What does the SD-16 race and Meg Whitman have in common?
The answer begins in Hanford, where the Kings County Farm Bureau has endorsed its first Democrat ever – Michael Rubio, running to replace the termed-out Dean Florez. The Republican, Tim Thiesen, isn’t very happy about this, but few believe has has a shot at winning the race.
One reason is that the State Senate Republican caucus is almost broke, having spent heavily to beat John Laird in the summer SD-15 special election, as Jason Kinney reports:
Senate Republicans, on the other hand, after spending the lion’s share of this cycle’s warchest on holding SD-15 (Blakeslee), came up way short in candidate-recruitment roulette when their ball landed on Tim Thiesen, a real-estate agent and political novice who incurred major campaign debt during a divisive primary and continues to run on fumes. Did I mention that Thiesen refers to himself as a “lifelong family farmer”? Apparently, the Kings County Farm Bureau is unimpressed.
Senate Republicans also face a very strong candidate in Anna Caballero, running in SD-12 against Republican Anthony Cannella. SD-12 has a massive Democratic registration advantage, but Republican Jeff Denham played on lower turnout and advanced a fake “moderate” image to win two terms there. A broke Senate GOP caucus isn’t going to help the GOP hang onto this seat.
And that’s where Meg Whitman comes in:
Meg Whitman has spent more than $100 million on her campaign for governor, but later this month, she will be raising cash for the next state Senate Republican leader, a key potential ally if she is elected.
Whitman may not be writing any personal checks, but the billionaire former EBay chief will appear at an evening fund-raiser for Sen. Bob Dutton (R-Rancho Cucamonga), who is expected to be the Senate’s GOP leader when the next governor is sworn in.
Whitman is billed as the “special guest speaker” at Dutton’s birthday bash on Sept. 30, which is to take place at a DoubleTree hotel next to the Ontario International Airport.
Whitman also helped support the Sam Blakeslee campaign in SD-15 with a fundraiser and, reportedly, with help crafting his message and with GOTV for both rounds of the special election. There have also been persistent reports that Whitman is lending her help to other statewide downticket races, with the aim of not just getting herself elected but bringing Republican coattails in a way we haven’t seen in this state in a long, long time.
This just shows the need for progressive Californians to get even more engaged in the November election. Meg Whitman doesn’t want to buy just the governor’s office – she’s after the whole state government.
You can buy some of the elections some of the time.
Big-money campaigns have an erratic history of success in California. Sometimes they work as they did for Sam Blakeslee. Sometimes they don’t as they didn’t for prop. 16.
The scary part is that there seems to be little rhyme or reason behind when they do and don’t. So it’s hard to tell if Meg’s mega money will work or not. The thought that it might is the part that frightens me.