Ortiz Jones won’t call it quits until all votes counted in hotly contested race against Hurd

Representative Will Hurd (TX-23) talks to supporters gathering at the Omni San Antonio Hotel at the Colonnade in San Antonio after winning his race, on Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2018. Representative Will Hurd (TX-23) talks to supporters gathering at the Omni San Antonio Hotel at the Colonnade in San Antonio after winning his race, on Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2018. Photo: Bob Owen, STAFF-photographer / San Antonio Express-News Photo: Bob Owen, STAFF-photographer / San Antonio Express-News Image 1 of / 57 Caption Close Ortiz Jones won’t call it quits until all votes counted in hotly contested race against Hurd 1 / 57 Back to Gallery

The race in Congressional District 23 came down to the last precinct — and election workers there misreported their vote tally, officials said.

That error temporarily gave Democratic challenger Gina Ortiz Jones a 282-vote lead around 2:30 a.m. — causing the Associated Press to rescind its call that the race had gone to incumbent Republican Will Hurd. But once it was corrected, Hurd was again ahead, although only by 689 votes.

The Hurd campaign declared victory Wednesday morning after the late-night dramatics.

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"With all precincts reporting, I'm proud to have won another tough re-election in the 23rd Congressional District of Texas," Hurd said in a statement. "I'm proud to be the first person to hold this tough seat three elections in a row (in) more than two decades. I'm ready to get back to work for my constituents."

But Wednesday afternoon, Gina Ortiz Jones’ campaign declared in a tweet that the race wasn’t over.

“This election is not over — every vote matters and must be counted. Gina’s campaign has been powered by grassroots energy from day one, and we won’t stop working until every provisional ballot, absentee ballot, and military or overseas ballot has been counted,” according to a statement by Ortiz Jones’ spokeswoman Noelle Rosellini. The statement was tweeted out on Ortiz Jones’ Twitter account.

There are still overseas military ballots and provisional ballots to be counted, according to Sam Taylor, communications director for the secretary of state. But he didn’t say how many of them are still out.

Taylor said the current results are unofficial. He also pointed out that Ortiz Jones “is will within the margin to request a recount.”

The secretary of state’s office has not received word that Ortiz Jones’ campaign has done that yet, Taylor said.

The district is one of the only perennial swing seats in Texas. Hurd won his previous two elections by just 1.33 percentage points in 2016 and 2.1 percentage points in 2014.

As it stands now, this year’s race was decided by one-third of a percentage point. Hurd has 102,903 votes to Ortiz Jones’ 102,214.

But Tuesday night, “for about a 30-minute window … there was a point where Ortiz Jones had appeared to win by 282 votes,” Taylor said.

Then it was discovered that a precinct in Medina County — the last in the district to report its numbers — had neglected to include Election Day votes in the tally they had sent in, according to Sam Taylor, communications director for the secretary of state.

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The state quickly reached out to Medina, which corrected its error.

At Ortiz Jones’ election night party Tuesday, the candidate never addressed the 150 or so supporters that gathered in a business office courtyard on the West Side to watch the results.

“We keep asking, but they’re not responding,” one clearly frustrated Democratic Party official said as the night wore on.

After supporters left, workers dismantled the stage and the Associated Press initially called the race for Hurd, Ortiz Jones finally surfaced and appeared to concede.

“I am extremely proud,” she said, “of the campaign that my team and I have a run. It’s been an amazing opportunity to give voice to the issues that matter to Texans all across Texas 23. It’s been my honor to speak with communities and to really think about how best to serve these communities. So while it didn’t shake out the way we would want we ran a campaign that we are proud of and that really reflected Texas values.”

She and her staff then left the building without answering questions from reporters.

Staff Writer Richard Marini contributed to this report. | Dylan McGuinness covers local politics and the Bexar County government for the Express-News. Read him on our free site, mySA.com, and on our subscriber site, ExpressNews.com. | dylan.mcguinness@express-news.net | Twitter: @DylMcGuinness