.
.
.
Orange Juice Blog hereby dubs any recount between South County El Pollo Loco baron Sidhu and the Irvine Mayor as: “BAWK CHOI”!
[Ed. Note: because there is such a thing as too many copies of the same photo of bok choy, we’re going to double, triple, however many -iple up here, so long as little is changing at this point. We’ll work in reverse chronological order.]
June 24th
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 222,229
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 222,229
Total Estimated Left to Count: 0
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 61,370
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 0
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 76,177
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 76,177
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 0
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 9,182
Total election day paper ballots counted: 9,182
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 0
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 17,500
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 17,500
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Commentary to follow.
June 23rd
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 222,229
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 220,484
Total Estimated Left to Count: 1,745
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 60,118
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 1,252
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 76,177
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 76,053
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 124
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 9,182
Total election day paper ballots counted: 9,154
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 28
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 17,500
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 17,159
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 341
Presumably, one more day (if that) of initial ballot counting left — and then the 1% hand count to make sure the machines worked.
Choi now leads Sidhu by 154. It is ridiculous how little fluctuation we’ve seen in that race for the past week!
* * * * * * * * *
Here’s a race that probably isn’t on your radar: Ed Royce’s CA-39, Dems ran a hapless sacrificial lamb in 2014, but a really good candidate in 20
CA-39 primary 2014:
June 3, 2014 Primary Election Results
Ed Royce (R) 49,071 70.6%
Peter O. Anderson (D) 20,480 29.4%
CA-39 primary 2012:
Ed Royce (R) 62,874 66.3% [68.85% of top-two vote]
Jay Chen (D) 28,457 30.0% [31.15% of top-two vote]
DMarie Mulattieri (N ) 3,561 3.8%
Now what do things look like in 2016? Murdock is down exactly 35% in OC, but overall in the tri-county area?
Ed Royce (R) 83,598 60.9%
Brett Murdock (D) 34,648 39.1%
Anderson got only 31% in November of 2014. But Chen got 42.2% in the 2012 general election — an 11.1% bump over his two-party vote share in the primary — while Royce got 57.8% (11% less than his two party share) after spending (going by memory here) $3 million or so to beat him. If that happens again this year … Murdock narrowly wins. And, if he can get his own million dollars or so, that’s even if Royce spends huge amounts of money against him! That either ties up Royce’s money at home — as it did in 2012 — allowing the election of more Democrats elsewhere, or else Royce realistically risks losing his seat.
Murdock has to be looking at the results of SD-29 and wanting to strange himself, thinking about how he might have had Josh Newman’s position in the runoff. (He can relax, if so: it couldn’t have, happened. Newman wasn’t getting out of the race and he and Murdock would have split the non-Asian vote. What should have happened was that Sukhee Kang should have done his party a service and run against Royce — where he might be as well-placed or better as Murdock is now– leaving Murdock to face off against Newman.) What Murdock is doing by pushing Royce to the wall in CA-39 is the sort of thing that should get one a medal from one’s party; as with Chen, it’s potentially far more significant than one mere race. But it usually goes uncelebrated.
* * * * * * * * *
If I understand the headlines correctly, Brea has voted to voted to secede from Orange County and make a go of it on its own. At least I think that that’s what “Brexit” must mean; not actually sure that that’s right, though.
June 22nd
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 219,938
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 208,418
Total Estimated Left to Count: 11,520
At this point, OJB is confused. None of the figures have updated. Was there an error in the automatic updating program? Did ROV workers get a well-deserved day off? Did they start in on the 1% canvas (the hand-count of votes) before finishing the provisional ballots? (That’s my guess.) The hard part of making these predictions (made easier by my certainly that no one is really relying on them) is that they come out right at the point that the office has has closed and I can’t easily call them to ask what’s up. (That timing may not be a coincidence.) Check back tomorrow!
Oh, THERE we go: it was just a little site updating problem. On to the turnout numbers!
