Battle for Congress? Not here. Bay Area Democrats on Average Serve Even Longer Than Supreme Court Justices

November 8, 2022 By Scooty Nickerson 2 Comments

The Bay Area has changed radically in the last few decades — new companies, new residents, new energy. But the people we send to Congress? They’ve stayed — remarkably — the same.

As Democrats and Republicans mount a pitched battle across the nation for control of the House and Senate, a Bay Area News Group analysis shows why our political inertia is all but certain to survive election day: Our region is by far the least competitive major metro area in the country for congressional races.

No Bay Area House race outcome is likely to cross the lips of cable news pundits on Tuesday night. Amid nail-biting across the nation, our cluster of the political map will fill in with the deepest blue — once again.

The current slate of 12 Bay Area House members — all Democrats — won their 2020 races by an average of 47 points. In the runner up region of Boston, victors in House races had an average 40-point margin.

And when it comes to job security, our members also come out on top, serving an average of 9 terms, or about 18 years, in office. Lifetime appointment? Well, no. But it’s even two years longer than the average time on the bench for every justice who ever served on the U.S. Supreme Court.

“It is extraordinary,” said Dan Schnur, a UC Berkeley politics professor. “If California is a blue state, then the Bay Area is down right indigo.”

Five of the Bay Area’s 12 representatives have each spent more than two decades on Capitol Hill. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, long villainized by Republicans as an enduring symbol of Democratic control, is the longest-serving member of the Bay Area delegation: She won re-election in 2020 by 55 points and is running for her 19th term. Barbara Lee, the Bay Area’s maverick progressive, captured 92.6% of the vote in 2020 and routinely beats her challengers by about 80 points. The Oakland Democrat is running for her 14th term on Tuesday.

No other major metropolitan area in the country comes close to the Bay Area’s longevity. Six terms, or about 12 years in office, is the average for House members in Los Angeles, New York, Houston, Seattle and Southern California’s Inland Empire, the news organization’s analysis found.

But it’s not just our House members who have record-long stays in DC. On Friday, Dianne Feinstein became the longest-serving female senator in U.S. history after crossing the 30-year milestone. At 89, Feinstein has stayed in office so long that even the Bay Area is now wondering whether it’s a good thing, with calls for her to retire over concerns her mental faculties have deteriorated.

Congressman Ro Khanna, D-Santa Clara, who shocked local Democrats by ousting eight-term Bay Area incumbent Mike Honda back in 2016, experienced full force what it’s like to fight against the Bay Area political establishment.

“Every endorsement was against me, from now-President Biden, to Speaker Pelosi, to every member of Congress,” said Khanna, who is facing a perennial Republican candidate — computer engineer Ritesh Tandon — whom he beat by 43 points in 2020.  “A lot of people were saying don’t run, it was disrespectful to run…. there was a sense that this was somehow not being a team player.”

Congresswoman Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, stayed out of it at the time. But she pointed out that Khanna would now rely on the very same political establishment that attacked him in 2016 to defend him from a future challenger.

“Frankly, he would do the same thing [as Honda] and ask the party to defend him,” said Eshoo, who with 15 terms under her belt is the second-longest serving Bay Area representative. “When you are challenging an incumbent, you have to expect that, otherwise you are a political novice.”

While the challenge to find viable challengers exists in many parts of the country, the Bay Area has a particular issue: the Republican party poses virtually no threat to Democratic incumbents. Only 14% of voters are registered Republicans in our seven counties. In fact, there is no Republican challenger in three of the 12 Bay Area races this year. Republicans have not held a congressional seat in the Bay Area since Tom Campbell left the House in 2000 to launch an unsuccessful Senate challenge against Feinstein.

Campbell, a law and economics professor at Chapman University in Orange County, says that Republicans began to lose control in the region after the national party pivoted in the 1990s to emphasize conservative positions on social issues, such as abortion, gay rights and immigration, which were anathema to the region’s socially liberal identity.

“Many times, I would begin a [debate] answer by saying ‘Well, that’s the national party, not me,’” he said.

What’s just as rare in the Bay Area as an upstart like Khanna upsetting a same-party incumbent like Honda, is when incumbents say they are ready to retire. This year, incredibly, there are two: San Mateo Rep. Jackie Speier and Stockton Rep. Jerry McNerney are both retiring after eight terms. They are the first vacancies in the Bay Area delegation in six years, when Sam Farr gave up his Central Coast seat after more than 20 years, making way for Jimmy Panetta whose father Leon Panetta held the seat for 18 years before Farr.

So, here, longevity begets even longer tenures.

“All the things that were supposed to cure all this, we did them,” said veteran Democratic consultant Bill Carrick, referring to how the state tasked a panel of citizens, not politicians, with the job of drawing congressional districts and created the state’s open primary system that sends the top two vote-getters regardless of party to the general election.

And yet, the trend persists.

In many parts of the country, politicians complain of having to perpetually run for office. While that can force them to spend more time in their districts, tending to the needs of constituents, in today’s political climate it also can drive candidates to feel beholden to party bosses, especially as the GOP fractures.

So does it matter if our incumbent representatives can sit comfortably in office, sailing to easy 50-point wins year after year without even needing to campaign?

Khanna says it matters a lot — and it needs to change. Young challengers often have a better grounding in issues of particular interest to young voters, he argues, ranging from student loan forgiveness to tech reform to tackling climate change.

“Democracy depends on renewal,” said Khanna, who was co-chair of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign.

Eshoo sees it differently. She says that constituents benefit from having long-serving members, who have the experience, expertise, and power to get things done in Congress.

