In Santa Clara County, Evan Low gained eleven additional votes in the recount for a total of 25,093, while Joe Simitian gained seven votes for a total of 23,775. These results will be added to the recount results in San Mateo County to determine the final results for the contest, expected on Wednesday.
The opponent of former San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo in the November election for California’s 16th Congressional District will be decided by the U.S. Postal Service.
After election officials in Santa Clara and San Mateo counties spent nearly two weeks in a machine recount of nearly 190,000 ballots, inspectors in the main post office in San Francisco spent four days poring over delivery records of just 17 ballots from San Mateo County.
That task is completed and final results are expected today, nearly two months after the March 5 primary. The San Mateo elections office said it will be making its final decisions on the acceptance or rejection of the challenges to 16 ballots. Any changes to the final count will be reported on the county election website by 5pm
The Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters on Tuesday announced it had completed its recount and review of more than 150,000 ballots, and announced that state Assemblymember Evan Low held a four-vote lead over Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian.
San Mateo County’s election office reported last week that when it had finished its review, the totals for Low and Simitian were identical to the initial count, when Simitian held a 1,314-vote margin over Low for second place among the county’s approximately 38,000 16th District voters.
The two men were tied with 30,249 votes apiece from both counties when official totals were certified April 12 by the California Secretary of State, more than 8,000 votes behind frontrunner Liccardo.
With a maximum of just 16 ballots under review, with votes distributed among up to 11 candidates, Simitian faced a formidable path to pass Low, even though he had held a solid margin over Low in San Mateo County in March.
In Santa Clara County, the final recount announced Tuesday showed Low gaining 11 votes and Simitian gaining 7 votes compared to the March 5 tally.
“Our elections staff has been working diligently for the past two weeks to conduct this unprecedented recount and ensure that the final results are complete and accurate,” said Santa Clara’s Assistant Registrar of Voters Matt Moreles in a statement. “This is the largest and most complex recount we have conducted, as well as our first machine recount on our new voting system.”
The seat representing the sprawling 16th District, stretching from Pacifica in the northwest to Campbell and west San Jose on the south, opened up in December when Rep. Anna Eshoo announced she would not seek re-election, after more than 30 years in Congress. About 80% of the district residents live in Santa Clara County, and 20% in San Mateo County.
Before the recount request by tech executive and former Liccardo staffer Jonathan Padilla, the 16th District was headed to a three-person November contest: Liccardo, Low and Simitian.
In the unlikely event that Simitian and Low are tied again after the recount, all three will be on the General Election ballot. If the recount results break the tie, only the first- and second-place candidates will advance to the general election.
“It is not unusual for a recount to change the vote totals, especially in such a large jurisdiction,” said Moreles. “Because this contest was so close with two candidates precisely tied for second place, even tiny changes can make a difference in the outcome.”
The recounts were fully open for public observation, and members of the public were permitted to ask questions and raise challenges. In Santa Clara County, some challenges involved the interpretation of voter intent when a ballot was marked in an unusual way, Moreles said.
He said the recount requestor asked to review previously uncounted vote-by-mail, provisional, and conditional voter registration ballots. “During the original canvass, these ballots were deemed ineligible and not counted,” he said.
Overall, observers in Santa Clara County challenged 45 uncounted ballots. Of these election officials determined that seven previously uncounted ballots were valid and should be included in the recount results.
The Santa Clara office also identified 19 ballots from six precincts that were included in the recount results that had not been included in the initial canvass results. The nineteen additional ballots were validated during the initial canvass but were not tallied due to human errors by the tabulation machine operators. Additionally, the elections office identified three ballots from two precincts that were erroneously counted twice in the original canvass, and those precincts’ results have been corrected in the recount to subtract those ballots.
“This recount has been a learning experience, and we will use these lessons learned to improve our processes and strengthen our quality control safeguards,” Moreles said.
In San Mateo, Jim Irizarry, assistant county clerk-recorder and assistant chief elections officer, said the machine recount produced the exact same numbers as the March 5 vote.
One ballot failed to fill in the citizen question and its signature didn’t match. Sixteen ballots challenged by Padilla had a late postmark or did not arrive at the elections office by the March 12 deadline. Postal officials were asked to double check the mail dates and the actual delivery dates for each ballot., and these were to be reviewed by elections officials for the last time today, May 1.