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 220,808
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 214,717
Total Estimated Left to Count: 6,091
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 55,466
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 5,904
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 76,177
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 76,053
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 124
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 9,182
Total election day paper ballots counted: 9,154
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 28
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 16,079
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 16,044
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 35
No major changes to report locally. Choi now up by 151. Munzing up 62 over Turbow. Nothing else of interest is that close.
We can tell you that, statewide, Hillary is now leading Bernie by 54.2% to 44.9% — a slight narrowing of the margin down to 9.3% — and that the U.S. Senate vote percentages stay the same. Loretta just broke the 1.3 million vote barrier, while Kamala just broke the 2.82 million vote barrier. Here in the tri-county area of the frozen north, Brett Murdock trails Ed Royce by only 61%-39% (which, if we pretend that this is a normal primary from which Dems significantly improve in the general, would be amazing); Ling-Ling is down to 44.5% of the vote compared to Josh’s 29.0% and Sukhee’s 26.6%, which is still an almost 4,000 raw-vote margin for the Democrats; and AD-55 appears to be unchanged with Phillip Chen up about 1,000 over Mike Spence for second place.
June 21st
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 219,938
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 208,418
Total Estimated Left to Count: 11,520
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 50,161
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 11,209
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 76,177
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 76,053
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 124
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 8,582
Total election day paper ballots counted: 8,454
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 128
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 15,809
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 15,750
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 59
Today’s notes:
- It’s one thing to say that Democrats cast more votes in Orange County in the primary election than Republicans did — which they did, by a current total of 330,517 to 285,481. But it’s somehow more eye-popping when you put it as a percentage of registered voters. Democratic turnout is currently 70.7% — which is amazingly high by recent primary election standards — and Republican turnout is a mere 51,2%. That just doesn’t happen. Who gets the credit for the Dem turnout? Bernie and Trump add to the normal amount that Hillary would have brought out against a generic Romney-style opponent.
- Unless the ROV has been saving the hardest ballots for last, the present pace suggests that today (Wednesday the 22nd) will be the last day of any initial counting of ballots. This will be followed by an automatic recount — or “canvass” of a portion of the ballots. My guess is that the count wraps up by Friday — at which point I believe that any demands for recounts can begin
- It looked at one point as if CA-46 — where “Hermaphrodem” Lou Correa won big, but only with a plurality — might be headed to a recount between Republican Bob Peterson and Democrat Bao Nguyen. That didn’t last long: Bao eventually steamed past Peterson and now leads him by 1,650 votes (or 1.8%) — and it will probably hit 2% by tonight.
- It also looked at one point like control over the Orange County Board of Education, to be determined by the race between incumbent Robert Hammond and Tustin Councilwoman Beckie Gomez, might also end up in a recount. But then Gomez just stomped him at the end of last week. She’s ahead by almost 1,600 votes, or 2.1%, and that will grow with the remaining ballots being almost all provisionals.
- The race that could still conceivably go to a runoff is for the second slot against Democrat Sean Panahi in AD-68, where the Republican challenger will likely to heavily favored. Pringle Ring candidate Harry Sidhu led on election night, but Irvine Mayor Steven Choi crept up on him and passed him about a week ago. Choi first led by 32, then 49, then 71 — and then jumped to 150, where he’s been hovering between 146 and 151 for the last four business days. A recount looks unlikely — but if Disney wants one, it will have one.
- The big upset of the night was between two Democrats, with Josh Newman beating party-insider favorite Sukhee Kang for the spot in the SD-29 runoff against a surprisingly anemic looking Ling-Ling Chang. Chang has only 44.5% of the vote in the district overall, half of which she has been representing in the Assembly. The two Democrats combined for almost 90,000 votes to her almost 72,000. If Newman gets party money, this is a winnable race.
- Other not-actual upsets that were still intriguing included:
- Doug Applegate losing CA-49 in OC by 20% was outshined by his being within 2% of incumbent Darrell Issa in the larger San Diego County portion of the district. Overall, Applegate trails by 10,000 votes in the district, or 6.3%. People are saying that Issa looks vulnerable — people don’t like him spending all that money to find dirt on President Obama and coming up completely empty — and I don’t recall them ever saying that before. A strong drive to bridge that 8,000 vote deficit in the four southernmost OC cities would be a pretty smart use of people’s time.