“Someone is half my age, so they’re twice as capable?” she asked rhetorically. “In the Congress, seniority is empowering. The manifestations of that power, together with the experience, really cannot be diminished.”

That experience in crisis was on display in the January 6 hearings with behind-the-scenes footage of Pelosi front and center calling the governor of Virginia to send in the National Guard to quash the rioters overtaking the Capitol. And Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a San Jose Democrat first elected in 1994, has played a key role in some of the U.S. government’s most critical moments of the last half century, from her work as a law student helping the House Judiciary Committee draft impeachment charges of President Richard Nixon to her service as a manager in President Trump’s first impeachment trial and as a member of the House’s Jan. 6 committee.

How exactly the Bay Area has become so immune from competition is a matter of debate.

UC Merced political science professor Jessica Trounstine, whose work focuses on the impact of incumbency in large American cities, said that the lack of competitiveness in the Bay Area is explainable in part by the unparalleled exodus of lower-income people from the region.

Though gentrification has impacted major metros throughout the country, none have been as heavily impacted as the Bay Area.

That means that incumbent House members have an easier time crafting popular economic policies, since they don’t have to appeal to voters across a wide range of incomes, and thus have an easier time winning re-election.

“It’s not just abortion,” she said. “Anytime a politician can create even a small coalition, it amplifies their presence.”

Campbell says that another reason that California House members generally fail to leave office is that there is no room for advancement. California has 52 House members, but, like other states, just 2 senators. That imbalance leaves House members with few options but to seek re-election until retirement or launch long-shot presidential runs, as Dublin Rep. Eric Swalwell attempted in 2020. This year, Khanna has sparked rumors he’s testing the presidential waters by employing consultants in early primary states.

Click here to read the full article in the Mercury News

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Mayoral Contest Tightens

November 5, 2022 By Benjamin Oreskes Leave a Comment

Bass holds slim edge, and negative ads put Caruso within striking distance, poll shows.

The race for mayor of Los Angeles was tightening rapidly as it entered its final week, with Rick Caruso cutting deeply into Rep. Karen Bass’ lead, putting him within striking distance in the contest to run the nation’s second-largest city.

Bass continues to hold an edge, 45% to 41% among likely voters, with 13% saying they remain undecided, according to a new UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll, co-sponsored by The Times. But Bass’ advantageis within the poll’s margin of error and strikingly smaller than the 15-point margin she held a month ago.

Support for Bass, a longtime elected official, has not significantly declined — she maintains strong backing among key groups of voters, including women, liberals and registered Democrats.

But Caruso, a billionaire businessman and developer, has steadily gained ground as previously undecided voters have made up their minds. His push has been powered by tens of millions of dollars spent on attack ads that appear to have succeeded in raising doubts about Bass in many voters’ minds.

He has maintained big advantages among the relatively few conservative and Republican voters in Los Angeles while also opening up sizable leads among Latinos, moderates and people living in the San Fernando Valley.

Bass leads across the rest of the city, relying on the electorate’s polarized view of Caruso, the backing of the state’s Democratic establishment and the liberal tilt of the city’s electorate. She leads among both white and Black likely voters, the poll found.

The survey comes on the heels of several other public and private polls that have shown significant tightening in the contest.

“This race could go either way,” said Tommy Newman, senior director at United Way of Greater Los Angeles, who is working with a coalition to pass a housing tax measure on the November ballot and is a close watcher of local politics.

“Nobody has this in the bag. There has been tremendous movement with Latino voters. The question is, will that correlate into votes?” Newman said. “[Caruso] is probably running the most robust field campaign we have ever seen in a mayor’s race. In a tight race, that’s when field campaigns matter.”

The tightening of the race has come during a period when the mayoral campaign has been somewhat overshadowed by the scandal that began with a leaked audio recording of three City Council members and a labor leader making racist remarks during a discussion last year about drawing new city council district boundaries.

The resulting furor has focused attention on racial and ethnic tensions in the city. The poll found that 69% of registered voters said relations among various racial and ethnic groups were just fair or poor, while just 23% said they were excellent or good.

The survey doesn’t, however, show a clear impact from the scandal on the mayoral race.

Bass and Caruso called for everyone involved in making racist comments to resign. They also each used the moment to make points they’d been pushing throughout the campaign.

For Caruso the scandal reflected a continuation of what he sees as the corruption that’s run rampant at City Hall and spoke to the need for an outsider to clean up city government. Bass said the scandal offered a moment for the city to come together and talk about its divisions while finding avenues to bridge them.

The poll found that voters who put a high priority on building coalitions among racial and ethnic groups favor Bass.

What clearly has had an effect is Caruso’s money.

With both campaigns now turning to get-out-the-vote efforts, Caruso has spent about $13 million mustering about 300 to 400 door knockers who have fanned out across the city to remind voters about the election. The field operation is designed to spur turnout among people — especially Latino voters — who have shown an interest in Caruso but won’t necessarily cast a ballot unless pushed.

That effort has been aided by the onslaught of advertising. Since the primary, Caruso is slated to spend $26 million on TV, radio and digital ads in the general election through Tuesday. That’s eight times the $3.3 million Bass is scheduled to spend, according to data from media tracking firm AdImpact.

Bass will also be boosted by a number of independent supporters on the airwaves, including unions representing carpenters and electrical workers and a pro-Bass political action committee funded by labor and Hollywood money. Those groups, which can’t legally coordinate with the Bass campaign, plan to spend several million on ads supporting the congresswoman.

