SAN DIEGO — Democrat Rep. Mike Levin won re-election to Congress representing a California coastal district that stretches from Del Mar into Orange County and had become a key battleground race in the fight for control of the House of Representatives.
The Associated Press called the race as both San Diego and Orange counties released additional vote results Wednesday afternoon. Official results will take longer.
As of Monday evening's release of partial results from both counties, Levin had held a five-point lead over Republican challenger Brian Maryott.
The district is one that could also shape Southern California's position on energy, environment and the economy.
Although many of the projected votes have been counted, election officials had expected it to take a week or more before final results are known.
Although GOP leaders have grappled with lackluster results in congressional races across the country since last week, Maryott's campaign had said Friday that it expected economic woes to sway voters in his favor and close the gap.
Levin, a former environmental attorney, was seeking a third term in the U.S. House of Representatives. President Joe Biden flew to San Diego County earlier this month as part of a campaign tour for vulnerable incumbents, saying the nation's democracy was at stake.
The race was a rematch of the 2020 general election, when Levin bested Maryott by 6 percentage points.
But the newly redrawn district — which stretches from Del Mar north through Encinitas, Carlsbad, Oceanside and into Laguna Niguel in Orange County — now had less of a Democratic registration advantage.
Last week, Thad Kousser, the chair of the political science department at UC San Diego, had said that if Levin survived Maryott's challenge, it would be partly because a projected "red tide" of Republican congressional victories failed to materialize, leaving the GOP with smaller gains than it had hoped.
A victory would also reflect Levin's "recognition that all politics are local" and affirm his work on issues unique to the district, including veterans' affairs, the environment and disposal of spent nuclear fuel at San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, Kousser said.
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