It could be several days before we know whether longtime Congresswoman Louise Slaughter will return to Washington for a 15th term.
The veteran Democrat and many others were surprised by the early vote count in her race with Republican challenger Mark Assini. Slaughter was leading by only about 600 votes, with 2,800 absentee ballots still uncounted.
Timothy Kneeland, history professor at Nazareth College, says he is not expecting Slaughter to lose the race once the official tally is in.
"You really have to see almost a two-to-one margin of votes in favor of Assini for him to overcome a 605 vote deficit, plus whatever Slaughter absentee ballots might be in that pile."
Monroe County Democratic Committee chairman Dave Garretson blamed the narrow margin of votes on poor voter turnout.
"We did not do as good a job as we should have to get our message to voters and to motivate voters to come out and support our candidates in every race,” said Garretson. He sees the 25th Congressional District race as a part of a larger trend and a tough night for the party overall.
"I think it's part of a rising tide where we saw Louise's colleague, Dan Maffei, unfortunately lost his seat. A number of other Democratic candidates were unsuccessful last night. It was a night for the Republicans and not the Democrats statewide, and I think this is part of that same tide."
Professor Kneeland said there is a message in this race for voters who may doubt how much influence they can have in an election.
"Clearly, this is the kind of the thing I'm going to take back to the classroom and say, 'Look, every vote counts. You can't sit out these elections. I mean, if this is a 605 vote difference out of the tens of thousands of votes cast, you'd be silly to sit out this election when your vote counted so much."
