Updated at 10:20 p.m.
Democrat Molly Gray will serve as Vermont’s lieutenant governor once again. On Tuesday, she easily defeated the incumbent, Republican John Rodgers.
Rodgers conceded the election about two and a half hours after polls closed. At that time, Gray, a human rights lawyer, was leading Rodgers, a stonemason and cannabis farmer, 60 to 38 percent with about 70 percent of the vote counted.
In a speech at a Vermont Democratic Party event in Burlington, Gray thanked Rodgers for all he’s done for rural parts of the state and his graciousness in accepting defeat. And she touted running a statewide campaign without accepting “a single cent” of corporate PAC money.
“I feel like we won this race the Vermont way,” she said. “We kept things positive. We focused on addressing our biggest challenges. We shared all sorts of ideas to address housing and health care.”
“I know the responsibility that comes with this office,” Gray continued. “I promise to show up starting tomorrow morning, rolling my sleeves up, preparing with urgency and with experience for what comes ahead.”
Rodgers was at home with family and staff in Glover and conceded the race via email.
“Tonight, the voters of Vermont have made their decision, and while this isn’t the outcome we had hoped for, I respect their choice and congratulate Molly Gray on a hard-fought campaign,” Rodgers said in a statement. “I wish her the best as she prepares to serve the people of Vermont.”
Gray had been elected to the post previously and served from 2021 through 2023. But she gave it up to make an unsuccessful bid for U.S. Congress. Gray next worked as executive director of the Vermont Afghan Alliance, a Burlington nonprofit organization that supports Afghan refugees.
The wide margin had been predicted in multiple polls, including the most recent Green Mountain State Poll from the University of New Hampshire, which reported that Gray was surging in the final weeks of the campaign.
During the campaign, both agreed that affordability was the single biggest issue facing Vermonters but offered very different views on how to address it.
Gray supports raising taxes on high-income residents and owners of second homes to help lower the property tax burden on homeowners and fund universal taxpayer-funded primary care services. Rodgers opposes tax increases and argues for fiscal restraint and reducing regulations on businesses to help grow the economy.
They also view the job very differently. Rodgers stressed how he has used the post to help regular Vermonters get help and solve problems, while Gray has said she would use it to speak out more forcefully for broad policy changes on health care and to push back on federal overreach by the Trump administration.
In late September, behind in the polls and in campaign fundraising, Rodgers ramped up his attacks on Gray. He questioned her commitment to the job when she held it, claiming she just used the post as a springboard to run for Congress.
He also blasted her for saying that large dairy “may not be viable” in Vermont, comments she said were taken out of context. Rodgers also pointedly suggested it was hypocritical of Gray to advocate for the rights of migrants when her family’s farm in Newbury employed seasonal workers in substandard housing.
Rodgers’ campaign released documents outlining an investigation into the conditions at 4 Corners Farm in South Newbury, where Gray grew up and her family members still live. The farm resolved the violations and paid a $1,728 fine in early 2025.
Gray, who lives in Burlington, called it “disgraceful” and “a new low” for Rodgers to bring up her family’s farm, noting that she has no involvement in its day-to-day operations.
She used the episode to turn the tables on Rodgers, painting him as a bully and someone who was attacking her to distract from the license violations at his cannabis farm in Glover, for which he’s agreed to pay a $2,500 fine.
Rodger spent his final day on the campaign trail visiting polling places in Chittenden and Washington counties before heading back home to vote in Glover.
In Montpelier, he squeezed in a visit to Morse Farm Maple Sugarworks for a final campaign creemee, then headed to the Barre Civic Center Auditorium to talk to voters.
“I think Trump’s an anchor on everybody that has an R beside their name,” Rodgers said before the polls closed.
He also blamed the media for failing to write critically about Gray’s campaign.
“Nobody has fact-checked her on all her lies,” Rodgers said
He also felt it was disingenuous of Gray to tell voters that she could lower their health care costs through a universal primary care program that previous administrations had explored and rejected as too expensive.
“For somebody to run a whole campaign on something that can’t be delivered, I just think that’s being dishonest with Vermonters,” he said. “Fiscally, it just can’t be done.”
In other races, U.S. Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vt.) won a third term in Congress, cruising to victory over five competitors, including Republican Gerald Malloy, a retired Army officer from Perkinsville who lost two previous bids for U.S. Senate by wide margins. The Associated Press called that race less than an hour after polls closed.
“I will never ever take your vote for granted,” Balint told the crowd at Burlington City Arts. “I will never ever forget who sent me to Washington.”
The race to succeed retiring State Auditor Doug Hoffer also proved an easy win for deputy state auditor Tim Ashe, a Democrat. The former Burlington city councilor and Senate president pro tempore cruised past his Republican opponent, Ivar Kronick, an accountant from Poultney who has never held statewide office.
Several other current Democratic statewide office holders easily kept their seats.
Treasurer Mike Pieciak, Secretary of State Sarah Copeland Hanzas and Attorney General Charity Clark cruised to victory over their opponents. All will serve their third terms.
Alison Novak contributed reporting.
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