No endorsement amid scandals

Republicans haven’t held a statewide office in California since 2006. Take one look at the state treasurer race and it’s easy to see why. Democratic incumbent Fiona Ma has faced a series of scandals during her first term in office. In February, Orange County media outlets reported that Ma personally intervened to help a local police union president count his union salary toward his state pension — and received generous campaign contributions from said union as the process unfolded. Last October, the Sacramento Bee reported that Ma, who chooses to live in San Francisco, charged taxpayers for her lodging when she and her staff spent the night in Sacramento for work — to the tune of $32,000 over her first two years in office. This report came in the wake of the revelation that Ma routinely shared hotel rooms with her subordinates on these trips, a practice as questionable as it sounds after a former staffer brought a lawsuit against Ma for sexual harassment that allegedly occurred on some of these stays. The staffer also alleges Ma wrongfully fired her in the aftermath.

In an endorsement interview, Ma denied all allegations of impropriety. But her answers weren’t particularly contrite. She did not, for example, betray any intention to pay for her own lodging in Sacramento, a curious choice given all the trouble her hotel charges caused.

Despite all this, Republicans couldn’t be bothered to put up a formidable opponent. And, unlike in the insurance commissioner’s race, where Democrat Marc Levine is taking on incumbent Ricardo Lara after Lara’s series of ethical missteps, no other Democrats are running for treasurer.

Ma’s top Republican challenger, Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do, has been accused of ethical lapses of his own. In 2020, Do’s campaign was alleged to have secretly laundered more than $22,000 in campaign contributions through the county Republican Party’s account, which had the effect of keeping the identity of the donors secret. The California Fair Political Practices Commission ultimately found no evidence of illegal activity. But Do’s chief of staff was dinged by the commission for similar alleged activity only a few years earlier.

Do did not respond to our repeated requests for an interview.

Ma’s other Republican challenger, Jack Guerrero, is a council member from the small city of Cudahy in southeast Los Angeles County. He’s a bright and engaging figure with degrees from Stanford, Oxford and Harvard respectively. His campaign is mainly focused on shoring up unfunded liabilities in California’s pension systems — essentially retirement IOUs to public workers that the state currently doesn’t have enough money to back up. But Guerrero lacks any meaningful support from his party infrastructure — and his largely selffunded campaign isn’t built to win. Were Guerrero purely a dollars and cents fiscal conservative, we might seriously consider his candidacy. But he’s running an activist campaign; among other ideas, Guerrero is a school voucher believer whose plans include searching for legal avenues to publicly finance the development of private schools.

Peace and Freedom Party candidate Meghann Adams, meanwhile, did not return our interview requests. Which brings us back to Ma. Ethical scandals aside, Ma is a fine candidate. She is hard working and kept the state’s coffers flowing despite logistical challenges during the pandemic. She is a passionate supporter of responsible divestment of public dollars from both fossil fuels and from Russia.

But her judgment in her first term has been a disappointment, especially given that her good government advocacy earlier in her career helped bring crucial reforms to the Board of Equalization.

With the opponents that she is facing, Ma will sail to the general election if not win the primary outright. She doesn’t need our endorsement. And, given the gravity of the harassment accusations against her, she won’t get it at this time.