California Assembly and Senate Races

As with all the races this year, the California Assembly races are interesting because there are new districts, the top two, and term limits creating open districts. Right now I see the legislature as 48 Democrats and 25 Republicans. The GOP would need to take only 2 of the remaining competitive seats to avoid the Democrats getting the 2/3 they'd need to pass tax increases. While the Democrats are underdogs to take 2/3 of the assembly.

Due to the California Supreme Court's inexplicable decision to use maps that state law says they can't use, the Democrats look poised to take 2/3 in the senate. Democrats will win at least 24 of the seats easily, while Republicans only have 11 safe seats. Jerry Brown won 4 of the remaining 5 districts, albeit by mostly small margins. Incumbent Democrat Fran Pavley is running in the state senate district that Meg Whitman won.

There's not a lot of competition in the competitive seats but check out these:

SD-5: Democrat Cathleen Galgiani will face off against either Republican Leroy Ornellas or Republican Bill Berryhill. Berryhill is favored Tuesday, but both he and Ornellas should be good candidates.

SD-19: This district has Republican Mike Stoker advancing against either of the Democrats, Hannah-Beth Jackson or Jason Hodge. Jackson is popular with the Democratic party, but Hodge is a good candidate.

SD-31: Republican Jeff Miller will face off against either of the Democrats, Richard Roth or Steve Clute. Roth is the favorite, but a Clute win won't change the district's prospects in November.

AD-60: Democrat Jose Perez will advance along with one of the Republicans, Stan Skipworth, Greg Kraft, or Eric Linder. Skipworth is the favorite, but I think Linder will surprise.

AD-66: Democrat Al Muratsuchi will face one of the Republicans, Craig Huey or Nathan Mintz. First, I'd like to disclose that I volunteered on Huey's congressional race last year and that I know people working on his campaign. Huey comes into the race with high name recognition and a nice war chest. Mintz is only 27 and is the founder of the South Bay Tea Party. He ran for a similar, although more Democratic seat, in 2010 and lost. I couldn't find any mention of the Tea Party on Mintz's website. It might be there, but I'd figure that it'd be easy to find. Two people I know mentioned to me that Mintz had turned off people in the Tea Party and while they supported him in 2010, they were behind Huey in 2012.