Gov. Gavin Newson lost San Joaquin County.

The final tally from the Nov. 8 election saw Republican challenger Brian Dahle collect 51.78 percent (91,827 votes) of all ballots cast in the county compared to 48.22 percent (85,498) for Newsom.

It is a reversal from the November 2018 election when Newsom topped the Republican candidate Jon Cox with 52.14 percent (101,749 votes) compared to 47.81 percent (92,966 votes).

In the September 2021 recall election Newsom prevailed 51.78 percent to 48.22 percent over those that wanted to remove him.

Ironically, after not doing as well as he had hopped in the San Joaquin Valley in 2018 Newsom vowed to pay greater attention to the region to try and win it over. Hs first week as governor included several trips into the San Joaquin Valley.

Democrats have almost 6 registered voters for every 3.5 registered Republican voters in San Joaquin County.  In recent elections the county had been trending  more and more toward Democrats.

It should be noted the Republicans haven’t won a statewide election since 2006.

That said, there were several Congressional seats in the Central Valley that were flipped to the Republican side in tight races in heavily Democratic districts.

Included was the 13th Congressional District where Republican John Duarte defeated Democrat Adam Gray.

But based on San Joaquin County’s share of the votes cast that included  Lathrop and the rural areas south of Manteca and east of Tracy, Adam collected 4,597 votes compared to 4,092 for Duarte.

Making this year’s results more striking in San Joaquin County is that in two of the five other state constitutional office races, the Republicans pulled  more votes than their Democratic opponents. They were Lanhee Chen (52.51 percent) against Malia Cohen  (47.49 percent) for controller and Jack Guerrero (50.31 percent) against Fiona Ma (49.69 percent)  for treasurer.

Democrat and incumbent lieutenant governor Eleni Kounalakis outpolled her Republican opponent Angela Underwood Jacobs by 22 votes for a virtual 50-50 split. Kounalakis became the state’s 50th lieutenant governor and the first woman elected to the position in 2018.

Other Democrats enjoying wins in SJ County including Shirley Weber (50.39) percent against Rob Bernosky (49.61 percent) for secretary of state, Ron Bonta (50.25 percent) against Nathan Hochman (49.75 percent) for attorney general, and Ricardo Lara (50.95 percent) against Jose Altamirano (49.05 percent) for insurance commissioner.

Democrat Alex Padilla garnered 51.49 percent of the county vote against Republican challenger Mark Meuser’s 48.51 percent.

Josh Harder clearly was the strongest Democrat with 55.43 percent (92,603 votes) to Republican challenger Tom Patti’s 44.57 percent (74,445 votes) to gain re-election to Congress from the newly created 9th District.

The 9th District is 100 percent within San Joaquin County although it includes Lathrop as well as the rural areas south of Manteca and east of Tracy.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com