Los Angeles Headlines

LOS ANGELES, CA — Three weeks post-Election Day, a congressional contest in California has taken a notable shift, significantly affecting the dynamics within the U.S. House of Representatives.

Adam Gray, the Democratic candidate aiming to unseat Republican Rep. John Duarte, claimed the lead in the District 13 race for the first time since election night on Tuesday. By 7 p.m. Tuesday, Gray was ahead by 182 votes. This development coincides with the Associated Press indicating that the vote count for the Central Valley District has surpassed 99 percent, potentially securing victory for Gray with some of the final ballots being counted.

The race remains too close to be determined and is the tightest in the nation. The two candidates previously faced off in 2022, where Duarte won by a narrow margin of less than half a percentage point. The second-closest race in the country is also happening in California — the only other congressional contest that remains too close to call is in District 45, spanning Orange and Los Angeles counties. Though this race has yet to be certified and the Associated Press has not made a declaration, the Democratic challenger announced a victory on Tuesday.

In both districts, Republican incumbents are lagging behind their Democratic challengers by less than 1 percent. Should the incumbents lose, Republicans will retain control of the House with an extremely slim margin, and California will have stripped the GOP of its buffer. While the party made gains nationwide, it will face significant setbacks in California. If the challengers in Districts 13 and 45 maintain their leads as vote-counting concludes, the Republican Party will have lost 25 percent of its Congressional representatives from California in this election.

Before the election, Republicans held 12 out of California’s 52 congressional seats. Rep. Mike Garcia has already surrendered his position in the 27th District to Democratic challenger George Whitesides by nearly 8,000 votes. Meanwhile, in the 45th District, Republican Rep. Michelle Steel was trailing Derek Tran by 613 votes on Tuesday evening, with more than 99 percent of the votes counted.

Tran leads with 157,960 votes to 157,347, representing 50.1% to 49.9%, as per the Secretary of State’s office. He announced his victory on Tuesday.

Tran, a consumer rights attorney and pharmacy co-owner, described his lead as a “testament to the spirit and resilience of our community.”

“Throughout this campaign, I heard from voters seeking representation that prioritizes our community’s distinctive challenges,” he remarked. “From the need for affordable healthcare and housing to the importance of an inclusive economy, people here are looking toward the future with hope and determination. I am eager to embody that optimism and work diligently to ensure our community’s voices are amplified in Washington.”

No comments have been made by the Steel campaign.

Tran has been gradually increasing his lead as counting from the Nov. 5 election proceeded. Initially on Nov. 6, Tran was behind by 11,363 votes but began to narrow the gap daily, eventually overtaking the two-term incumbent on Nov. 16.

It remains unclear how many ballots are still outstanding.

As of Tuesday, Republicans held a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives with 219 seats. There are still three races nationwide too close to call — California’s 13th and 45th districts, where the incumbent Republicans are trailing, and Iowa’s District 1, where the Republican incumbent leads by 800 votes. Recounts will likely occur in all three close races.

It’s common for California to be among the last states to tally ballots weeks post-election.

Given its status as the nation’s most populous state, California often has delayed reporting of its election outcomes.
Four years ago, nearly one-third of ballots remained uncounted after election night, and the state provided daily updates until Dec. 3, a full month after Election Day.

California lawmakers structured their elections to enhance accessibility and boost voter turnout. Voters benefit from automatically receiving a ballot at home, a deadline to return it up until Election Day, and additional days to resolve any voting issues, granting Californians significant time and opportunities to cast their votes. This approach, however, affects the speed at which the final counts are known.

“Our priority is to maximize participation among actively registered voters,” explained Democratic Assemblymember Marc Berman, the author of the 2021 bill that established all-mail elections in the state. “While it means slower results, I believe our democracy is worth the additional time to ensure accuracy and to create an inclusive voting environment.”

California, which has a long-standing tradition of absentee voting, began shifting towards all-mail elections over the past decade. Such systems invariably extend the counting process. Mail ballots necessitate extra verification steps — every ballot must be opened, validated, and processed individually — thus they generally require more time to tabulate compared to in-person ballots scanned at polling locations.

In 2016, California passed legislation to allow counties to choose to adopt all-mail elections, subsequently establishing it statewide temporarily in 2020 and solidifying it legally ahead of the 2022 elections.
Research has indicated that states that implemented all-mail voting early, such as Oregon and Washington, experienced increased voter turnout. Additionally, mail ballots tend to enhance the likelihood of a voter completing their ballot, according to Melissa Michelson, a political scientist and dean at Menlo College in California with expertise in voter mobilization.

In recent elections, thousands of California voters submitting their mail ballots on Election Day have created a bottleneck on election night. Over the last five general elections, California has counted an average of 38% of its votes after Election Day. In the 2022 midterm elections, half of the state’s votes were counted following Election Day.

Delayed counts have coincided with later mail ballot deadlines. In 2015, California instituted its first postmark deadline, enabling the counting of mail ballots that are received after Election Day, provided they are postmarked by then. Berman noted this postmark deadline allows for accepting mail as a drop-off option, preventing penalties for voters who submit their ballots as required but are delayed by postal service issues.

Initially, legislation mandated that ballots arriving within three days of the election would be treated as timely. This year, ballots could arrive up to one week past Election Day, meaning California couldn’t ascertain the total ballots cast until Nov. 12.

The Associated Press and City News Service contributed to this report.