CLCV Dives into California’s Special Election Cascades

California is currently facing wave after wave of special elections that will continue throughout the year and beyond. One cause of these election cascades has been President Obama’s appointments—which have left vacancies in various levels of elected government—but any seat switch can also start a cascade that takes months, if not years, to end.

A cascade begins with the need to fill a single vacancy. A special election is called with more significant time constraints than standard elections. This setting naturally favors sitting elected officials who tend to have more name recognition, more fundraising power, and a campaign infrastructure already in place. So these elected officials run in the special election to fill the initial vacancy, and if they win, a new special election is then required to fill the seat that they have now left vacant.

The ripple effect gets passed from one constituency to the next until there are no more vacancies that require an election to be filled.

Recently in Southern California, former State Senator Mark Ridley-Thomas won his bid to become a Los Angeles County Supervisor and vacated his senate seat in November 2008. After a special election earlier this year and a run-off election, CLCV-endorsed candidate Assemblymember Curren Price of the 51st Assembly District became a state Senator. The Assembly seat that now-Senator Price vacated is up for election on September 1st, and CLCV has endorsed Steve Bradford in that race.

In Northern California, President Obama’s nomination of Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher to serve as Undersecretary of State for Arms Control created a cascade for her seat (CA-10). This seat has made headlines because current Lt. Governor John Garamendi dropped his bid for governor to run for this seat instead. The other elected Democratic contenders include State Senator Mark DeSaulnier—whom CLCV has endorsed —Assemblymember Joan Buchanan, and Iraq war veteran Anthony Woods.

But depending on who wins and how long the elections take to resolve, the extent of the cascade can vary. There’s already a long list of candidates bidding for Garamendi’s seat, which is up in 2010.

If Garamendi wins there may be a temporary appointment until someone wins next fall, but it’s possible that both major parties want one of their own top 2010 gubernatorial candidates to act as a placeholder for the seat because that would give that candidate a slight edge over the competition. However, DeSaulnier’s senate seat is not up again until 2012, so if he wins, expect an election to fill his seat–and expect some of the candidates seeking to fill his vacancy to be current sitting legislators.

Clearly, these election cascades are somewhat unpredictable, especially because it’s difficult to tell exactly when a cascade will end. To further complicate matters, a new cascade could start at any time. This may all sound great to an election junkie. But, there are consequences to all of these cascades, from the cost to the public to hold election after election, to the staff time and resources it takes for CLCV to make endorsements and support candidates in some of the most critical races.

Of course, all of these special elections are coming up just as CLCV is finalizing our 2010 election strategies, priorities and candidate questionnaires. So stay tuned for a full slate of endorsements as the 2010 primary election approaches.

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