Sunnyvale’s District 3 City Council election isn’t quite over after all — the votes soon will be recounted at the request of candidate Justin Wang.

Wang requested the recount after the city certified the results last week and initially declared his opponent, Murali Srinivasan, as the winner. The race between the two candidates was extremely tight, and the initially certified results showed that Srinivasan ended the race ahead of Wang by just one vote.

Wang told the Mercury News that he requested the recount to ensure that the election is given due process and that every voter is accurately represented.

“I deeply appreciate all the support that my campaign received from D3 voters,” Wang said in a statement. “With a race this close, it’s standard to have a hand recount to ensure all votes were counted accurately.”

He added that he’s paying for the recount by giving his campaign a large loan, as well as by trying to fundraise from people who previously endorsed him or donated to him during his campaign.

During campaign season, Wang and Srinivasan were vying to represent District 3 for the first time ever. The district was formed in 2020 after the city voted to switch to a district-based electoral system and drew six districts based on U.S. census data.

Srinivasan initially was declared the winner after the Santa Clara County registrar of voters conducted an automatic recount of the votes, according to City Clerk David Carnahan. According to initial results, he finished the race with 2,813 votes, and Wang finished with 2,812.

The automatic recount was conducted in accordance with county election laws, which state that an automatic recount has to be performed in elections with a margin of victory of less than 0.25% of ballots cast, or less than 25 votes. The recounts are performed manually, according to the registrar.

Srinivasan told the Mercury News that he felt the initial results, which were unchanged by the automatic recount, were “a victory for democracy” because of the robust turnout that voters in the district seemed to exhibit.

“If you look at District 5 and District 3, we pulled nearly 1,100 more votes,” Srinivasan said. “It’s definitely a great victory for democracy and District 3 voters — credit should go to them.”

And after the recount was announced, Srinivasan maintained that he trusted the original results and was “confident about the process.”

“I think the outcome will be the same thing,” he said. “It’s a waste of taxpayers’ money, because we need to trust (the registrar of voters) — if we don’t trust them, we don’t trust democracy, right?”

The registrar of voters was not immediately available for comment but said in a notice that the recount will take place Monday from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and is open to members of the public to observe. Wang submitted the request for a recount Monday, according to the notice.