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We Are Back!!! Cash For Votes in LA

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on August 25, 2014

It is with much appreciation that I announce to our readers that we are officially back from our candidate filing period hiatus. Due to some of our new partnerships that we have made a lot of candidates are now working with us for this November election especially after the success we had in June with Linda Lindholm, Eric Woolery, Tony Rackauckas, Ira Glasky, Robert Ming, etc… Now that candidate filing has closed we will have the time to start updating the blog more frequently.

voted

One item that I just noticed while catching up on news was the story of the city Ethics Commission in Los Angeles recommending a lottery in which $1,000 cash prizes will be offered to people as an incentive for voting. This comes as a result of extremely low voter turnout in the last city council election. I find this to be an absolutely horrendous idea with a number of potential negative results. The biggest problem with this is the potential for more uninformed voters turning out simply to earn a shot at $1,000 without researching the candidates.

If LA really wants to increase voter turnout they can do so with a couple of simple fixes:

1) Update who is on the active voter rolls. Orange County had their voter roll shrink by 17% this last year during a large-scale update. By shrinking the active voter rolls it will give a more accurate picture of voter turnout.

2) Consolidate the election with the Gubernatorial and Presidential elections. By having an election in an odd year fewer people will be motivated to turn out thus driving down voter turnout. If the elections are consolidated with the June Primary and November General Election in even years, turnout will see an increase.

I find voting to be a civic duty and am appalled by the idea of offering cash prizes to get people out to vote. One final gripe I have is about why the LA Ethics Commission has anything to say about this. What does voter turnout have to do with ethics?

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

June 2014 Post-Election Analysis: Lieutenant Governor

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on June 16, 2014

We now move on to the race for Lieutenant Governor which will see former California Republican Party Chairman Ron Nehring take on sitting Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom in the November run-off.

The June election was between eight candidates and unfortunately for Republicans Gavin Newsom is teetering close to 50% of the vote despite having one other Democrat on the ballot (ballots are not completely finished being counted).

california_flag

Nehring advances to November after easily finishing ahead of Republicans David Fennell & George Yang. Here are the statewide results on the race:

Candidate Votes Percent
Eric Korevaar (Party Preference: DEM) 224,800
5.5%
* Gavin Newsom (Party Preference: DEM) 2,022,663
49.9%
David Fennell (Party Preference: REP) 348,390
8.6%
Ron Nehring (Party Preference: REP) 949,328
23.4%
George Yang (Party Preference: REP) 324,446
8.0%
Jena F. Goodman (Party Preference: GRN) 94,224
2.3%
Amos Johnson (Party Preference: P&F) 38,307
0.9%
Alan Reynolds (Party Preference: AE) 54,157
1.3%

Turnout in Orange County is slightly concerning if you look at the fact that Newsom finished in first place, However, the vote total for all Republicans in OC totals 56% of the vote and Nehring finished 20% ahead of the closest Republican challenger:

Lieutenant Governor
Completed Precincts: 1856 of 1856
Vote Count Percentage
* GAVIN NEWSOM 110,859 34.7%
RON NEHRING 107,447 33.6%
DAVID FENNELL 41,474 13.0%
GEORGE YANG 31,409 9.8%
ERIC KOREVAAR 15,161 4.7%
JENA F. GOODMAN 5,589 1.7%
ALAN REYNOLDS 5,319 1.7%
AMOS JOHNSON 2,369 0.7%

Despite having multiple Republican opponents Nehring still managed to finish ahead of Newsom in a majority of Orange County cities including Brea, Dana Point, Fountain Valley, Huntington Beach, La Habra, Laguna Hills, Laguna Niguel, Lake Forest, Los Alamitos, Mission Viejo, Newport Beach, Orange, Placentia, Rancho Santa Margarita, San Clemente, San Juan Capistrano, Villa Park, and Yorba Linda

Statewide though Newsom had a very large advantage geographically. The most shocking thing for me was noticing that Nehring did not come in first in his home county of San Diego:

June_LG_Map_Fixed

The most shocking thing of all though is that Nehring did as well as he did raising only $23,000 for a statewide race and spending even less than that (expenditures are through 5-17-2014):

