The last few days have been good ones for Tom Malinowski.

The  CD-7 Democratic congressman has slightly increased his lead over Republican Thomas H. Kean Jr. as votes are slowly and sporadically counted in the six counties that make up the district.

As of mid-afternoon Monday, Malinowski is leading Kean by about 4,700 votes.

That may not sound like much; the spread was about 28,000 on Election Night.

Since then, Kean had been slowly and surely chipping away at Malinowski’s lead. Late last week, it was down to around 4,300 and the Blue Wave, a liberal group, circulated a missive admitting that the congressman was “in trouble.”

But in over the weekend counting, Malinowski widened his lead, thanks in part to overseas ballots.  The congressman is a former State Department official.