san diego, calif.<u+2014>rep. darrell issa, one of the highest-profile republicans in congress, continued to hold a slim lead<u+00a0>wednesday<u+00a0>night over his democratic rival and declared himself close to victory. the closeness of the race for the eight-term congressman, who had generally won comfortable victories in the past, is a sign of the continuing weakness of the gop in california. the 63-year-old mr. issa led doug applegate, a retired marine colonel and iraq war veteran, by a 51% to 49% margin, according to state records. by contrast, donald trump, while winning the presidency, lost in california to hillary clinton by nearly 30 percentage points. in an email, a spokesman for mr. applegate said, <u+201c>there are tens of thousands more votes to count. we are cautiously optimistic.<u+201d> <u+201c>as the final ballots are counted, we are confident they will affirm the results from election night,<u+201d><u+00a0>said mr. issa in a statement<u+00a0>wednesday<u+00a0>night. the statement didn<u+2019>t say how many ballots remained to be counted. the california secretary of state said 100% of the precincts had partially reported as of<u+00a0>wednesday<u+00a0>evening. mr. issa, who was first elected to congress in 2000, has been a staunch critic of president barack obama and a supporter of mr. trump. as chairman of a powerful house investigative committee for several years, he looked into a range of controversial actions and programs of the obama administration, such as the internal revenue service<u+2019>s treatment of nonprofits aligned with conservative causes. a close race had been expected for months. in the june primary, mr. issa won 50.8% of the vote just 5 percentage points ahead of mr. applegate. the 62-year-old mr. applegate was seen as a potentially more appealing candidate in the district than past democratic opponents, in part because of his military background. the district is home to a major marine base at camp pendleton. though orange and san diego counties have long been bastions of republican support, the gop<u+2019>s position there has been eroding as california becomes increasingly dominated by democratic and independent voters. currently, all statewide officeholders are democrats, as are the two u.s. senators. democrats comprise majorities in california<u+2019>s congressional delegation and both houses of the state legislature. write to john r. emshwiller at john.emshwiller@wsj.com
u.s. rep. darrell issa confident of victory in southern california  - wsj
john r. emshwiller