Alabama town’s first Black mayor, who had been locked out of office, wins election
August 28, 2025
The first Black mayor of an Alabama town has won election by a landslide, four years after he ran unopposed and white residents locked him out of the town hall. Patrick Braxton won 66 votes to his opponent’s 26 on Tuesday to hold onto the mayor’s office in Newbern. He had to file a federal lawsuit accusing white residents of refusing to let him serve before finally occupying the office last year. Tuesday’s mayoral elections were part of the settlement. It was the town’s first vote in decades. Previously, each mayor appointed a successor, resulting in a nearly all-white government in a town that is overwhelmingly Black.