Jerry Brown, California Democrats appear to be big winners in election

Gov. Jerry Brown’s $6-billion-a-year tax initiative to rescue California schools and the state's finances appeared to squeak by with a victory early Wednesday, and Democrats' grip on Sacramento tightened as the party crept toward winning a super-majority in both houses of the Legislature.

Tuesday's election also brought an end to the three-decade-long congressional career of Rep. Howard Berman, who early Wednesday morning conceded defeat in his political slugfest against fellow Democrat Brad Sherman in the San Fernando Valley.

The bitter contest between Sherman and Berman, awash in more than $13 million in campaign spending by the candidates and independent political groups, was triggered when California's newly drawn political boundaries put the two incumbents in the same district.

"I congratulate Brad. ... I will do whatever I can to ensure a cooperative and orderly transition," Berman said in a concise concession statement early Wednesday.

FULL RESULTS: California races

In a similar high-profile mash-up between Democrats, Rep. Janice Hahn of San Pedro was cruising to an easy win against Rep. Laura Richardson of Long Beach in a newly drawn district that includes many minority, working-class communities, election results showed.

Among other closely watched races for California House seats, Assemblywoman Julia Brownley (D-Oak Park) narrowly defeated state Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Moorpark) in Ventura County, and Rep. Lois Capps (D-Santa Barbara) bested former Republican Lt. Gov. Abel Maldonado, according to results with all voter precincts reporting in those districts.

California's senior U.S. senator, Democrat Dianne Feinstein, won an easy reelection victory over nonprofit executive Elizabeth Emken, her underfunded, little-known Republican challenger.

PHOTOS: California voters head to polls

The governor woke up Wednesday as one of the biggest apparent victors in Tuesday’s election, however.

Facing well-funded opposition, Brown campaigned heavily for Proposition 30 as a way to restore fiscal sanity to Sacramento and to stave off deep cuts to public schools and universities. The initiative calls for a quarter-cent increase to sales taxes for four years and a seven-year tax hike on California’s highest earners.

Californians have not approved a statewide tax increase since 2004.

Voters overwhelmingly rejected a competing measure bankrolled by millionaire civil rights lawyer Molly Munger -- Proposition 38 – which would have increased income taxes for most Californians to raise funds primarily for schools and early childhood education.

In one of the highest-profile state ballot measures, labor unions appeared to defeat Proposition 32, which would have reduced their political influence by barring unions from using paycheck deductions for political purposes.

Californians also soured on a measure to abolish the death penalty -– Proposition 34 -- which was trailing badly with most of the voter precincts reporting Wednesday morning.

Other law-and-order measures were greeting more warmly. Voters favored Proposition 36, which would change the three-strikes sentencing law so offenders whose third strikes were minor, nonviolent crimes could no longer be given 25 years to life in prison.

Voters also supported Proposition 35, which promoted increased punishment for sex trafficking of a minor. Both led by wide margins with most ballots counted.

With most ballots tallied across California, initiatives to label genetically engineered foods and change state law to create a new car insurance discount appeared headed for defeat.

One of the biggest surprises of the election was the Democrats' strong showing in legislative races. Democrats appear on the verge of winning a two-thirds majority in the state Senate and Assembly, enough to approve tax measures without Republican support.

In Los Angeles County, veteran prosecutor Jackie Lacey became the county's first female and first African American district attorney after defeating Deputy Dist. Atty. Alan Jackson. Jackson conceded early Wednesday morning.

Lacey, 55, touted herself as the only candidate with the experience to run the office. She had the support of her boss, Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley, who is retiring after three terms.

Los Angeles County voters also approved a local measure requiring adult film actors to wear condoms. With most precincts reporting, a measure to fund transportation projects by extending a countywide sales-tax increase for an additional 30 years remained just shy of the two-thirds vote required for approval.

Some races remained too close to call, including the San Diego congressional race between Rep. Brian P. Bilbray (R-Carlsbad) and Democrat Scott Peters, a San Diego environmental attorney. In the Coachella Valley, Democratic emergency room doctor Raul Ruiz was leading Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-Palm Springs) with just under two-thirds of precincts reporting early Wednesday morning.

ALSO:

Munger’s Proposition 38 fails, according to AP

Prop. 40, on state Senate districts, passes, per AP

Proposition 36 on three-strikes law passes, AP says

-- Phil Willon

Photo: Gov. Jerry Brown addresses supporters of Proposition 30 and 32 at the Sheraton Hotel in Sacramento Tuesday. Source: Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times

D.A. Cooley's office won't file misdemeanors against Kinde Durkee

Los Angeles County prosecutors said Thursday they will not pursue misdemeanor charges against campaign treasurer Kinde Durkee for allegedly claiming to be an accountant when she did not have a license.

Durkee already has been charged in federal court with mail fraud in connection with the alleged embezzlement of a client's money, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office noted in a statement.

"In light of the significant prison time she faces in that case, misdemeanor charges are not warranted as the … violations are not likely to result in additional punishment or time in prison," the statement said. "Prosecution is declined in the interest of justice."

Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley, said there was no conflict of interest for the prosecutor stemming from Durkee’s work on his political officeholder committee in 2000.

The state attorney general's office and the Burbank city attorney's office also have declined to take the case, so the state Board of Accountancy is weighing its options. Those could include giving the case to the U.S. attorney's office, said Lauren Hersh, a spokeswoman for the board.

RELATED:

Durkee provided accounting services without a license, state investigation concludes

 The Kinde Durkee scandal: what about the campaign donations?

Lessons of the Kinde Durkee affair

-- Patrick McGreevy, reporting from Sacramento

 

Republican congressional candidate Mike Webb scores DA Steve Cooley's backing

Redondo Beach City Atty. Mike Webb, whose Republican affiliation makes him an underdog in the upcoming race to replace Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice) on Wednesday scored a big endorsement: from Los Angeles County District Atty. Steve Cooley.

Webb is a career prosecutor who said he and Cooley, also a Republican, "have worked closely together over the years on issues relating to public safety and homeland security."

Harman isn't expected to resign until Monday, so the governor can't yet call a special election to replace her in the strongly Democratic, largely coastal 36th Congressional District. But several candidates already are off and running, including perceived frontrunners Secretary of State Debra Bowen and Los Angeles Councilwoman Janice Hahn, both Democrats.

--Jean Merl

L.A. County prosecutor Alan Jackson jumps into 2012 D.A.'s race

Deputy Dist. Atty. Alan Jackson isn't wasting any time applying with voters to be Los Angeles County's top prosecutor -- in 2012.

Jackson, a 16-year prosecutor, on Monday announced his candidacy for district attorney, hoping to succeed his boss, Steve Cooley.

Cooley, who last month narrowly lost the race for state attorney general, said last week he would not rule out running for a fourth term as D.A. He said he would consider seeking reelection if no qualified candidates stepped forward or some "undeserving and unworthy" contenders appeared likely to win. He said he would thoroughly evaluate candidates before endorsing anyone, and that to get his backing, a contender must be a prosecutor committed to running a nonpartisan office.

Jackson political consultant John S. Thomas, who managed Cooley's D.A. campaigns, said his client has a "very, very strong" relationship with Cooley, who has chosen Jackson as the lead prosecutor on several big cases. They include the successful prosecutions of former music mogul Phil Spector and the murderer of Lily Burk, the high school student who was abducted and killed while running an errand for her mother.

The new candidate's website, www.votealanjackson.com, says he was chosen Prosecutor of the Year in 2008 by the Assn. of Deputy District Attorneys and received the same designation in 2010 from the Los Angeles County Bar Assn.

-- Jean Merl

Kamala Harris declares victory in attorney general's race

Four weeks after election day, Democrat Kamala Harris declared victory in the race for attorney general on Tuesday, a narrow but historic win that makes her the first woman and first minority to be elected the state’s top law-enforcement official.

“I stand before you today humbled to be chosen to be the next attorney general of this state,” Harris said, her voice breaking with emotion as she spoke before scores of supporters in the Emerald Ballroom of the Millennium Biltmore in downtown Los Angeles. “I pledge and make a pledge to work hard every day to make sure the law of this state is on the side of the people of this state.”

Harris’ win over Republican Steve Cooley, Los Angeles county's district attorney, cemented a Democratic sweep of every statewide post in California, a remarkable feat in a year when Democrats saw deep losses in the rest of the nation.

Harris, San Francisco’s district attorney, praised Cooley for running a spirited campaign and vowed to work with him. Cooley conceded the race on Wednesday.

Harris planned to continue her victory swing Tuesday with a news conference and celebration in San Francisco. But she said she chose to start the day in Los Angeles to emphasize that she would represent all Californians.

“I thought it was important that we are clear that this position of attorney general is about representing all the people of the state of California,” she said.

Los Angeles was also key to Harris’ statewide victory; her 14-point win in Cooley’s backyard helped lift her toward her 75,000-vote margin out of nearly 8.8 million votes cast.

On Tuesday, she announced a laundry list of priorities -- reducing the state’s recidivism rate, which is the nation’s highest; helping homeowners facing foreclosure and being targeted by predatory lenders; protecting the state’s environment; ensuring the civil rights of Californians regardless of race, religion or sexual orientation; and using innovation and technology to attack problems such as identity theft.

Harris also named a transition team that includes former LAPD Chief William Bratton, former secretaries of state Warren Christopher and George Shultz, and civil-rights attorney Constance Rice.

After an 11-minute speech, Harris took a handful of questions from the press. She demurred when asked about current litigation with the city of Bell, or the prison overpopulation case that is before the Supreme Court. In both cases, she said, she needed to study the legal papers before commenting on them.

Asked to reflect on the meaning of her historic win -- as the first woman, African-American and Indian-American elected to the office -- Harris smiled brightly and said, “We’ll see!”

-- Seema Mehta in Los Angeles

Photo: Kamala Harris holds a news conference at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. Credit: Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times.

