The 2025 Boston mayoral election is scheduled to be held on November 4, 2025, to elect the Mayor of Boston. Because more than two candidates qualified for the ballot, a non-partisan primary election, known in Boston as a preliminary election, was held on September 9, 2025.[1] The election is to be held concurrently with the 2025 Boston City Council election.
Incumbent mayor Michelle Wu is running for re-election to a second term in office. Wu and nonprofit executive Josh Kraft advanced to the general election. However, Kraft ended his campaign two days after the preliminary election on September 11 and formally withdrew his name from the ballot on September 12, which was officially confirmed by the Secretary of the Commonwealth's office on September 15.[2][3][4]
Candidates
Advanced to general election
Two candidates advanced to the general election after winning the two highest vote totals in the non-partisan preliminary election.[5]
Four candidates qualified for the primary ballot, with two advancing to the general election.[8] The following candidates qualified for inclusion on the ballot and did not advance.[9]
A forum hosted by political reporter Saraya Wintersmith of GBH News was held with Michelle Wu, Josh Kraft, Domingos ReRosa, and Alex Alex on May 15th.[83] On September 3rd, a forum with Michelle Wu and Josh Kraft was held.[84]
2025 Boston mayoral election primary debates and forums
No.
Date & Time
Host
Moderator
Link
Participants
Key: PParticipant AAbsent NNon-invitee OutOut of race
Wu raised $1.8 million for her campaign committee. Kraft's committee raised $6.8 million,[89] a record for a Boston mayoral preliminary campaign.[90][91] However, $5.5 million of what Kraft raised came from his own personal wealth and only $1.3 came from sources and contributors other than Kraft himself[89] (primarily wealthy donors, including Boston business leaders)[91]
Kraft's committee spent more than $5.6 million before the primary, while Wu's campaign committee spent more than $1.1 million. The Super PAC Your City, Your Future, supporting Kraft's campaign, spent more than $3.1 million before the primary. Its chief contributors Jim Davis (chairman of the company New Balance) and Michael Rubin (founder of the sports merchandise company Fanatics), who each gave the PAC $1 million. Bold Boston, a Super PAC supporting Wu, spent more than $850,000.[92]
Campaign and major issues
Kraft has campaigned as being more moderate than the incumbent Wu, who is regarded to be a progressive.[93] Kraft entered the election considered a potentially strong challenger to Wu due to his lengthy philanthropic resume, his lack of political record for her to litigate, as well as his vast personal wealth and connections to wealthy prospective donors from which he could fund his campaign.[94]
Ahead of the preliminary vote, Wu criticized the amount of his own personal wealth that Kraft used to fund his campaign, the vast amount of money Kraft spent on the preliminary, as well as Kraft's lack of full public transparency about the sources from which he derives his $6.3 million annual income.[89] Kraft pledged in February 2025 that, if elected mayor, he would recuse himself "anything that my family's business had in front of the city of Boston".[95]
Ahead of the preliminary, Wu received a broad amount backing from incumbent members of the Boston City Council and local Democratic Party leaders.[96] She also benefited from holding a high popularity rating in Boston. Ahead of the preliminary vote, she had success in tying Kraft to President Donald Trump, who is highly unpopular in Boston.[94] This tactic was regarded to have resonated, in part, due to Kraft's father having had ties[h] to Trump.[103][98] Wu is regarded to have benefited from having attained newfound prominence nationally as a perceived foil to the Trump administration,[94] defending the city against attacks by the Trump administration. The week prior to the election, the Trump administration's Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Boston over its "sanctuary city" policy. On the day of voting for the primary election, the Trump administration's Department of Homeland Security put out a statement announcing a further immigration crackdown in Massachusetts.[96] The Trump administration also levied the threat of deploying the National Guard into the city.[104]Tufts University political scientist Jeffrey M. Berry characterized Wu as having established herself during the Second Trump Administration" as a, "symbol of democratic resistance to the president", which he opined was to the benefit of her mayoral re-election prospects.[96] Kraft has argued Wu's emphasis on Trump is an effort to distract from her own effort.[90]
One of Kraft's main criticisms of Wu was the installation of bike lanes during Wu's mayoralty, with Kraft accusing her administration of having installing too many bike lanes and having done so with an insufficient amount of prior planning.[89][105] Another of Kraft's top criticisms of Wu was the renovation of White Stadium which Wu has championed, with Kraft characterizing it as expensive as well as unpopular with and detrimental to communities living near the stadium.[89][95] Wu has countered this by refuting Kraft's allegations of rising costs for the project, and by alleging that Kraft had a conflict of interest against the stadium due to his family's company, the Kraft Group, planning to build a privately-owned soccer stadium in the neighboring city of Everett for their New England Revolution men's team (a renovated White Stadium could compete with the Kraft's planned soccer stadium for event-bookings).[89][95] Kraft also characterized Wu as having insufficiently addressed the city's housing needs in her term as mayor. Overall, Kraft's campaign was characterized as struggling to find a resonant message against Wu, and a week prior to the primary he parted ways with two of his top campaign advisors.[96]
Results
Results by ward
Wu—80–90%
Wu—70–80%
Wu—60–70%
Wu—50–60%
Wu—40–50%
Wu and Kraft's leads over Cappucci and DaRosa was pronounced enough that the Associated Press projected Wu and Kraft's first and second place finishes in the preliminary within eighteen minutes after the election's poll-closing time.[89] Wu's 49–point lead over Kraft in the preliminary was described by The Boston Globe as "staggering"[106] and the Dorchester Reporter as a "blowout".[104] Wu is the first candidate to receive more than 70% of the vote in either round of a Boston mayoral election since the 2001 election.