- Ari Grayson running fewer than 10% behind John Moorlach in SD-37.
- Gregg Fritchle getting 35.4% of the primary vote in AD-55; he’ll face Phillip Chang, who has 22.1%.
- Sharon Quirk-Silva leading “Bigoted Buttkicker” Young Kim by 8.2% so far in their AD-65 rematch.
- Karina Onofre leading incumbent Matt Harper by 42.3% to 39.0% in AD-74.
- Michele Martinez leading incumbent Andrew Do by 37.8% to 34.5% in the 1st Supervisorial district.
And finally:
- In the Democratic Presidential primary, Hillary Clinton currently leads Bernie Sanders in OC by 52.1% to 47.0%. The gap between them has been closing at about 0.7% per day, once we’ve gotten to provisionals, so expect the final margin to be about 4.5%. The current gap between them statewide is 9.4%. So there, rest of California! Sure, we’re not Medocino County, where Bernie’s up by 26.5% — but we did OK! Among the Southern California Counties east of Santa Barbara, we were Bernie’s best.
- In the Senate primary, Kamala Harris is beating ‘homegirl Loretta Sanchez by 40.4% to 18.6% in the jungle primary — a margin of more than 1.5 million votes out of the 4.1 million that went to them combined. Coming in third place was leading Republican Duf Sundheim with 8.0%. An unheralded Republican, Phil Wyman, came it 4th with 4.8% — but is winning 4 counties (Modoc, Lassen, Glenn, and Kern) to Loretta’s 6 (Orange, Fresno, Imperial, Tulare, Madera, and Kings), with the other 48 going to Harris. In OC, Harris led slightly early on, but Loretta’s lead is now 26.9% to 24.7% — about 13,500 votes.. Loretta’s combined lead in the other five counties where she lead Harris was only about 8,700 votes, so OC is definitely her base. (At least after Imperial County.) [Full Disclosure: I’m Harris’s county coordinator here, and I’m told that they don’t entirely blame me for the loss.]
June 20th
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 218,538
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 191,958
Total Estimated Left to Count: 26,580
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 35,041
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 26,329
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 74,977
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 74,918
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 59
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 8,582
Total election day paper ballots counted: 8,430
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 152
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 15,609
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 15,569
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 40
Nothing major to support: Joe Dunn has almost caught up with Bob Peterson for third place — meaningless for the top 2 race, but possibly meaningful for estimates of how many progressive Democratic votes are out there. Steven Choi is back up ahead of Harry Sidhu by 150. (Fancy a recount, Mr. Sidhu?)
Today was almost all provisionals — and the results of voting show it. This is sort of exciting to us stats nerds because we can now look at what happens when only provisional ballots are counted. (I’m just going to pretend like the 21 Eligible/Belated VBMs didn’t even happen. Out of about 15,000 ballots counted today, that’s not much more than rounding error.) I’m doing a special calculation of the results of just today’s ballots as a sample of what provisionals look like. Those will be posted in a separate item today or tomorrow.
June 17th
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 217,257
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 176,453
Total Estimated Left to Count: 40,804
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 20,838
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 40,532
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 74,977
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 74,918
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 59
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 8,582
Total election day paper ballots counted: 8,430
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 152
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 14,328
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 14,267
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 61
Now I’m not saying that Neal Kelley is messing with me, but now 800 votes have been added back in to the “Total Ballots Counted (after Election Day)” number, which I had been using to try to determine how many provisional ballots are being approved. I’m going to interpret that as a pretty big hint that I shouldn’t try to do that. Ok, FINE.
The ROV also counted 200 more VBMs left at the polls today and 114 timely postmarked but belatedly arriving VBMs, perhaps just to complicate my calculations. But, the added “Vote by Mail” numbers show that 1,114 Vote by Mail ballots have been added — which means that we’ve probably fond the 800 VBMs that were added to the total above. All of the numbers are supposed to be estimates, but that 58,000 VBMs number is more estimated than most, and that may be where the discrepancy lies. Unless they’re all in some precinct or district that makes a difference in some race, I’m not going to worry about it — and the ROV, as usual, gets credit for showing its work well enough to spot this.