A good deal of Caruso’s advertising is in Spanish. Together with the canvassing aimed at Latino voters, that pitch appears to be paying off. In the last Berkeley IGS poll just over a month ago, Bass led among Latino likely voters by 6 points, 35% to 29%; she now trails by 17 percentage points in that group, 48% to 31%. Many of Caruso’s Latino supporters, however, don’t routinely vote in every election, making turnout a challenge for him.

“You got to give Caruso a lot of credit. He’s making big inroads into this segment, but they’re not regular voters,” said Mark DiCamillo, who directed the poll and has been surveying California voters for decades.

“He’s making inroads where he didn’t have those inroads in June” in the primary, DiCamillo said. “The whole question is, will it be enough? It’s definitely going to be close.”

Bass’ biggest advantage remains her overwhelming support among liberals — the voters who define the shape of Los Angeles’ electorate.

In recent elections, liberal voters powered Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who campaigned with Bass last week, to victory in Los Angeles during the Democratic primary in 2020 and propelled progressive candidates to the fore in this year’s primary.

If their sway holds, Bass will likely win.

Bass leads by 40 percentage points among likely voters who identify as somewhat liberal (64% to 22%) and about 60 percentage points among those who are strongly liberal (74% to 12%).

Those liberal voters are the bulwark that could block further growth of Caruso’s support in the San Fernando Valley, where he now leads by 9 points (45% to 36%). Bass remains ahead in every other part of the city by nearly 20-point margins. The one exception is the South L.A. and Harbor region, where Bass leads 48% to 43%.

“It’s problematic for Caruso,” said Ange-Marie Hancock Alfaro, political science professor at USC. Bass “has her base of support. We’ll see if the structural advantage for Bass holds.”

In the last several weeks, the campaign has featured a volley of attacks on issues including each candidate’s ties to USC. Caruso has lambasted Bass for taking a $95,000 scholarship to attend a graduate program, while Bass has attacked him for his involvement in the response to a sexual misconduct scandal.

But Caruso’s ads have been far more frequent. Their effect can be seen in the rise in the share of voters who have an unfavorable view of Bass and in an erosion of her standing among registered Democrats.

About half the electorate still has a favorable view of Bass, but the share of likely voters who see her unfavorably is up 10 points since September to 35%.

Among Latino voters, one-third now have an unfavorable view of Bass, compared with one-sixth in September.

Bass continues to have a more favorable image than Caruso, however. In the current survey, 43% view him favorably and 42% unfavorably, compared with 38% to 40% last month.

Caruso has gained some support among Democrats, who make up the majority of Los Angeles voters. In September, just 19% of Democratic likely voters backed him. Now, 28% do. That’s still much less support than Bass, who is backed by 56% of Democrats, with 14% undecided, but it represents a significant inroad by the businessman, who was a Republican much of his life and only changed his party registration to Democrat in January.

About 20% of voters surveyed had already voted. Caruso had a slight lead among them — 49% to 46%. He also leads heavily among voters who said they planned to cast ballots in person on election day. Bass was doing much better with voters who plan to mail or drop off their ballots, leading 50% to 33% among them, the poll found.

Beyond the negative ads, the central policy arguments of the race have been over homelessness and public safety. These two issues along with the economy and education are what voters say the next mayor must prioritize.

Addressing climate change and coalition building between people of different racial and ethnic backgrounds are seen as less important by most voters, although they are top priorities for Bass’ backers.

Even though Caruso is trailing, voters believe he would do a better job addressing crime, the economy and homelessness. They believe Bass would do a better job tackling education, climate change and coalition building.

The Berkeley IGS poll was conducted Oct. 25-31 among 1,437 Los Angeles registered voters, of whom 1,131 were deemed likely to vote in the November election. The sample was weighted to match census and voter registration benchmarks.

Click here to read the full article at the LA

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Sharp Swing in Momentum Toward GOP Sparks Democratic Angst

October 25, 2022 By Max Greenwood 4 Comments

Angst is growing among Democrats that the momentum they saw earlier this year in their bid to keep control of the Senate is beginning to wane as towering inflation and deepening economic unease supplant issues like abortion rights atop the list of voters’ concerns.

As recently as a few weeks ago, Democrats were bullish about their chances of defying harsh historical and political headwinds, believing that voter anger over the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and lingering GOP concerns about the quality of Republican candidates might allow them to not only hold, but expand their paper-thin Senate majority.

But the political winds appear to be shifting once again in the GOP’s favor. Recent polling has found Republicans regaining an edge on the so-called generic ballot, a survey question that asks voters which party they plan to vote for in November. Meanwhile, the data website FiveThirtyEight’s Senate forecast shows Democrats’ chances of holding the Senate dropping by 11 percent over the past month.

“A month ago, it looked like not only were the Democrats poised to hold the Senate, the question was: were they going to be able to get, you know, two extra seats?” said Fernand Amandi, a Democratic pollster who worked on former President Obama’s 2008 and 2012 campaigns. “Now I think the hope is just to hang on.” 

With fewer than three weeks to go before Election Day and early voting already underway in key battleground states like Georgia and Arizona, the tightening contest for the Senate has some Democrats fearing that the party may have peaked too early.

“If you look at the Dobbs decision — that seems to have come a little too early for the Democrats,” Jon Reinish, a Democratic strategist and former aide to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), said, referring to Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the Supreme Court decision that overturned the constitutional right on abortion. 

“And I think there [are] other currents — inflation is probably the biggest one — that have kind of interfered with the singularity of that argument.”

Indeed, Republicans have hammered Democrats relentlessly on inflation, the economy and crime throughout the fall campaign season, betting that those issues would eventually outmuscle Democrats’ core themes: that abortion rights are at risk, the future of American democracy is in jeopardy and that they’re capable of governing in a volatile moment in the country’s history.

