State Democrats flip 2 House seats; 4 others up in air
California Democrats picked up a pair of Republican-held congressional seats Wednesday, adding to the party’s growing advantage in the House.
Democrat Mike Levin, an environmental attorney, won the seat in the 49thDistrict, which straddles the border between Orange and San Diego counties, defeating Republican Diane Harkey. The seat opened up when GOP Rep. Darrell Issa of Vista (San Diego County) retired.
In the northern reaches of Los Angeles County, Democrat Katie Hill beat GOP Rep. Steve Knight of Lancaster, who was seeking his third term in Congress. Knight conceded the race.
“I entered this race to serve our community and bring our voice and priorities to Washington,” said Hill, a 31-year-old resident of Agua Dulce (Los Angeles County) who has never held public office. “This is just the beginning.”
Late-arriving ballots probably will determine the results in two other districts that Democrats were trying to wrest from Republicans.
In the 48th District in Orange County, Democratic businessman Harley Rouda held a 1,600-vote lead over 15-term GOP Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of Costa Mesa.
“We knew this would be a close race and we expected we would have to endure California’s absurdly long counting process,” said Dale Neugebauer, a spokesman for Rohrabacher. He estimated that there could be 80,000 or more ballots left to count.
In the Central Valley, GOP Rep. Jeff Denham of Turlock (Stanislaus County) held a 1,300-vote lead over Democrat Josh Harder. Denham’s campaign estimated there were “tens of thousands” of votes remaining to be counted.
“We’ve known from the beginning this wasn’t going to be resolved on election night,” said Nicole Nabulsi, a spokeswoman for Harder. “We are encouraged by the results so far and we will be watching the results closely in the days to come.”
It may be a while. In the June primary, for example, it took three weeks before Rouda was declared the winner of the second slot on this week’s ballot.
About 7.2 million votes were tallied by Wednesday morning, for a 36 percent statewide turnout. But mail ballots postmarked by election day and arriving by Friday still will be counted, along with provisional ballots and mail ballots turned in at polling places.
In all, an estimated 3 million or more ballots are still out there. A pair of statewide contests are also hanging in the balance — for insurance commissioner, where Democrat Ricardo Lara was clinging to a small lead over independent Steve Poizner, and superintendent of public instruction, where Marshall Tuck was narrowly ahead of Tony Thurmond.
Republicans have held on to one of the seven House seats in California that Democrats were especially hopeful of grabbing after Hillary Clinton won in those districts in the 2016 presidential election. GOP Rep. David Valadao of Hanford (Kings County) was an easy winner over Democrat TJ Cox.
Two additional races were too close to call Wednesday. In Orange County, Republican Young Kim of Fullerton was leading Democrat Gil Cisneros, 51 percent to 49 percent, while GOP Rep. Mimi Walters of Irvine had a 52 percent to 48 margin over Democrat Katie Porter, a UC Irvine law professor.
Democrats may have improved on their performance by nominating candidates who better fit conservative-leaning
“When Democrats ran candidates like (Mike) Levin and (Harley) Rouda, businessmen with experience in private industry, they won.” Thad Kousser, political science professor at UC San Diego
districts, said Thad Kousser, a political science professor at UC San Diego. While Orange County is no longer the Republican stronghold it once was, it’s still a GOP-friendly area that’s a tough sell for a progressive like Porter.
“All the excitement this year was around the most liberal candidates, but in toss-up districts, having a candidate who sounded like people Republicans were familiar with and comfortable voting for made a difference,” Kousser said. “When Democrats ran candidates like Levin and Rouda, businessmen with experience in private industry, they won.”