As ballots continue to be counted by the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder, the results of key city council races are seeing significant shifts that could change the composition of the city council.
LA City Councilman Kevin de Leon and tenant rights attorney Ysabel Jurado are now leading in the Los Angeles City Council’s 14th District race, after a switch in the second space following Friday’s ballot counting update.
The vote is not final and ballots still will need to be counted before the election is certified, so the result may shift again in the near future. The latest update comes after 119,932 more ballots were processed since Thursday. LA County Registrar-Recorder is estimating there are 408,500 ballots left to be processed, with 1,217,867 ballots processed so far. That puts the turnout at 21.44%, countywide.
Miguel Santiago, a state Assemblyman with the backing of powerful outside groups like the LA County Federation of Labor, sank down in the rankings, after initially looking like he would come in second place on election night.
The highly-watched race in the 14th District will be decided by voters on the eastside. The communities include Boyle Heights, downtown Los Angeles, Eagle Rock, Highland Park, and other northeast communities.
And in LA City Council’s 2nd District race, Jillian Burgos, a businesswoman who initially looked to come in third following election night tallying, has strengthened a second place position she took on Thursday when she had only a single vote ahead of opponent Sam Kbushyan. She now is ahead of Kbushyan by more than 400 votes. Adrin Nazarian, a former top staffer in Council President Paul Krekorian’s office, currently remains in 1st place.
The 2nd District includes North Hollywood, Studio City, Sun Valley, Toluca Lake, Valley Glen, Valley Village and Van Nuys.
In races in which there is no candidate with more than 50% of the votes, the top two finishers will need to face off in a runoff during the November general election.
Shifts such as the ones in the 2nd and 14th districts are not uncommon as ballots are counted after election night. If trends continue in other districts, the final results may shift as well.
In the 4th LA City Council District, which includes southern San Fernando Valley communities and Los Feliz and East Hollywood, incumbent Nithya Raman has increased her lead, but is still just shy of the more than 50% of the votes needed to win the race outright against challenger Ethan Weaver. Raman is now at 47.56% of the votes, up from 46.73%. Levon Baronian has 11.45% of the votes.
In the 10th LA City Council District, incumbent Heather Hutt (who was appointed to the seat after it was vacated by Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas) and Grace Yoo, an attorney, hold the top two spots. The race is most likely headed to a runoff. The district includes Koreatown, Mid-City, Crenshaw, The Village Green, and Leimert Park.
LA City Council 12th District incumbent John Lee is in a commanding lead against challenger Serena Oberstein, a former City Ethics Commissioner. Lee was recently hit with accusations of ethics violations, some of which stem from a trip to Las Vegas that was part of an FBI probe that led to a conviction of his former Councilman Mitchell Englander. Lee sued the Ethics Commission, and the next hearing on the case is in April. The 12th District is in the northwest San Fernando Valley. It includes the communities of Chatsworth, Granada Hills, North Hills, Northridge, Porter Ranch, Sherwood Forest, and West Hills.
Incumbents Imelda Padilla, who represents the 6th LA City Council District in the San Fernando Valley, and Marqueece Harris-Dawson, who is president pro tem of the City Council and represents the 8th LA City Council District, both continue to strengthen their already commanding leads. Both dominate their races with at least 78% of the votes.