Nguyen v. Nguyen

Opinion

SILLS, P. J.

I. INTRODUCTION

Trung Nguyen seeks, in this appeal from a judgment after an election contest, to be declared the winner of an election for an Orange County supervisorial seat. The winner of the election, as certified by the Orange County Registrar of Voters (Registrar of Voters or Registrar) after a recount, was Janet Nguyen. That is, after the recount, Janet Nguyen had the highest number of

legal votes

among all those running for the office. Trung Nguyen’s theory is that Janet Nguyen requested a statutorily incorrect methodology for the recount, and therefore the recount

itself

was invalid, and he is thus entitled to take office as the certified winner of the election based on the results prior to the recount.

In specific terms, Trung Nguyen asserts this: Janet Nguyen’s request that paper absentee ballots be recounted by hand but ballots cast by “direct recording electronic” (DRE) machines be recounted electronically ipso facto invalidated the recount. He contends that sections 15627 and 19253 of the Elections Code

1

do not permit a recount in which paper absentee ballots or valid paper provisional ballots are recounted one way (manually), but electronic ballots are recounted another (electronically).

As we explain in detail below, this argument is not persuasive. There can be no doubt that, in a recount,

paper ballots

may be recounted manually while electronic ballots may be recounted electronically. (A recount requester

[1641]

does, of course, have the

right

to have electronic votes recounted manually, and if they are, the manual count governs over any electronic count.)