Consultants $0
Campaign Literature/Mailings $800
Campaign Paraphernalia/Miscellaneous $0
Television/Cable $0

Newsom raised almost ten times as much as Nehring in this period and spent substantially more (expenditures are through 5-17-2014):

Consultants $122,000
Campaign Literature/Mailings $700
Campaign Paraphernalia/Miscellaneous $9,000
Television/Cable $0

Nehring is not one of the Republican candidates that I would say is in great position going forward. Newsom is likely going to campaign extremely hard in order to show strength for 2018 where it is rumored that he might take on Attorney General Kamala Harris for Governor. Newsom did not come anywhere close to the numbers that Jerry Brown had in spite of the fact that Brown faced more opponents and had two better funded challengers.

I am going to vote for Ron Nehring for the good of the Republican Party and because I think he would make a much better Lieutenant Governor than Gavin Newsom. However, this particular seat will be an uphill battle unless Nehring can raise a lot of money going forward.

Posted in California | Tagged: , | 3 Comments »

Breaking News: Teacher Tenure Ruled Unconstitutional

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on June 10, 2014

A Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge ruled earlier today that teacher tenure is unconstitutional. We will have a deeper analysis of this ruling later today. H/T to the Sacramento Bee for posting this story.

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

June 2014 Post-Election Analysis: Governor

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on June 9, 2014

In my effort to keep our readership happy and provide some interesting content on the blog while we all wait for the filing period for the November General Election to commence, I will be giving an analysis of each race (not including races with a Custom Campaigns client in it) detailing what happened. Each race will be analyzed with an Orange County perspective in mind.

I will be waiting a few weeks on my analysis of the race for California State Controller because the race is ridiculously close between 2nd-4th place and I want to know for sure who is advancing before I analyze this one. On a side note Chris Nguyen has informed me that he will be doing his analysis of different races with heads on the map (he did these in 2012).

california_flag

We will start by taking a look at the race for Governor. Under the  Prop 14 rules the top two candidates advance to number regardless of how high a percentage the top vote getter receives. This is good news for Neel Kashkari who advances to November but faces a steep uphill battle. Here are the statewide results on the race:

Candidate Votes Percent
Akinyemi Agbede (Party Preference: DEM) 30,469
0.8%
* Edmund G. “Jerry” Brown (Party Preference: DEM) 1,970,995
54.1%
Richard William Aguirre (Party Preference: REP) 30,215
0.8%
Andrew Blount (Party Preference: REP) 78,173
2.1%
Glenn Champ (Party Preference: REP) 65,638
1.8%
Tim Donnelly (Party Preference: REP) 543,817
14.9%
Neel Kashkari (Party Preference: REP) 710,881
19.5%
Alma Marie Winston (Party Preference: REP) 39,223
1.1%
Luis J. Rodriguez (Party Preference: GRN) 53,220
1.5%
Cindy L. Sheehan (Party Preference: P&F) 42,731
1.2%
“Bo” Bogdan Ambrozewicz (Party Preference: NPP) 12,204
0.3%
Janel Hyeshia Buycks (Party Preference: NPP) 9,965
0.3%
Rakesh Kumar Christian (Party Preference: NPP) 9,217
0.3%
Joe Leicht (Party Preference: NPP) 7,815
0.2%
Robert Newman (Party Preference: NPP) 36,699
1.0%

These results show Tim Donnelly running fairly closely to Neel Kashkari statewide but surprisingly in conservative Orange County Kashkari had a much wider margin of victory over Donnelly as can be seen by the results:

Governor
Completed Precincts: 1856 of 1856
Vote Count Percentage
* EDMUND G. “JERRY” BROWN 114,481 38.3%
NEEL KASHKARI 92,946 31.1%
TIM DONNELLY 58,715 19.7%
ANDREW BLOUNT 8,031 2.7%
GLENN CHAMP 5,320 1.8%
RICHARD WILLIAM AGUIRRE 3,215 1.1%
CINDY L. SHEEHAN 2,965 1.0%
ALMA MARIE WINSTON 2,941 1.0%
ROBERT NEWMAN 2,700 0.9%
LUIS J. RODRIGUEZ 2,299 0.8%
AKINYEMI AGBEDE 1,946 0.7%
“BO” BOGDAN AMBROZEWICZ 900 0.3%
JOE LEICHT 843 0.3%
RAKESH KUMAR CHRISTIAN 753 0.3%
JANEL HYESHIA BUYCKS 588 0.2%

Looking at results from the different cities in Orange County Neel Kashkari managed to finish ahead of Donnelly in all but one city. I was shocked to see that the city Tim Donnelly finished ahead of Neel Kashkari in was Santa Ana of all places by a margin of over 500 vote (vote counting is not quite over yet).