The New York Times-Siena College poll of 792 likely voters nationwide showed the economy and inflation topping the list of problems facing the country, while only 5 percent of voters said that abortion is the most pressing issue. Even among Democratic voters, economic challenges took precedence over reproductive rights. 

In one of the poll’s more alarming findings for Democrats, women who identified as independents said they preferred Republicans by an 18-point margin, a stark reversal from September, when those voters favored Democrats by a 14-point margin. Democrats have sought relentlessly to sway those voters by warning of threats to abortion rights.

“The voters who would be most susceptible to the Democrats’ messaging on abortion are shifting,” said Ford O’Connell, a Republican strategist and former congressional candidate.

“As long as the Republicans stay focused on two things — my money, my family — then they’ll win in 2022,” he added. “They’ll win in 2024. Because the Democrats aren’t showing any sign of changing their approach.”

To be sure, Democrats still stand a decent chance at holding their Senate majority in spite of the recent shifts. Their Senate candidates are outraising Republicans across the board, the GOP is seeking to wrangle a roster of untested candidates and, as of Thursday, FiveThirtyEight’s forecast still gives Democrats a 60 percent chance of winning the Senate.

At the same time, Democratic incumbents who were considered some of the most vulnerable have solidified their positions in key races. 

In Arizona, for example, Sen. Mark Kelly (D) has a distinct polling and financial lead over his Republican rival Blake Masters. Likewise, New Hampshire Sen. Maggie Hassan (D) is leading her GOP challenger Don Bolduc by nearly 8 points in FiveThirtyEight’s polling average. Both races lean in Democrats’ favor, according to The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan election handicapper.

But with the Senate divided 50-50 between the two parties, Democrats have no room for error. If Republicans net even a single seat in the upper chamber next month, it would deliver them the majority.

In Nevada, the race between Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D) and Republican Adam Laxalt remains in a dead heat. And despite facing a spate of scandals and questions about his personal history, Republican Herschel Walker has managed to stay within striking distance of Sen. Raphael Warnock (D) in Georgia. 

Democrats still stand a chance at flipping a GOP-held Senate seat in Pennsylvania, where Lt. Gov. John Fetterman and Republican Mehmet Oz are vying to succeed retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), though polling has shown a tightening race in recent weeks following a barrage of attacks against Fetterman accusing him of being soft on crime.

“A lot of these races — they were always going to tighten,” one Democratic strategist said. “I think a lot of folks just got ahead of themselves over the summer, thinking they had some kind of silver bullet.”

“I still say advantage Democrats for now,” the strategist added. “But yeah, no doubt the Republicans are catching up a little bit.”

Some Democrats expressed frustration with the way key Senate races have tightened. Amandi, the pollster, said that Democrats need to focus their closing message on sharpening the contrast between themselves and “extreme, unhinged Republican candidates.”

“Perhaps Democratic messaging hasn’t been as strong as it could be,” Amandi said. “But we’re talking about things tightening when the choice is between chaos and competency. The Democrats have governed with a competent, steady hand in a very volatile environment. What we’ve seen from the Republican Party over the last six years has been wholesale unhinged chaos. And what they’re offering is more chaos.”

Others, however, said that the party simply hasn’t done enough to campaign on meaningful legislative accomplishments and the pocketbook issues that could ultimately decide the midterms.

“How is it possible that seniors don’t know about the reduction in drug prices because of the ability of Medicare to negotiate?” Jonathan Tasini, a former national surrogate for Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-Vt.) 2016 presidential bid, said, referring to a provision in the Inflation Reduction Act, which was signed into law this summer.

“It’s obviously going to be very close, but it shouldn’t be,” he added. “Control of the Senate will be decided by probably a seat or two. And it just shouldn’t.” 

Keith Naughton, a veteran Republican strategist with deep experience in Pennsylvania politics, said that the improving environment for the GOP isn’t necessarily surprising. Rather, it’s the result of more voters tuning into the political conversation as Election Day draws nearer.

Click here to read the full article in The Hill

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Bay Area Counties Defend Use of Election Software Ensnared in China Data-Sharing Probe

October 19, 2022 By Eliyahu Kamisher 2 Comments

Three of the Bay Area’s largest counties will continue to use polling station software that was ensnared in a Los Angeles data breach investigation and resulted in at least four other election jurisdictions ditching the software amid allegations of embezzlement and Chinese data sharing.

Alameda, Contra Costa and San Francisco counties all use the PollChief software – produced by the company Konnech – to manage poll worker schedules and track voting equipment, but not to tabulate votes. Unlike Los Angeles, local elections officials in Contra Costa and San Francisco say sensitive data on election workers was never shared with Konnech and they are confident that other polling station information stored on Konnech servers was kept within the United States. Alameda County did not return multiple requests for comments.

Last week, prosecutors in Los Angeles accused Konnech CEO Eugene Yu of storing the personal data of thousands of Los Angeles election workers on servers in China, where it was accessed by Chinese contractors.

One Konnech project manager called the situation a “huge security issue,” according to the criminal complaint filed in Los Angeles. Prosecutors said Yu violated Konnech’s agreement to store data in the United States thereby embezzling public funds.

An attorney for Yu, who was released on bail, denied the allegations saying they are based on “discredited election deniers,” according to a National Public Radio report, which added that the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office launched the probe after a tip from Gregg Phillips, a leading election conspiracy theorist.

The criminal investigation has sent election officials around the country scrambling to reassure voters amid heightened scrutiny of election administration spurred by false claims that voter fraud cost President Donald Trump his reelection bid in 2020. Under California legislation signed into law last month, election workers can now hide their home addresses from the public amid concerns of harassment and threats driven by election fraud claims.