The big news, as reported in a new story, is that Beckie Gomez turned into Godzilla and just started to stompify Robert Hammond in OCBOE District 1. She added about 1,150 votes to her margin (which at the end of Thursday was -146) and turning a squeaker into a laugher. It’s very unlikely that Hammond can come back with provisionals only, but it would be great to see the charter school extremists bankroll his doing a recount. (Great from the “charter school moderate” perspective, I mean.)
I other news, Steven Choi‘s margin for second place actually slipped back four votes today, meaning that if that pace keeps up for 36 more days of counting Harry Sidhu still has a chance.
Josh Newman‘s districtwide margin in SD-29 — including Chino Hills and the LA-based districts — is holding firm, currently at 3,599 votes. I’m told that Sukhee Kang finally conceded today — which I don’t criticize, as it has been conceivable that provisionals could break in his direction — but last I checked his website there was no evidence of it. Kang’s website had a post Friday after the Los Angeles County ballot count was updated; it said, in its entirety, “Thank you for your support? Thank You from Sukhee Kang!” Sounds like a concession to me! (Or something.)
Among Assembly districts, AD-74 (where Karina Onofre will meet incumbent Matt Harper in the fall) had a bit over 103,000 votes cast so far. AD-69 (where incumbent Tom Daly will face Republican challenger Ofelia Velarge-Garcia) had almost exactly half that: 51,500. CA-46, overlapping and about 50% larger, had about 89,000. The overlapping BOE district had about 75,000 voters; the overlapping Supervisorial District — both about 1/3 larger than AD-69, had about 85,000. Is it possible that — Latinos don’t really come out for Tom Daly?
My current State Senator, Bob Huff, was running for the most conservative seat on the LA County Board of Supervisors. It’s not entirely over yet, but as he is down around 1,000 votes it seems very likely at this point that Huff will finish third. (Provisionals are not exactly going to support him more than his Democratic opponent.) Huff moved from Diamond Bar to San Dimas for this race; I’m going to take a wild guess that he’ll be serving on a Water Board somewhere — ANYWHERE!, maybe even in OC! — a year from now. “Have funds, will travel.”
And finally, in the OCGOP Central Committee race for the 73rd district, here’s the people in slots 5 through 7, two of whom will win:
|
The numbers don’t seem to be changing much, and Turbow has been fading since the VBMs were counted. And so, with Beall apparently safe, this exciting political week will Endall.
June 16th
Now, Gentle Readers, we’re going to start to get a sense of how many provisional ballots are making it through the system — one of the main reasons for publishing these daily updates!
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 216,457
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 167,937
Total Estimated Left to Count: 48,520
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 13,436
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 47,934
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 74,677
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 74,418
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 259
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 8,582
Total election day paper ballots counted: 8,430
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 152
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 13,828
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 13,653
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 175
Thursday’s count therefore included 8,316 provisional ballots, 125 VBMs left at the polls, 2,757 paper ballots, and 753 timely postmarked but belatedly arriving ballots. That’s 11,951 total ballots. And yet, the “Total Ballots Cast” amount went up by only 6,272: 879 Vote-by-Mail ballots and 5,393 Precinct ballots. That’s a discrepancy of 5,679 ballots.
The 879 figure matches up almost exactly with with the total of 878 “VBMs left at polls” and “timely postmarked” groups. So the discrepancy is all within the paper and provisional ballots. Because a lot of paper was also counted Thursday, we can’t so clearly tell what proportion of this is paper and what proportion is provisional; the Friday count, which will be almost solely provisional, will be much more informative in that respect.
Because we haven’t seen any previous changes to the “Total Ballots Cast” number since the belated absentees arrived, it’s a decent bet that few if any paper ballots are being thrown out. (Disqualification of paper ballots does happen sometimes, but it’s nowhere as likely as with provisionals.) Also, I’m taking the discrepancy reported above seriously — but it may not be. It may be that the number has been dropping all along and simply hasn’t been reported before now; it’s also possible that the publication of this number yesterday was itself unintended. But it seems likely enough that this discrepancy reflects the number of provisionals being rejected that it’s worth doing a little math to see what we find.
