King County Elections just dropped the results from about 54,000 newly tallied ballots, about half the number we were expecting to be reported today. No word yet on what’s taking so long.
In the King County Executive race, Dow Constantine now leads Susan Hutchison, 57.53% to 42.26%, a full one point increase in his margin of victory from last night’s results.
In the Seattle mayoral race, Mike McGinn’s lead over Joe Mallahan has narrowed to 461 votes, or a 49.77% to 49.33% margin. McGinn led by 910 votes last night, 50.03% to 48.96%. 20,742 new Seattle ballots were added to the mix, of which Mallahan received about 51% of the vote.
So what does this mean?
Not all that much. Like I’ve previously said, my understanding is that these ballots were from the same larger batch from which yesterday’s ballots were drawn: those that were received by 5PM Friday. If voters trended McGinn over the weekend, that trend won’t show up until later ballot drops. And there’s certainly no conservative trend in today’s new numbers in the county executive race.
Still, if I were Mallahan, I’d be feeling a tad buoyed. Whereas if I were Hutchison, I would do the gracious thing and finally concede.
UPDATE:
Drawing on my earlier post about the miracle it would take for Hutchison to pull out victory, assuming turnout projections are fairly on target, Hutchison would need to win the remaining ballots by a better than 15-point margin in order to pull into the lead; she currently trails by a better than 15-point margin.
She better start praying.
Goldy, I note that there is a discrepancy in vote total of about 30k between the ballot measures (1033 has ~30k fewer). Do you know what’s up? Due to the shitty ballot position?
R-71 approval extends its lead:
http://blog.seattlepi.com/seat.....184137.asp
Zotz@1
According to http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....voter.html (Yes it’s the Times…sorry for that)…others have noticed this as well and theories are forming.
KING 5 News just reported that Hutchison conceded.
@3Chris: Thanks!
For everyone else, 3 nuggets in the link: 22k blank 1033 votes in KingCo — ballot placement of 1033, good GOTV for R71 caused some to vote just for R71.
Also, Goldy, Washington poll agrees with the low end of your prediction: R71 will pass 52-48.
It appears about 22,000 fewer votes were cast in the I-1033 contest than in the R-71 contest, lending support to concerns that I-1033’s ballot placement confused voters. The fishwrapper says UW prof Matt Barreto “said last month he didn’t think there would be much confusion. Now he’s changing his mind.”
http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....voter.html
In other election news, the fishwrapper’s Bruce Ramsey is reduced to whining that “ballot-counting day is a sad imitation of real voting”
http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....ebook.html
and the pathetic little rival blog’s Jim Miller has nothing to crow about winning 3 legislative seats in eastern Washington (you know — the yard trash capital of Washington state) that Republicans always win.
http://www.soundpolitics.com/
One of the seats the R’s picked up was a special election in the Walla Walla area, the Democrat that previously held the seat for 20 years had died.
Not that it matters much, but I think you’re wrong that the ballots counted today were from the same “batch” that was counted yesterday. The KC election website indicates that results include “accessible voting centers.”
It would shock the hell out of me if KC elections drew 20,000 ballots from the same “batch” and they differed as much these did from the results posted yesterday. There is something significantly different about these 20K and last night’s 90K. I suspect the campaigns (with their voter registration ids and the master database) are trying to see how these populations are different.
Pete @8,
Yes, today’s count included the accessible voting centers. But that’s not a whole lot of votes.
As for your other point, that’s not how I understand it.
@9, The differences between yesterday’s result and today’s count (that taken alone had Mallahan up by 51% to 48%) can not be explained by chance alone. Something(s) about the populations that these two samples were drawn from is (are) different (geography that they were drawn from, timing of when the ballots were received by KC, demographics, etc.). Therefore, I conclude that the 2 samples were not from the same population, or “batch” as you put it. The most likely candidate for what might distinguish the 2 populations is the date that the ballot was mailed (or dropped at one of the neighborhood centers), especially if the votes coming from accessible voting centers can be ruled out because they make up only a small number of votes.
“King County Elections just dropped the results from about 54,000 newly tallied ballots, about half the number we were expecting to be reported today. No word yet on what’s taking so long.”
Deal making…
@11 “Deal making…”
If you can’t let go, you should seek counseling before you hurt yourself or someone else …
@12 don’t be so sensitive Rog…It was a joke…..