Statewide though Jerry Brown dominated most counties however it was Tim Donnelly and not Neel Kashkari that pulled off a win in a couple of counties (Modoc & Lassen). Here is a map from the Secretary of States website that shows the winners by county.

Governors_Map

Donnelly ran a more grassroots campaign relying on members of the tea party and other conservative groups to help spread his message spending a grand total of $585,000 on the race including the following major categories of expenditures (expenditures are through 5-17-2014):

Consultants $220,000
Campaign Literature/Mailings $9,000
Campaign Paraphernalia/Miscellaneous $4,000
Television/Cable $0

Kashkari definitely ran a more aerial campaign as can be seen from his campaign finance reports were he spent over $2,500,000 on the race including the following major categories of expenditures (expenditures are through 5-17-2014):

Consultants $340,000
Campaign Literature/Mailings $237,000
Campaign Paraphernalia/Miscellaneous $9,000
Television/Cable $1,000,000

Jerry Brown is clearly waiting for November with his campaign spending less than $100,000 in June.

At the end of the day numbers don’t lie and Jerry Brown is in a very strong position going forward to November. Despite low Democratic turnout Brown managed to capture over 50% of the vote statewide. Kashkari is going to be attacked by Jerry Brown in messaging to conservatives (who already were likely in the Donnelly camp) that Kashkari voted for Obama and ran TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program). With increased voter turnout in November for Democrats and the possibility of some conservative voters sitting out this race Jerry Brown is at a definite advantage going into the November election. Financially Brown has over $20,000,000 cash on hand while Kashkari has just $1,400,000 which is a substantial deficit to start things off.

I am not going to make a prediction on this race though because Neel Kashkari did run a much stronger campaign than Donnelly and despite facing tough odds against Jerry Brown the CRP has been a bit revitalized with Jim Brulte doing an excellent job since taking over. I look forward to seeing Kashkari run a much stronger and more competent campaign than Meg Whitman did in 2010 (he can start by keeping the axe off of future mailers).

Posted in California | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

June 2014 Organizational Endorsements Scorecard

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on June 5, 2014

Chris Nguyen posted a humongous grid of endorsements that broke down all the major organizations and what candidates they endorsed for non-partisan offices in Orange County. You can take a look at his humongous grid of endorsements here. As a follow-up I have done the math on how the endorsed candidates fared in the Tuesday election and have given credit to an organization for endorsing a candidate that either won outright or advanced to the November election.

report_card

Here is a guide to the abbreviations: OC GOP = Republican Party of Orange County, DPOC = Democratic Party of Orange County, CRA = California Republican Assembly, HJTA = Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, CWLA = California Women’s Leadership Association, OC Tax = Orange County Taxpayers Association, OCBC = Orange County Business Council, and CTA = California Teachers Association.

OC GOP DPOC OC Register Lincoln Club Atlas PAC CRA Family Action PAC HJTA CWLA OC Tax OCBC CTA OC Labor Federation Evolve Women in Leadership Planned Parenthood
%  83% 14% 76%  75% 80% 83% 83% 100% 100% 92% 50% 50% 43% 0%  50% 33%
# of Winners  10  1  13  9  8  10 5  5  7  11  2  1  3  0  1  1
# of Losers  2 6  4  3  2  2  1  0  0  1  2  1 4 2  1 2

 

Anybody that got 75% and higher can be considered an organization with a valuable endorsement but the big winners from this election cycle were the California Women’s Leadership Association (Orange County Chapter) and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association both of which managed to endorse no losers.