Wu led the vote in all of the city's 22 wards by comfortable margins. Of Boston's 272 precincts, Kraft only led Wu in 9. Some of the precincts where Kraft outperformed her were in Ward 16, regarded to be one of the city's more conservative areas. However, Wu still won a number of precincts in Ward 16, and carried the overall vote in the ward.[104] Jon Keller of WBUR noted that Wu had carried the vote Ward 16 precinct 2 by a preliminary-count of 84 to Kraft's 37. Keller described that precinct as being "one of the last remaining pockets of 'old Boston' voters in South Dorchester," and described Wu's strong performance there as, "a warning sign that moderate-to-conservative voters are by no means reflexively anti-Wu."[94]
On September 11 (two days after the preliminary), Kraft announced he was ending his campaign. The following day, he filed a request with the elections office to have his name removed[i] from the general election ballot.[103][3] On September 15, the Secretary of the Commonwealth's office confirmed Kraft properly filed the paperwork by the deadline to remove his name from the ballot.[4] As a result, his name will not be listed on the general election ballot.[109] This is the first instance under Boston's current election format[j] that a candidate has withdrawn after advancing to the mayoral election ballot.[110]
DaRosa (as the next-highest candidate in the preliminary) would be eligible to replace Kraft as the general election opponent to Wu if the final tally of the preliminary sees him receive at least 3,000 votes. DaRosa does not appear to have received sufficient votes, making it probable Wu would be unopposed on the general election ballot.[3][108] DaRosa announced he would seek a recount of the preliminary in the longshot hope that there had been a several hundred vote undercount of his support in the preliminary that would be sufficient for a recount to potentially increase his vote share to the 3,000 needed for him to be eligible to replace Kraft on the general election ballot.[3][110] DaRosa began circulating petitions to request a recall. However, due to the unlikelihood of an undercount on the scale DaRosa would need to reach 600 votes, it is anticipated that Wu will likely be the first candidate unopposed on a mayoral general election ballot since Tom Menino in 1997.[110]
↑ DaRosa had previously run in the 2017, 2019, and 2021 Boston City Council elections[18]
↑ Augustin withdrew a week before the petition deadline and did not file a nominating petition.[21]
↑ This ward committee is led by Bob Binney, who is a campaign treasurer for Wu's campaign.[53]
1 2 Key: A – all adults RV – registered voters LV – likely voters V – unclear
↑ Robert Kraft (father of Josh Kraft) had a longtime friendship with Trump dating back to the 1990s,[97] and made a sizable donation to fund the Trump's first inauguration. While he was reported to have initially distanced himself from Trump in the years following the January 6, 2021 attack, reports emerged in early 2025 that the two had resumed communication,[98] and they were once again being described by media as being allies.[98][99] In February 2025, Trump named Robert Kraft's wife (Josh Kraft's step-mother) Dana Blumberg to the board of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as part of a greater effort by Trump during his second term to purge members of the board and exert control over the venue.[100][101][102]
↑ State law gives candidates up to six days after the preliminary election to request to have their name removed from the ballot. After this deadline, they are not not permitted to make such a request.[3][108]
↑ 1951 was the first election in which Boston used its current format of nonpartisan preliminaries preceding its mayoral general elections[110]
↑ Garcia, Marcela (May 20, 2025). "Alex Alex's quixotic candidacy for Boston mayor". The Boston Globe. Retrieved August 27, 2025. The formerly undocumented immigrant only decided to run for office last month and won't even make the ballot; the deadline to submit the required 3,000 certified signatures from registered Boston voters is May 20. As of Monday morning, he'd only collected around 150.
↑ Binney, Bob (June 24, 2025). "Wu Hits Back at Bondi; Voter Info; Our Next Meeting". Boston Ward 5 Democratic Committee. Archived from the original on August 25, 2025. Retrieved August 25, 2025. At our June 24th Meeting, endorsed Michelle Wu for Mayor, [. . .]
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