Thursday, April 4, Art Tinoco, Riverside County registrar of voters,
certified the vote totals from the March 5 Presidential Primary Election
and the board of supervisors accepted the results at its April 9
meeting.

Turnout

In Riverside County, about 30.8% of the 1.3 million registered voters
cast a ballot in this election. The statewide turnout for the March
Primary Election was 35%, compared to the 50% turnout in the 2022
Gubernatorial Election.

Locally, turnout in Pine Cove and Idyllwild was almost 53% while
Mountain Center and Garner Valley saw about 47% of registered voters
cast ballots. The lowest local turnout was 36% in Anza. Two years ago,
the local turnout was between 58% and 72%.

Riverside County turnout was in the middle of its neighboring counties.
Both Orange and San Diego counties had turnouts of about 36%. San
Bernardino County’s turnout was 26%, but Imperial County only had a 22%
turnout, lowest in the state.

Presidential races

In the Democratic Presidential contest, President Joe Biden easily won
the state’s delegates with 89% of the counted ballots. His Riverside
County result of 89.5% is similar. Overall, the local votes for Biden
were similar to the county and the state.

In the Republican primary, Donald Trump was the victor with 79.2% of the
Republican votes, but he was stronger in Riverside County with 83.2% of
the vote. Nikki Haley was second statewide and in the county.

Nearly 93% of Garner Valley voters in the Republican primary chose
Trump. About 80% of Idyllwild and Pine Cove Republicans voted for the
former president and his lowest percentage was 66.7% in Mountain Center.

U.S. Senate

In the contest to replace former Sen. Diane Feinstein, the state’s
voters decided a nominee from each party was their preference to two
Democratic nominees.

Representative Adam Schiff was the top Democrat and Steve Garvey, a
former Los Angeles Dodger, was the top Republican. They will be battling
through the November election.

Statewide, Schiff and Garvey were almost equal. Only 3,500 votes
separated them out of nearly 7.7 million votes cast. Schiff garnered
31.6% and Garvey had 31.5% with Schiff having the higher vote total. The
two other major Democratic candidates were far behind. Katie Porter of
Orange County had 15.3% and Barbara Lee of Oakland could only capture
9.8%.

In Riverside County, Garvey was the favorite with 42.1% of votes counted
and Schiff was second with 27.7%.

The Hill was split. Idyllwild and Pine Cove favored Schiff, giving him
34% and 37%, respectively. Garvey was the second choice in both
precincts, but much closer with 32% in Idyllwild.

Anza, Garner Valley and Mountain Center all favored Garvey. He received
two-thirds of the Senate vote in Garner Valley and 55% in Anza. Schiff
was a distant second in all three areas.

U.S Congress

In the race for Congressional District 41, the two November 2024
candidates will again be Republican incumbent Ken Calvert and Democrat
Will Rollins. This was the choice in the 2022 election, which Calvert
won.

Last month, Calvert again garnered the majority of votes cast with 53%
and Rollins collected 38.4%. A distant third was Anna Nevenic with 8.6%
of the votes.

In total, the Hill voting results were similar. However, locally, both
Pine Cove and Idyllwild gave more votes to Rollins. Combined, Rollins
and Nevenic grabbed 60% of the votes in those two precincts.

However, in the lower elevation precincts, Calvert was the clear victor,
receiving nearly 70% of the votes in Garner Valley and Anza.

The November results will be close and may affect which party has
control of the House of Representatives. Many political pundits and
websites have called it very close. The Cook Political Report ranked the
district as a “toss-up.” The National Journal included it as one of the
15 House seats most likely to flip this election cycle. Both The
Washington Post and The New York Times have already published articles
about the district’s role in deciding the next House majority.

Congressman Dr. Raul Ruiz, who represents the 25^(th) Congressional
District, which used to encompass the Hill communities, won his primary
with 47.4% of the vote. Ian Weeks, a Republican, was second with 20.8%
of the vote. They will face off in November.

Assembly District 36

Assembly District (AD) 36 encompasses parts of three counties —
Imperial, Riverside and San Bernardino. Overall, Republican Jeff
Gonzalez leads the seven candidates to replace incumbent Eduardo Garcia,
who retired.

