It became official late Tuesday afternoon: Democratic challenger Josh Harder has an insurmountable lead over incumbent Republican Congressman Jeff Denham in the race for Denham’s 10th Congressional District seat.
Harder will take over the seat, which includes Stanislaus County and a portion of San Joaquin County. Denham had a slight lead in the polls on election night and for a few days following, but Harder began to catch up and then eventually passed the incumbent with announcement late Tuesday that Harder has been declared the winner.
DCCC Chairman Ben Ray Luján released the following statement on the Harder victory: “Congratulations to Josh Harder on an incredible campaign – it was truly a campaign of the Valley, for the Valley. Josh’s historic victory is a testament to the grassroots energy behind his campaign, which was disciplined and laser-focused on the kitchen table issues that Central Valley families face every day. I know Josh will continue to be a fierce advocate for the Valley in Congress – and look forward to working with him in Washington.”
Riverbank voters, meanwhile, approved a city measure on the ballot in the Nov. 6 election, along with voting for two City Council members.
Measure B, offered by the City of Riverbank, allows the city council to impose a business tax on cannabis businesses and received 70 percent approval, 4,080 ‘yes’ votes to 1,774 ‘no’ votes.
Races for the Riverbank City Council have frontrunners but no declared winners until all the vote totals are certified. Incumbent council member Cal Campbell was leading fellow incumbent Leanne Jones Cruz, 821 to 757, in the race for the seat in District 3; Luis Uribe had a 401 to 352 vote lead over Jack Whorton in the race for District 1, with Eva Sanchez Nash in third with 284 votes.
Heath Flora easily won reelection in the 12th Assembly District with a 55,857 to 37,904 vote margin over challenger Robert D. Chase.
Countywide, Scott Kuykendall had a 67,633 to 56,486 vote lead over Shannon Sanford for county Superintendent of Schools while incumbent District Attorney Birgit Fladager easily outdistanced challenger John R. Mayne, 75,604 votes to 48,635, in her bid for reelection.
The voters in Stanislaus County also favored John Cox for governor; casting 73,309 votes for him and 68,418 for Gavin Newsom. That vote did not reflect the statewide results, as Newsom was elected as the state’s next governor.
Stanislaus County Registrar of Voters Lee Lundrigan released an updated report on Friday, Nov. 9, indicating that an additional 63,631 ballots have been added to the initial Election Night vote count. In the county, 143,627 ballots have now been counted.
The approximate number of ballots remaining to be processed include 11,000 provisionally voted ballots, 700 conditionally voted ballots and some 6,000 miscellaneous and remaining vote by mail ballots.
The canvass will continue until complete. The office was closed Monday, Nov. 12 in observance of Veterans Day and the canvass began again on Tuesday, Nov. 13.
California law requires certification of the election to be on or before Thursday, Dec. 6, 2018, which is 30 days following Election Day.
Stanislaus County was third of 58 counties to report results to the California Secretary of State on election night, Lundrigan noted.
More information regarding the General Election is available on the Stanislaus Registrar of Voters website at: stanvote.com.