If all of the paper ballots were counted, and if the discrepancy is real, that would mean that the entire discrepancy would be due to rejected provisionals. In other words, if 5,679 of the 8,316 provisional ballots were rejected, then the numbers would match up completely. That would be a rejection rate of almost exactly 68.29%, meaning a retention rate of 31.71%. (And again, the ballots that were counted would be spread across the county — and many of them would not include voters for a given race. Some people, for example, only vote for President.)
Over the past three days listed here, Hammond’s lead has dropped from 381 to 262, a net loss of 119 votes, to 146 today — a net loss of another 116 votes, despite that many fewer votes were apparently counted. 47,934 provisionals remain; let’s presume that only 31.71% of those will be counted — that brings us back to 15,200. That’s about 3,000 per district. Even with not all people voting downballot, the drop-off is not much more than the hotly contested and substantially overlapping Supervisor’s race — 71,000 vs. 81,000. Given that Hammond won’t be getting a whole lot of provisions, Gomez would seem to have an advantage right now — but we’ll know a lot more after tomorrow’s “clean” vote of provisionals. (I’ll go out on a limb and say that she edges ahead on Monday evening and ends with enough of a margin to make a recount unlikely.)
While Hammond’s margin has fallen to 146, Choi’s lead now up to 150. (In other words, this was the day that they crossed.) Oh, and Bao’s up 1,096 over Peterson, so that one’s pretty much over. What else new is going on? Not much here, but here’s something over note: the Secretary of State has identified 13 “close contests” in the state and 3 of them — CA-46, AD-55, and AD-68 — are mostly or entirely in OC. The BAWK-CHOI contest is the second closest legislative race in the state.
June 15th
Starting once again with What’s Left to Count before reviewing individual races.
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 219,075
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 158,593
Total Estimated Left to Count: 60,482
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 5,120
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 56,250
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 74,677
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 74,292
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 385
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 11,200
Total election day paper ballots counted: 8,281
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 2,919
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 13,828
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 12,900
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 928
A bit over 11,000 ballots counted on Wednesday, roughly half of them paper ballots filled out at the polls. Beyond that were about 4,000 provisionals, 940 VBMs returned at the polling place, and 900 timely postmarked arriving post-election. OC’s ROV office seems to like to leave some of the non-provisional ballot categories outstanding, for what are presumably staffing management reasons. It’s pretty easy to estimate how much time processing 300 or 900 VBM ballots will take; it’s less easy with provisionals. So, my unconfirmed (and un-posed) guess is that it’s a good way to avoid too much staff overtime.
Democrats are now up to 65.5% turnout, which if it isn’t unheard of in a primary is certainly beyond what I recall seeing recently. Republicans remain at 49.0%.
Not all that much new:
- In CA-46, Bao Nguyen is now over 1,000 votes (and 1.3%) beyond Bob Peterson, so it looks like a Bao-Lou November. Thanks, I guess, go out to Lynn Schott, although Bao’s margin is still less than Rudy Gaona’s share of the vote.
- In AD-55, Philip Chen up over Mike Spence by only 180 votes, but he’s up by 900 (and 1.1%) factoring in LA County and Chino Hills.
- In AD-65, Sharon Quirk-Silva is now more than 6.5% ahead of Young Kim.
- In AD-68, Steven Choi has a beastly 18,666 votes to Harry Sidhu’s 18.595, continuing his excruciatingly show climb. Has he found his lawyers to review the provisional ballots yet, I wonder?
