By Deb Murphy

With only a sample hand count and the formality of presenting the June 7 Presidential Primary election results to the respective Board of Supervisors yet to do, Inyo and Mono counties’ election results look very much like the preliminary results available the day after the election.

The only real surprise in both counties was voter turnout. Neither Inyo nor Mono hit the 60-percent mark, despite a bevy of new registrations logged in Inyo, according to Registrar of Voters Kammi Foote.

No new winners emerged in the unofficial final tally. Bernie Sanders beat the now presumptive Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton by more than 10-percent; Donald Trump took both counties in what amounted to an uncontested race.

In local races, Cleland Hoff and Bill Sauser are the two new Mammoth Lakes Town Councilmembers. Jeff Griffiths, the incumbent Inyo District 2 supervisor, beat Russ Aldridge decisively with 70.5-percent of the vote. In the District 4 supervisorial race, the only contested race in Mono County, John Peters took 45.8-percent of the vote over incumbent Tim Fesko’s 39.4 percent.

Both incumbent Assemblymen took the top spots in their respective races. Frank Bigelow in Mono’s District 5 and Devon Mathis in Inyo’s 26^th. Bigelow will face off against Robert Carabas, Mathis against Ruben Macareno in November.

The counties agreed on who would go up against Congressman Paul Cook in the November election. Cook won the majority in both counties with Democrat Rita Ramirez coming in second with 25-percent in Inyo and 32-percent in Mono. District wide, Ramirez beat Republican Tim Donnelly by a little more than 1-percent of the total vote.

The political leanings of both counties came out only in the choice of runner-up to Kamala Harris, Democratic candidate for the Senate. Inyo went with Republican Phil Wyman, only four percentage points lower than Harris; Mono went with Democrat Loretta Sanchez. State-wide, it will be Harris and Sanchez in the November election.