Incumbent Leticia Perez loses lead in District 5 Supervisor race
Nov 13, 2024
BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) -- The County elections office released new numbers late this afternoon, and District 5 Supervisor Leticia Perez has now lost her lead to Kimberly Salas, who now leads by 43 votes in one of the closest local races in recent memory. Perez, the incumbent, had been leading since election day.This race and the 22nd Congressional District race were projected to be close, but not this close for the District 5 Supervisor race. The new numbers have people watching this race wondering, 'who will win it?'
Last night, Leticia Perez was leading Kimberly Salas by just four votes, now Salas is leading by 43. Both candidates said they were not available to comment on the race.
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Tal Eslick, Central Valley Political Analyst says the last minute political drama of Perez's office being raided by district attorney investigators two weeks before the election is what most likely played the strongest role in swaying votes.
"There was the issue with the raid of the office that I think was probably not helpful and we're seeing that play out. This one will continue to be battled for the coming days and weeks," said Tal Eslick.
Eslick also says Salas had big money backing her, "In this particular race there was outside interests i.e. independent expenditure money that came into the race I think in opposition to Supervisor Perez and I think Kim Salas appears to have run a pretty disciplined campaign."
The congressional District 22 race was called by the AP yesterday. David Valadao beat Rudy Salas by almost 10,000 votes.
"I think Rudy's message of being different than what he had voted for," said David Valadao. "Running against the policies that have made people's lives more difficult here in the central valley wasn't resonating because people didn't believe what he was saying."
There are still 10,000 unprocessed ballots according to the Elections Office. The office said that the next ballot results should be out by Friday.