In races involving Westwood not called until early Wednesday, Ben Allen defeated Sandra Fluke for the 26th State Senate District and Sheila Kuehl edged out Bobby Shriver for a seat on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.
As of Wednesday night, several U.S. Senate contests also remained uncalled, though the Republican Senate win was confirmed Tuesday night.
In an election where each side raised more than $1 million, Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District board member Allen won 60.8 percent of the vote over social justice lawyer Fluke’s 39.2 percent. Both are Democrats, since the top-two system puts two candidates with the most votes in the primary into the general election. Fluke entered the national spotlight two years ago after being subject to personal attacks by radio host Rush Limbaugh for supporting contraceptive measures.
Former state senator Kuehl won a tightly contested race for the sprawling Board of Supervisors 3rd District. She held 53 percent of votes against former Santa Monica city councilman Shriver’s 46 percent, faring especially well in the densely populated Westwood, Santa Monica and Hollywood areas, according to Los Angeles County Clerk data.
Measure P, the measure that would levy a $23 flat parcel tax to improve county parks, gained the support of 62 percent of voters, failing to meet the two-thirds majority required to pass.
Though Democrats swept all statewide offices, they failed to maintain a two-thirds supermajority in the state Senate overall. They are also poised to lose the State Assembly supermajority, as five races remain uncalled.
For U.S. Senate races, Alaska incumbent Mark Begich, a Democrat, has not yet conceded the race to Republican Dan Sullivan, though Sullivan currently holds a 3.7 percent lead. A Begich campaign statement said that he will wait until nearly 24,000 absentee and early votes are counted.
In Virginia, the contest between Democratic incumbent Mark Warner and Republican Ed Gillespie remains too close to call, with a difference of less than 20,000 ballots, or 1 percent of the vote. The Louisiana Senate election will move to a December runoff.
Compiled by Arthur Wang, Bruin contributor.