Jim Cooper leads in the race for Sacramento County sheriff
Jim Cooper is leading against Jim Barnes in the race for Sacramento County sheriff, according to election results Tuesday night.
Sacramento County residents are voting for a new sheriff for the first time in 10 years with Scott Jones leaving office to run for Congress.
The race pits Cooper, a Democratic assembly member representing Elk Grove, against current undersheriff Barnes.
"Our job is to present our case to the people, kind of like a jury trial," Barnes said. "And at the end, it's up to them."
He said he executed his plan and would be "at peace" no matter what the results come back as.
Cooper, who has a background in law enforcement, tried campaigning for the position in 2010 but was defeated by Jones, who has expressed public support for Barnes.
"I've been all over talking to a lot of folks and just trying to get here to this point," Cooper said. "It took a long time to get here. I'm just happy today is here and it's almost over."
Because this race only has two candidates, this race could be decided in the primary if one of the candidates receives more than half of the votes, so at least 50% votes plus one vote. If that does not happen on June 7, the race continues to the November runoff, where the candidate with the most votes will claim office.
See election results below (IMPORTANT, app and mobile users CLICK HERE to see the results.)