Just weeks ahead of the November general elections, Bay Area election clerks on Monday sought to reassure voters that their continued use of PollChief poses no security risks to election workers’ private information or voters’ ballots. Officials cautioned that the software plays no role in scanning ballots or vote tabulation and the Los Angeles district attorney emphasized that PollChief has had “no impact” on election results in Southern California.

But as local officials continue to use the PollChief software, at least four other jurisdictions around the country have halted use of the software. Detroit’s election chief told the radio station WDET the city is no longer using PollChief “out of an abundance of caution.”  Even election administrators that did not use Konnech’s election software have issued news releases seeking to calm voters’ worries and clarify their relationship with the company.

In the Bay Area, elections officials are reluctant to ditch the software, which provides key logistical support for poll station management. Among the uses are scheduling poll workers at voting locations, sending communications to poll workers, and tracking voting equipment and supplies.

Election clerks in Contra Costa and San Francisco counties said unlike Los Angeles, they do use the software for payroll, which would require them to store the private identification information of poll workers using the Konnech servers. Alameda County appears to only use the software for ballot box tracking, according to a 2022 poll worker manual.

“We’ve protected our poll workers. We’re not concerned that our poll workers’ data has been breached or shared,” said Helen Nolan, an assistant registrar in Contra Costa County. She said the county’s IT department reviewed their servers to ensure there was no data breach and they have also received assurances from Konnech that Contra Costa data is being stored in Michigan, as required under the company’s contract with the county.

John Arntz, director of San Francisco elections, said PollChief is used only to track warehouse inventory and there is “no information indicating our warehouse inventory is being stored on a server in China.”

San Mateo County does not use the software. Santa Clara County inked a contract with Konnech in June, but South Bay officials were not planning to implement the technology until after the November general election, the registrar’s office said, adding that the county is currently “reviewing the situation for appropriate action.”

Nolan said Konnech has provided “services without a problem for us since 2018,” and at the moment there is not “enough information or evidence to warrant canceling a contract.”

Click here to read the full article at the Mercury News

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Hundreds of voter guides found in Tower District dumpster, Fresno election officials say

October 17, 2022 By Brianna Vaccari Leave a Comment

Hundreds of Fresno County voter guides were recovered Friday from a Tower District recycling dumpster, election officials reported. The Fresno County Registrar of Voter’s office was notified shortly before 4 p.m. Friday that about 200 copies of county voter information guides and four copies of state voter guides were found in the recycling dumpster. No ballots were discarded, the registrar’s office said.

The voter guides were properly mailed through the U.S. Postal Service. Elections officials were working to determine which voters were affected to quickly send new copies of the Fresno County voter guides in the coming days. The Registrar of Voters is working with local, state and federal officials to determine how the voting materials ended up in the dumpster and to prevent similar incidents from occurring again.

The Fresno County incident comes on the heels of ballot errors discovered in Merced County. There, 40ballots in the cities of Merced, Los Banos and Gustine were missing certain local races or included incorrect candidates. The Merced County Elections Office said the errors occurred because of mapping issues after new district lines were drawn earlier this year. Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8.

Click here to read the full article at the FresnoBee

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Susan Shelley’s Guide to State Ballot Measures

October 11, 2022 By Susan Shelley 3 Comments

Election Day has arrived.

It’s now the law in California that a ballot will be mailed to every active registered voter, and the state’s 58 counties have already begun to mail them. Voting begins this week and continues through November 8. Verifying and counting all those ballots will take a month beyond that.

Many people ask me how they should cast their ballot — by mail, dropped off, in person, early or on Election Day. My advice is just to be sure to vote, however and whenever it’s convenient. If you have concerns about whether your ballot has been sent or received, sign up for the ballot tracking notification service on the Secretary of State’s website at WheresMyBallot.sos.ca.gov.

If you’re eligible but not registered to vote, your secret is safe with me, but really it would be better if you helped out. You’re an intelligent person reading a column about what’s on the ballot. Come off the sidelines and get in the game at RegisterToVote.ca.gov, or register at any vote center or polling place right through Election Day.

Here are my recommendations on the statewide ballot propositions.

Proposition 1 — NO. The most important thing to understand about Proposition 1, which “enshrines” the right to abortion in the state constitution, is that it’s going to create a constitutional right to late-term abortion, no questions asked. It does this by overriding conflicting state laws, such as Health and Safety Code Section 123466, which says, “The state may not deny or interfere with a woman’s right to choose or obtain an abortion prior to viability of the fetus, or when the abortion is necessary to protect the life or health of the woman.” Instead, Prop. 1 guarantees the “fundamental right to choose to have an abortion” without any limits on when or why. The decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade did not change California law at all but Proposition 1 will, and not in a good way. It’s not needed to protect current law, and it will have unintended consequences. Vote NO on Proposition 1.

Proposition 26 — NO. This measure would legalize in-person sports wagering exclusively at tribal casinos and a handful of racetracks. It includes a particularly nasty provision aimed at harming the tribes’ competitors in the gambling space, card clubs. Prop. 26 authorizes private lawyers to file lawsuits against cardrooms for alleged violations of state gaming regulations. This sets up a potential shakedown, because it can cost more in attorney fees to fight these lawsuits than to settle them. There’s no good reason for this provision, which is designed to harass competitors. The whole initiative seems designed to eliminate all competition in a lucrative new business. Vote NO on Proposition 26.

