The 2015 San Francisco mayoral election took place on November 3, 2015, to elect the
Mayor of
San Francisco,
California. Incumbent Mayor
Ed Lee won re-election to a second term in office.[1][2] All local elections in California are
nonpartisan
Candidates
In November 2015, incumbent Mayor Ed Lee declared that he would stand for reelection for a second term as mayor.[3] State Senator
Mark Leno had considered running but ultimately decided against it.[4][5] Former Mayor
Art Agnos,
City AttorneyDennis Herrera,
Public DefenderJeff Adachi and former State Assemblyman
Tom Ammiano all also declined to run. Initially, local media speculated that Lee would run for reelection unopposed.[6] Lee was ultimately opposed by five candidates: Kent Graham, Francisco Herrera, Reed Martin,
Stuart Schuffman, and Amy Farah Weiss.[7]
Election results
Municipal elections in
California are officially non-partisan, though most candidates in San Francisco do receive funding and support from various political parties.
Instant-runoff voting, also known as ranked-choice voting, was used in the election. Lee was reelected with a majority of the vote in the first round of votes, and no transferring of votes was required.