State Sen. Shannon Grove, R-Bakersfield, had found great confidence when gaining her win by a large margin against Susanne Gundy after the June primary.
Election Day results seemingly matched Grove's confidence as the small-business owner carried a lead of 64.9 percent over Gundy's 35.1 percent for the 12th District 47.2 percent of results tallied as of 10:26 p.m.
"I feel good with what I’ve seen so far," Grove said when reached by phone Tuesday night. "But we want to make sure every vote is counted. ... I'm looking forward to seeing all votes."
Grove currently represents the 16th District, which includes a number of the communities that are in the 12th after a recent redistricting.
The new 12th District includes parts of Bakersfield, as well as the Kern River Valley, Ridgecrest, Taft, Tehachapi and parts of Fresno and Tulare counties. Throughout the past year, Grove has expressed excitement to represent the top-three food producing counties: Fresno, Kern and Tulare.
Gundy, a retired public health program manager and longtime Democrat who lives in Visalia, faced an uphill battle to unseat Grove even before the primary. Gundy had said she wanted to run to keep the race honest and make sure Grove wasn't running unopposed.
This is Gundy’s third run for office after a pair of unsuccessful attempts, one a run for the Tulare County Board of Supervisors about 20 years ago, and then for Visalia City Council about eight years ago.
"So far I think that is not that bad, considering my opponent has a lot of money and I don’t," Gundy said of the early results. "This shows that even though it’s a solidly Republican district, we have a third of voters wanting Democrat."
Gundy said she wasn't able to campaign as much as she would have liked because she recently suffered a right-hand injury from a bite that occurred when she tried to stop a fight between her dogs.
Grove has said she wants to make California affordable again, and added rising gas prices and grocery bills are "really ridiculous." Water, public safety and rising prices were cited as her major priorities after getting the higher number of votes in the primary.
If she's re-elected, she plans to bring back her bill to make human trafficking a violent felony and that is a strike-able offense. Senate Bill 1042 was voted down in a party line vote by the Senate's Public Safety Committee during the previous session.
