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The CDP Endorsement Process Starts Tomorrow

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Democrats across the state will meet to begin the first step towards legislative endorsements

by Brian Leubitz

UPDATE: AroundTheCapitol.com is tracking the contested races.  Some of the big news already is that in SD-13 (San Mateo, Jerry Hill/Sally Lieber), there was no consensus, so there will be no official endorsement.  Also, no endorsement in AD-8.

The same is the Democrats across the state will meet at pre-convention caucuses across the state to begin the somewhat complicated process of endorsing for assembly, senate and congressional seats.  (Note: I have a part in this, as I am running the SF-based Region 4 endorsement process)  This might get confusing, but here’s a quick run-down of the process. If you’d like all the details, the CDP has a handy endorsement process memo written for campaigns.

1) Pre-convention: The voting population is made up of all the democratic state central committee (DSCC) members (delegates to the state convention) as well as 1 representative for every 20 members for all chartered democratic clubs in the district. If one candidate gets 70% of the vote in the district, he or she receives the endorsement.  If no candidate receives 50%, there is no endorsement in the race. If a candidate receives between 50 and 70%, the process moves to the convention.

Voters can attend the pre-convention caucus for each of the 21 regions and vote there, or they can mail, email or fax in their ballots to their regional directors.

2) Convention:

The voting population is made up of the DSCC members in the district, club representatives are no longer involved. Incumbents need to receive only 50% of the vote, while non-incumbents need 60%. If the recommendation is less than 2/3 of the vote, the recommendation can be pulled to the convention floor by signatures of 300 members of the DSCC. If the recommendation is by more than 2/3 of the vote, it can only be pulled by the pre-primary endorsement review committee.

3) Floor

If it does get to the floor, the entire DSCC gets to vote on the endorsement. Endorsement requires the same threshold as the convention caucus in part 2.

So there you have it. Fun stuff, huh? Well, if you are at the convention in San Diego in Feburary, you are sure to here more about this process. Until then, if you are a voter, be sure you get your ballot in today!  

7 thoughts on “The CDP Endorsement Process Starts Tomorrow”

  1. i like the skyline silhouette and the new font, but it kind of looks like the bear got sawed in half.  

  2. Do you think the endorsement process will do away with contested primaries now that we have the open primary system?

    I fully expect that in short order the primary process will happen internally in both parties so as to avoid the very disruptive possibility of two democrats (or 2 republicans) running in a general election.

    Until we get instant runoff elections that is.

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