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Original Title: “Foley Finishes First in Second Supervisorial Scrum.”
UPDATE: According to the VOC, Moorlach has conceded.
With the race over, we’re putting the few updates needed above the double line. Everything below the line is in chronological order. What’s above that line is in reverse chronological order, to keep the final report on top.
OJB: Now we’ll take a look at what’s changed in the past couple of days! [Narrator: Almost nothing has changed in the past couple of days. ]
Update, Thurs. 3/11
An additional 14,600 or so ballots have trickled into the count on Wednesday and Thursday, pushing turnout from 24.3% of registered voters to 28%. Here’s how the percentage totals have changed from before and after the more recent 3.7% increase in turnout, which represents 13.21% of the overall vote. (The total went from 95,907 to 110,504.)
- Foley: 44.28% to 43.79%
- Moorlach: 30.98% to 31.47%
- Muldoon: 11.24% to 11.56%
- Vo: 9.03% to 8.94%
- Rappaport: 4.46% to 4.25%
These numbers tell an interesting story: a story of two elections.
Let’s look at the combined showing, before and after, for Foley and Moorlach. Before the last , they two combined received 75.26% of the vote. After that latest 14,897 votes were added — not a small addition out of about 110,000 votes! — they top two candidates had received … 75.26% of the vote. Exactly the same amount, to the hundredths place! That’s pretty wild!
What that means is that for a tad over 3/4 of the electorate, this election was simply a choice between the two party-endorsed front-runners. Foley won 58.19% of that vote; Moorlach won 41.81%. That’s a 16.38% margin; or about a 4-to-3 ratio.
The three also-rans combined won a consistent 14.74% of the vote. Muldoon went up 0.32%, Vo lost 0.09%, and Rappaport lost 0.21%. (We’re deep into rounding error territory here.) In other words, almost nothing happened.
I’ve been making the same assumption about the split in party identification as most others have, but now it’s time to abandon it. Yes, nominal Republicans won about 52% of the vote to the Dems’ 48%. But that’s misleading in two ways, which operate in two different directions.
First, I have my doubts as to how many people even knew that Rappaport was a Democrat. If a Democratic-leaning voter didn’t vote for Foley in this race, they were not likely “gettable.”
Second: While the combined vote total of Moorlach and Muldoon almost match that of Foley’s, I have a hard time thinking that the “I like Murdoch, but I like Muldoon just a little bit more” was that substantial. I suspect that Muldoon had just decided not to vote for Murdoch, period — with their main alternatives being voting for Foley, voting for Vo, voting for Rappaport — or (most likely) not voting at all. The same analysis, switching out the names, goes for Vo voters as well: I doubt that they were making a hard decision between Moorlach and Vo; more likely it was between Vo and Muldoon, or Vo and Not Voting.
In other words, I suspect that if you eliminated the “second election” between the bottom three candidates, the 4:3 ratio in the first election would have … stayed pretty much where it is. Few voters would have stepped into that “first election” — and likely not nearly enough to get Moorlach up to 50%. (Even a Do endorsement of Moorlach, combined with Vo and Muldoon dropping out of the race, probably wouldn’t have done it. Viet voters not coming out for Moorlach was probably already baked in. I honestly don’t get the Republican antipathy towards Moorlach (beyond it being pushed by Do), but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.
Could Muldoon or Vo have won a straight up, one-to-one race against Foley? Maybe — but I don’t think that the brunt of Viet voters would come out for Muldoon or that the brunt of Muldoon voters would come out for Do; I think that the respective pro-Viet push to vote in Greater Little Saigon or, my sense is, the likely anti-Viet sentiment in Newport Beach would have turned people out. And, of course, I’m not convince that real anti-corruption Moorlach voters would have roused themselves to support either.
The logical conclusion here is that Republicans beating up on Muldoon and Vo is probably unfair. Nevertheless, as a Democrat I hope that the Republicans keep on doing it. Muldoon has likely harmed himself, and I’m fine with that. Beating up on Vo will likely alienate the Vietnamese community — and after a year where Viets came out hard for their Asian Republican candidates, a little bracing alienation (in which Viets learn that Newport Beach Republicans still don’t really respect them as their potential leaders) might be just desserts for all concerned, while Democrats continue to work on winning over the younger generation.
