Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do greets supporters after his public swearing in ceremony at the Old Orange County Courthouse on Tuesday in Santa Ana. JEFF GRITCHEN, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Andrew Do was sworn in as supervisor for Orange County's first district Tuesday morning, despite Lou Correa's request for a recount and allegation of voting “irregularities.”
Do was welcomed to the dais by Chairman Todd Spitzer after Do’s wife, Superior Court Judge Cheri Pham, administered his oath of office before a packed house at the Hall of Administration.
Do beat Correa by 43 votes in a Jan. 27 special election that saw Correa with an early lead that tipped to Do by just two votes, then more than a few hundred before dropping.
Correa said in a statement that his campaign has heard that people who lived outside the district “registered to vote and cast ballots in this election.” He also said he’s heard that opposing campaigns collected and paid for ballots that were returned to the Registrar’s office or at the polls.
Correa said his lawyers observed the counting of provisional ballots last week and said some were counted even though they were not signed by the voter, and that some voters appeared to have voted more than once while others claimed to have moved to the district without registering at their supposed new address.
Correa noted that he “does not necessarily expect” the recount to change the final result, but he wants to do his part to assure his supporters and the public that the election was fair.
“If ballots were cast illegally in the election and were erroneously counted in the original canvass of the votes, a recount cannot 'undo' those votes and remove them from the vote count,” Correa said. “Conversely, a recount generally cannot result in adding any votes to the tally that were erroneously rejected in the original vote count.”
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