 

Posted in 2nd Supervisorial District, 4th Supervisorial District, 5th Supervisorial District, Anaheim, Buena Park School District, Democrat Central Committee, Irvine Unified School District, Orange County, Orange County Assessor, Orange County Auditor-Controller, Orange County Board of Education, Orange County Clerk-Recorder, Orange County Public Administrator, Orange County Treasurer-Tax Collector, Republican Central Committee | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

OC Register Endorsements: Including Brand New Endorsement From Weekend

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on June 2, 2014

The OC Register endorsed in a majority of races on the ballot including a new endorsement that was released this morning for Marshall Tuck a candidate for State Superintendent of Public Instruction. Here is a list of endorsed candidates:

State Superintendent of Public Instruction- Marshall Tuck
O.C. Supervisor, District 2- Michelle Steel
O.C. Supervisor, District 4- Shawn Nelson
O.C. Supervisor, District 5- Robert Ming & Frank Ury (You can only vote for 1)
O.C. Assessor- Claude Parrish
O.C. Clerk-Recorder- Hugh Nguyen
O.C. District Attorney- Tony Rackauckas
Superior Court Judge, Office 20- Helen Hayden
Superior Court Judge, Office 27- Joanne Motoike
Superior Court Judge, Office 35- Carmen Luege
O.C. Board of Education, Trustee Area 2- Tom Pollitt
O.C. Board of Education, Trustee Area 5- Linda Lindholm
Irvine Unified School District Board- Ira Glasky 
O.C. Measure A- Yes
Buena Park Measure B- No
Anaheim Measure C- Yes
Anaheim Measure D- No
Anaheim Measure E- Yes
Prop. 41- No
Prop. 42- Yes

To see more details about each of the endorsements click on this link to go to the OC Register website by clicking here. I agree with a majority of the endorsements that they made with a few small differences. It will be interesting to see how each of these candidates fares on Tuesday night.

Posted in Anaheim, Orange County, California, Orange County Board of Education, Orange County Board of Supervisors, Irvine Unified School District, Buena Park School District, 2nd Supervisorial District, 4th Supervisorial District, 5th Supervisorial District, Orange County District Attorney's Office, Orange County Clerk-Recorder, Orange County Assessor | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Gubernatorial Race Looks To Be A Nail Biter. LA Times has Kashkari Up 5%

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on June 2, 2014

The LA Times just recently announced the results of a poll that they conducted for the gubernatorial race:

Half of Californians deemed likely to vote in the primary supported Brown’s reelection. Among his chief challengers, both Republicans, Neel Kashkari was far behind at 18% and Tim Donnelly trailed at 13%. The difference between the two vying for the second slot in the general election was within the poll’s margin of error.

The results showing Jerry Brown at over 50% are not surprising since incumbency is still of some value and Kashkari and Donnelly have been targeting each other more than Brown based on mailers and individual appearances at events.

131106-Tim-Donnelly-4051

Despite the fact that Donnelly currently trails Kashkari by 5% of the vote in the most recent poll I believe that the race may be closer than some may expect. Voter turnout is extremely low at this point and I project based on the fact that as of 6-2-2014 only 156,741 out of 743,454 (21%) of absentee ballots have been returned we are going to have a lower turnout than most people are expecting. This low turnout will benefit Donnelly more than Kashkari because Donnelly has a conservative voting base that is more likely to mail in an absentee ballot or vote at the polls.

At this point I would say that Kashkari is definitely the front-runner but I believe the race for second place will be a nail biter. The higher the turn out on election day the worse off Donnelly is.

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Handicapping The Races: OC Clerk-Recorder (June 2014)

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on May 28, 2014

I am onto the last race that I am posting an analysis for (This June) and will give readers my take on the upcoming OC Clerk-Recorder race, which features the following candidates:

  • Steve Rocco – Retired Teacher
  • Monica Maddox – Local Businesswoman
  • Gary Pritchard – Governing Board Member, Capistrano Unified School District
  • Hugh Nguyen – Appointed Orange County Clerk-Recorder

Voter registration heavily favors Republicans in Orange County as a whole, Republicans have 42% of registered voters, Democrats have 31% of registered voters, and No Party Preference voters count for 22% of the electorate. Even though party affiliations matter very little in these races because they do not appear on the ballot we will fill in readers on what they are; Steve Rocco has No Party Preference, Monica Maddox is a Republican, Gary Pritchard is a Democrat and Hugh Nguyen is a Republican.