Proposition 27 — NO. This measure would legalize online and mobile-device sports betting in California, but its provisions would allow only a few very large companies to offer it, freezing out potential competitors. Problems with this measure, in addition to the anti-competitiveness, include a creepy authorization to snoop on people’s gambling habits and report data to the attorney general of California. The proponents say some of the tax revenue from the measure will fund homelessness services. You may remember that the California Lottery was going to fund education. Vote NO on Proposition 27.

Proposition 28 — YES. This measure directs about $1 billion per year from the state’s General Fund to arts and music education in public schools. It is not a tax increase, and it does not diminish other funding for the schools. Instead, it orders the legislature to spend money on this particular priority. This will end the game of politicians crying that arts and music programs will be cut from the schools unless you agree to the next tax increase. Vote YES on Proposition 28.

Proposition 29 — NO. Rejected by voters twice before, this is once again a union’s pet project, placed on the ballot to harass the companies that operate (non-union) kidney dialysis clinics and make them spend money to defeat it. There’s no reason for this measure other than that. Vote NO on Proposition 29.

Proposition 30 — NO. This is a tax increase. It would raise the state’s top income tax rate from the highest-in-the-nation 13.3% to the even higher 15.05% on income of $2 million or more. The money would be spent on subsidies for the purchase of electric cars, on construction of charging infrastructure, and on enough wildfire fighting efforts to make it look appealing on the ballot. Here’s the problem: a small fraction of California residents pay most of the personal income tax revenue in the state’s General Fund. If enough of those people move to a lower-tax state (49 choices), there will be less tax revenue for schools, health care and other state priorities. Ride-share company Lyft is financing this campaign because state regulators ordered ride-share companies to have 90% of the miles they drive be zero-emission by 2030, and nobody wants to pay for the cars or the charging stations. We could slow down the mandates and then we don’t need the damaging tax increase. Vote NO on Proposition 30.

Proposition 31 — NO. This is a referendum on a law that banned the sale of flavored tobacco products in California. Vote yes if you want to keep the law, vote no if you want to dump it. In my view, this law would create a thriving black market that enriches criminals instead of bringing in tax revenue. Vote NO on Proposition 31.

Click here to read the full article in the OC Register

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California Elections Attorney/Official Says Be Patient – May Be Millions of Votes Left to Count

June 10, 2022 By Katy Grimes 10 Comments

The 2020 General Election was the first all-mail-in-ballot election under California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s then-executive order, now a law. Since then, many voters still are not sure about the process. And after Tuesday’s California Primary Election, many voters have reservations.

The Globe spoke with Audrey Martin, an Elections attorney and Elections official for the Republican National Lawyers Association who works on election integrity, as well as with many county registrars.

Martin says California does mail-in voting well.

I told her that right before the 2020 General election I visited the Sacramento County’s Voter Registraton and Election office to learn what happens after a mail-in ballot is dropped off.

What I witnessed was a sophisticated production process replete with checks and double checks.

Martin agreed. She said she doesn’t necessarily agree with all of California’s voting laws, but most county registrars “are very well run.”

Martin said not all county voter registrars have the same computerized capabilities as Sacramento, so when some counties were sharing early totals on Election night, others still had bags of ballots stacked throughout their offices which had not yet been processed and counted.

“Theoretically there could be a lot of ballots to process – it’s usually a big number,” Martin said. Maybe millions? She said with so many people waiting to drop off their ballot, or mailing it on Tuesday, “it takes much more time by registrars on the back end.”

And this happens “because it is so easy to vote in California,” Martin said. There are many options, which also means people don’t always know the way to vote, particularly those who always voted on Election Day in person. The voting-by-mail for them just isn’t clear. For many, they are worried that their mailed ballot doesn’t get to the registrar, so they show up in person on Election Day to cast their vote. Martin said this takes county registrars so much extra time because they have to check the voter logs against the mailed ballots.

In the  Sacramento County’s Voter Registraton and Election office, ballots collected from the more than 170 official collection boxes around the county are sorted by precinct. Those ballots go next to employees operating the machines that slice open the return envelope, and a poof of air allows the operator to lift the ballot out, while a second operator separates but saves the envelope, which are used later for audits.

The ballots are scanned into the computer system, and voter signatures on the envelope are matched to the voter’s signature in the county elections system. If the operator feels the signatures don’t match, the voter is mailed a new signature page, which they fill out and send back.

Deep inside of the elections offices is a production center which resembles the production process in a printing plant bindery. Operators feed ballot return envelopes in stacks into a large machine which scans them, and separates by batches and precincts. Other operators act as auditors along the way. And there are phone banks of employees taking calls about the process.

There are employees in teams of two who analyze the actual ballot for any votes “X’d” out as a mistake, looking for voter intent. If they cannot make out the voter intent, it is left blank.

All of these operations are monitored by “Big Brother” – cameras in every room, from several angles.

With so many outstanding ballots, and 36 days to count them, expect some of the races to tighten up, or other candidates to pull away with bigger leads.

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US House Races in California Could Shape Future of Congress

June 10, 2022 By Michael R. Blood 2 Comments

U.S. House battles took shape in heavily Democratic California that could tip the balance of power in Congress, while former Trump administration Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke was in a tight match to claim the Republican nomination for a new House seat in Montana.

In Mississippi, two Republican congressmen were forced into runoffs to keep their seats. Rep. Steven Palazzo had been dogged by ethics questions over his campaign spending, while Rep. Michael Guest faced a challenger who criticized his vote on a proposal to create an outside commission to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.

Primary elections across seven states Tuesday set up November contests in dozens of races, as Democrats look to protect the party’s fragile majority in the House.

