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“HEY, PAW! Th’ truck wit th’ new ballots done come!” [NOTE: This is not how it really happened — we presume.]
We were supposed to be DONE with this year’s Vote-By-Mail ballots, move results the wrong way (from OJB’s perspective) — for example, towards Righeimer and away from Hunphrey. But 3,000 more of them showed up today and 2,736 of them got counted. This is about a quarter of the roughly 11,000 ballots counted today — and may be, by which I mean hopefully is, responsible for a lack of desired progress in today’s returns.
Total estimated number of ballots to count (after Election Day): 150,305 165,305 177,305 180,305
Total estimated number of ballots counted (after Election Day): 14,765 43,792 79,638 111,235 138,714 148,561 155,556 166,533
Total estimated number of ballots left to count: 135,540 106,513 70,667 54,070 38,591 28,744 21,749 13,772
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots to count: 40,000 43,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots counted: 14,765 40,000 42,736 [2,736 TODAY]
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots left to count: 25,235 0 264
Total estimated number of provisionals to count: 38,513
Total provisionals counted: 0 5849 12,467 17,552 25,793
Total estimated number of provisionals left to count: 38,513 32,664 26,046 20,961 12,720 [8,741 TODAY]
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls to count: 66,000 81,000 93,000
Total vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls counted: 0 3,792 39,638 71,235 87,615 90,644 92,554
Total estimated number of vote-by-mail ballots returned at the polls left to count: 66,000 62,208 26,362 9765 5385 2356 446
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots to count: 5792
Total election day paper ballots counted: 0 5250 5450
Total estimated number of election day paper ballots left to count: 5792 542 342
Orange Juice Blog remains Orange County’s newspaper of record on all the close races, although other media outlets beyond our friends at Voice of OC and A Bubbling Cauldron even seem to be catching on to the drama. We start, perhaps for the last time, with Laguna Woods. Carol Moore has climbed ahead of Rae Tso by 19 votes for the second seat on the Laguna Woods City Council behind Bert Hack. Moore picked up 57 today while Tso gained 42. Moore gaining had been the trend for a while now; I’ll be demoting this one from the top spot tomorrow unless there’s a Tso comeback.
Here are the other headlines:
Costa Mesa: Righeimer now up by 48.
Garden Grove: Bao now up by 11.
Irvine: Fox now down by 220.
Anaheim: Vanderbilt lead down to 206.
Measure J: Now legitimately past 55%.
Measure N: Stalled!
Garden Grove
Yesterday, Bao Nguyen led by 7.
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Today, Bao leads by 11.
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Another 149 votes were counted. Broadwater picked up 66 votes (44.3%), Bao picked up 70 (47.0%), and Ayala picked up 13 (8.7%). Like I said yesterday, but now with more desperate emphasis: chances are good that only provisionals remain — and that’s where Bao has been cleaning up. The wrong precincts coming in could still take him down, but having momentum plus the lead is exactly where one wants to be.
Costa Mesa
Yesterday, Jim Righeimer led by 37.
| CITY OF COSTA MESA Member, City Council |
| Number To Vote For: 2 |
| Completed Precincts: 70 of 70 |
| Vote Count | Percentage | |
| KATRINA FOLEY | 9,279 | 26.5% |
| * JIM RIGHEIMER | 7,468 | 21.3% |
| JAY HUMPHREY | 7,431 | 21.2% |
| LEE RAMOS | 5,268 | 15.0% |
| TONY CAPITELLI | 1,849 | 5.3% |
| AL MELONE | 1,467 | 4.2% |
| RITA LOUISE SIMPSON | 1,181 | 3.4% |
| CHRISTOPHER SCOTT BUNYAN | 1,101 | 3.1% |
Today, Righeimer leads by 48 — but don’t panic. (Not much, anyway.)
