CA Openly Gay Candidates Win Primaries

Openly gay Assemblymember Mark Leno easily won the hotly contested Democratic primary in State Senate District 3 last night with 43% of the vote, while openly lesbian incumbent Carole Migden placed 3rd with 27.7% behind Joe Nation at 29.3%.

Openly gay John "Tony's Cousin" Perez won his primary in the State Assembly District 46 race with more than 54% of the vote.

San Francisco Supervisor Tom Ammiano won his uncontested primary to replace Mark Leno in the California Assembly in District 13.

Sadly, Greg Pettis and Chris Cabaldon lost their primaries by just over 1000 votes each, in Assembly District 80 (Palm Springs) and Assembly Distrist 8 (West Sacramento), respectively.

So, as Mad Professah predicted many weeks ago the new LGBT Legislative Caucus in 2009 will be: State Senators Christine Kehoe and Mark Leno, and Assemblymembers John A. Perez and Tom Ammiano, a reduction to 4 members from last session's 5 and down from a high of 6 in 2005.

In the last three years term limits have forced John Laird, Sheila Kuehl and Jackie Goldberg out of the Legislature.

Mad Professah had endorsed Perez and Leno in their contested primaries.

SD-3: Pelosi Endorses Leno

Mark Leno's campaign for the State Senate got a big boost yesterday with the public endorsement of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (3rd in line for the Presidency, after Vice President Dick Cheney.)

SD-3: Leno Likely To Win Migden's State Senate Seat

Mark Leno got some good news from a recent SurveyUSA poll commissioned by KPIX-TV: he is very likely to win the June 3rd Democratic primary election for the State Senate 3rd District.

Frank Russo at California Progress Report has some more details and analysis of the poll internals.

Overall, this survey of 1000 voters out of which 516 were determined to have already voted or to be likely voters, has a margin of error of 3.2% as to the favorable/unfavorable ratings and 4.4% as to who voters would vote for. The poll is fresh—from last Tuesday May 13 to Wednesday May 14. It was released Thursday [May 15].

Leno has by far the best favorability rating—34% to 16% overall and a whopping 48% to 10% favorable rating amongst those who the survey determined had already voted and a 44% to 11% favorability advantage with those who are likely voters.

Nation has a 23% to 15% favorability rating and this is 35% to 24% with those already voted and 23% to 15% with those who are deemed likely to vote.

Migden has a 34% to 17% unfavorable rating and her negatives with those who have already vote[e]d—38% to 25%--and likely voters—33% to 20% parallel this.

Nation has a narrow lead amongst conservatives 41% to 37% over Leno, get[s] beaten by Leno 37% to 30% by moderate voters, and is trounced by liberal voters (the bulk of the Democratic primary vote in this district) with 47% to 17% voting for Leno. Migden badly trails Leno in all of these categories. Leno even wins the women’s vote 35% to 25% in this survey.

This is a big change from a poll back in March which Mad Professah blogged about that showed Leno and Nation basicaly tied for the lead and Migden trailing badly.

The Leno-Migden primary race is one of the hottest and most interesting electoral battles of the June 3rd election.

The Next LGBT Legislative Caucus of California

Although there have been reports that the California LGBT Legislative Caucus is in danger of extinction the truth is that in January 2009 it is very likely that it will be as large as ever.
The only current member who is not termed out are State Senators Christine Kehoe and Carole Migden. However, Migden is facing a primary fight which she is very likely to lose.

January 2007                       January 2009
Assembly                          
Mark Leno (AD-13)                  Tom Ammiano (AD-13)
John Laird (AD-27)                 John Perez (AD-46)
                                   Chris Cabaldon (AD-8)
State Senate
Christine Kehoe (SD-39)            Christine Kehoe (SD-39)
Carole Migden (SD-3)               Mark Leno (SD-3)
Sheila Kuehl (SD-23)

In addition, there's the possibility that Laurette Healey may win her primary to replace
Assemblymember Lloyd Levine in the 40th Assembly District and it's possible that Greg Pettis will win his primary in the 80th district (but it's unlikely he will win the general election in this Republican-leaning district).

SD-3: Migden Booed Off The Stage at Party Convention

According to Be_Devine at Calitics and another blogger who was there, there was an incident involving State Senator Carole Migden at the Women's Caucus meeting of the California Democratic Party convention in San Jose on Friday.

