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 Runoff county results Garamendi: 40–50% 50–60% Harmer: 50–60% | |||||||||||||||||
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California's 10th congressional district special election, 2009 was held on November 3, 2009, to fill the vacancy caused inCalifornia's10th congressional district by the resignation ofEllen Tauscher. Democratic Party candidateJohn Garamendi won against Republican opponent David Harmer.
On May 5, 2009,PresidentBarack Obama nominatedDemocraticRepresentative Ellen Tauscher for the position ofUndersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security.[1] She was confirmed by theUnited States Senate on June 26 and subsequently resigned from her congressional seat.[2]
Following her resignation,GovernorArnold Schwarzenegger called aspecial election. Anopen primary among candidates of all political parties took place on September 1, 2009. If a candidates received a majority of the vote in the primary, that candidate would wins the seat without an additional election. As that didn't occur, the general election took place on November 3, 2009, between the candidates with the most votes for each party.
The following individuals appeared in the certified list of candidates and the certified list ofwrite-in candidates published by theSecretary of State of California, and were thus eligible to receive votes in the special primary election.[3][4]
| Poll source | Date | John Garamendi | David Harmer | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Survey USA[6] | October 26–28, 2009 | 50% | 40% | 6% |
Since no candidate won a majority in the September 1, 2009, open primary, the candidates with the top votes for each party advanced to the special general election. Garamendi won more votes than any other Democrat and Harmer more than any Republican. Denham, Cloward, and McIlroy were the only candidates from their parties so they advanced the general election by default.
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Democratic | John Garamendi | 27,580 | 25.70 | |
| Republican | David Harmer | 22,582 | 21.05 | |
| Democratic | Mark DeSaulnier | 18,888 | 17.60 | |
| Democratic | Joan Buchanan | 12,896 | 12.02 | |
| Democratic | Anthony Woods | 9,388 | 8.75 | |
| Republican | Chris Bunch | 4,871 | 4.54 | |
| Republican | Gary Clift | 4,158 | 3.88 | |
| Republican | John Toth | 3,340 | 3.11 | |
| Republican | David Peterson | 1,671 | 1.56 | |
| Green | Jeremy Cloward | 552 | 0.51 | |
| Republican | Mark Loos | 418 | 0.39 | |
| Democratic | Adriel Hampton | 376 | 0.35 | |
| American Independent | Jerome Denham | 309 | 0.29 | |
| Peace and Freedom | Mary McIlroy | 272 | 0.25 | |
| Democratic | Tiffany Attwood (write-in) | 2 | 0.00 | |
| Total votes | 107,303 | 100.00 | ||
| Turnout | 29.39 | |||
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Democratic | John Garamendi | 72,817 | 52.85 | |
| Republican | David Harmer | 59,017 | 42.83 | |
| Green | Jeremy Cloward | 2,515 | 1.83 | |
| Peace and Freedom | Mary McIlroy | 1,846 | 1.34 | |
| American Independent | Jerome Denham | 1,591 | 1.15 | |
| Total votes | 137,786 | 100.00 | ||
| Turnout | 35.33 | |||
| Democratichold | ||||
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