Today saw 206 new votes recorded. (NOTE: We don’t know how many ballots contained no votes, nor how many people voted for 1 versus 2 candidates.) Foley came in with 59 new votes (28.6%). Righeimer received 49 (23.8%). Humphrey received 32 (15.5%). Ramos received 34 (16.5%). Capitelli received 5 (2.4%). Melone received 7 (3.4%). Simpson received 14 (6.8%!). Bunyan received 6 (2.9%).
Two thoughts:
First, I’m not checking to see which precincts are getting updated, but there’s a decent chance that Costa Mesa had a precinct or two with conservative VBM ballots (which we know favored Righeimer) and a decent chance that it had few if any provisional ballots coming in. People in Costa Mesa, who know the character of the precincts, should be doing that work.
Second, something screwy is going on with these numbers — and I’m not talking about the statistical aberration of Simpson receiving almost 20% more votes than Capeitelli and Melone combined. (Maybe her home precinct just came in.) The proportion of Righeimer to Foley votes — a little over 80% — is about what we’ve been seeing all along. But the proportion of Humphrey to Foley votes, which should also be at about 80%, is instead about 55%. At first I thought “oh, the Righeimer team may be challenging provisional ballots” — which would explain why Humphrey would be so far down — but that would likely be dragging down Foley’s numbers as well, because you challenge provisional ballots before they are opened rather than challenging individual votes afterwards. So unless a lot of people bullet-voted Foley, either in VBMs or in provisionals, I simply find this surprising. And, as a Humphrey supporter, disturbing.
Special bonus thought: I hope that Humphrey has an attorney there at least noting whether and when Righeimer’s’s team in engaging in ballot challenges. Sometimes one side will challenge ballots in bad faith, or let’s just say using highly exaggerated expectations of a ballot’s illegitimacy, knowing that they will eventually be counted; this may allow them to go into the certification as the leader, which would mean that the other side pays for the recount if they lose. They need some attorney there not only taking notes, but speaking up in opposition, if anything like that is occurring.
Irvine
Yesterday, Fox trailed Jeff Lalloway by 215
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Today, Fox trails Lalloway by 220.
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Another 394 votes were counted. Schott picked up 95 (24.1%). Lalloway picked up 89 (22.6%) for the second straight day. Fox picked up 84 (21.3%). Agran picked up 74 (18.0%). Chemers picked up 52 (13.2%). Is Fox running out of time? Right now, that seems pretty likely. If this included VBMs and not provisionals — and Agran’s low number suggests that this is possible — then she did pretty well. If it didn’t have VBMs or had a decent number of provisionals, then her late charge looks like it will stall. Even if Irvine has 1000 provisionals out of what’s left, picking up 220 votes on Lalloway seems highly unlikely. (If they’re mostly UCI students — then it’s possible.)
Measure J
Yesterday, the Measure J bond (which needs 55% to pass) 0.54979995357% of the vote — but strong momentum.
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Today, it finally broke through:
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Another 2298 votes were counted. The Yes side added 1533 votes (59.84%). The No side added 1029 votes (40.16%). That’s not the pace we saw yesterday, when Yes had 64.32%; this probably reflects some of those VBM ballots diluting the advantage for Yes in provisionals. Yes is now winning with 55.063%. That’s not a safe margin. It could be that all of the 710 VBMs are from North County and none of the 12,720 provisionals are. But is that likely? No, that is very unlikely.
Anaheim
Yesterday, James Vanderbilt led Gail Eastman by 220 votes.
| CITY OF ANAHEIM Member, City Council |
| Number To Vote For: 2 |
| Completed Precincts: 147 of 147 |
| Vote Count | Percentage | |
| * KRIS MURRAY | 16,122 | 20.7% |
| JAMES D. VANDERBILT | 15,474 | 19.9% |
| * GAIL EASTMAN | 15,254 | 19.6% |
| JOSE F. MORENO (1) | 11,424 | 14.7% |
| DOUG PETTIBONE | 7,267 | 9.3% |
| JERRY O’KEEFE | 6,212 | 8.0% |
| DONNA MICHELLE ACEVEDO | 3,167 | 4.1% |
| JOSE MORENO (2) | 2,941 | 3.8% |
Today, Vanderbilt leads by 206 votes.
