Posted on 11/05/2010 9:49:49 AM PDT by Arec Barrwin
Lawyers watch carefully as Kern counts its votes
BY JAMES BURGER AND STEVEN MAYER, Californian staff writers jburger@bakersfield.com | Thursday, Nov 04 2010 09:00 PM
Last Updated Thursday, Nov 04 2010 09:00 PM
smayer@bakersfield.com
Grim-faced teams of lawyers and campaign strategists for Republican Andy Vidak and Democrat Jim Costa's 20th District Congressional campaigns camped out in the Kern County Elections Division offices Thursday, literally peering over the shoulders of election workers as they went through the 65,000 uncounted provisional and vote-by-mail ballots.
Those ballots, and more than 70,000 outstanding ballots being counted in Fresno County, will decide which man wins the seat.
But, even a GOP strategist agreed, if voting trends hold as they have, the winner of the race will probably be Costa.
Vidak held an 1,823-vote lead over Costa Thursday, according to the California Secretary of State's office, but that lead was built on Election Day ballots cast in Kings County, Vidak's home county, where he jumped out ahead with nearly 70 percent of the votes.
But there are only a handful of votes left to be counted in Kings County, a situation that doesn't bode well for political newcomer Vidak.
That's because around 61 percent of votes counted so far, in both Kern and Fresno counties, were votes for Costa.
And if that trend continues, Kern County's uncounted ballots alone could be enough to give Costa the win.
Around 17.8 percent of the total vote-by-mail ballots in Kern County come from the 20th Congressional District.
If you apply that percentage to the county's 58,000 uncounted vote-by-mail ballots, there should be around 10,324 Kern County ballots in the 20th yet to be counted.
If Costa gets 61.5 percent of those votes, the same percentage of counted ballots he's claimed in Kern County, Costa will top Vidak by an additional 2,413 votes when counting here is complete.
That would put him more than 590 votes ahead of Vidak in the entire 20th Congressional district, without even considering Fresno County, Costa's home county.
Fresno County's numbers are expected to break down similar to Kern's, said Republican strategist Tal Cloud.
"The numbers will not allow Andy to win this race because of the heavy Democratic registration in Fresno and Kern," Cloud said Thursday.
He said Costa was able to use that registration to his advantage, and to avoid engaging Vidak in a spirited campaign.
Costa, who spoke with The Californian on Thursday, said his team is tracking similar numbers to what Cloud had seen.
"We're getting more than 60 percent of the vote in Kern County," he said. "Those trends usually don't change more than a percentage point."
The percentage of voters opting for Costa was high in Fresno County as well.
"Again, I don't expect that trend to change much," he said. "The Kern County elections office is doing its job ... making sure every vote is counted. They have a process to go through.
"At the end of the day, I put my trust and faith in the voters," he said. That's what I've always done."
Reached Thursday, Vidak Chief of Staff Rudy Mendoza said Vidak was "not releasing any statements at this time."
He did say the candidate was anxiously awaiting completion of the vote count. And he characterized projections based on early voting percentages as "a lot of speculation."
Lawyers for Vidak, who began observing Kern County's count of provisional and vote-by-mail proceedings on Wednesday, declined to comment on reasons they were watching the count.
Lawyers for Costa, who showed up Thursday afternoon, also declined to speak.
Kern County elections chief Karen Rhea said the attorneys for Vidak were asking questions about the process Kern County has for verifying that people who helped other voters cast a ballot had done so legally.
And, she said, they are watching as elections workers verify the signatures on the ballots to make sure those signatures match voter registrations.
They have, Rhea said, challenged the validity of a few of the signatures on the ballots, setting up a second review process. But the ultimate decision about the validity of those signatures and the ballots they are attached to is made by Kern County Elections.
Costa's attorneys, she said, are also asking basic questions and hoping to review the county's counting procedure as well.
Costa said it's been a long year -- with the last two months of the campaign going very negative.
But he's been there before.
"I'm fine," he said Thursday from his Fresno office.
"In 2004, I was outspent more than 2-to-1 when Roy Ashburn ran," he said. "In 1994, I was one of only five Democrats in the country to beat an incumbent Republican.
"So I'm fairly resilient," he said. "While I've been in some easy races, I've experienced some very tough ones, too. So this is not my first rodeo, so to speak.
"In September and October of this year, we were hit by several television spots, all of them negative.
He attributed the flood of negative campaigning to more that $1 million poured into Vidak's campaign by "Karl Rove and company" Crossroads GPS.
"We've seen 16 hit-mailers in eight weeks -- two a week.
"It's funny how you remember those things," he said.
Unfortunately, the Fresno vote favored Costa. I’m crossing my fingers and praying for VIDAK. Costa is a certified Nancy butt weasel.
Damn. I had hopes for this one. Another close one for the Dem.
Dammit. I forever more will swear off hoping ANYTHING pertaining to elections goes well in California. Why the hell do I do that all the friggin’ time? I should know the fix is in.
Except for Bush, democrats ALWAYS WIN close elections...They’ll count and re-count untill they do.
I’m calling BS on this. What are the odds of every close race coming up a rat winner and
the only people that get caught cheating are republicans?
This rat is a plant and all those “found” votes in other races are cheating.
Jail time or public whippings are the only answer and we had better start playing ball.
Why do these recounts NEVER go our way? WTH?
The best alternative explanation of that (alternative to cheating) came out in the 2000 election controversy -
Democratic voters and districts/election staff tend to have more “issues” - poverty/stupidity/incompetence/social problems, what have you - which leads to many more complications in counting their votes vs Republicans. So a full count of votes of and by Democrats is necessarily slower than a full count of votes of and by Republicans.
So, according to this theory, it is natural that the full Democratic vote count will emerge more slowly, what with questionable ballots, ambiguous voting, tallying, and registration procedures, etc.
Now, Republican vote counts can also be hampered by so many coming from rural areas, but this is mostly just a communications and transportation problem, which adds a day or two delay, not extended complications.
In that whole area with thousands of unemployed workers in the Fresno area alone and the water problem plopped down as the responsibility of the Dem Leg., you would think some voters there would give Vidak a chance to help the area instead of rewarding the liberal Dem!
Mexicans. Lots of them.
Yes. Western Fresno County suffered huge job losses and devastating economic damage because of Costa’s buddies. Costa tried to cast himself as a good guy but people largely rejected his attempt. In the past, he has easily sailed to victory. This election was far different, largely in part because people finally understood the damages agriculture suffered due to the Democrats. So I hope Vidak prevails. And if EVER there were mean pit bull attorneys needed to watch a recount, this one qualifies by leagues! Costa might still win, but his power and influence will be diminished, and quite frankly, I hope he is removed from any more committees making water decisions for California.
I noticed on Election Night in PA, the Philly precincts were reported first and, whaddayaknow, Pat Toomey won with a lead stretching toward the end. I am willing to bet $ that, had Philly entered their numbers at the end, for sure Sestak would’ve won the Senate race.
‘Dammit. I forever more will swear off hoping ANYTHING pertaining to elections goes well in California. Why the hell do I do that all the friggin’ time? I should know the fix is in.’
Right. I’m feeling that way about WA State also...although still holding out some hope for Koster v Larsen in CD 2.
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