Also, it is important to explain that this race is just like a race for Orange County Supervisor where the top two vote getters will advance to November, unless the top vote getter finishes with over 50% of the vote.

Steve Rocco

Rocco is a non-factor in this race and I will list nothing but the following picture for prospective voters. This is all you need to know:

rocco

Monica Maddox

Monica Maddox is not running much of a campaign based on campaign finance data that has come in. Her only donation as of March 17th was from personal funds, totaling less than $6,000. She has no name ID because she has never been on the ballot before.

Her website as an absolute disaster with her first bullet point stating, “Monica will never vote for a tax increase.” This is an excellent campaign promise but it makes no mention of the fact that this is an executive office and does not have the ability to vote on items.

I do not think that she has much of a chance to advance to November.

Gary Pritchard

Gary Pritchard is a liberal member of the Capistrano Unified School Board and a lot of people are curious as to why he is running for this seat.

Pritchard will have some name ID due to the times he has appeared on the ballot in South OC for both CUSD and when he challenged Mimi Walters for the 33rd Senate District. However, Pritchard is not running much of a campaign and didn’t even bother to get the ballot statement.. Let’s take a look at his electoral history.

Results from 2012 (General Election):

CAPISTRANO UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT Governing Board Member, Trustee Area 5
Completed Precincts: 31 of 31
Vote Count Percentage
GARY PRITCHARD 9,087 59.1%
WILLIAM “BILL” PERKINS 6,291 40.9%

Results from 2008 (General Election):

STATE SENATOR 33rd District
Completed Precincts: 754 of 754
Vote Count Percentage
MIMI WALTERS (REP) 219,068 58.1%
GARY PRITCHARD (DEM) 157,945 41.9%

As you can see from the election results, Pritchard is an average candidate at best, running countywide without a ballot statement is not a campaign that he will likely win. This is amplified by the fact that a more conservative electorate is expected thanks to it being a gubernatorial primary election.

Pritchard is ironically the most likely opponent to possibly push Hugh Nguyen to a November run-off.

Hugh Nguyen

Hugh Nguyen was appointed to the office almost a year ago and has done an excellent job in running the office. He has run the most comprehensive campaign of all the candidates in the race purchasing slates and signs.

He ran for the seat in 2010 and did not have the best of luck when facing Tom Daly. Here are the results from that race:

County Clerk-Recorder
Completed Precincts: 2084 of 2084
Vote Count Percentage
* TOM DALY 286,286 74.6%
HUGH NGUYEN 97,711 25.4%

Hugh Nguyen will eventually win this seat but the question is whether or not he can win it in June based on the fact that three other candidates are in the race to split the vote.

My gut feeling is that because Hugh is the only candidate with a ballot statement and the only candidate that is making a real attempt at reaching out to voter, the odds are in his favor.

Prediction Time

Based on all of the above factors and analysis, I predict the winner will be

Hugh Nguyen (in June) – I think he is going to clear 50% of the vote.

Posted in Orange County Clerk-Recorder | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

Handicapping The Races: OC Assessor (June 2014)

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on May 27, 2014

It’s to the point where I am simply getting the trademark Chris Nguyen scowl every time I write one of my handicapping posts. Now we shall take a look at the Orange County Assessor race:

The following candidates are running for OC Assessor:

  • Claude Parrish – Taxpayer Advocate/Businessman
  • Webster Guillory – Orange County Assessor
  • Jorge O. Lopez – Consultant/Appraiser/Businessman

Voter registration heavily favors Republicans in Orange County as a whole, Republicans have 42% of registered voters, Democrats have 31% of registered voters, and No Party Preference voters count for 22% of the electorate. Even though party affiliations matter very little in these races because they do not appear on the ballot we will fill in readers on what they are; Claude Parrish is a Republican, Jorge Lopez is a Democrat, and Webster Guillory is an NPP voter.

Also, it is important to explain that this race is just like a race for Orange County Supervisor where the top two vote getters will advance to November, unless the top vote getter finishes with over 50% of the vote.

Claude Parrish

Claude Parrish is the predecessor to Michelle Steel on the State Board of Equalization and he has huge name ID. He ran for this office four years ago and came fairly close to upsetting Webster Guillory and I would argue that Parrish has a stronger ballot designation this time around.