- Robert Hammond is now 262 votes ahead of Beckie Gomez. Over the next two days, we should have a decent estimate of this race, which will depend almost entirely on provisional ballots. The noise created by non-provisionals will be mostly out of the way tomorrow, as almost all of the paper ballots are used up; after that, we’ll see how much Gomez progresses per thousand provisionals. It’s astounding how much is riding on this race — and these last few days. With probably around 11,000 provisonals left in this district, it’s less a matter of how much better Gomez will do in completed provisionals (lots, I presume) than what proportion of the provisionals will get approved and how many of the voters filling them out made it down all the way to this race on their ballots. I presume that Beckie has competent representation in the room; otherwise, she’s gonna get rolled.
So the two big story lines right now are: Can Choi stay ahead of Sidhu and can Gomez catch up to Hammond?
In too miscellaneous even for bullet points news, there’s at least one close race for the critical 6th spot among the County Committees, but Orange Juice Blog is not feeling a burning need to cover it before it’s done. It should be noted that Jeff Lalloway, despite our own Tyler’s best efforts, looks fairly secure in 6th place in his district, with a 2000 vote lead over … Jon Fleischman! Finally: nine of California’s 58 counties have still not reported anything beyond their Final Election Night Update. And no one seems to care.
June 14th
We’ll get to Buh-BAWK CHOI (or should it be just “Bawk Choi”? Let us know what you think in comments) in a moment. Let’s start with What’s Left to Count, before we get into developments with individual races.
Total Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 219,075
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 147,245
Total Estimated Left to Count: 71,830
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 58,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 58,000
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 0
Provisionals Left to Count
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 61,370
Total provisionals counted: 1,126
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 60,244
Vote-by-Mail Ballots Returned at the Polls Left to Count
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 74,677
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 73,356
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 1,321
Election Day Paper Ballots Left to Count
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 11,200
Total election day paper ballots counted: 2,763
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 8,437
Eligible Vote-by-Mail Ballots received after Election Day Left to Count
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots received after Election Day left to count: 13,828
Total eligible vote-by-mail ballots counted: 12,000
Total estimated number of eligible vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 1,828
The yesterday’s flood of 59.000 ballots counted has dwindled to a relative trickle of 15,000 today (which is still a whole lot of ballots.) If, as I suspect, the pace will be about that or even less as we move more deeply into paper and provisional ballots, which have just begun, then we’re in for another 5-7 or so of counting, then the 10% hand canvas. So let’s tentatively expect to finish no earlier than a week from Friday, though it could extend into the following week.
(1) BAWK-CHOI!
Provisional ballots are where much of the serious election fighting is, which means that it’s timely for Steven Choi to send out a fundraising appeal for a legal team to fight for them (the ones from Irvine at least) to be counted in AD-68.
With over 90,000 votes counted in the 68th Assembly District, I am leading Harry Sidhu by 32 votes.
So, Harry Sidhu has hired a legal team to keep all the votes from being counted in cities that I won.
I hate to ask again, but it is imperative that I raise $7,000 immediately, so my campaign can immediately hire an attorney.
Simply stated, I need your help to ensure my campaign has the legal advice needed to ensure a fair count and keep Sidhu’s attorneys from trying to steal the election.
With only 8732 votes left to count, every vote truly matters as this election will be decided by a handful or votes.
Your $1000, $250 or $100 donation could mean the difference between winning and losing and the difference between the kind of representation I would provide and kind Harry Sidhu offers.
[Editor’s note: OJB does not encourage readers to actually send him money. E-mail address omitted.]
I think that Choi may be barking up the wrong tree here. He has what is a de facto “Get Choi the Hell Out of Irvine” committee going, which includes lawyers like Larry Agran, Jeff Lalloway, and Melissa Fox. Hit them up, man! They might do it for free! (Not me: I’d charge for it!)
The good news for Choi is that he extended his lead over Harry “Buh-BAWK” Sidhu by over 50% today! The bad news is that that only takes it from 32 to 49 votes.
(There’s much more to write, but I have picking up daughter and taking grandson to the park duty, so I’m tossing this up now and will add more later. A comment saying that I’ve done so will follow! … OK, I’m back, a mere 14-plus hours later.)
(2) Bringing the Hammond Down!