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Anaheim counted 354 new votes, compared to 1559 from yesterday. Murray picked up 68 (19.2%), Vanderbilt 54, (15.2%) Eastman 68 (19.2%), Dr. Moreno 73 (20.6%), Pettibone 32 (9.0%), O’Keefe 22 (6.2%), Acevedo 13 (3.7%), and JoJo Moreno hitchhiked to 24 (6.8). By the time we’re done, we’re going to have a pretty decent estimate of how much Fake Moreno hurts Real Moreno — or in this case perhaps pro-Moreno voters who are confused play it safe and vote for both of them. An intensive influx of Vanderbilt-averse provisionals out of the 12.720 remaining could still pull this out of the fire for Eastman, but today didn’t help those efforts. (At least she got the same number of votes from Murray — I guess that these weren’t the people who were told not to vote for her.)
Measure N
Yesterday we had: Yes, 21,262, 49.8%; No, 21,427, 50.2%.
Today, we have: Yes, 21,379, 49.8%; No, 21,508, 50.2%.
So that’s an increase of 198 votes. Recent history: Monday, Measure N was down by 341. Tuesday, it was down by 289. Wednesday, it was down by just 165. Today, it’s down 129. The Yes side added 117 votes; the No side added just 81, for a net gain of 36. Yes is getting 59.1% of the vote; it’s not going to be stopped unless Anaheim stops getting new votes — which is unlikely.
Others
Some other close races so still exist, but in none of them (except maybe Dana Point) does the challenger seem likely to catch up due to provisional ballots. For the record, though, you could keep an eye on:
- Art Montez by
123126 (0.7%) over Kevin Sequeira in Centralia School District - Jim Cunneen by
887983 (0.3%) over Gary Stine in Fountain Valley School District - Cynthia Aguirre by
132181 (0.9%) over Kevin Jacobson in La Habra City School District (as Hanson overtakes MacMurray for 1st.) - Joe Muller by
6457 (0.3%) over Jodi Payne for Dana Point City Council - Measure K (Orange School Bond) up to 54.46071% from 54.32024% on 515 new votes.
- Satoru Tamaribuchi by
1,3671,387 (2.2%) over Execrable Dave Ellis for Municipal Water District of Orange County, Seat 5
(That last one isn’t really a close race; we just like rubbing it in.)
Thank you, Greg.
Any more explanation (or inquiry ?) than “just appeared” ? I voted by mail, and was repeatedly reminded that ARRIVAL TIME was the only test, that mere postmarks DIDN’T count. What records are kept about the time / location recorded on the ‘chain of custody’ of the ballots, generally, and what do those facts have to say about these “new” 3000 ballots? WHERE were they for all this time, until suddenly “found”? The stats on OCVOTE.com seem to be very transparent, the rest of the process should be consistent with that. Any info ?
I really don’t know. You know how I hate to do actual reporting, but I may have to call Neal Kelley tomorrow and ask him. I hope that he takes the photo illustration I put together in good humor.
Isn’t that what the previous Registrar uh, retired over: misplaced ballots that were later found?
Lesson: Let the lost stay lost.
No, that’s not the lesson. If the ballots were there, he did the right thing by counting them and taking his lumps. And this could be as simple as a clerical error with updating the website — although in that case it’s not clear why they were not counted before now.
Friday evening – i’m sure Greg is writing something big, but the results are unspectacularly similar to yesterday’s.
BAO still leads BROADWATER, now by 16.
RIGGY still leads HUMPHREY, now by 47.
MELISSA still 200+ behind. And GAIL EASTMAN still 200+ behind Vanderbilt.
MEASURE N still defeated, just barely.
MEASURE J has won, just barely.
NEXT, recounts in Garden Grove at least, I assume.