It’s been more than two weeks since results from the national red-wave election were obvious, but in California the excruciating process of counting continues. That’s led to some nail-biting races in Orange County, which slowed the determination of which party would control the House of Representatives.
Republicans did remarkably well statewide. Despite (or maybe because?) Vice President Kamala Harris being a Californian, she vastly underperformed Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton in California. Trump flipped several counties that had gone for Biden in 2020. Although Orange County tilted toward Harris by 2.6 percentage points, that’s a much slimmer Democratic victory than Biden’s 2020 nine-point margin.
Perhaps the highest-profile congressional race was the 47th district where Democratic state Sen. Dave Min is the projected winner over Republican Scott Baugh. The district had been represented by Democrat Katie Porter, who gave up her seat to lose her race for U.S. Senate. She always seemed far too left for the district. Min ran largely as a progressive and was dogged by a drunken-driving arrest. Baugh ran as a traditional Republican who avoided MAGA extremism. That contest largely consisted of the Min campaign misleading voters about Baugh’s stance on a so-called national abortion ban.
In the 45th district, incumbent Republican Michelle Steel is down by around 300 votes, but the trend is in the direction of Democratic challenger Derek Tran. Note to conspiratorialists: Late vote counting often trends in one direction based on the areas counted and the difference in voter preferences between early voters and later ones. It is not a sign of cheating.
U.S. Rep. Young Kim, a Republican, won by more than 10 points in the 40th district, which has a three-point GOP lean. More than her GOP colleagues, Kim emphasized her bipartisanship. Legendary U.S. House Speaker said all politics is local. The keys to winning vary by district, even if they are skewed by national waves.
It’s been a long time since OC has been a reliably conservative bastion, but this year’s results show the GOP remains competitive – even if it’s still unclear what the party needs to do to retake or hold those closely contested seats.
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