The manual recount of ballots in the razor-close Chula Vista City Council race between former Mayor Steve Padilla and former Sweetwater school district president John McCann has been suspended with no net change in the outcome.
McCann remains in the lead by just two votes. During the manual recount, each side lost a vote, leaving the race still tilting toward McCann by two votes.
Humberto Peraza, a Democratic lobbyist who requested the recount, said the strategy is to refocus energy on the 269 ballots that remain uncounted. Peraza said the manual recount can be picked up again later.
Registrar Michael Vu said those 269 ballots remain uncounted for a variety of reasons, including the ballot not being signed or not properly completed. Other reasons include signatures on the envelope not matching the one on the registration form, a person who's not registered to vote and ballots that came in too late.
"That's the reason why we didn't count them, but they can challenge our ruling on any of the uncounted categories," Vu said.
Peraza said he believes there are about 70 ballots in which the voter didn't sign the ballot, but those cannot be counted toward the official vote because they are considered invalid.
The last recount in the county was between now-Chula Vista Mayor Mary Salas and U.S. Rep. Juan Vargas (D-San Diego) for the 40th state senate seat. The Salas campaign suspended the recount within a couple days and Vargas won by the official tally of 22 votes.
Local
The McCann-Padilla race is the closest in the history of Chula Vista.
