California Primary Election 2018: Live Updates

LOS ANGELES, CA — Despite all the handwringing on the left about California's "jungle primary," Democrats had a banner election day Tuesday.

With a majority of the votes counted, California's wildly unpredictable congressional races were razor thin, but Democrats were able to secure a place on the ballot in all seven districts they hope to flip from Republican incumbents in their quest to retake the House of Representatives in November.

In that sense, Democrats managed to escape their worst nightmare — being shut out of the November midterms in competitive congressional races.

In the Governor's race, as expected, Gavin Newsom won with a leading 33.2 percent of the vote, while Republican John Cox had a surprisingly strong showing to edge out Antonio Villaraigosa for second. Cox garnered 26.2 percent of the vote to Villaraigosa's 13.5 percent.

Little about the race for U.S. Senate, however, was close. Incumbent Dianne Feinstein claimed victory with less than 6 percent of the votes counted Tuesday night. She had garnered 43.8 percent of the vote with her next closest rival Democrat Kevin de Leon pulling 11.3 percent and Republican James P Bradley, a close third with 8.8 percent of the vote. De Leon and Bradley spent much of Tuesday night jockeying back and forth in the race for second.

"Tonight's victory was because of you," tweeted Feinstein. "Thanks so much for your support and for your faith in me. Now it's on to November!"

Click the links below for the latest updates in each race.

The Democrats' strong showing Tuesday night was something or a surprise. There was no shortage of enthusiasm on the left, but prognosticators weren't sure it would drive out the vote in a midterm primary. It was also widely believed that the glut of Democratic candidates could split the vote on the left.

"As the saying goes, 'When California sneezes, the rest of the country catches a cold.' What happens here is going to have big impact on what the rest of the country looks like on Jan. 2," said Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs.

Nationwide, Democrats need to flip 23 congressional seats to retake control of the House. But if there is one word to summarize California's messy top-two primary this wild election season, it would be 'unpredictable.'

"I think you have a lot of nervous candidates and they just don't know how to read the tea leaves," Graeme Boushey, associate professor of political science at the University of California, Irvine said before polls closed. "We are going to be dealing with potentially razor thin margins."

• California Congressional Races 2018: Election Results
  
• California Governor's Race 2018: Election Results
  
• California Polling Locations 2018: Where To Vote
  
• Candidate Resumes: Meet The CA Contenders In Tuesday's Election
  
• Could Glut Of Candidates Sabotage Dems' Blue Wave In California?
  
• California Primaries: Everything You Need To Know | Northridge
  
• Polls Show Governor's Race Slipping Away From Villaraigosa
  
• California Governor's Race Gets Weird
  
• Calif. Propositions Explained: Voter Guide for 2018

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