dyker Heights.

As of 1:10 a.m., with more than 98 percent of the votes counted, Fox had 12,145 votes (50.44 percent) and Brannan had 11,890 (49.39 percent), according to unofficial results from the Board of Elections.

“With 95 percent of the vote in, we can say we won the night,” Fox wrote on Facebook. “However, there are still absentee and military ballots coming in and we must wait for them to be counted for a final result. We do expect to win them as well.”

“We’ll need to wait for every vote to be counted,” Brannan said on social media, “but just like 2020, we’re confident there are enough absentee ballots to prevail once the count is complete.”

Brannan was referring to last November, when a few local Republicans saw large election night leads vanish once the absentee ballots were tallied.

Brannan declared victory during a speech to supporters last night, and state Sen. Andrew Gounardes tweeted that Brannan had won the race.

“The newly re-elected $100M man of Southern Brooklyn – Council Member @JustinBrannan,” Gounardes wrote.

At the time, Brannan had a big lead, but by 11:30 p.m. Fox was ahead by 21 votes with 94.74 percent of the votes counted. The lead grew into the late hours of the night.

Brannan, who went to the local Xaverian High School as well as Fordham University and the College of Staten Island, was originally known as a rock guitarist for the bands Indecision and Most Precious Blood. Later, he worked in finance and went into politics, founding the Bay Ridge Democrats and serving as director of communications and legislative affairs for then-Councilmember Vincent Gentile.

He became Gentile’s successor after he won the Democratic primary and then the general election in 2017. In addition to his political career, Brannan is an outspoken vegetarian.

Fox is the managing partner of Philip Martin Talent Advisors, a high-tech staffing and consulting firm focusing on Microsoft Dynamics/Dynamics 365. According to the policy website Gotham Gazette, Fox ran on the issue of rising crime, and has alleged that Brannan voted to “defund the police” after Brannan voted in favor of the city’s budget last year, which shifted several hundreds of millions away from the NYPD.

He also wants the Sanitation Department to step up efforts against graffiti, and wants the city to establish more “no kill” animal shelters, Gotham Gazette said.