The Registrar of Voters certified the 37th Senate District Special Election on Friday night, John Moorlach took the oath of office yesterday afternoon, and he will be on the Senate Floor at his desk for the first time at 2:00 PM today while Don Wagner will be back on the Assembly Floor at 12:00 PM today.

We’ve all seen the official results districtwide, with Moorlach avoiding a runoff by 199 votes:

Besides both being conservative Republican legislators from Orange County, there’s something else Moorlach and Wagner have in common: their most recent constituents like them.  In the 37th Senate District special election, Moorlach won the 2nd Supervisorial District while Wagner won the 68th Assembly District.  Turnout in the 2nd Supervisorial District was 16.8% while turnout in the 68th Assembly District was 15.0%.

Winner by city or unincorporated area in the 37th Senate District Special Election.  (Note: the sizes of their heads have nothing to do with their vote margin in that community, it’s just the geographic size of the community that did it.  Laguna Woods and Laguna Beach are very oddly-shaped cities.)

The 68th, the 2nd, and Neutral Territory

In the 68th Assembly District (Anaheim Hills, Lake Forest, Orange, Tustin, Villa Park, and the northeastern 1/3 of Irvine), Wagner defeated Moorlach by almost the identical percentage (5.3%) that Moorlach beat Wagner overall in the 37th Senate District (6.3%).  (For those who care to an incredible level of detail, the charts are near the bottom of this post.)

In the 2nd Supervisorial District (Costa Mesa, Huntington Beach, and Newport Beach), Moorlach beat Wagner by a whopping 20.6%.

In the neutral territory outside the 68th and the 2nd (Laguna Beach, Laguna Woods, and the southwestern 2/3 of Irvine), Wagner defeated Moorlach by a large 18.5% margin.  (To add insult to injury for Naz Namazi, write-in candidate Louise Stewardson beat her in these areas.)  In a testament to how fed up voters were with negative campaigning, it was in these areas where Stewardson and Namazi did the best, getting a combined 8.9% here as opposed to 5.4% in the 2nd and 4.5% in the 68th since there was no “favorite son” candidate in these areas.

Moorlach’s Newport Beach-Costa Mesa Landslide

Moorlach’s margin of victory in his hometown of Costa Mesa was a whopping 25.4% (1,712 votes) and in Newport Beach, it was an even larger 27.9% (2,996 votes).

Costa Mesa and Newport Beach combined to give Moorlach 4,708 more votes than Wagner.  Districtwide, Moorlach defeated Wagner by 4,714 votes.  In other words, without Costa Mesa and Newport Beach, Moorlach would have been ahead of Wagner by just 6 votes, and obviously, there would have been a run-off.

Moorlach also held on to the other 2nd District city, Huntington Beach, by a margin of 7.3% (599 votes).

Moorlach Won Portions of the 68th While Holding All of the 2nd

There were three critical areas where Moorlach broke into Wagner’s home turf: Anaheim Hills, Villa Park, and Silverado.  Had Wagner been able to stop the Moorlach incursion into those three areas of the 68th Assembly District, there would have been a run-off.

The Anaheim Hills votes are interesting in that Moorlach beat Wagner by 76 votes in Anaheim Hills overall, but Wagner beat Moorlach by 7 votes in the 39th Congressional District.  The only portions of the 39th Congressional District that overlap with SD-37 are in Anaheim Hills.  Anaheim Mayor Tom Tait endorsed Moorlach and did a robocall for him.  Congressman Ed Royce endorsed Wagner, did a robocall for him, and was listed on Wagner’s mail as an endorser.

It appears Tait managed to push Anaheim Hills out of the 68th District’s generally pro-Wagner voting pattern, but Royce was able to push his Congressional District back into Wagner’s column.  This war of endorsements from popular elected officials and of campaign mail probably explains why Anaheim Hills was the closest city in the entire district.  (We can rule out most precinct walking operations since the “Hills” name is very, very apt compared to the rest of the relatively flat SD-37.)

Moorlach was endorsed in Villa Park by Mayor Rick Barnett, Councilman Bill Nelson, Councilman Robert Collacott, and former Councilwoman Deborah Pauly.  Wagner was endorsed in Villa Park by Councilman Greg Mills and Councilwoman Diana Fascinelli.  Pauly ran Moorlach’s ground operations, which caused Villa Park to buck the trend of the 68th District backing Wagner.

I have no explanation for Silverado.

Moorlach Won the Liberal Pockets of SD-37

In spite of all the union independent expenditures against Moorlach and/or for Wagner, Moorlach actually won the liberal City of Laguna Beach and the flag-banning precincts of UC Irvine.

Tables Galore

Random Trivia Not Worth a Separate Post

For anybody wondering, Moorlach will be seated in the front row on the Senate Floor and will be seatmates with Cathleen Galgiani (D-Stockton).  Moorlach will be one of only two Republicans with a Democrat as a seatmate: the other bipartisan pair of seatmates are Anthony Cannella (R-Ceres) and Jerry Hill (D-San Mateo).  Moorlach will be diagonally seated from his old colleague of eight years on the Board of Supervisors, Janet Nguyen (R-Garden Grove), whose seatmate is their eight-year colleague on the Board of Supervisors, Patricia Bates (R-Laguna Niguel).