3 Democrats vie for second in primary race for governor
With Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom a good bet to win a spot on the November ballot for governor, three other Democrats face the inexorable arithmetic of California’s top-two primary.
And because the two leading vote-getters move on to the fall campaign, second place is as good as first. And third is the same as last.
The June 5 primary is a little more than two weeks away, which means state Treasurer John Chiang, former state schools chief Delaine Eastin and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa are in an all-out sprint for that second spot.
The polls give little guidance. While Newsom has been on top in virtually every survey, it’s an ever-changing field for the runner-up slot, with Villaraigosa and Republicans John Cox and Travis Allen all in the mix.
With those same polls showing that more than 10 percent of the voters remain undecided, however, that gives even Chiang and Eastin,
who bring up the rear in most of the surveys, a chance to catch fire and move up.
John Chiang
On an afternoon last week, Chiang was in his element, chatting comfortably with young Asian Pacific Islander Democrats at a function at state party headquarters in Sacramento.
That’s nothing unusual for someone who has spent the past 20 years in elected state office. But even his supporters sometimes shake their heads at Chiang’s soft-spoken, businesslike manner, which is very different from the ebullient approach of many politicians.
But Chiang, 55, wears the green eyeshade with pride. He says his years as a financial pro with the state Board of Equalization and then as state controller and treasurer make him uniquely qualified to guide California’s future.
“People will pass on the flash, but they want someone who will make sure the state’s not broke,” he said in an interview. Gov. Jerry Brown “keeps saying we’re going to hit a rough (financial) patch, and when we do, who’s the best prepared to deal with it?”
To work with those problems, though, Chiang has to finish in the top two, and there’s nothing shy and retiring about how he’s working to do that. It’s almost impossible to turn on the television in Southern California without seeing a Chiang ad slamming Villaraigosa over his eight years as mayor. And barely a day goes by without a Chiang press release hitting Villaraigosa or Newsom about what they did before or are doing now.
The other candidates “make promises but fall short, as the two mayors did on issues like homelessness,” Chiang said.
It’s important to make those tough comparisons, the treasurer said. All the candidates “have different backgrounds, and people want to know who you are at your core.”
From the start of the campaign, Chiang has talked about the problems he faced growing up outside Chicago as the son of immigrants from Taiwan. He remembers vandals throwing rocks at his house, anti-Asian graffiti spray-painted on their garage and fights on the school playground. It’s a background that gives him sympathy and understanding for the underdogs of society, he said.
Things changed over time, though. He was a class officer in high school and graduated with a degree in finance from the University of South Florida and a law degree from Georgetown University. He moved to Los Angeles in the late 1980s, working for the Internal Revenue Service and then for the state controller, all the time staying active in Democratic politics.
Chiang, who lives in Torrance (Los Angeles County), was appointed to the state Board of Equalization in 1997 and won the first of two terms in 1998. He was elected controller in 2006 and treasurer in 2010.
“I just have to keep connecting with voters,” he said. “I need my supporters to reach out to their friends and coworkers.”
Delaine Eastin
For Eastin, the campaign has been one long road trip that won’t end until election day.
“I’ve been all over the state, hither and yon,” she said in an interview. “I’m going places where other candidates have yet to go.”
The 70-year-old Eastin recalled bringing out 175 local Democrats to an event in the Tuolumne County community of Twain Harte, population 2,226.
“That was a pretty good turnout for a dinner where they didn’t even serve alcohol,” she said.
It’s stops in communities like that that suggest to Eastin that her long-shot campaign still has a chance to finish in the top two.
“People are much more organized this year, so it’s hard to know what they will do,” the Davis resident said. “Democrats are disappointed that they have these huge majorities in the Legislature and every statewide office and there’s still not much happening.”
For Eastin, who hasn’t run for elective office in 20 years, that perceived disappointment, combined with dislike for President Trump’s policies, opens the way for an experienced outsider like her.
“People see a need for authenticity in campaigns and candidates,” she said. “The same old same old is not acceptable anymore.”
That’s not a problem for Eastin, whose call for progressive change in California comes out in every speech and debate. When she talks about the need to improve state schools or build more housing, she doesn’t shy away from the money question.
“You have to look people in the eye and say that we have to change things to afford this,” she said. “I’ve been willing to talk about the need to revise Prop. 13” — she says commercial property should be reassessed more often — “and approve an oil severance tax.”
Born in San Diego to a father who was a Navy machinist and a mother who worked as a salesclerk, Eastin grew up in the Bay Area. With a bachelor’s degree from UC Davis and a master’s in political science from UC Santa Barbara, Eastin taught at community colleges before taking a job with what was then Pacific Telephone as an accounting manager and, later, a corporate planner.
“One of the best decisions I’ve ever made was to be involved in public life,” Eastin said during a debate earlier this month. She also noted, “I made 2½ times as much when I worked in the private sector.”
She served on the Union City City Council and was elected to the Assembly in 1986, and then in 1992 to the first of two terms as state superintendent of public instruction.
“There are a lot of people who don’t remember me, so I have to reintroduce myself,” Eastin said, telling people that during her time in office, “I got things done.”
While she can only wonder at the “jaw-dropping” amount of money going to her opponents, Eastin she will continue to run to win.
“I’m going to do what I’ve been doing,” she said. “Showing up and speaking the truth.”
Antonio Villaraigosa
When Villaraigosa showed up in the Mission District earlier this month, he admitted he wasn’t in the city just to collect endorsements from former San Francisco Mayor Art Agnos, Supervisor Aaron Peskin and one-time Supervisor David Campos.
He promised to “stake a claim” in San Francisco, letting Bay Area residents get a look at him and hear what he would do as governor.
“More people know me in Southern California,” Villaraigosa said, since as mayor of the nation’s second-largest city he was on the TV news almost nightly.
But as someone who has never run for office outside the Los Angeles city limits, he’s got plenty of work to do in the rest of California.
During his 18-month “listening tour” of the state, the 65year-old Villaraigosa spent almost a month in the Central Valley, “since I didn’t really know the valley. It was an eye-opening experience, to learn about farming, water and the area’s high unemployment.”
His travels have brought home just how diverse a state California is, Villaraigosa said.
“The biggest challenge facing the state is growing together,” he said.
Villaraigosa was born in East Los Angeles and raised by a single mother. After being expelled from high school for fighting, he earned his high school diploma in night school. He graduated from UCLA with a degree in history and worked as an organizer for the local teachers union and other unions.
In 1992, Villaraigosa was elected to the state Assembly and quickly became speaker. He lost a bid to become mayor of Los Angeles in 2001, won a seat on the City Council in 2003 and was elected mayor in 2005.
His two terms in the city’s top spot were marked by battles with teachers as Villaraigosa tried unsuccessfully to take control of the Los Angeles school system, and clashes with municipal workers as he struggled to keep the city solvent during the recession.
While those fights made Villaraigosa plenty of enemies in education and the labor movement, they also brought him a host of new supporters, such as the charter school advocates who have raised more than $16 million to boost the former mayor in his campaign for governor.
They have also given Villaraigosa a major talking point in the race, where he argues that he’s different from the other Democrats because he’s shown that he’s willing to take on teachers, public employee unions and other Democratfriendly special interests.
As for the attacks aimed at him and his record in Los Angeles, they don’t matter much, he said.
“It’s just a lot of noise at the end of the day,” Villaraigosa said. “People want to know more about what you’re going to do for them than about that noise.”
The only concern now is the June 5 finish line.
“It’s pretty clear that I’m fighting to get into the runoff,” Villaraigosa said. “So I’m going to be out in the state, knocking on every door.”