Free Republic

Kevin Faulconer recaptured the mayor’s office in San Diego for Republicans in a special election yesterday. The polls were skin-tight leading into yesterday’s election, and unions poured in millions to keep control in the nation’s eighth-largest city. But in the end the vaunted Obama election model — flood the zone with negative attack ads and excite the base of the Democratic party — flopped. Faulconer defeated fellow City Council member David Alvarez by nine points in a city that Barack Obama carried by 63 percent to 37 percent only 15 months ago.

== ABSENTEE RESULTS ONLY == SIGNONSANDIEGO Unofficial results. Updated at 20:00:01 on 07-26-05. MAYOR - UNEXPIRED TERM  8 of 721 precincts – 01.1 percent  DONNA FRYE 36560 42.42%   JERRY SANDERS 23117 26.82%   STEVE FRANCIS 19941 23.14% 

SACRAMENTO - Legislative committees Wednesday approved two bills introduced in response to the controversial outcome of San Diego's mayoral election. San Diego County election officials ruled that Mayor Dick Murphy was re-elected last November by 2,108 votes, but they didn't count 5,551 write-in votes for runner-up Donna Frye. On those ballots, voters wrote in Frye but didn't darken the bubble on the ballot next to her name. Current law requires that voters take both steps for a write-in vote to count. Frye's supporters are challenging the election outcome in court. A bill by Sen. Debra Bowen, D-Redondo Beach, would allow...