Let’s take a look at his electoral history.

Results from 2010 (Primary Election):

Assessor
Completed Precincts: 2084 of 2084
Vote Count Percentage
* WEBSTER J. GUILLORY 203,814 53.4%
CLAUDE PARRISH 177,909 46.6%

Results from 2002 (Republican Primary):

Board of Equalization
3rd District REP
Completed Precincts: 2094 of 2094
Vote Count Percentage
Claude Parrish 151,092 64.7%
Steve Petruzzo 66,705 28.5%
Emad Bakeer 15,885 6.8%

As you can see Parrish has some strong name ID over the past ten years. I will also point out that Parrish is the king of slates having bought up almost every major slate mailer that exists.

Parrish has loaned his campaign $100,000 and donated an additional $170,000  and appears willing to spend whatever is necessary to win this race. He has a almost all of the slate mailers, has the most campaign signs, and has run an excellent campaign so far.

With a low turnout election projected it bodes very well for a challenger who is running a strong campaign because the voters are more informed and will likely take the time to read about the race and the OC Register endorsement of Parrish a very valuable one.

Based on the factors above, I like his chances.

Webster Guillory

Webster Guillory is the incumbent and his been in this office for a very long time.

Guillory has very high name ID due to being on the ballot multiple times for a very long time. However, Guillory has not had to campaign for a very long time and does not appear willing to campaign very much this time. Let’s take a look at his electoral history:

Results from 2010 (June Primary):

Assessor
Completed Precincts: 2084 of 2084
Vote Count Percentage
* WEBSTER J. GUILLORY 203,814 53.4%
CLAUDE PARRISH 177,909 46.6%

Results from 2006 (June Primary):

Assessor
Completed Precincts: 2076 of 2076
Vote Count Percentage
WEBSTER GUILLORY 191511 58.9%
MIKE LEBEAU 68935 21.2%
LARRY BALES 64728 19.9%

Results from 2002 (June Primary):

Assessor
Completed Precincts: 2094 of 2094
Vote Count Percentage
Webster J. Guillory 256,214 65.8%
Larry L. Bales 133,299 34.2%

As you can see from the election results, Guillory has a track record of getting elected to this seat, but I notice that he is trending downwards in terms of the percentage of the vote that he is receiving. With turnout at a ridiculously slow pace so far this climate may not be the best for an incumbent due to a more conservative electorate likely to turnout.

Guillory has done little campaigning outside of the ballot statement and has not even filled out the paperwork that shows he is planning to spend more than $1,000. With the lack of mail and other campaign materials he appears to be relying on just his name ID to try and advance to the November run-off. With three candidates in the race it would appear that Guillory has an excellent chance to advance but not win outright due to the anti-incumbent vote being split.

Guillory has received a little bit of press due to opponent Jorge Lopez complaining about how he gathered a majority of his signatures from county employees that work within his office.

Jorge O. Lopez

Jorge O. Lopez is on the ballot but he has done no real campaigning for the seat through voter contact. Unfortunately, he did not even get a ballot statement thus making it almost impossible for voters to figure out who he is and where he stands on the issues.

Lopez will likely play the role of spoiler though because his candidacy will likely gain enough votes to send this race to a November run-off thus making it more likely that Guillory can hold onto the seat.

Prediction Time

Based on all of the above factors and analysis, I predict the winner will be

Claude Parrish & Webster Guillory- Advancing to November

Posted in Orange County Assessor | Tagged: , , | 1 Comment »

Handicapping The Races: 74th Assembly District (June 2014)

Posted by Former Blogger Chris Emami on May 27, 2014

It is getting worse, Chris Nguyen is likely going to come after me with the butcher knife from the Emanuel Patrascu mailer. Here is my take on the 74th Assembly District race which is open due to Assemblyman Allan Mansoor making an ill-advised run for the 2nd Supervisorial District against Michelle Steel.

