Marc Berman and Tim Dec battle for seat in District 23

Incumbent seeking third term is facing off against regional business owner

Running for a third term in the California Assembly, Marc Berman of Palo Alto is facing off against Republican challenger and small business owner Tim Dec to represent residents on the San Mateo County coast and southern Peninsula.

Berman, a Democrat, was elected in 2016 to represent much of the lower Peninsula, but changes in the legislative map after the 2020 census placed more conservative coastal communities in his district.

After the 2020 census, borders between assembly districts shifted, placing communities in the north coast side of San Mateo County as well as in the west valley in District 23, along with lower Peninsula cities like Palo Alto, Menlo Park and Mountain View. The two candidates will go head to head in the Nov. 8 election as both are running uncontested for Assembly District 23 in the June 7 primary.

When he won his seat in 2016 to represent Assembly District 24, Berman beat out Democrat Vicki Veenker by about 6,000 votes, and since then he's faced only Republican opposition. In 2018, Berman won against Alex Glew by 54 percentage points, and in 2020 he beat Peter Ohtaki by a similar margin.

Now Dec hopes to unseat Berman and he may have an advantage that Republicans didn't in the past. The new District 23 covers much of the same territory as Berman's current district, but adds the northern county coast, Saratoga and communities west of San Jose which are more conservative. Berman lost East Palo Alto and Sunnyvale in the new lines and gained coastside communities up to Pacifica.

Still, Berman is hoping that his work on education and climate change policy in the assembly will resonate with voters.

Berman was a Palo Alto City councilman for four years starting in 2012 and previously worked for U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo's office and the Justice Department. He has a law degree from the University of Southern California and studied at Georgetown University for his bachelor's degree. He practiced corporate law before going into politics and also worked at the Silicon Valley Education Foundation, a nonprofit focused on closing the achievement gap in STEM education in Silicon Valley.

In the Assembly, Berman has worked primarily in education, climate change and voters' rights, he said in his campaign website.

“I wrote the law to make California a permanent vote-by-mail state,” Berman said. “While other states are making it harder to vote, I am proud to lead the effort to make it easier for you to participate in your democracy.”

Berman also authored “legislation to ban the sale of new gas-powered equipment like leaf blowers and lawnmowers in starting in 2024,” an effort to reduce CO2 emissions. He also worked on the Student Transfer Achievement Reform Act of 2021, which makes it easier for community college students to transfer to four-year colleges.

In fundraising, Berman reports about $850,000 on hand to run his campaign, and he boasts endorsements from Gov. Gavin Newsom and Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis. Berman has faced criticism over the handling of a sexual harassment allegation in his office and for dropping the “F” bomb during a hearing at the capitol.

Republican Dec is running his campaign focused on fiscally conservative values, environmental issues and easing regulations. Dec grew up in Oregon and moved to the Bay Area after getting a degree in electrical engineering at Oregon State University. He's lived in the Bay Area since 2002, and has worked for 30 years in the technology sector. He most recently worked with Apple, when he realized he wanted to go into politics, according to this campaign website.

“After a successful 30year career in technology, most recently with Apple, I realized that my passion was not in technology, but in helping my coworkers fix problems and teaching them how to do it themselves,” Dec said. “With that insight, I decided to take the risky and unusual leap to step away from my job and find a better way to pursue my passion.”

Dec now runs a technology coaching business and volunteers as a tech tutor at Little House Senior Center in Menlo Park. As a Republican, he faces stiff competition on the Peninsula, but he said his passion is for “finding common ground, regardless of politics.”

He is currently a South Peninsula Area Republican Coalition board member and treasurer.