Outcome Unaltered by Recount
Gardena officials recounted the ballots Wednesday from last week’s City Council election, but the outcome remained the same: Incumbents James Cragin and Paul Tsukahara won, with Tsukahara edging out challenger Steven Bradford.
However, the new computer-tabulated results showed that Bradford narrowed the margin between him and Tsukahara to 33 votes. Unofficial results last week showed that Bradford came within 43 votes of Tsukahara.
Bradford demanded the recount because of what he and his supporters claimed were improprieties in the way city workers handled ballots and, at one precinct, incorrectly instructed a voter about how many candidates to select.
In addition, a state-required hand count last Friday of ballots from a randomly chosen precinct did not match a machine-tabulated vote count. That discrepancy, combined with the closeness of the race, prompted City Clerk May Y. Doi to agree to Bradford’s recount request.
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