Look, we’ve hit the double-line!
In a first past the post election, not even Janet Rappaport can sap away as many voted from Foley as Muldoon and Vo can from Moorlach
Her are the figures on turnout in the first pass. (Second report comes out at 9:00.)
VOTER TURNOUT:
- 22.8% Ballots Cast
- 90,236 Vote Center Ballots
- 0 Vote by Mail Ballots
- Registered Voters 395,296
Presumably, we will see vote by mail ballots coming in, but it would be surprising to see a sizable enough red shift in them.
Presuming the results show up, Costa Mesa will now be led by the first tongue twister in recent memory: “Mayor Marr”. That refers to Vice-Mayor Andrea, with whom Foley has been simpatico.
Who will replace Mayor Marr in District 3? Marr’s opponent in 2018 was Brett Eckles, but it’s doubtful that a Foley-friendly majority — if there still is one, which I haven’t yet assessed — would tilt his way. We’ll check with the Pot Stirrer to see who else might live there — IF district boundaries stay the same!
Here come the 9:00 results!
Moorlach begins his comeback! And ends it, if those results from all precincts mean that all votes are counted. And if they are, there is really NO EXCUSE for that sort of extreme efficiency! I had blocked out my entire evening for this, Neal!
Foley slips by an entire 0.57%! The two Democrats no longer have a (unnecessary in a plurality wins contest) combined above 50% of the entire vote! LET THE RECRIMINATIONS BEGIN!
(Oh, what’s that? The recriminations had already begun before the vote? Well, all right then!)
For the record, Moorlach gained 0.61% in the first update. Muldoon gained 0.17%. Vo lost 0.11% of the vote share. And Rappaport lost 0.09% of the vote share.
At this rate, given Foley’s original lead in the advance vote of 15.96%, Moorlach would eventually overtake Foley’s 14.77% advantage over him, but at a rate of 1.19% gain per 2,192 added votes it would require 27,207 votes to be counted, which — while not impossible in a race where the votes of 300,000 votes haven’t been tallied (and where everyone who voted by mail after March 1 or so may not yet be in the count), is pretty much impossible, especially because the remaining categories of last minute voters, ballot damagers, paper balloteers, and a few others tend to vote Democratic anyway. We here in the newsroom are just trying to keep it interesting for you at this point!
Here’s the 9:30 update!
OK, 5,236 votes minus 2,192 equals 3,044 new votes are in!
Foley has dropped by 0.70%, which is actually a little slower of a drop than her vote in the first update, given that this is based on more votes. Moorlach is up by 0.56% — less than in the first update — closing the 14.77% gap we saw last to 13.51%. So this is looking less likely to be a blowout, but still not likely to change. He needed a bit more than 12 results like the first update to overtake Foley; now he needs a bit more than 11 — and he’s used up a bit more than 1-1/3 the number of cotes to do it!
In the recrimination watch, the combined Democratic vote is now 48.89%. Muldoon’s lead over Do is slightly wider than at first.
What will a Foley win mean for county governance? Well, one thing we know is that nobody likes Don Wagner, which is a sign of intelligent life on the Board. So if this is going to be a matter of a 3-2 majority, there will be four possibilities for the rest of this cycle (after which, again, we will see redistricting):
- Bartlett, Chaffee, Do vs. Foley & Wagner. This would be the coalition — substituting Foley for Steele that has brought a modicum of sanity to the Board recently, but it seems the least likely line-up.
- Bartlett, Chaffee, Foley vs. Do & Wagner. Do (who I’m told does not like Moorlach) had as much to do with this result as anyone but Foley, by endorsing Vo, so this seems unlikely on political grounds, but I could easily see this happening on policy grounds. Chaffee and Foley are natural Democratic allies — though see below! — and Bartlett probably has more tolerance of working with them than the more partisan Do does. Probably the most likely on most 3-2 splits, but less likely than 4-1 splits with Wagner losing.
