An elected incumbent mayor of Boston hasn't been ousted since 1949. Here are the odds Kraft faces in bid to unseat Wu.

Boston Globe

13-03-2025

Such is the power of incumbency in Boston: It took a conviction and prison sentence to unseat Curley, and in the 76 years that followed, not a single incumbent has lost, even when he appeared vulnerable. It is a historical record that philanthropist Josh Kraft must grapple with as he seeks to displace the current incumbent, Mayor Michelle Wu,
To be sure, there are no guarantees in politics, and Kraft has a number of advantages that could help balance the scales. As a son of the billionaire owner of
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Still, more than seven decades of election results show Kraft faces long odds in his bid to unseat Wu amid the benefits incumbency brings.
Kraft appears clear-eyed about the task at hand.
'I enter this race as an underdog, and I know this is going to be an uphill fight, but I'm excited for the challenge,' Kraft said at his Feb. 4 campaign launch.
The incumbency advantage has translated into a relatively small number of Boston mayors over the past 76 years, given that most of them have stayed in office for multiple terms.
The division and unrest sparked by
federal posts,
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Several other
factors help explain the durability of Boston mayors, experts say. Like any incumbent, mayors benefit from the bully pulpit that comes with the job as well as the limelight and earned media. It's the mayor who gets to cut the ribbon at newly renovated parks and take credit for filling potholes, clearing snow, and providing other constituent services.
And in an overwhelmingly Democratic city like Boston, it can be harder for challengers to find a lane to run in when they're going up against someone from their own party.
In this year's mayoral race, the national political environment could also boost
Wu, said Erin O'Brien, a political science professor at University of Massachusetts Boston. Wu's appearance last week before a GOP-controlled congressional committee provided her a high-profile opportunity to rally Boston voters to her side in the face of Republican efforts to attack her over the city's immigration policies.
While Trump won a slightly larger share of the Boston vote in 2024 than previously, he's still largely unpopular in the city where 76.7 percent of voters backed Kamala Harris.
'She has the chance to be a face of pushing back against the Trump administration,' O'Brien said. 'Josh Kraft doesn't have that same capability simply because he's not in office.'
And the incumbency advantage isn't the only factor contributing to Wu's strength going into her first reelection race. In the 2021 mayoral election, Wu emerged as an early front-runner in a crowded field of candidates that included then-acting Mayor Kim Janey; Andrea Campbell, who now serves as the state attorney general; and Annissa Essaibi George, a city councilor at the time who ran on a more moderate platform.
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Running on an unabashedly progressive agenda,
as a barrier-breaking figure and ushered in a new era of Boston politics, shifting power away from the white, Irish male political establishment that had controlled the city for decades.
Boston's demographics have also become more diverse in recent years, as Wu's political influence has grown.To wit:
Those council wins suggest that Wu's ascension to the mayor's office reflects a longer-term trend in Boston's electorate favoring younger, more progressive candidates of color like Wu.
To win, Kraft will need to forge a coalition of not just conservatives or Republicans already unhappy with Wu's leadership, but residents who voted for her in 2021, said David Hopkins, a political science professor at Boston College.
Kraft is already working to tap into dissatisfaction with Wu among key constituencies, including those unhappy with her push to
to-date unsuccessful
effort to
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He's also sought to capitalize on frustration over Wu's signature bike and bus lanes, which are unpopular among many residents around the city.
For those reasons and others, Hopkins said Wu would be smart not to take her incumbency advantage for granted.
There's plenty of time for a race's dynamic to change in the months before an election.
'At some point, we're going to have another incumbent mayor lose ... and you don't want to be the person that breaks the streak,' said Hopkins.
Wu seems to be taking that advice to heart, and has come out swinging against Kraft.
She's
She's also gone on defense: Wu recently
Other examples across the country demonstrate that a dramatic change in leadership is not impossible, even in a famously progressive city. Both Wu and Kraft likely had their eye on San Francisco, where
Essaibi George, who lost to Wu in the 2021 mayor's race, acknowledged the advantage incumbents enjoy in Boston, but said the odds of defeating one are probably highest in the first term because their list of accomplishments is the shortest.
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'That is always a hard thing to do, to unseat an incumbent mayor,' she said. 'But if one were to try to do it, from a political perspective, that first term is the time to do it.'
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See every Boston mayoral general election since 1949
1949
General election
John B. Hynes:
Years as mayor 1950-1959
Served as temporary Mayor June 26 to November 28, in 1947 during Curley's absence
1951
General election
1955
General election
1959
General election
John F. Collins:
Years as mayor 1960-1967
1963
General election
1967
General election
Kevin White:
Years as mayor 1968-1983
1971
General election