Indian-American Ami Bera, the Democratic Party Congressional candidate from California has increased his narrow lead over his Republican challenger as counting of provisional and absentee ballots continued.
California's Sacramento County Registrar of Voters yesterday announced that Ami Bera increased his lead to 1,779 votes against incumbent Dan Lungren of the Republican Party for the California's Seventh Congressional District seat.
As of last afternoon, Bera had received 105,244 votes (50.43%) against 103,466 votes (49.57%) received by Lungren. With 208,000 votes counted, he is leading by nearly one percentage point.
The Sacramento County would continue processing and counting of provisional ballots next week. Officials said it is too early to determine, when the entire process would be over. The election results would be updates Tuesday.
When polls closed on November 6 and the counting of votes were completed that night, Bera, whose parents migrated from India more than 50 years ago, had a slender lead of 184 votes; as a result of which outcome of the election was put on hold and authorities initiated the process of counting of provisional and absentee ballots.
"This is still a close race, but we remain confident that the voters of Sacramento County voted for new leadership that puts the people first," Bera said in a statement. So far Lungren, a Republican stalwart, has refused to concede the election. In 2010 Congressional elections, Lungren had defeated Dr Bera by seven percentage points.