Justin Sanchez defeated Antirson Ortiz in the fourth round of ranked choice voting Tuesday to become Bronx District 17’s Democratic nominee for New York City Council. Sanchez will face off against Conservative candidate Marisol Duran for term-limited Rafael Salamanca Jr. ‘s seat representing South Bronx neighborhoods like Hunts Point, Longwood, and parts of Morrisania in November.
The 33-year-old progressive candidate took home around 62% of the vote after all the ranked choice tallies were in, compared to Ortiz’s nearly 38%. In each round, Sanchez took home the majority of the ranked-choice votes from the candidates who had been eliminated, meaning that if Sanchez wasn’t the first choice on someone’s ballot, he was ranked second, third, or fourth if all their other candidates were eliminated.
Sanchez told the Bronx Times he was with friends and family eagerly waiting for the results to come in on Tuesday.
“My immediate reaction was just super proud and super excited seeing all of the hard work that we did throughout the course of this campaign really come into fruition,” Sanchez said. “But more humbled than anything to see all of the support that we got, not only in the first round but also in the subsequent rounds where we really saw that folks believed in us and what we were doing.”
Sanchez surged ahead on June 24, capturing a strong early lead on primary day as he aimed to distinguish himself from several other qualified candidates.
Preliminary results from the city’s Board of Elections showed Sanchez ahead with 40.4% of first-choice votes in the ranked-choice election. Antirson Ortiz followed with 25.1%, Freddy Perez Jr., who was endorsed by incumbent Salamanca Jr., secured 17.7%, and Elvis Santana trailed with 15.9%.
But Tuesday’s ranked choice tallies confirmed what seemed inevitable on primary day. Sanchez will represent the Democratic party in the general election for District 17 in November.
Sanchez, a former chief of staff to State Senator Nathalia Fernandez, entered the race as a progressive-aligned candidate backed by major political forces. He locked in endorsements from the Bronx Democratic Party, U.S. Reps. Ritchie Torres and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Borough President Vanessa L. Gibson, and a broad coalition of unions and advocacy groups.
He also outpaced his rivals financially. As of June 13 campaign finance filings, Sanchez outspent his nearest competitor by about $60,000—an advantage that helped fuel his ground operation.
Running on a platform titled “17 for 17,” Sanchez prioritized quality-of-life improvements, including sanitation, drug treatment, and youth programming. His campaign’s blunt slogan—“clean the damn streets”—cut through political noise and connected with voters.
He told the Bronx Times that his team came up with a plan to listen more than they talked, and in the end it paid off. Knocking on over 100,000 doors Sanchez said that his campaign didn’t start out asking for votes, but instead, asking what voters wanted to see.
“They were worried about who’s gonna help them with their quality of life?” Sanchez said. “Who’s gonna help them [with] cleaning the damn streets— exactly what we ran on. Who’s going to make sure to get trash cans on street corners. Getting folks that are dealing with substance use disorder off of our streets into the long-term care that they need, and improving our education system. Getting our kids the opportunities that they deserve.”
If elected, Sanchez would become only the second openly gay candidate to be elected to the city council from the Bronx and the third to serve on the council from the Bronx, and the first from District 17. U.S. Representative Ritchie Torres was the first openly gay candidate to be elected from the Bronx in 2014. Former City Council Member James Vacca, a democrat representing District 13, came out publicly to an outpouring of support on in 2016 on social media, while he was serving his term.
The Bronx is known for some high profile anti LQBTQ+ rhetoric from politicians. Former Bronx City Council Member Rev. Ruben Diaz Sr. accused the city council of being “controlled by the homosexual community” in a Spanish-language interview on a show for cab drivers in 2019. Former City Council Member Fernando Cabrera in 2014 praised the country of Uganda for its stance on homosexuality— a country with some of the harshest punishments for same-sex relations in the world.
Sanchez told the Bronx Times he was aware that his identity might have been seen negatively.
“We ran in a generally conservative district that these social issues could have played out in a very ugly and nasty way,” Sanchez said. “But we made sure that we ran a campaign focused on the issues and not on identity politics and I think that really resonated through.”
He said that voters in the district cared more about his core message of “cleaning up the damn streets” because he built his platform based on what he was hearing from constituents.
“ Clearly with the mandate that you saw that we got from the voters, I don’t think that [being gay] was a real top of mind issue,” Sanchez said.
