Two congressional candidates tied. Now, recount requests are complicating it even further

The astonishing saga of a tied Silicon Valley congressional race took another zag this week, with multiple citizens submitting official requests for recounts.

Two candidates tied for second place in the primary to replace retiring Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Menlo Park), meaning both they and the first-place finisher will face off in the November general election, per California elections code. All three are prominent local Democrats who fielded serious campaigns in the primary.

The slated three-way race is, to put it mildly, a highly unusual outcome, even in the wild world of California politics.

It is the first time this has happened in a congressional race since the state shifted to its nonpartisan primary system in 2012, which dictates that the top two finishers advance to the November ballot regardless of party affiliation.

A recount could theoretically put a kibosh on a November three-way race, if the vote totals change. The calls for recounts — which could cost the citizen requesters hundreds of thousands of dollars — have also raised questions about who is truly behind the effort and generated a fresh round of campaign mud-slinging.

Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian and Assemblymember Evan Low, who repeatedly traded positions while votes were being counted, each finished with 30,249 votes. The first-place finisher, former San José Mayor Sam Liccardo, has a secure spot on the November ballot even if a handful of votes shift in a recount. Liccardo finished with 38,489 votes, well ahead of his challengers.

“It’s hard to believe this is really happening,” veteran Democratic strategist Darry Sragow said with a laugh of the latest twists in the race.

Sragow — who has been involved in campaigns since Richard Nixon was president — said he’d never dealt with a tie election result during his five decades in politics. It’s not something that strategists ever plan for or even think about, he said.

The district is overwhelmingly Democratic and encompasses parts of Santa Clara and San Mateo counties, including the cities of Palo Alto and Mountain View and part of the city of San José.

Santa Clara and San Mateo county election officials both said they were preparing to start recounting votes on Monday, so long as they received the necessary financial deposits from the requesters.

Both county offices received two recount requests early this week, one from software developer Dan Stegink and the other from Jonathan Padilla, a onetime Liccardo campaign staffer who is co-founder and CEO of the data company Snickerdoodle Labs, per Padilla’s LinkedIn page.

California elections code dictates that any voter can request a recount, so long as they are willing to pay its cost. They are also required to disclose which candidate the request was made on behalf of.

Padilla and Stegink filed on behalf of Low. Stegink said he was requesting on behalf of Simitian and Low but named Low because he was required to pick one candidate and picked alphabetically, according to paperwork shared by the Santa Clara County registrar’s office.

Low’s campaign opposes both recount requests and said it has had no communication with the requestors.

They’ve accused Liccardo’s campaign of being behind the recount efforts.

“There’s zero doubt that Sam Liccardo orchestrated this recount, and Padilla’s declaration that the recount is on our campaign’s behalf is simply disingenuous. Clearly Sam Liccardo doesn’t think he can win a three-way race because he’s showing he will do anything to avoid one,” Low spokesperson Clay Volino said in a statement Wednesday. “Instead of filing for the recount himself, Sam is hiding behind a former staffer who’s mounting an extremely expensive and time-consuming recount for political gain.”

Orrin Evans, Liccardo’s political consultant, confirmed that Padilla had worked for Liccardo a decade ago on his first mayoral campaign, but said that the campaign “unequivocally had nothing to do with the recount.”

But Evans welcomed the request, saying in a statement that “recounts are part of the state’s electoral process to ensure accuracy” and noting that Santa Clara county had not included more than 100 ballots in their “final” because of voter signature verification problems and other issues.

Simitian appeared intent on staying of the fray, issuing a statement that said: “Eventually, this process will work itself out. My job is to stay focused on how I can best represent the folks in our district. And that’s what I’m doing.”

Padilla did not immediately respond to questions sent to his attorney, but issued a lengthy statement Wednesday on the social media platform X, saying he had been involved in Democratic campaigns since childhood and was confused why “other Democrats don’t believe in counting votes and ensuring that the will of the people is transparently reflected.”

Stegink, who filed the other recount request, said he had no prior contact with any of the campaigns.

Speaking to The Times from the Memphis airport while en route home from a trip to Graceland with his children, Stegink said that he’d filed the request because he believed that his next congressional representative should be selected with a majority of the vote, as would be the case in a two-way race, rather than with a much smaller plurality of the vote, as might be the case in a three-way contest.

A manual recount of votes in Santa Clara County would cost about $32,000 a day for a duration of 10 days, so a total cost of about $320,000, according to county registrar spokesperson Michael Borja. The county would require a $32,000 deposit to begin the process on Monday.

San Mateo County costs would ultimately depend on a number of factors but would likely be “in the neighborhood of around $84,000 for a manual recount,” said Assistant Chief Elections Officer Jim Irizarry. His office would require a $5,000 deposit to begin work Monday.

It’s possible costs could be refunded depending on the outcome of the recount, but there are still open questions about how that would work in this situation.

Santa Clara County accounts for the vast majority of the district’s voters, with about 82% residing there and about 18% living in San Mateo County, according to California Target Book.