After an astonishing eight-week saga of counting and recounting more than 182,000 ballots, Assemblymember Evan Low emerged on top Tuesday — ahead of Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian by just four votes in their race for second place in California’s Congressional District 16.
But it’s not over yet, as more than a dozen challenged ballots are still up in the air in San Mateo County.
On Tuesday, Santa Clara County wrapped up the recount in the primary race to replace U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo, with Low gaining 11 votes overall and Simitian gaining seven. San Mateo County finished its recount last week and saw no changes in the vote totals for either candidate.
The captivating recount kicked off April 15 — more than a week after Low and Simitian tied behind former San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo. With no automatic recount provision in statewide or federal races in California, Jonathan Padilla, a 2020 and 2024 Biden delegate and former mayoral campaign staffer for Liccardo, requested the recount and has been paying for it through a Super PAC called Count the Vote.
In a press release, Matt Moreles, Santa Clara County’s Assistant Registrar of Voters, called the recount “the largest and most complex recount we have conducted.”
“It is not unusual for a recount to change the vote totals, especially in such a large jurisdiction,” Moreles said. “Because this contest was so close with two candidates precisely tied for second place, even tiny changes can make a difference in the outcome.”
Indeed, several changes were made.
In their release, the Registrar of Voters acknowledged that 19 validated ballots were left uncounted in the original tally, and three ballots were counted twice.
Observers, including lawyers representing the recount requester and candidates, challenged the exclusion of 45 ballots originally rejected by Santa Clara County. Of those 45, seven were accepted. One signature match that was originally rejected was overturned. The other six votes were originally rejected because the voter did not check a box attesting to their citizenship status. However, those six voters were already registered and had improperly been given a conditional ballot for people registering to vote on Election Day.
The remaining 38 ballots, however, were rejected by the county for a number of reasons, including signatures not matching voter registration records or the ballots arriving past the March 12 deadline. Sixteen of the rejected ballots, in particular, sparked a rift between election officials and the recount requester’s attorney. In those 16 instances, individuals registering Election Day failed to check the box on the conditional ballot form where they attest to being a U.S. citizen.
Matthew Alvarez, an election attorney with Rutan and Tucker, argued that the voters also signed a line on the bottom of the ballot swearing under penalty of perjury that they are at least 18 years old and a citizen. The county ultimately rejected the argument, prompting Alvarez on Friday to send a letter accusing election officials of stripping the 16 individuals “of their voting rights, all while calling them non-Americans and liars.”
In the end, Moreles called the recount a “learning experience” that will ultimately help “improve our processes and strengthen our quality control safeguards.
“The Registrar of Voters is committed to continuous improvement to deliver the most effective and accurate elections possible for our voters,” he said.
Low spokesperson Clay Volino said in a statement that the campaign had reviewed the final results in Santa Clara County and were awaiting “a final decision on the remaining challenged ballots in San Mateo County in determining the ultimate outcome.”
“We would like to thank the elections officials and their staff for their hard work during this process,” Volino said.
Before the recount even started, Low’s camp vehemently tried to halt the recount, bitterly criticizing the effort, attacking Padilla and accusing Liccardo of being behind it — a claim the former mayor flatly denied. The assemblymember’s lawyers even sent a letter to Santa Clara County arguing that the recount couldn’t move forward because Padilla changed his request from a manual to a machine recount — a move that made it cheaper — after the deadline.
Both Simitian and Liccardo’s campaigns declined to comment.
The final result now hinges on what happens next in San Mateo County.
Jim Irizarry, the county’s Assistant Chief Elections Officer, couldn’t be reached for comment but said on Friday that they were still waiting on information from the U.S. Postal Service that was needed to make their ruling.
The 17 ballots under review either arrived without postmark dates that showed whether they were sent on or before Election Day or with dates that were illegible.
It’s unknown which of the 11 candidates in the race those 17 individuals voted for, but in San Mateo County, voters appeared to favor Liccardo and Simitian.