- Chaffee, Do, Foley vs. Bartlett & Wagner. This could come about on some issues pitting South County against the rest, but I don’t think it’s that likely because of my suspicion — based on knowledge of each of them though no knowledge of their relationship — that Bartlett and Foley are really going to get along on the Board. They’re the two coastal reps, which gives them some commonality on issues, but stylistically they’re both smart, aggressive, capable women.
- Bartlett, Do, Foley vs. Chaffee & Wagner. This might seem like the least likely possibility, but I think it’s actually second or third most likely! It won’t happen if Chaffee doesn’t try to dominate Foley and exert his greater experience on the Board. But if he does demean her, subordinate her, or ignore her even a little bit — than I think that she would be willing and able to sting him like a scorpion. Bartlett and Do would seem to have some interest in seeing this happen on as many issues as possible. Does Chaffee have the chops to prevent it — even if he ends of lower on the Board’s pecking order than Foley? I honestly don’t know — but I think that Foley’s performance in Costa Mesa suggests that she has better chops than Chaffee’s performance in Fullerton suggests of him. This might not come about much because if he’s behind 3-2 Chaffee might switch to make it a 4-1 — but we’ll see what happens to his pet projects and such to read the writing on the Kremlin wall.
Oh, look — it’s 10:00! Time for the last update of the night!
This will be it until 5:00 tomorrow afternoon — but it suggests that we need not really hold our breath awaiting the outcome.
Another 441 votes are in. Foley drops down by 0.12%; Moorlach goes up by 0.07%. The percentage margin shrinks from 13.51% to 13.34%.
In absolute terms, the margin falls from 12,855 to 12,719 — a pickup of a not-negligible 136 votes. Moorlach beats Foley by 203 to 67, with 93 for Muldoon, 63 for Vo, and 7 for Rapaport (and 8 presumably write-ins, empty, or spoiled.) In some ways, though, those strong showing by Muldoon and Do are what tells the story. In what was obviously an incredibly conservative precinct (or drop box location, or whatever) where Moorlach trounced Foley by a tad over 2-to-1, he still took only 70% of the Republican vote — and it did move things that much. And there aren’t that many really conservative areas out there.
For what it’s worth, Foley’s campaign declared victory no later than 10:30 p.m. on Election Night. The outcome might be technically still in play, but it’s hard to argue with that call.
UPDATE: Nope! Moorlach has conceded. Foley is Supe!
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With as much talk Muldoon was making, I thought he’d do better than he did. Never heard of the guy prior. Looks like the OC GOP’s biggest fear of the 3 splitting the votes ended up costing Moorlach.
Indeed, Republicans showed an uncharacteristic lack of discipline in this election, at least a large measure of which gets placed on Andrew Do’s plate.
One might also conclude that Democrats showed an uncharacteristic amount of good discipline — but I think that the key was that no other Democrat in this district could claim nearly as much of a strong chance of winning as Foley. I thought that Gina Clayton-Tarvin might do as well– based on my expectation that Foley would get a lot of heat for jumping immediately from a successful (and scorched earth) Mayor’s race into the Supe’s race, but from what I could see from my faraway perch no one really broached that argument successfully.
That sort of attack would normally be front-and-center for any politician — and like many other arguments, would tend to be even more powerful against a woman — and yet … crickets. I’ve really missed Geoff West’s blog on this one!
Do’s not stupid – he apparently either wanted Katrina to win or didn’t mind the possibility (over whatever he hates about Moorlach.)
The Board will now be dominated by Do and Foley, given her energy and aggressiveness. Trumpy Teabagger Wagner will be isolated.
Could be that Do was put off by Moorlach’s never-ending sanctimony especially since Do has so much to answer for.
OK, but who’s third in the leading coalition: Chaffee or Bartlett?
My musings on this from last night — composed and posted following the now-obsolete 9:30 update — may be lost in the above shuffle, so I’ll repeat them below, with a little typo correction and reformatting:
I don’t really follow your fascination with some 3-2 breakdown. I just see Wagner isolated on most things. And sometimes the three Republicans sticking together on fiscal/union matters.
My Fullerton friends tell me Chaffee exhibits signs of dementia.
When I see that 24.3%, does that mean 24.3% of all eligible voters in the district casted votes ?
Alex — no, it’s a percentage of registered voters, not of registerable voters.
