HOW WE’RE MAKING ENDORSEMENTS THIS YEAR

It’s hard to believe that ballots for the June 7 election will land in mailboxes countywide in two weeks’ time, but it’s true. Voting begins May 9, and all of the county’s 1.9 million registered voters should expect to get a mail ballot that they can either return by mail or drop off at dozens of ballot box locations.

Most San Diegans will do so pretty quickly. Fewer and fewer San Diego County residents wait until Election Day to vote. In the 2016 elections, 63 percent of the county voted absentee. In 2018, that percentage was about 70 percent. In the 2020 primary election, it was 72 percent, and in the 2020 general election, it was a whopping 88 percent.

While this is bad news for opposition-research consultants and October surprises, it’s great news for democracy. Making it easier to vote means more people might vote, which means representative democracy can live up to its name. It does mean more work for editorial boards like ours, which now have to interview scores of candidates much earlier.

The San Diego Union-tribune Editorial Board began our interviews in March. Because of the pandemic, most are being done by email, but in a first for us, we have also planned in-person forums for all four San Diego City Council races (which will all stream live on The San Diego Union-tribune’s Facebook). The first is Monday at 6:30 p.m. at the Malcolm Xvalencia Park branch library in and for District 4 and live on Facebook. Please visit sandiegouniontribune.com/councilforums for the dates and details for Districts 2, 6 and 8 and email Editorial and Opinion Director Matthew T. Hall at matthew.hall@sduniontribune.com to suggest questions for candidates. Then join us at a forum.

Even though some readers will question our endorsements or wonder why we make them at all, and some editorial boards are abandoning them altogether, we believe they are important. First, asking the public to get up to speed on so many candidates in so many races in such a short period of time is asking a lot. The pandemic has been so hard on so many people in such different ways. We’re all just trying to get by. We’re busy. It’s hard for anyone to do anything extra. Yet not all candidates are serious. Not all candidates are truthful. Not all candidates have the expertise or wherewithal to do these jobs that make our society function (or fail). That’s where our board has a role. We’re news junkies. We all live in this region. We’re members of the community. We’re subject matter experts and researchers — or we have subject matter experts and researchers on speed dial. We have access to the candidates that most people do not. Our calls and emails get returned (mostly). In short, it would be a dereliction of duty for us not to learn more about the candidates — and then to share that information with you.

As readers know, we’ve now published candidate Q&AS in races for San Diego City Council, San Diego Unified School District Board of Education, San Diego County Superior Court judge, San Diego County Board of Supervisors and Congress. Soon, we’ll publish Q&AS in races for state Assembly and state Senate, San Diego County sheriff, Chula Vista mayor and the state’s constitutional offices such as governor, lieutenant governor and the like.

After our interviews, more research and debate among the members of the editorial board (listed on the upper right of this page), we will issue recommendations on which candidates should advance to Nov. 8 runoff elections. In making our endorsements, we consider candidates’ accomplishments, background, character, demeanor, experience, record of community service and policy stances, but political party is irrelevant to us. In recent years, we’ve endorsed more Democrats than Republicans, but that’s partly a function of California voters advancing more Democrats than Republicans to runoff elections and partly based on our belief that the Republican Party in the Trump era has lost its way on issues like climate change and immigration, not to mention election falsehoods. Ultimately, our recommendations are just that: recommendations. We’re not here to help any particular candidate win or lose. We’re here to help you become a more informed voter.

In the end, we hope you do some research, offer us some feedback and vote. The choice is yours.