ElectionRecon

Two California house races remain uncalled, and it will be a minute before we know who wins. 🔴CA-13: Lean John Duarte ⚫CA-45: Toss Up There has been no change from last week's assessment, but both races have shifted ever so slightly toward Republicans. John Duarte (CA-13) remains the favorite, with Merced and Stanislaus dropping votes this evening. If the results are favorable, a race call could come (if they are unfavorable, we press on). The real action is over in CA-45, where all the bitching and moaning from accounts on here about how the votes are always favorable to Democrats down the stretch could see Republicans flip this one. Steel for the steal is well within reach. Derek Tran currently leads by 102 votes; however, the composition of the remaining vote is more favorable to Michelle Steel than it is to Tran, IMHO. CVRs (Conditional voter registrations) are California's version of same-day registrations. Because they must be done in person before or on election day, they're more Republican than mail or drop box ballots. We've seen CVR only drops in counties like Riverside, Madera, and even Los Angeles, showing a significant shift toward the Republican candidate compared to previous vote drops. 56.4% of all possible remaining ballots (pre-cures) in Orange County are CVRs + a small batch of provisionals. The remaining 43.6% of potential votes to be counted is a mix of early mail, late mail, early drop box, election day drop box, and damaged ballots requiring duplication. We know the CVRs are Republican +21 in terms of registration (just within the CA-45 portion of Orange County), so Steel is highly likely to see a net gain overall from counting these ballots. We don't know precisely how many there are, how many will be counted, or how favorable/unfavorable the rest of the vote will be to her; thus, this remains a coin flip. An estimated ~10,000 overall ballots are left to count. It may come down to how many cures come in before the December 1st deadline. Orange, 8 pm ET tonight, another small batch of votes will hit the wire.