In a diverse district anchored in California’s Orange County, Republican U.S. Rep. Michelle Steel, a South Korean immigrant, will face Democrat Jay Chen. The district, which includes the nation’s largest Vietnamese American community, is widely considered a toss-up.

In other districts in the nation’s most populous state, two Republican House members were trying to surmount challenges tied to former President Donald Trump: One voted to support Trump’s impeachment after the U.S. Capitol insurrection, while the other fought against it.

A look at results in key U.S. House races Tuesday:

BATTLEGROUND CALIFORNIA: TRUMP HISTORY LOOMS IN KEY DISTRICTS

In 2020, Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Garcia won a narrow victory in a Democratic-leaning district north of Los Angeles. The former Navy fighter pilot was endorsed by Trump that year, then joined House Republicans who rejected electoral votes from Arizona and Pennsylvania and opposed Trump’s impeachment after the Capitol insurrection. That record will be a focus for Democrat Christy Smith, who earned a chance for a rematch with Garcia, after losing two years ago.

In a Democratic-tilting district in the state’s Central Valley farm belt, Republican Rep. David Valadao is highlighting an independent streak while contending with GOP fallout for his vote to impeach Trump over the Jan. 6 insurrection. Early returns showed him holding an edge over Republican Chris Mathys, who made Valadao’s vote a centerpiece in his campaign to oust him. The winner will face Democrat Rudy Salas, a state legislator.

California uses a top-two election format in which only the two leading vote-getters advance to the November general election, regardless of party.

In the Central Valley, Republican Connie Conway won a special election to complete the term of former Rep. Devin Nunes, who resigned to head Trump’s media company.

TWO MISSISSIPPI CONGRESSMEN FORCED INTO RUNOFFS

A pair of GOP congressmen in Mississippi are headed to June 28 runoffs.

U.S. Rep. Steven Palazzo, first elected in 2010, will face Jackson County Sheriff Mike Ezell after failing to win the GOP nomination outright on Tuesday, earning less than 50% of the vote.

A 2021 report by the Office of Congressional Ethics found “substantial reason to believe” Palazzo, a military veteran who serves on the Appropriations and Homeland Security committees, abused his office by misspending campaign funds, doing favors for his brother and enlisting staff for political and personal errands. His then-spokesperson, Colleen Kennedy, said the probe was based on politically motivated “false allegations.”

In another Mississippi district, U.S. Rep. Michael Guest will face former Navy pilot Michael Cassidy in a district that cuts through parts of central Mississippi.

Cassidy criticized Guest for being in the minority of Republicans who voted to create an outside commission to investigate the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol — a group that would have been separate from the congressional committee now conducting the investigation. Cassidy also says on his website that President Joe Biden should be impeached.

FORMER TRUMP CABINET MEMBER SEEKS RETURN TRIP TO WASHINGTON

Montana gained a second congressional district this year thanks to its growing population, and Zinke, an Interior Department secretary under Trump, is one of five Republicans on the primary ballot for the open seat.

Zinke’s rivals have been drawing attention to his troubled tenure at the agency, which was marked by multiple ethics investigations. One investigation determined Zinke lied to an agency ethics official about his continued involvement in a commercial real estate deal in his hometown. He’s faced a smear campaign over his military service from the extreme right wing of his party and questions about his residency following revelations that his wife declared a house in California as her primary residence.

Zinke, a former Navy SEAL and former Montana congressman, was in a tight race Wednesday against former state Sen. Al “Doc” Olszewski, an orthopedic surgeon and hard-line conservative who has tried to paint Zinke as a “liberal insider.” The results of the race were being delayed because of ballot printing errors that forced officials in one county to count votes by hand.

The winner will face Olympic rower and attorney Monica Tranel, a Democrat, in the general election.

IOWA’S SOLE DEMOCRATIC HOUSE MEMBER FACES A TOUGH FIGHT

A Republican state senator has captured the slot to take on Democratic Rep. Cindy Axne this fall in a newly drawn district that appears more favorable for the GOP.

Axne is the only Democrat in Iowa’s House delegation.

State Sen. Zach Nunn easily outdistanced rivals Nicole Hasso, a financial services worker, and Gary Leffler, who works in the construction industry, to claim the GOP spot. Nunn, an Air Force pilot who has served in the Legislature since 2014 and has worked to cut taxes, was the best known among the GOP contenders.

In previous elections, Axne was elevated by her strong support in the Des Moines area, even as she struggled in rural counties that typically lean Republican. The new district includes several counties in southern Iowa known to turn out strongly for Republicans, increasing the pressure on Axne to drive up her numbers in Democrat-friendly Des Moines and its suburbs.

REMATCH COMING IN NEW JERSEY HOUSE BATTLEGROUND

In what could be New Jersey’s most closely watched contest in the fall, Democratic U.S. Rep. Tom Malinowski and Republican Tom Kean Jr. won their primaries, setting up a rematch of their closely contested 2020 race.

Malinowski, a State Department official in the Obama administration, is seeking a third term as his party faces headwinds heading into the general election. His district added more Republican-leaning towns during redistricting, making his reelection bid potentially more difficult.

Another complicating factor is an ethics investigation he’s facing over stock transactions in medical and tech companies that had a stake in the pandemic response. A report from the Office of Congressional Ethics said the board found “substantial reason to believe” he failed to properly disclose or report his stock transactions.

Malinowski said his failure to initially disclose the transactions was “a mistake that I own 100%.” He said he didn’t direct or even ask questions about trades made by his brokerage firm.

Kean, a former state Senate minority leader and the son of the former two-term Republican governor, said in a tweet that he was humbled by his victory and looks forward to seizing the seat in November.

