Los Angeles election: Vote counting almost over; Cedillo out at City Hall

Los Angeles City Councilman Gil Cedillo, who has been a no-show at council meetings for the past week, failed to gain any ground Tuesday in his ill-fated effort to retain his District 1 seat, with challenger Eunisses Hernandez maintaining her solid lead and time running out for the incumbent.

The latest vote tally from the June 7 election showed Hernandez, a community activist and public policy advocate, maintaining 54.04% of the vote, the same as it was during the last update released on Friday. The update released Tuesday by the Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk’s Office gave Hernandez 16,097 votes, compared to 13,690 for Cedillo.

According to the recorder’s office, only 6,491 votes remain to be tallied countywide, with only a fraction of that number likely to be from the city’s District 1. Despite being effectively eliminated, Cedillo has yet to formally concede defeat.

Hernandez has repeatedly proclaimed victory, most recently on Friday, when she wrote on social media, “Now the hard work begins. We must stay rooted in not leaving people behind and uplifting and taking the lead of directly impacted people. We will continue to lead our work with love, compassion, deep strategic analysis and patience.”

In the race for city attorney, civil rights attorney Faisal Gill continued to lead the seven-candidate field with 137,448 votes, or 24.22%. But the race for the second spot in the November runoff election remained too close to call. As of Tuesday’s vote-counting update, financial law attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto was holding a 150-vote lead over former federal prosecutor Marina Torres — down from 178 on Friday.

The next vote-counting update is set to be released Friday, when all ballots are expected to be tallied.

Meanwhile, former Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jan Perry was maintaining 569-vote lead over Culver City Mayor Daniel W. Lee in their battle to take on Sen. Sydney Kamlager in the Nov. 8 general election for the 37th Congressional District seat, which was vacated by Rep. Karen Bass to run for Los Angeles mayor.

The latest returns show Perry with 17,963 votes (18.4%), Lee with 17,394 votes (17.9%) and Kamlager with 42,585 (43.7%).

All three candidates are Democrats.