Here's the relevant excerpt from Melissa's first hand account:

We walked in and who was at the podium in front of hundreds of people? Carole Migden! And Mark Leno was standing in the back of the room! I looked around and saw lots of women holding Leno signs and gay men holding Migden signs. And the supporters were heckling each other! Hilarious!

I later learned that this was a meeting of the California Democratic Party Women's Caucus. Migden launched into her speech, which fell pretty flat until she got to the part about how "women should vote for women" and pointed to a group of women in the corner of the room (some of whom were, um...not-petite) who were holding Leno signs and said:

"Are those women? They look like heavy guys to me."

I shit you not.

Allow me to repeat that:

"Are those women? They look like heavy guys to me."

The room was silent for a second while we all thought the same thing: "Did she just effing say that?" Then the place erupted with boos and curses that did not stop.

The woman next to me scowled and said, "Can you believe this?"

"No!" I squealed! "I love it!!" (Sanity is no fun to write about.)

Then one of the women on the panel on the stage said, "You need to stop speaking, you are disrupting our caucus." So Carole had to step down.

The endorsement of the Democratic Party in Senate District 3 will go to the convention floor. At the first endorsement vote Migden received 55%, Leno 42% and Nation 3%. The typical threshhold for a state party endorsement is 60%, unless you are an incumbent, then it is lower!

In the open seat to replace termed-out Assemblymember Lloyd Levine in AD-40, my friend Laurette Healey is running, but although Bob Blumenfield got the 60% threshhold but over 300 signatures were obtained to pull the AD-40 endorsement from the consentment calendar.

FPPC Countersues Migden for $9 MILLION

Things just seems to be getting worse and worse for State Senator Carole Migden. Yesterday, the California Fair Political Practices Commission filed a countersuit for 9 million dollars against her. Last week, the FPPC levied the largest fine ever against a state political candidate against Senator Migden.

Migden is one of the most senior members of the California LGBT legislative Caucus. She is facing a primary challenge from another openly gay politician, Assemblymember Mark Leno, for the right to represent the City of San Francisco in State Senate District 3.

SD-3: Migden Fined $350K For Campaign Finance Violations

Today's Daily Roundup has news of developments in the hot State Senate race to un-seat openly lesbian powerhouse Carole Migden. Migden was fined $350,000 by the California Fair Political Practices Commission. This is the largest fine ever levied against a candidate for statewide office.
Migden is in a tight race with Mark Leno and Joe Nation, who wasted no time piling on:

"It's stunning and staggering that things were that bad," said Nation. "I can't imagine you could have such sloppy bookkeeping."

Tom Higgins, Leno's campaign manager, said the sheer numbers alone tell the story: "$350,000 in fines ... 89 counts, more than $16,000 of her campaign funds used for personal purposes."

Ouch. It's looking worse and worse for Migden, but she's not hte kind of person you EVER count out. She is currently suing the FPPC in federal court in order to access 1 million dollars she has in previous campaign accounts for this race.

Field in Leno-Migden Race Shrinks

According to Brian Leubitz at Calitics, the Democratic field in State Senate District #3 that Mad Professah has been following closely has narrowed recently from a four-way race to a three-way race when San Francisco Police Commissioner Joe Alioto Veronese. Senate District 3 is currently represented by openly lesbian Carole Migden and she is being challenged by openly gay Assemblymember Mark Leno who is termed out this year and former Assemblyman Joe Nation in the June Democratic primary.

The most recent polling has shown that Migden is in trouble of holding her seat:

A poll taken last week by David Binder found State Senate District 3 a two-way contest between challengers Joe Nation and Mark Leno, with incumbent Carole Migden trailing badly. Binder, who is San Francisco’s leading pollster and has been busy surveying for Barack Obama, found that Nation led Leno 27-24% on the initial ask, with Migden trailing at 17%. When pro and con statements about the candidates were read, the Leno-Nation numbers reversed, with Migden remaining at 17%. Joe Alioto Veronese was at 7 and 10%, and nearly a quarter of the electorate remains undecided.

In addition, Migden is in a legal dispute with the California Fair Political Practices Commission over money (nearly a million dollars) that she wants to spend in this race which she raised years ago when she was a Assemblyperson before she was elected to the State Board of Equalization and State Senate.

If the Binder poll numbers hold there will be strong pressure for Migden to drop out in April or May lest the seat that has been held by an openly gay San Francisco Democrat fall into the hands of a staight, more conservative Marin County man.