Monday, April 23, 2012

CA-3: An Opening for the GOP

There were a few districts that were gifts to Republicans and this is one of them. It went from a district that Obama got 65% of the vote to 55%. The commission paired 4 conservative Northern California counties with Yolo and Solano counties. These areas don’t have a lot in common and shouldn’t be together.

But it is. And John Garamendi may have a race. It’s a D+3 Presidential, D+3 Gubernatorial, and D+2 Congressional district. At least it was. In the last year Democratic registration has dropped almost by a full point, but Republican registration has remained constant. There’s still a Democratic registration edge, but Democratic registration is padded with low turn-out voters.

Garamendi’s performance was less than stellar in his initial 2009 election and similarly lackluster in 2010. Both years leaned Republican and 2012 doesn’t figure to.

He has four Republican challengers, three of whom are just some guy. While both Rick Tubbs and Eugene Ray are out there stumping for votes, nothing says that you have votes more than people donating to you. Neither has gotten much in donations. Rick Tubbs has a few endorsements, while Ray and Sutter Deputy DA Tony Carlos don’t show anything.

The real challenger, the only one with a chance to win is Colusa County supervisor Kim Dolbow Vann. She’s got fundraising dollars and a lot of endorsements. She’s a supervisor in Colusa County. While I like county supervisors, Colusa is a small county. A positive for Dolbow Vann is that she has endorsements in the other counties in the district.

I don’t know if she’s a good campaigner, but she should finish a strong second on June 5. Watch Republican and Democratic share of the vote to see if she has a shot.

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