Lessons of Tuesday’s election

The final numbers are still being added up from Tuesday’s election for the 35th District state Senate seat, and so the most important result is still unknown. At this point, Republican Huntington Beach Assemblyman Tom Harman holds the narrowest of leads over Republican Diane Harkey, a Dana Point city councilwoman. The winner of that race essentially is a shoo-in in the general election, facing Democrat Larry Caballero. With just a few hundred left to be counted, the winner could change ? although at this point it is highly unlikely as the remaining ballots should follow those that have already been counted.

Despite the suspense about who the winner will be, there are plenty of results we all can see already.

Chief among the obvious results is that few people thought it was worth voting. It appears that about 19% turnout will be the final count, but that includes a huge majority who voted absentee. With almost all the absentee ballots counted, 14.1% of voters mailed in their choice versus just 4.9% who took time out on Tuesday to go to the polls.

These numbers suggest a few conclusions.

It is possible that the near handful of elections in the past year have caused voter burnout ? or at least that the state Senate seat just didn’t strike many as terribly important. If that’s the case, that burnout should worry those running in the fall city council races and those putting together initiatives for Newport Beach. They all may have a tougher than usual job getting voters to care about their campaigns.

It is possible that the intense, negative campaigning that Harman and Harkey engaged in turned voters off, though that seems such an obvious answer we hesitate to suggest it. But the evidence certainly is there, and so the next wave of candidates should consider themselves warned.

Finally, whatever the final vote count is, it’s clear that neither of the Republicans got any support that was close to a mandate. Whether it be Harman having to reach out to the GOP establishment and the party’s more conservative members, or Harkey having to get in touch with more centrist voters, the winner of this election needs to see that the district is greater than the sum of his or her more narrow constituency.

That is, of course, unless the unthinkable happens and Caballero manages to win the general election on June 6.