Politics & Government

Democrat Herring Leapfrogs Ahead in Attorney General Race

Fairfax County still has unresolved results.

The clean sweep of Virginia statewide offices Democrats were hoping for looked a lot more possible Tuesday after state Sen. Mark R. Herring moved ahead in the attorney general race by 117 votes out of some 2.2 million cast.

Tuesday, the State Board of Elections showed Herring with 1,103,610 votes and his GOP opponent, state Sen. Mark D. Obenshain, with 1,103,493, votes. Herring had entered Monday trailing by 17 votes.

Elections officials throughout the state have been scrubbing their vote totals since the Nov. 5 election, and on Monday Herring picked up more than 100 previously uncounted votes from Richmond.

Nobody is celebrating yet. 

The vote is almost certainly headed for a recount, which either side can request if the margin of victory is less than 1 percent. If it's less than a half-percent, the state  pays for the votes to be recounted.

In Fairfax County, meanwhile, elections officials were trying to verify 493 provisional ballots that were cast, The Washington Post reported. By Monday morning, the Fairfax County electoral board had approved 172 provisional ballots and rejected 138 of them.

The deadline for local jurisdictions to report their results to the State Board of elections is today, Tuesday, at 6 p.m. The state is to certify results on Nov. 25.

The races for governor and lieutenant governor were won by Terry McAuliffe and state Sen. Ralph Northam, both Democrats.





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