*Pappa John had this grave dug….when the Rat Pack Central Committee made him run for Supervisor again.
Congratulations to Katrina…..she is a good one and will do a fine job as Supervisor. Kat has been around the horn and seen most of the elephants for a long time.
Roy Blunt and Ron Johnson and about 10 more Trump loyalists will not be running for office in 2022. Says something about the state of the Republican Party. Reminds us
of “Lost in America” when Julie Haggerty is stuck on the Roulette Wheel crying out “22”, “22”. Al Brooks says: “How are you doing?” “Down!”, “Down!” she says…..Al says: “What? You lost our nest egg!”……Julie responds: “22”…”22″!
That last reference is a good catch! We need a still from the movie.
That tragic squeaker loss of Harley Rouda created that vacuum for Katrina to fill. I’m sure there were many Maga Mesa Verdeans who were more than willing to trash Katrina for jumping up to the Board of Supes, all the while grateful she’s no longer Mayor.
That being said, Katrina is in position to do more at the County level for District 2,which helps CM.I know she will take Mayor Marr,s call and Andrea Marr is s brilliant lady. She’ll do remarkably well, I’m sure.
Sadly we have another do-nothing Congress person in Michelle Steel. We need Harley back in, Katrina re-elected, maintain the CM super majority….and get some shit done for once.
*Agree on all counts! Oversight is the name of the game for the BOS and no doubt that “Mission Statement” has been Missing In Action……since the day…that we walked into the Building and saw 100 Homeless parked outside next to the Hot Dog Cart……
However, in defense of some members….they did get rid of a lot of Unincorporated Areas of the County. Some we agreed with….like the Acquisition for Newport Beach by the Airport and some not……Sunset Beach to HB….which we still think is a tragic reach. Hopefully, Kat can come in and takeover quickly. She needs no time for niceties. We need County Policy which incorporates the funds from the Rescue America ….just passed. These funds should not go down some rabbit hole….they should be distributed fairly and transparently.
Do (not Do) I really have to point out (again) that party affiliation means almost nothing on the BoS. 99% of the votes would be the same either way. Good grief, what unnecessary drama.
You’d generally think so. But public health stupidly became a partisan issue last year. Immigration too.
That was a one off. Unless it happens again.
Note that this was updated with new returns and new analysis overnight.
In response to Vern’s question about why my looking at the various coalitions matter: it’s first because it shows the likelihood that [edited to remove double negative] Chaffee (whom, despite what Zenger’s Fullerton friends have to say, does not likely have dementia) is in a much worse position on the Board that one would imagine given the election of a second Democrat. He is likely to be the “junior partner” in the relationship with a much more vigorous and deft politician whom Do and Bartlett will both be trying to court. (If he doesn’t see that, then maybe Zenger’s friends have a point.)
Second, being in a governing coalition means, unfortunately, often overlooking bad decisions and corruption by one’s governing partners. So it’s useful to know how much someone who may be disposed towards one or both will be able to get away with it.
Things I don’t know for sure:
1) Chaffee actually has been diagnosed with dementia.
Things I do know for sure:
1) Chaffee is a corrupt and unreliable
2) Chaffee is incompetent
3) Chaffee is desperate for public power
4) Chaffee is married to a fake carpetbagger (perjurer)
5) Chaffee is married to a criminal (criminal record expunged by now).
Argue with Brian Chung, below; he’s the one who’s gunning for you.
I’m not going to argue with the five things you know for sure — although I think that you mean to say that his wife is a real carpetbagger, not a fake one, and I believe that when one’s record is expunged you no longer need to be referred to as a criminal.
But I think that, for Brian’s sake, you might want to expound on your reasoning, with examples. Or not. Up to you.
Um, no, she is not a REAL carpetbagger, she is a fake one – she never really lived in the district in which she briefly rented a home during the Council election. (Real carpetbagging may be a bad thing but it’s not illegal.)
She pled guilty to stealing campaign signs, which CALLED her a carpetbagger. And she stole many more than she got caught stealing – just about every one she could find.