Click here to read the full article in the AP News

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Column: Rep. Levin’s District Is a Battleground Again, This Time With Strong GOP Headwinds

June 6, 2022 By Michael Smolensk 2 Comments

North County Democrat’s primary election mailer seeks to boost desired GOP opponent for November

Several California congressional districts always come up in discussions about control of the House of Representatives. The 49th District represented by Mike Levin, D-San Juan Capistrano, is one of them.

Regardless of whether the district straddling the San Diego-Orange county line ends up being pivotal in November, the election there promises to be a close one.

Seeking his third term, Levin seemingly has an unencumbered path to the fall general election in the slightly Democratic-leaning district, allowing him to marshal his resources and focus strategy on his eventual Republican opponent. Meanwhile, a handful of Republicans are slugging it out to advance out of Tuesday’s primary.

That’s the good news for Levin. The other news is he’ll have to face one of a few robust GOP challengers during an election year in which so many dynamics are trending in the Republican Party’s favor. That’s a change from his first two elections, when the political climate had the wind at his back.

Not only that, the district has been redrawn to adjust to population changes reflected in the once-a-decade census, adding some new voters he hasn’t represented and taking away some he has.

“There certainly is peril that Mike Levin faces in this district,” said Thad Kousser, chair of the UC San Diego political science department.

Having said that, Kousser isn’t so sure the GOP effort to retake the House majority “hinges on this district.” In other words, if Levin loses, that will be indicative of a big Republican win nationwide on Nov. 8, according to Kousser.

Levin isn’t just waiting for the fall campaign. He’s become a presence in the primary — as a player in the battle among GOP candidates.

The most prominent Republicans are three who hold or have held elective office: Orange County Supervisor Lisa Bartlett of Dana Point, former San Juan Capistrano Mayor Brian Maryott — who lost to Levin in 2020 — and Oceanside City Councilmember Christopher Rodriguez.

A mailer supporting Levin noted Rodriguez favors the repeal of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that legalized abortion across the country. With the Supreme Court poised to overturn Roe, the issue of protecting abortion rights has become a potentially potent one for Democrats in this election — particularly in purple swing districts like the 49th.

The tactics behind such a mailer are two-fold: It looks like a hit on an anti-abortion candidate to Democrats, while it might encourage conservative voters to back Rodriguez.

“This is the emerging part of the Democratic playbook,” Kousser said. “. . . We’ve seen this in other races where a strong Democrat is trying to pick the weakest Republican candidate.”

Maybe there’s polling that suggests Rodriguez is the better target for Levin in November. But the Oceanside council member is a Latino Marine veteran in a district that includes the Camp Pendleton Marine base and is home to a lot of veterans and Latinos.

Complaints that such maneuvers amount to meddling in the other party’s contest tend to fall flat these days. Back when there were separate Republican and Democratic primaries, making cross-party forays generated more controversy.

But here, Levin is running in the primary against not just the one little-known Democrat, but the Republicans as well. In California’s nonpartisan primary system, the candidates are on the same ballot and the top two vote-getters advance to November, regardless of party affiliation.

Elections such as this have much of the same feel of the old, separate primaries. In other districts that are dominated by Democratic or Republican voters, it’s not unusual for the top two finishers to be members of the same party.

Not only are congressional politics trending Republican, Kousser said there is a “stronger set of Republican challengers across the state this year.”

Click here to read the full article in The San Diego Union Tribune

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Compton City Council Election Overturned in Wake of Vote Rigging Scandal

June 1, 2022 By James Queally 2 Comments

Results of a Compton City Council race decided by one vote have been overturned following an election rigging scandal that prompted criminal charges against the winner last year.

Two-term Councilman Isaac Galvan must be replaced by his challenger, Andre Spicer, after a judge determined that four of the votes cast in the election were submitted by people who did not live in the council district that the two men were vying to represent, according to a 10-page ruling issued Friday by Superior Court Judge Michelle Williams Court.

After a contentious primary, Galvan and Spicer advanced to a runoff in June 2021, which Galvan won, 855 to 854. With the four illegal ballots disqualified, Court ruled that Spicer was the rightful winner of the election by a tally of 854 to 851.

Calls to Galvan and Spicer were not immediately returned Monday. Spicer, a Compton native and entrepreneur, told NBC he was “elated” by the ruling.

It was not immediately clear when Spicer would take office. A spokesman for the Los Angeles County Registrar referred questions to the city. Compton Mayor Emma Sharif did not immediately return a call seeking comment Monday.

The municipal contest drew attention in August, when the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office charged Galvan with election rigging and bribery.

Prosecutors alleged that Galvan conspired with primary opponent Jace Dawson to direct voters from outside the council district to cast ballots for Galvan in the June runoff against Spicer. Galvan was also accused of trying to bribe an elections official with concert tickets, according to the criminal complaint. The official immediately reported the attempt, according to Dean Logan, the county’s top elections official.

Dawson, Kimberly Chaouch, Toni Sanae Morris, Barry Kirk Reed and Reginald Orlando Streeter were charged with two counts each of conspiracy to commit election fraud last summer. When she ruled on Spicer’s election challenge Friday, Court found that Chaouch, Morris, Streeter and a man named Jordan Farr Jefferson all voted in the runoff between Spicer and Galvan despite not living in the Compton City Council’s second district.

Chaouch, Morris, Streeter and Jefferson all listed Dawson’s address in Compton as their home when registering to vote in the race, according to the 10-page ruling.

Six days after the race, Chaouch admitted on a recorded line that she actually lived in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles and that Dawson had her register to vote from his address, court records show.

Click here to read the full article in the LA Times

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