Robert Hammond’s lead over Beckie Gomez in OC BOE Area 1 continues to slip, and this one seems especially likely to ride on provisional ballots — which should be disproportionately plentiful in this part of the county. Hammond’s lead was 1,232 and 2.4% last Wednesday evening, the “mop-up day” after Tuesday night’s count; as of Tuesday evening it had dwindled to 381 and 0.5%. The question is simply whether Gomez is going to run out of ballots to count. She (and her supporters) should really have someone there at the ROV’s office arguing to approve, count, and retain provisionals, the tallying of which has already begun. My guess is that Hammond does better on paper ballots but that Gomez should slaughter him on those provisionals that are counted — that italicized phrase being critical. And. of course, many voters aren’t going to vote this far down on the ballot either. But those that do will be disproportionately Latino — and the name “Gomez” is a good signal for their support.
(3) Department of “Apparently This is Not a Misprint”
With almost 72,000 ballots remaining, Democratic turnout is at 64.0%. Sixty-four percent — and running about 30,000 votes ahead of Republican turnout in raw numbers. The question for Democrats is: how much of this was Trump … and how much was Sanders?
(4) Clinton’s Lead in OC Now at 7.7%, Versus 11.1% Statewide; Loretta Inches Upwards in OC
This is interesting largely to track what kind of Democratic-leaning voters are being added to the totals each day. Bernie Sanders still trails Hillary Clinton in OC by 23,000 votes. If he closes fast here, that will tell us a lot about provisional ballots. I would probably have lost money betting on OC underperforming for Hillary. In the other marquee race, Loretta Sanchez is now up 1.1% in OC, but behind Kamala Harris by 22.2% statewide.
(5) Bao Now Up by 867 Votes; Chumley and His Anonymous Assettes Get Weird and Mean
Because now much is happening in the Congressional races other than Bao Nguyen shooting past Bob Peterson into the runoff against hermaphrodem Lou Correa, let’s spend some time checking out the the rumbling at our competitor GlibOC, where putting on a brave face rules the day.
First, here’s Chumley — he’s Chumley again now in my book; you can call him “Chemical Lewinsky” if you wish but I think that poor Monica has had enough bad associations in her life for me to be willing to pilot on one more — giving his analysis of recent developments:
- Bao, who doesn’t live in the district, is still 22,000 votes behind Correa
- Correa will likely attract Republicans in the race (<== just occurred to him??)
- Bao will attract support of Dunn voters, despite being a carpetbagging carpetbagger
- Bad blood between Dunn and Bao supporters; “doubtful that the Dunn progressives will be particularly welcomed in the Nguyen camp (without some significant and apologetic groveling”)
Sure — or, on the other hand, Bao may decide that he’s like to be in Congress. Wishful thinking there! But it’s nothing compare to the wishful thinking of one of his anonymous assettes, the probably mislabeled “OC DEM.” Enjoy this with us:
Joe Done’s supporters will grovel back to Bao, but boy will he have leverage.
I can’t even imagine the reasoning here. Bao has leverage, because if Dunn supporters don’t join him … he’ll lose?
This one is off-topic, on AD-68, but I can’t resist it:
Sean [Panahi] is the biggest underdog of the season, it is stunning to many that spoilers like Brian Chachua were put up against an endorsed candidate.
Raise your hand if you know that Panahi was not an endorsed Democratic candidate. He is now, though, and I plan to support him, especially if Sidhu comes back to make the runoff. (And not just with anonymous blog posts, either.) Now — onward!
(6) Assemblywise, Chen Pulling Away from Spence; Quirk-Silva Up Almost 6%
Philip Chen’s district-wide lead over Mike Spence is now 1.1%; and Gregg Fritchle now has a full 35% of the primary vote. (Not entirely impossible in November!) Sharon Quirk-Silva is up 5.8% against Young Kim in AD-65, making her case for some love from contributors in a Trumpsy-Turvy world. Karina Onofre up almost 2,000 votes against Matt Harper; one wonders who the third-place candidate, Republican friend-of-the-blog Katherine Daigle, is going to endorse!
(7) Spitzer Take!
