Dec. 5 is nearly a month after the Nov. 8 election. But the race to represent the District 47 seat in the California Assembly remains exceedingly too close.

As of Monday evening, Dec. 5, Republican Greg Wallis has a 35-vote lead over Democrat Christy Holstege. This district is mostly in Riverside County, but about 30% of its voters reside in San Bernardino County.

In an email to the Town Crier, Wallis said, “I’m ecstatic about the amount of support our campaign has received. We outlined a bold vision for safer streets, better schools, and a more affordable California. There are still a significant [number] of votes that need to be counted and we are going to let the vote counters do their job. I’m confident in the process and look forward to seeing the results once every vote has been counted.”

The Riverside County Registrar of Voters has certified the vote count here. However, San Bernardino County has about 2,000 votes uncounted and it is not known how many, if any, are from the 47th Assembly District.

Riverside County voters favored Holstege by 10,455 votes. Her majority locality was 54% to Wallis’s 46%. However, San Bernardino County was overwhelming in support of Wallis. He garnered nearly 64% of the San Bernardino vote resulting in a 10,490-vote advantage, which is sufficient to give him the lead in the whole district.

There is no automatic recount for elections in California. Any registered voter may request a recount but would have to pay for it if there were no change in the results. Requests for recounts may be by county or precinct.

In the Riverside County portion of AD 47, slightly more than 130,000 ballots were counted. However, the number of ballots cast in the district was almost 135,000. There were nearly 5,000 ballots with no vote or a write-in name cast for this race.

Turnout in both counties was about the same — 55% in Riverside and 53% in San Bernardino.

Within the whole district, the number of registered Democratic votes is almost 20,000 greater than registered Republicans. Together they represent about 74% of registered voters in the district and another 19% have no party preference.