HOUSTON — Voters here have kept the largest city in Texas in Democratic hands, electing a longtime lawmaker as mayor in a tight race over a Republican-leaning businessman.
State Representative Sylvester Turner defeated his rival, Bill King, on Saturday as rainy weather lowered the turnout in the runoff election.
The vote represented a political crossroads of sorts for the country’s fourth-most-populous city. For nearly six years, Houston has been led by Mayor Annise D. Parker, a Democrat who became one of the first openly gay mayors in the nation after her 2009 win.
Houston has long been more diverse and Democratic-leaning than most other parts of Texas, and although officially the mayor’s seat is nonpartisan, it has been nearly 40 years since a Republican was elected mayor.
But as Parker’s third and final term neared an end, the city was caught up in pragmatic concerns and complaints, from pothole-ridden streets to the costly pension system for public employees, a signal to many that Democrats’ lock on the office was in jeopardy.
The mayoral election came weeks after voters repealed an antidiscrimination ordinance, a defeat for Parker and gay rights advocates.