Rep. Katie Porter, D-Irvine, added 881 votes to her lead over Republican challenger Scott Baugh Tuesday to move 3,772 votes ahead of the former Orange County Republican chairman and assemblyman.
Baugh gained Monday as ballots dropped off at vote centers on Election Day dominated the tally. Those votes, experts say, tend to favor Republicans.
The Orange County Registrar has only 1,243 ballots dropped off at vote centers left to process. There are 1,110 vote-by-mail ballots left. There are 24,313 ballots put in the mail that arrived after Election Day left to count.
The Registrar has 7,194 provisional ballots left to process, about 80,000 ballots put in drop boxes still to count and 2,308 ballots that had errors that prompted election officials to create duplicates, which can be run through machines and counted.
Porter’s race could be crucial to keep hopes alive among Democrats to hang onto a majority in the House of Representatives. But those hopes were mostly dashed Monday when Rep. Michelle Steel was declared the winner in her race.
In another closely contested race, Rep. Mike Levin, D-Dana Point, saw a 12,796-vote lead trimmed to 12,019 in his race against Republican Brian Maryott in the 49th Congressional District. But that change was based on only Orange County tallies Tuesday as San Diego, where Levin is leading, did not see an update in that contest.
Orange County voters also cast ballots last Tuesday for three of the five seats on the nonpartisan Board of Supervisors. If Supervisor Katrina Foley, a Democrat, can hang on to her lead over Republican state Sen. Patricia Bates, a former supervisor, then Democrats will hold a majority on the board. Foley’s lead was trimmed from 3,429 votes on Monday to 3.008 on Tuesday.
Orange County Board of Supervisors Chairman Doug Chaffee defeated fellow Democrat Sunny Park, the mayor of Buena Park, 56%-44%, in the 4th District.
Santa Ana Mayor Vicente Sarmiento saw his 607-vote lead over Garden Grove City Councilwoman Kim Bernice Nguyen increase to 1,586.