Progressive challenger Randall Woodfin on Tuesday unseated William Bell, the mayor of Birmingham, Alabama, in a nonpartisan runoff election.

Woodfin’s ambitious platform and dogged ground game ultimately bested Bell, 68, a two-term Democratic incumbent who had been in city politics since before Woodfin was born.

But not even Woodfin’s most optimistic boosters anticipated the resounding margin of his victory. With all but one polling place reporting, Woodfin defeated Bell 58 to 41 percent.

“Our city, our 23 communities, our 99 neighborhoods, you all have spoken very clearly ― we deserve better,” Woodfin said at the start of his victory speech Tuesday night, prompting cheers from the audience.

When Chokwe Antar Lumumba won the Democratic primary for mayor of Jackson, Miss., last month, he was described as a "left radical" and a "radical activist" -- and that was by leftist publications like In These Times and The Nation.

People in Jackson say such labels are overstated.

"I've not seen any evidence of the radical side," says former Mayor Kane Ditto. "I've not heard any proposals that I thought were not in the mainstream."

Nonetheless, Lumumba -- who won Tuesday's general election -- has made it clear he intends to take the city in a liberal direction. He ran on a program of inclusive growth, and his mayoralty may offer striking evidence of a nationwide trend: strongly progressive policies being pushed in big cities, even in deep red states.

"He is a pretty progressive-minded person," says Councilman De'Keither Stamps.

In strongly Democratic Jackson, there was no doubt Lumumba would be elected once he won the primary. On Tuesday, he garnered 93 percent of the vote.