Here are the candidates running for AD 74:

  • Karina “Karina” Onofre (D) – Small Business Owner
  • Keith D. Curry (R) – Businessman/City Councilmember
  • Emanuel Patrascu (R) – Orange County Business Owner
  • Matthew Harper (R) – Huntington Beach Mayor
  • Anila Ali (D) – Middle School Teacher

Voter registration heavily favors Republicans, with Republicans having 43% of registered voters in the 74th Assembly District compared to Democrats who hold just 29% of voter registration which is extremely close to the number of No Party Preference voters who hold 23% of the vote. This is an open primary that falls under the rules of Proposition 14, so regardless of percentages, the two candidates with the most votes will advance to the November election. The 74th Assembly District currently has the following cities within its boundaries:

  • Costa Mesa
  • Laguna Beach
  • Laguna Woods
  • Newport Beach
  • Huntington Beach (Portion)
  • Irvine (Portion)

Karina “Karina” Onofre

I have had numerous Democrats call me accusing Republicans of planting Karina Onofre in this race as a Democrat to try and embarrass the Democratic Party. Onofre is a former candidate for Santa Ana City Council. Let’s take a look at her electoral history.

Results from November 2012 (General Election):

CITY OF SANTA ANA Member, City Council, Ward 5
Completed Precincts: 108 of 108
Vote Count Percentage
ROMAN A. REYNA 32,419 61.8%
KARINA ONOFRE 20,065 38.2%

Onofre has major issues with turning her campaign finance reports in on time and has very little money raised ($5,000 raised as of the last report) and I am not considering her $100,000 loan a factor unless she actually starts to spend it. Normally I would say that the Democrat usually would have an excellent shot of advancing to November but Onofre will be splitting votes with fellow Democrat Anila Ali. This leads me to believe that due to Democratic registration being low that with a vote split Onofre and Ali will finish in the last place slots this June.

Nevertheless, Onofre has made this election a lot of fun. Check out these posts from Scott Carpenter; Prepare to be Entertained: The AD 74 “Feet to the Fire” Candidate Forum and AD74 Watch: Karina Onofre Channels Napoleon Dynamite.

Keith D. Curry

Keith Curry is considered the front-runner by most prognosticators at this point. He has the most money and has name ID in one of the largest cities in the district (Newport Beach)

Curry has been on the ballot multiple times in Newport Beach with a very successful track record in getting elected. Let’s take a brief look at his electoral history.

Results from November 2012 (General Election):

CITY OF NEWPORT BEACH Member, City Council, District 7
Completed Precincts: 89 of 89
Vote Count Percentage
KEITH D. CURRY 30,255 100.0%

Results from November 2008 (General Election):

CITY OF NEWPORT BEACH Member, City Council, District 7
Completed Precincts: 92 of 92
Vote Count Percentage
KEITH D. CURRY 21,259 55.0%
DOLORES OTTING 17,376 45.0%

Curry is in complete control when it comes to campaign fundraising with over $171,000 raised and he has also spent his $100,000 loan in addition to the money he has raised. He has purchased multiple slate mailers, signs, and is currently in the lead on mail. Here are some of the mailers that our blogger Marion Morrison has posted:

AD 74 – Curry and Patrascu Both Positive
AD 74 – More Positive From Keith Curry
AD 74 Mail – Curry Postive and Patrascu Negative

With the amount of money that he has spent on voter contact it is a safe bet that Curry will be advancing to November.

Emanuel Patrascu

I will give Emanuel Patrascu credit because he has run an excellent campaign so far. He picked an excellent ballot designation and he has spent his money wisely on direct mail.

Patrascu has run for office before in Laguna Beach. Let’s take a brief look at her electoral history.

Results from November 2010 (General Election):

CITY OF LAGUNA BEACH Member, City Council
Number To Vote For: 3
Completed Precincts: 26 of 26
Vote Count Percentage
* KELLY H. BOYD 7,190 30.3%
* ELIZABETH PEARSON 6,669 28.1%
* TONI ISEMAN 6,023 25.4%
EMANUEL PATRASCU 3,819 16.1%

Patrascu could be classified as the candidate that has gotten the most out of the money that he has. His campaign fundraising numbers include $60,000 raised and $33,000 raised (I am including the loan because he has spent the money). His mail has been directly attacking Curry which is one of the main reasons that I think Curry is considered the front-runner by all candidates. Her is a look at some of the mail sent out by the Patrascu campaign courtesy of our blogger Marion Morrison:

AD 74 – Emanuel Patrascu Attacks Keith Curry on High Speed Rail
AD 74 – Curry and Patrascu Both Positive
AD 74 Mail – Curry Postive and Patrascu Negative

Patrascu is in a dead heat with Matt Harper for the second place slot and I will give my reasoning for this later in this post.

