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Councilman Zack Reed Concedes Cleveland Mayoral Race to Frank Jackson

[Timothy Dubravetz / ideastream]

Cleveland City Councilman Zack Reed lost his mayoral bid to incumbent Frank Jackson on Tuesday night. Reed won 40 percent of the vote to Jackson's 59. 

Shortly after 11 p.m., Reed called Jackson to congratulate him. 

Watch Reed's concession speech above.

Zack Reed sounded a bit snarky in his concession speech after losing by 19 percentage points.

“The voters of the city of Cleveland spoke and they want to continue down the path we’ve been going down for the last 12 years.”   

Reed had argued that neighborhoods needed more attention and downtown development less.  

And he campaigned on a platform of public safety, saying he would hire additional police officers.  

Zack Reed with his fiance and supporters on election night.   (urycki/ideastream) 

                    Do you think the public safety message may have hurt you because of anger with police?

"No, it was a good message." replied Reed.  "You started from the beginning of  ‘He’s crazy, he’s out of his mind he wants to hire 400 more police.’

You now look at the literature from the mayor - he’s talking he wants to hire 300 police.  You start from a conversation of we’ve only traditionally had only 2 police cadet classes, now he set about to put on five.”  

The 56 year old Reed says he will serve out the rest of his term and then decide what he is going to do next.