Is the third time the charm for Mahmood?

For Muhith Mahmood, his quest to win the mayoral election is not over.

By Charles Sercombe
Mayoral hopeful Muhith Mahmood is not giving up his fight to count 37 untabulated ballots from the November election.
Mahmood made an emergency appeal to the state supreme court to have those 37 ballots included in the election total.
What’s at stake is the possibility that counting the ballots could tip the election result to Mahmood’s favor. He lost by a slim 11 votes.
Hamtramck City Clerk Rana Faraj, who is on paid suspension, found the ballots after the election and turned them into the county.
So far, Mahmood has struck out in a Wayne County Circuit Court where Judge Patricia Perez Fresard ruled against counting the ballots because the ballots were not secured.
Mahmood initially asked for a recount on of all the ballots including the 37 ballots in question. But the Wayne County Board of Canvassers deadlocked in a 2-2 vote on whether to have the ballots counted.
That tie vote automatically meant the ballots could not be counted, but the recount resulted in Adam Alharbi increasing his victory margin from six votes to 11.
Mahmood’s attorney, Mark Brewer, argues that there is prior case law in favor of counting the ballots. Not counting the ballots, Brewer has said, disenfranchises those voters.
Brewer said an appeal was made to the supreme court in order to bypass an appeal court and have the matter drag out.
Mayor-elect Adam Alharbi is scheduled to be sworn into office this Sunday, Jan. 4, at the Hamtramck Public Library.
In the meantime, Alharbi went to Wayne County Circuit Court and tried to get Mahmood disqualified by accusing him of not being a resident in Hamtramck. Judge Fresard dismissed his lawsuit saying that there was no evidence to support the claim – just hearsay.
Alharbi based his accusation on a prior internal investigation by a company that said there is evidence that Mahmood actually lives in Troy with this family.
Mahmood says that although his family lives in Troy, he resides in Hamtramck.
Posted Jan. 1, 2026