BTW, during that BoE election, Jose Moreno in a really bad (and rare) lapse of judgment decided to enthusiastically back her – apparently just because she wasn’t Jordan – and much of the Anaheim Democrat Club followed his judgment rather than back the only decent Democrat, Dr. Vicki Calhoun. During that time Paulette started coming to all our meetings even though she’s a FULLERTON Democrat. That wasn’t surprising, I was expecting her to stop coming after her election loss. Pero no, she is still an Anaheim Democrat Club regular. Which kind of makes me wonder if she’s contemplating some other run. Or maybe she just has nothing better to do on the first Saturday of each month.
Maybe she’s there because you’re just that good of a recruiter.
OK, I get the term now. But if she was a fake carpetbagger, for doing the same thing (as I recall) that Galloway (and Sidhu?) did when running for Supervisor, why did the signs then call them “carpetbagger”? Maybe the taxonomy was less refined back then.
Well obviously “fake carpetbagger” takes explaining, so it doesn’t make a real good SIGN.
And the list of OC’s fake carpetbaggers is LONG, probably longer than the list of real carpetbaggers. Much longer than just Sidhu and Galloway, who yes were TOTAL fake carpetbaggers that lied.
Of course she’s contemplating another run. She and Bud still have money in the bank.
So if she stole signs calling her a [real] carpetbagger when she was actually only a fake carpetbagger, does she have a libel action against the people who claimed that she was a [real] carpetbagger, when she wasn’t one, just because the false claim made for a better sign?
I stand by my original point, whatever the hell it was.
Your original point? I think you were just sticking up a little for the Chaffees against Zenger and me, thinking it was just another battle in the Carpetbag Wars.
Gotta e-mail you about the Jordan petition. One little fix the City is demanding is something only you can do (hopefully not too much work!)
No, my original point was that I considered her a *real* carpetbagger rather than a *fake* carpetbagger, because I had gotten the impression that she was a *real* carpetbagger from the signs she stole calling her a “carpetbagger.” If you think that that’s “sticking up for her,” that’s on you.
She never lived at her fake address and nobody believes she did.
He’s not gunning for me. I didn’t say Chaffe had dementia. I just passed along an observation from Fullerton Chaffee watchers.
Plus, I have no idea who Brian Chung is, or if he is even a real person. If he is I bet he has never seen Bud Chaffee in (in)action.
Other things we know for sure:
He’s pretty damn old and shows very low energy, and frequently falls asleep on the dais.
Perfect! All that needs to happen is for Katrina to fit him with a shock collar so that she can wake him up at the right time and tell him how to vote.
That corresponds with what I’ve heard from Fullerton where he was the happy tool of Fitzgerald – Pringle’s Vice President of Something or Other. The accompanying observation was that he is daft and getting dafter.
Wow. How Fullerton is that! Claiming a guy you likely have NEVER met, let along spent considerable time with has a medical condition. Makes wonder what side you guys are on? I guess you didn’t call out Foley aggressiveness in a sexuality way!
Welcome, Brian. A few points:
(1) What side are we guys on? Vern and I are usually but not always on the same side, but sometimes he agrees with Zenger and/or Ryan. I often agree with Ryan, despite our ideological differences, and increasingly with Zenger, on matters of substance — as Trump has brought most sane people together (in opposition to him) — but we’re less likely to agree on matters of style and demeanor. I hope that that answers your sort-of question.
Ryan and Zenger both have considerable Chaffee-watching experience, so — presuming that you’re responding to his “dementia” comment — the problem is less one of unfamiliarity as lack of diagnostic credentials. If Supervisor Chaffee wants that remark — not even opinion, but reporting of others’ putative opinions — taken down, he can contact us. Suffice it to say that this site does not endorse Zenger’s friends’ diagnostic capabilities, regardless of whether they’re correct here.
We didn’t “call out” Foley’s aggressiveness. She’s an attorney, and a damn good one, and noting her aggressiveness is more of a compliment than a call-out. Aggressiveness combined with bad ethics or bad causes is bad; combined with good ones it is good, and we’ll see which way she breaks while on the Board. (I’d say that Vern and I are both optimistic.)
I don’t know what you mean by “in a sexuality way.” I don’t know her “sexuality”; if you mean sexual orientation, I’d probably guess hetero, but that’s just going by baseline statistics. If you’re referring to her being a woman, I don’t think anyone around her sees “aggressive woman” as pejorative, and “aggressive woman attorney” is if anything even less so.
