Vermont prosecutor notches a win despite crime wave

By Ted Cohen

Chittenden County State's Attorney Sarah George coasted to a third election victory Tuesday, waving off a vigorous challenge from her former boss.

George received 53 percent of the vote to Bram Kranichfeld’s 46 percent, a clear, convincing margin of triumph in the Democrat primary.

The win effectively gives George a free pass on the general election since there is no Republican candidate on the ballot.

For Kranichfeld, currently the top prosecutor in a smaller northern county, the loss was an especially bitter one.

He shelled out for his humiliating defeat more than four times what George spent on what became her payback victory.

Kranichfeld had been deputy Chittenden state’s attorney back in 2017 when his boss, T.J. Donovan, resigned after being elected Vermont attorney general.

To fill the temporary vacancy, Republican Gov. Phil Scott leapfrogged the more experienced Kranichfeld to appoint George, a junior colleague of his, to the top spot.

Kranichfeld resigned after the political rebuff, switching gears to attend Episcopal seminary before resuming his legal career as an appointed prosecutor in Franklin County.

But he never put out of mind having been forced to relinquish his dream in the county seat of the state's largest city, Burlington.

So he announced he would take on George, who he portrayed as soft on crime in deference to what she calls “restorative justice.”

Kranichfeld hoped tagging his political nemesis with a troubling narrative of repetitive violent crime in Burlington would propel his cause.

But George on election day proved far more robust in the liberal pocket of Vermont than her more-conservative opponent ever imagined, winning all but a handful of the 18 towns in the county.

The vote between them in the county seat of Burlington - which could have turned the race - was close enough for George to declare it tantamount to a victory.

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Sarah George 14,441; 52.5%

Bram Kranichfeld 13,049; 47.4%

Kranichfeld concession statement which he followed with a request for donations to help pay off his campaign debt:

Friends,

This is not the outcome we hoped for, but I am feeling something much bigger than disappointment: gratitude.

Thank you to everyone who supported this campaign. Whether you knocked on doors, made phone calls, put up a lawn sign, donated, hosted an event, or talked to your neighbors, you made this campaign possible.

And we accomplished something important together.

Over the last five months, we built a broad coalition across Chittenden County and helped change the conversation about public safety. Concerns that many people felt were not being heard are now part of a serious community conversation about accountability, compassion, and how our justice system can work better.

I am also incredibly proud of how we ran this race. We committed from the beginning to running a positive, clean campaign, and we stayed true to that commitment.

And I am proud that I ran as a Democrat. I have always been a Democrat, and Democratic values are my values. It was an honor to put those values before voters in this primary.

The voters have spoken, and Sarah George is our Democratic nominee for State’s Attorney. I congratulate her and hope we can carry forward the conversations this campaign began.

Now it is time to come together. Whatever candidate we supported, we are neighbors, we are one community, and ultimately we all want Chittenden County to thrive.

Thank you for believing in me and for everything you gave to this campaign.

With deep gratitude,

Bram