Matthew Harper

Matthew Harper is considered the conservative darling in this race by many due to his years of activism in the Republican Party of Orange County. It appears that both Keith Curry and Emanuel Patrascu are ignoring him with most of their negative mail being focused on each other.

Harper has hold office for a number of years and has had a lot of success on the ballot. Let’s take a look at his electoral history:

Results from November 2012 (General Election):

CITY OF HUNTINGTON BEACH Member, City Council
Number To Vote For: 4
Completed Precincts: 152 of 152
Vote Count Percentage
CONNIE BOARDMAN 20,019 9.4%
* JOE CARCHIO 18,523 8.7%
MATTHEW HARPER 15,886 7.5%
JOE SHAW 14,585 6.9%
BARBARA DELGLEIZE 14,171 6.7%
BLAIR FARLEY 13,932 6.5%
BILLY O’CONNELL 13,175 6.2%
JIM KATAPODIS 13,100 6.2%
FRED J. SPEAKER 11,183 5.3%
DAN KALMICK 10,775 5.1%
NORM WESTWELL 10,187 4.8%
BILL RORICK 9,835 4.6%
HEATHER GROW 9,624 4.5%
SHAWN ROSELIUS 7,628 3.6%
ERIK PETERSON 7,137 3.4%
BRUCE J. BRANDT 7,125 3.3%
LANDON FICHTNER 4,654 2.2%
ANDRISSA DOMINGUEZ 4,440 2.1%
WILLIAM GRUNWALD 3,652 1.7%
JOHN VON HOLLE 3,209 1.5%
BLAKE ROSE (W) 50 0.0%

Results from November 2002 (General Election):

Huntington Beach Union High Sch Dist
Vote For: 3
Completed Precincts: 238 of 238
Vote Count Percentage
Matthew Harper 29,220 17.5%
Bonnie Castrey 27,605 16.5%
Brian Garland 26,242 15.7%
Rosemary Saylor 24,516 14.7%
Sylvia Garrett 17,739 10.6%
Jim Peters 12,052 7.2%
Sallie E. Dashiell 12,050 7.2%
Ted K. Tadayon 9,303 5.6%
Andrew Scott Patterson 8,495 5.1%

Harper has more name ID than both Curry and Patrascu but his fundraising numbers have been anemic at best. He has raised just $22,000 and again I am including his personal loan because he has spent it. This is a pretty large fundraising gap between himself and Patrascu.

With this fundraising gap in place it is a safe bet that Harper will likely not appear on any direct mail although he is on a decent amount of slate mailers including the always popular and effective Landslide Communications slate mailers. The biggest concern I have is that the Curry campaign has not hit him yet and this is a bad sign considering Curry has paid for polling data in this race.

In spite of my concerns I still consider Harper to be in a dead heat with Patrascu and I will explain why at the end of this post.

Anila Ali

In any normal election I would predict the Democrat to consolidate enough support to advance to November but Ali is likely going to lose because Karina Onofre is also running as a Democrat. Ali has never run for office before and has no name ID in this district. She has raised $39,000 which is more than both Onofre and Harper but I just don’t think it is enough to overcome both Onofre and the Democratic registration disadvantage.

Prediction Time

Before I make my prediction I want to point out where the ballots that have been returned are coming from:

14,961 ballots have been returned so far in AD 74
3,500 ballots from Newport beach (approximately)
3,000 ballots from Huntington Beach (approximately)
2,000 ballots from Laguna Woods (approximately)
2,000 ballots from Costa Mesa (approximately)
1,000 ballots from Laguna Beach (approximately)

Based on the high turnout from Huntington Beach I am giving Harper a fighting chance to advance to November although I am still leaning towards Patrascu.

Based on all of the above factors and analysis, I predict that the candidates who advance to November will be a repeat of AD 72, an All-Republican run-off:

Keith Curry (R) in 1st and Toss-Up Between Emanuel Patrascu and Matthew Harper (R) for 2nd

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