I’ve had two problems with Foley in this election, neither enough to make me hope that she wouldn’t win. The first is that I was concerned that she was going to get skewered by Costa Mesans for running for Supe just a few months after being elected Mayor. I expected that to happen — and it didn’t. I guess that people understood that Hometown Girl had a big opportunity here and thought that it was reasonable for her to take it.
The second is that I’m concerned that Foley may be vulnerable to some interest groups — the Trades/Teamsters and the pension inflaters, for starters — that may desire bad policies that the county can’t afford. But she seems to be made of pretty stern stuff, so I won’t presume the worst until and unless I see it.
I hope that this helps you understand our coverage. Weigh in on the math, too; I love the math!
That’s what people in Fullerton are saying. And they know Bud Chaffee very well. I know he’s immoral, greasy, and incompetent. As to his mental faculties I await a professional diagnosis.
Whoever you are.
*In Retrospect: Remember Tom Reilly or Harriet Weider?”
Pappa John Moorlach came in after the USC alumni Citron…..learned the lesson
of False Pride and thought that Derivatives and Hedge Fund could save his gambling
addition. At that time, it was hard to make your chops on the BOS following the John Wayne Airport Debacle and the naming game….making it Tom Rielly Terminal rather than Eddie Martin…..with the bloated over budgetness of course. Some guy name Sheriff Mike Carona was making a name for himself and in fact had things go right….may have been a good candidate for Governor of California. But no, dirty laundry and iffy associations had created an atmosphere that was ripe for being targeted by the OC Power Brokers….(always afraid of strong personalities). When Moorlach was chosen to be the hit man against Carona….promises were made….however, Chris Street came along to fill his old Treasurer spot and Big Screen TV’s and fresh paint for BOS Offices became all the rage. Because Street was Pappa John’s bud….he became the sacrificial lamb of the day. Then Hitchens came in as Sheriff. Tom Fuentes did what he could to hold the game together but even he couldn’t make the dirt go away. Pappa John our hero….had to chase after a few lost seagulls but managed. His attempt to takeover Leisure World in Los Alamitos was not as good as it could have been. He did have to bite the bullet on Sunset Beach and the Annexation by HB. In the end, his reputation was still intact, which made him a danger…. Moorlach could have been the next Governor of California after Gavin …..(ah….notice how that little Recall game got
started all of a sudden…over literally nothing?) Anyway, Gavin is going to beat the Recall and maybe come out even stronger. Pappa John? Notice how the numbers came out so that perhaps had Muldoone and Vo not run….MAYBE Moorlach could have beaten Foley? Our take is different. Moorlach was sandbagged by the Power Brokers and everyone on the planet knows it. So what? The what is that we have lost a very capable, intelligent and powerful Republican figure in California for the moment. Could
Moorlach beat a Michelle Steel in a Primary? What would Dr. D. say: “Don’t go there!”
Anyway, the Moorlach future will be a wonderful observation point as the years go by.
We hold great hope for the wonderful Pappa John….in spite of his political opponents and naysayers. Foley? She is a quick study and will find that with only Lisa Bartlett on her side she will still be able to get stuff done. Foley is coming from the “Lone Ranger”
Costa Mesa City Council……to a BOS “Long Ranger and Tonto” environment.
I’ve edited Mike Carona’s surname to be more accurate and less viral.
Please correct the name of the late, almost lamented successor Sheriff. And then maybe cull the rest for a single coherent thought.
Looked it over more closely. Augean stables, man. My pitchfork stops here.
*Edit yourself dear friend. Your comments are superfluous at best…..nonsensical and extraneous without a doubt. Most people do not have the time or inclination to address so much diminutive during their very busy day. We suppose we are sinking to your level at this point…..however, you have been given a pass far too many times. Cutting to the chase:
Let’s just be clear….we don’t like you either!
For me to dislike you I would have to care enough about you in the first place. Carry on.
*Yeah, we agree…..you are not worth the price of the toilet paper it takes to wipe off the mirror with. But of course we could be wrong….you might be after all?
Katrina sworn in…