Todd Spitzer is still winning unopposed in the 3rd Supe with 92,897 votes, which has 292,938 registered voters. This district largely overlaps, but is just under 27% larger than, the 68th Assembly District, which has 230,819 registered voters. So this is a reasonable rough comparison to see how well Spitzer did in his district. A total of 91,272 votes, at current count, have been cast in the 68th AD. 126.91% of 91.272 is 115.836. So if you presume that that’s a decent estimate of the number of cast ballots that gave voters a chance to vote for Spitzer, he got 78.8% of the possible votes in that district, running unopposed. (Running unopposed is a double-edged sword here: no one’s going to vote for “the other guy,” but people also have scant reason to vote at all.)
Post has been UPDATED!!!! Beckie Gomez should read it, too!
I honestly didnt even know a dem was i the race for the 68th. early on there were grumblings about that. but what is disturbing is barbaros foray into the 68th on behalf of choi via his oc victory fund that did a mailer on his behalf touting his democratic values.
The good news is that Frank’s just doing that because the Irvine Democrats want Choi out of the Mayor’s race — ideally by his losing for Assembly, but even if he wins, he’d be gone from city politics for a while. It has nothing to do with Choi’s actual virtues (although I prefer him narrowly to Sidhu.)
The bad news is that Frank’s interest may be less in electing Mary Ann Gaido or Melissa Fox or Shiva, Farrah, etc. on their own merits — but because hopes that they may not continue any investigation and prosecution of his friends Forde and Mollrich (and whatever collateral damage may accompany that. With Choi out, that may be the perfect race to lose what should otherwise be a winnable race — but that doesn’t mean that that’s won’t what happens. It will make this fall’s candidate questions pretty interesting.
Hi OJ Blog,
My name’s Luke and I am a 21 year old college student finishing his undergrad education in the east coast. My place of residence is in Irvine, and I hope to return to the OC eventually to work, settle down, and get involved in the community.
What would you say is the most effective way for someone at my stage of life to get involved in local city affairs or politics?
Make a godawful amount of money and save your morals for a deathbed conversion.
I don’t think that it’s the best way, but you asked what was the most effective. Let’s open it up to others’ comments.
Ha! Nicely done.
Write for us, kid. Highlighting issues that you feel are important to your neighbors is a great way to meet the right political players in your community.
Thanks Ryan. Who can I talk with to get more information?
Vern or Greg.
That was a delicious amount of snark, much thanks
*Luke, pay no attention to these disgruntled employees. When you get to town, make personal appearances at every elected’s office and introduce yourself. Ask about Intern jobs…ask about being a paid Campaign worker. Make contact, show your face, bring your resume and background information. Every elected is running scared right now for either party. They need you and you need them and don’t be put off by our Bandy Legged Nay Sayers,.
No worries, thanks for the advice!
I revised the post in light of the new results from yesterday — we’ll just use this post for daily updates, for now — but forgot to leave a comment calling attention to the changes. So: yoo-hoo! Updates! Get ’em while they’re still warm!
I FINALLY flashed on what bothered me each time I read “bawk”……It’s NOT “bawk”, it’s … “buk,buk,bugayh” !
Here-
https://youtu.be/XfWnITmT1Ws
Heresy!
OK, not heresy, but various transliterations are acceptable. As I do in all aspects of life, I take my guidance here from childhood memories of Superchicken.
By the way, this post is now updated through yesterday’s release of results, which among other things may give us a decent idea of what proportion of provisional ballots are being approved.
“Bawk.”
Is that supposed to be funny?
“Bawk”? Funny? Oh no, certainly not!
“Bawk” combined with “Choi”? Sure, Connie!
*Hopefully this will all be resolved by the 4th of July…so not everyone will choke on
their hotdogs.
Today’s revision of the vote count and results is up. We may be down to about two days of provisionals, followed by a 10% canvas. Finishing by Friday (or even Thursday) seems possible!
ROV hadn’t updated the website (so far as my computer could tell) when I checked last night. New figures, which change little of significance, are up. Another update, which should get pretty close to finishing the existing ballots, should be up this evening (presuming that the ROV website has the update.)