In the South Bay’s only competitive Assembly race, Patrick Ahrens is leading over Tara Sreekrishnan to fill the Assembly District 26 seat.
As of 4:45 p.m. on Wednesday, Ahrens, district director for Assemblymember Evan Low, is ahead with roughly 57.8% of the vote, or 48,373 votes. Sreekrishnan, a deputy chief of staff and legislative director for state Sen. Dave Cortese, is trailing behind with roughly 42.2% of the vote, or 35,315 votes. The county’s voter turnout is about 44.6% and more than 468,000 ballots have been cast.
The Assembly 26 seat is open since Low, the incumbent, is running for Congress and did not file for reelection. The district includes Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, Cupertino and parts of West San Jose and Alviso.
Ahrens said he’s feeling very encouraged by the initial returns.
“I’m incredibly humbled by the votes so far,” he said. “There are a lot of votes left to be counted. I’m feeling overwhelmingly grateful at the culmination of a year of reaching out to the community asking for their support. I’m really encouraged by the results but waiting until vote is counted.”
Ahrens, also a trustee on the Foothill-De Anza Community College District board, said many issues facing the state are interconnected, like housing, homelessness, health care and education. He has previously experienced homelessness and lost his twin brother, Sean, to cancer, which gave Ahrens perspective into improving both systems.
Ahrens, who has worked for Low for more than a decade, said he wants to elevate multiple local projects to the state level. Ahrens worked alongside Santa Clara County officials to bring a full-service health clinic to De Anza College, for example, which is supported by the county’s health system — an idea he said could be implemented across the state.
Ahrens joined Low and others at the Democratic Volunteer Center, where dozens of supporters gathered around projection screens showing MSNBC’s national elections coverage and a live update of Santa Clara and San Mateo counties’ results. They also awaited Low and Ahrens, who are expected to make an appearance.
After the first round of results, some of Ahrens’ supporters said they were nervous but excited. Michelle Wu, a senior intern with his campaign, said she was anticipating the results especially in light of the campaign’s work.
“(We’re) certainly optimistic,” senior intern Maddy Chang told San José Spotlight. “We’re in the lead by a somewhat good margin, (but) it’s not a done deal yet.)
The race for Assembly District 26 has been close leading into Election Day, and candidates have been neck and neck in funding. The Oct. 25 filings show Ahrens has raised $995,402 since the beginning of his campaign, while Sreekrishnan has raised $926,352.
Special interest groups have spent hundreds of thousands on the race, including Uber and PG&E supporting Ahrens, while labor unions backed Sreekrishnan.
Sreekrishnan said she appreciated the broad support her campaign received.
“I am so inspired by the support our campaign earned across the district and deeply thankful to every supporter and volunteer who stood with us,” Sreekrishnan told San José Spotlight. “Together, we stood strong against a massive onslaught of outside spending and never wavered from our vision for a state government that fights hard on behalf of people who work hard.”
Contact B. Sakura Cannestra at sakura@sanjosespotlight.com or @SakuCannestra on X, formerly known as Twitter.