Incumbent Democratic state Rep. Betsy Ritter once again defeated Republican challenger Tony Siragusa on Tuesday.

With 6,152 votes from four districts in Waterford and two districts in Montville, Ritter was elected to her fifth term, while Siragusa received a collective 4,012 votes. Siragusa also ran against Ritter in 2010.

The 38th District encompasses Waterford and southwestern Montville.

There are 13,076 registered voters in Waterford and 9,826 registered voters in Montville, according to the town’s registrars of voters.

Ritter celebrated Tuesday evening with her supporters at Waterford’s Democratic headquarters in the Jordan Brook Plaza.

“I’m really pleased, I worked very hard for this and I think there’s been a strong showing,” Ritter said. “I’ve increased my margin over last time and I’m pleased about that, considering there was a redistricting in Montville, and several hundred voters there were new voters for me.”

She spent much of the day Tuesday visiting polling places in both towns. After casting her vote at Quaker Hill Elementary School at 6 a.m., she remained there for two hours greeting voters but said she didn’t spend much time talking about pressing political issues.

“A lot of people have wished me luck, but there hasn’t been any conversation about the issues,” Ritter said. “We’ve had more than enough time to decide.”

She planned to return to Quaker Hill School again before the polls closed because she prefers to start and end her campaigning at her home polling place.

“It’s sort of superstitious,” she said.

The now-twice-defeated House candidate had this to say Tuesday evening: “That’s the way it is, the voters got what they wanted. You can’t do nothing about that.”

When asked if he plans to challenge Ritter a third time, Siragusa said it’s “too early to think about that kind of stuff.”

“Maybe in a month,” he said.

j.hanckel@theday.com