Harris Holds Slim Lead Over Cooley In AG Race
LOS ANGELES (CBS) — San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris holds a slim lead over Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley in the race for attorney general entering Saturday's ballot count.
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Harris, a Democrat, had trailed from Nov. 5, until Friday, but now leads.
Cooley, a Republican, led by 11,400 votes at the start of Friday's counting of vote-by-mail, provisional and damaged ballots and then had his lead grow to 14,174 votes.
Officials with both campaigns predicted victory Friday.
"We believe once all the remaining ballots are counted, Kamala Harris will be the next attorney general," Harris campaign manager Brian Brokaw told City News Service.
"What you're seeing in this vote count is a weeks-long replay of how election night ended up. Steve Cooley had the early lead, thanks to Republican-leaning counties reporting their results early. As the night went on, Kamala Harris took the lead."
When polls closed Nov. 2, Cooley declared victory, but by early Nov. 3, Harris led by almost 15,000 votes. However, with thousands of ballots remaining to be counted, the race was too close to call.
"They've predicted victory before," said Kevin Spillane, a senior consultant with the Cooley campaign. "We are cautiously optimistic."
Spillane said the outcome may not be decided until Thanksgiving or the Dec. 3, deadline for counties to provide their counts to the Secretary of State's Office.
"It's going to be a very close race," Spillane said. "It probably will be decided by 30,000 votes or less."
To Spillane, the margin between the candidates in Los Angeles County has been a key to the closeness of the race.
Cooley trails Harris by 13.5 percent in Los Angeles County, while the seven other Republican statewide candidates each lost the county by 27.9 percent to 36.6 percent.
"Cooley's strength in Los Angeles County is one of the major factors why he is the top Republican vote-getter statewide," Spillane said.
Cooley was the only Republican statewide candidate to win Sacramento County and was the party's top vote-getter by "significant margins" in San Diego, Kern, Fresno "and countless other key counties," Spillane said.
"But given Los Angeles County's massive number of votes, it is Cooley's relative strength, even as a Republican, in his home county that has kept him in the game," Spillane said.
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