decision 2022

What to Know About the 49th Congressional District, Sheriff's Race and 80th Assembly District Primaries

Results are still trickling in from the Registrar of Voters, but here is where three of the most-watched San Diego County races stand

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Results are still trickling in from the Registrar of Voters, but here is where three of the most-watched San Diego County races look as of June 8.


The 80th Assembly District race has been confusing and yielded different results when looking at the primary for the general election and the special run-off election to fill the rest of Lorena Gonzalez's term, reports NBC 7's Priya Sridhar.

The 80th Assembly District Race:

The 80th Assembly District race has been confusing and yielded different results when you look at the primary for the general election and the special run-off election to fill the rest of Lorena Gonzalez's term. Gonzalez vacated her position earlier this year after she took a job to head California's Labor Federation.

Not only did many voters say the two concurrent elections were confusing, but newly redrawn boundaries for the 80th District meant some voters were eligible to vote in one election and not the other. In the special election to fill the rest of Lorena Gonzalez's term, David Alvarez had 56% of the vote to Georgette Gomez's 43% as of Wednesday evening.

Both Gomez and Alvarez are Democrats who have served on San Diego City Council. Gomez earned the endorsements of Lorena Gonzalez, San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria and the California Democratic Party.

Alvarez gave a victory speech in Barrio Logan on Tuesday night.

"Iā€™m feeling great tonight, amazing results, pretty clearly the people of the 80th District decided they wanted to support someone who was going to unify the different factions of the people out there and our message was very positive from the very beginning," Alvarez said.

Georgette Gomez has the lead in the primary for the general election earning 35% of the votes to Alvarez's 31%.

Two Republican candidates, John Vogel Garcia and Lincoln Pickard also competed in the primary earning 19% and 13% of the votes respectively.

Alvarez got the endorsement of a prominent San Diego County Republican Greg Cox, who was the former Chair of the County Board of Supervisors. In a mailer to voters in the 80th, Cox is quoted as saying, "There is no Republican candidate for State Assembly in our District. So I'm voting for David Alvarez."

If Alvarez serves out the rest of Gonzalez's term, he will be the incumbent candidate in the general election in November and if he can absorb the votes of the two Republican candidates that were knocked out in the primary, he could have an edge over Gomez. Georgette Gomez was unavailable for comment as of Wednesday but sent an email to supporters saying: "We will continue to monitor the election returns and provide an update to everyone soon."


NBC 7's Priya Sridhar breaks down the race the 49th Congressional District.

The 49th Congressional District Race:

The 49th Congressional District drew national attention after new district boundaries, made the district a battleground that Republicans were hoping to flip to retake the majority in the House of Representatives in Washington D.C.

Incumbent Democratic candidate Mike Levin had five Republican challengers and one Democratic opponent.

The coastal district spans from Del Mar to Dana Point, but recently redrawn boundaries caused the 49th to lose La Jolla and gain the Orange County city of Laguna Niguel. Now, the party registration in the district is 36% Democrat, 33% Republican and the rest independent making it a swing district.

"Well we have been running in a very competitive District since day one, you know that. When we won this district in 2018, we did it after it had been held by a Republican for 18 years, so the competition is nothing new to us, in fact, we thrive on it," Levin said on Tuesday before the results were released.

The Republican challenger who will likely advance to face off against him in November is his former rival, Brian Maryott who is a former certified financial planner and mayor of San Juan Capistrano. Maryott got 19% of the vote in San Diego County behind Levin's 53%.

"We can feel it building, people are not happy with where this administration and today's Democratic Party is trying to take things and the impact it's having on their everyday lives, it's very distressing to people," Maryott said.

He lost to Levin in 2020 by 6 percentage points. In Orange County, Republican Supervisor Lisa Bartlett got second place behind Mike Levin, but Maryott was only 350 votes behind her as of Wednesday night which makes him second place overall in the district.


Results are still trickling in from the Registrar of Voters, but here is where the San Diego County Sheriff's race stands. NBC 7's Priya Sridhar reports.

The San Diego County Sheriff's Race:

The San Diego County Sheriff's race was also a hot contest with San Diegans getting a ballot with no incumbent candidate for the first time in 30 years. The San Diego County Sheriff's Department has been under a lot of scrutinies because of a scathing report from the state auditor's office that said the department failed to do safety checks and provide mental health services to inmates which caused many jail deaths.

The latest results from that race have Kelly Anne Martinez, the current Undersheriff, with 38% of the vote, and John Hemmerling with 20% of the vote. Martinez is a Democrat and was endorsed by the Deputy Sheriff's Association and Hemmerling is a Republican, a former Marine and San Diego police officer, and a newly resigned prosecutor.

Dave Myers, a Democrat who is also a retired Sheriff's commander is in third place with 17% of the vote. He trails Hemmerling by approximately 10,000 votes as of Wednesday night.

The San Diego County Registrar of Voters says the next round of results will be released sometime before 5 p.m. on Thursday, June 9.

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