Gonzalez has captured 35.1% of the total district vote. His challenger
in November will be Democrat Joey Acuña, who had 19.9%. Edgard Garcia,
another Democratic candidate, earned 12.8% of the vote and Kalin Morse,
Republican, collected 11.3% of the total district vote.

In Imperial County, the vote was closer. Gonzalez led the seven
candidates with 27.7% of the votes, but Acuña was second with 22.5%.
However, fellow Republican Morse ran second to Gonzalez in San
Bernardino County, where only 911 ballots were counted.

Gonzalez and Morse collected 46.4% of the total district votes cast.

In Riverside County, Gonzalez had 38.4% of the votes and Acuña was
second with 18.7% of nearly 45,000 ballots cast.

On the Hill, Garner Valley and Anza, which are part of AD 36, have
stronger support to Gonzalez. He captured 50.7% of the Anza vote and
49.5% of Garner Valley’s.

In both precincts, with nearly 18% of the vote, Morse was second.

Assembly District 47

In another repeat from 2022, incumbent Republican Gregg Wallis will face
Democratic challenger Christy Holstege in November for the state’s
Assembly District 47 seat.

However, in this primary, Wallis had 48.6% and Holstege, after leading
during the first week of vote counting, got 46.4%. The difference is
about 2,600 votes. The third candidate, Democrat Jamie Swain, received
the balance with 5.1%, representing 6,115 votes.

In 2022, it took weeks to determine that Wallis defeated Holstege by 85
votes out of nearly 170,000 ballots cast. For this primary, only 16
months later, about 120,100 ballots were counted.

Holstege gained the majority of Riverside County votes with 50.2%
compared to Wallis’s total of 44.3%. However, in San Bernardino County,
which has about 25% of the district’s total voters, Wallis had 63.1% of
the vote.

His vote lead in San Bernardino County was 8,100 votes. In Riverside
County, Holstege had about 5,500 more votes in the primary.

Idyllwild and Pine Cove clearly favored Holstege. She gathered about 55%
of the vote in both areas while Wallis received only 40%.

Riverside Board of Education

In the Trustee Area 4 race (which includes the Hill), Bruce Dennis
easily won reelection with 91% of the vote compared to this challenger
Sergei Vinkov.

With a certain victory, Dennis wrote in an email to the Town Crier,
“Honestly, I’m thrilled to serve another four years and continue to be
part of the great work RCOE is doing. It also allows me to remain on the
Board of Directors of the California School Boards Association, and
continue my advocacy through them.”

Dennis captured at least 85% of the vote in every Hill community.

Proposition 1

Proposition 1 combines a $6.4 billion bond with changes to the Mental
Health Services Act, initially approved in 2004. These proposals are
intended to provide mental health care and drug or alcohol treatment to
people, including the homeless.

Statewide, Prop 1 eked out a victory with a slim majority: 50.2% of
ballots voted “Yes.” Its lead is only 26,200 out of more than 7.2
million votes.

The Opposition to Prop 1 has conceded, but for several weeks, its
opinion of the results vacillated.

In Riverside County, the opposition reaped 53.6% of the counted ballots,
34,300 more votes than its supporters.

Similarly to the races for political office, Idyllwild and Pine Cove
favored Prop 1, with 56% and 53%, respectively. And Garner Valley, Anza
and Mountain Center opposed it. Nearly two-thirds of Garner Valley’s
votes were cast “No.”

County supervisors

Two county supervisorial districts, 1 and 3, were on the ballot.

In District 3, incumbent Supervisor Chuck Washington won reelection. By
earning a majority of the votes, 53.3%, he will not have to face a
November race for reelection.

“I’m happy for the win in the primary because of what I perceive it
means: even with two challengers, voters recognize my effort, my
character and my competence,” Washington told the Town Crier. “Secondly,
I am freed up to devout 100% of my time and energy to serving my
district as their supervisor … I’m ready to get back to work!”

In District 1, incumbent Kevin Jeffries is retiring at the end of his
term. The two candidates on the November ballot will be Richard Roth, a
former state senator, and Jose Medina, a former Assembly member.
However, Medina edged the third-place candidate, Debbie Walsh, by only
1,200 votes out of a total of 56,600 cast.