Kate Murray trailing Joylette Williams in race for Hempstead Town Clerk

Hempstead Town Clerk Kate Murray was trailing Democrat Joylette Wiliams by a narrow margin Wednesday evening, as Nassau election officials opened unopened ballots. 

With all precincts reporting late Wednesday, Williams led Murray by a margin of less than 1%, 50.26% to 49.66%, with 1,750 votes separating them, according to Nassau County Board of Elections results. 

Earlier Wednesday, there was one precinct that had yet to report results: Shore Road School in Bellmore, where a single machine contained about 200 cast ballots, said James Scheuerman, Nassau's Democratic elections commissioner. That machine was locked inside of a polling site and was expected to be opened later in the day, he said. He added that it was mistakenly sealed after polls closed, which is a common occurrence that "happens somewhere every election."

The board received by Election Day about 4,500 mail-in ballots, which were also expected to be opened on Wednesday, Scheuerman said earlier in the day. Additional mail-in ballots can still be counted in the coming days, Scheuerman said, if they were postmarked by Election Day.

Murray, a former Hempstead Town supervisor from 2003 through 2016, was elected town clerk in 2019. She ran unsuccessfully for Nassau County district attorney in 2015.

Williams is a trustee of the Hempstead school board and serves on the board of the Hempstead Chamber of Commerce and Hempstead Community Land Trust.

Democrat Joseph Scianablo declared victory late Tuesday night in the Hempstead Town supervisor's race, clinching a stunning upset over Republican Supervisor John Ferretti. Scianablo became just the second Hempstead Democrat to win the seat in a century of GOP rule. In 2017, Democrats Laura Gillen and Sylvia Cabana unseated Supervisor Tony Santino and Town Clerk Nasrin Ahmad, both Republicans, in a stunning upset. Their tenure was short-lived, with both Democrats losing reelection two years later. Gillen, of Rockville Centre, was reelected Tuesday to her House seat representing New York's 4th Congressional District.

Jay Jacobs, chair of the state and Nassau County Democratic committees, on Wednesday said he believed Williams would prevail.

"She will win it," Jacobs said in a text message.

Nassau County Republican Chairman Joseph Cairo said in a statement Wednesday that the party was monitoring the outcome.

"The numbers in the clerk’s race are close," Cairo said. "We will watch as the Board of Elections counts the outstanding absentee ballots with interest."