First Take: Kamala Harris takes the lead. Ted Lieu clears the field. Interpreting Proposition 26.

Lawyers, lobbyists and lawmakers alike are scrambling to figure out just how Proposition 26, passed by voters earlier this month, will effect politics in Sacramento.

Democrat Kamala Harris has taken a slim lead over Republican Steve Cooley in the race for attorney general.

Assemblyman Warren Furutani has dropped out of the race to succeed late Sen. Jenny Oropeza (D-Long Beach), all but clearing the field for termed-out Assemblyman Ted Lieu (D-Torrance). Lieu has been endorsed by Councilwoman Janice Hahn, also considered a contender for the seat.

Governor-elect Jerry Brown returns from vacation this week as he works to assemble both his administration and his budget proposal for the new year.

Meanwhile, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is in Davis, Calif., Monday at the third annual Governors' Global Climate Summit. The conference has become a showpiece for Schwarzenegger to try to solidify his legacy and reputation as a champion of the environment.

-- Anthony York

Get the latest on the Brown transition and the rest of California politics. Follow PolitiCal on Twitter.

 

First Take: Congressional races up in the air. Steve Cooley clings to narrow lead over Kamala Harris

One week after election day, eight congressional races remain undecided, including two in California.

Republican Steve Cooley is clinging to a 43,000-vote lead over Democrat Kamala Harris in the still-undecided race for state attorney general.

The late Sen. Jenny Oropeza (D-Long Beach) won reelection despite her death just weeks before the Nov. 2 election. Now, a host of pols are lining up to replace her.

The defeat of the two businesswomen at the top of California's Republican ticket raises questions about their political futures and the future of the state party.

Cooley's lead in attorney general widens Sunday

Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley widened his lead in the race for California attorney general, and now leads his Democratic rival, San Francisco Dist. Atty. Kamala Harris, by 26,455 votes, according to the latest statewide figures.

As of 4 p.m. Sunday, the total vote reported by the state's 58 counties was 3,674,137 for Cooley and 3,647,682 for Harris.

Those figures differ from those reported by the secretary of state, whose website has lagged behind on reports from a number of counties.

The lead in the attorney general’s race has see-sawed between the two candidates since election night, and with considerably more than 1 million ballots remaining to count, could easily reverse again. Several large counties, including Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego, did not report updated counts in the attorney general’s race Sunday. At last count, those three counties among them had reported some 885,000 ballots remaining, mostly mail-in ballots that arrived in election offices on election day, but also provisional ballots and ballots that could not be machine counted because they were damaged.

Counties have until four weeks after election day to complete the count.

--David Lauter

 

 

Things get nasty as attorney general's race heads into overtime

With more than 7 million ballots counted, and as many as 2 million still left to tally, the race for California attorney general remains undecided. But the hostilities between the campaigns seem to have escalated while the fate of the second-most-powerful office in California remains undecided.

On thursday, Ace Smith, a consultant for Democrat Kamala Harris, sent an e-mail to reporters with the subject line "Why Kamala Harris will be the next Attorney General of California." The note included an analysis of where the remaining uncounted ballots were and why they would only increase Harris' narrow lead over Republican Steve Cooley.

(As of 10 a.m. Friday, Harris was clinging to a 17,000-vote lead.)

"The late absentee ballots will reflect Harris’s late surge in the race -– which was captured both in public and private polling," Smith wrote.

Later that day, the Cooley campaign sent out an e-mail of its own from campaign manager Kevin Spillane. That's when things got a little personal.

"Harris' consultant, Ace Smith, was also involved in the extremely close Attorney General's race which his father lost to Dan Lungren," Spillane wrote. "During the vote tabulation for that race, Smith filed legal challenges -- which ultimately were thrown out -- to attempt to skew the result by disenfranchising voters in counties supportive of Lungren. We are prepared to fight any such manipulations of the ballot counting process by the Harris campaign."

Arlo Smith lost the 1990 race for attorney general to Lungren after leading the vote count on election day. Lawyers were eventually called in, but Lungren wound up winning the race by fewer than 30,000 votes.

Like Harris, Smith was the district attorney of San Francisco when he ran for attorney general. Whether or not she suffers the same electoral fate will be determined in the weeks to come.

-- Anthony York in Sacramento

First Take: Jerry Brown hits Sacramento; Assembly Republicans elect a new leader

Jerry Brown came to Sacramento Thursday to meet with legislative leaders and Department of Finance officials to start working on the state budget.

As Brown readies for his new gig, his old office's case against officials in the city of Bell may be in jeopardy. The race for state attorney general remains undecided with an estimated 2 million ballots left to count.

In the wake of a disastrous election for California Republicans, Assembly Republicans ousted their leader Martin Garrick (R-Solana Beach), electing Assemblywoman Connie Conway (R-Tulare) as his replacement.

Get the latest headlines from California politics and the latest on the Brown transition. Follow PolitiCal on Twitter.

--Anthony York in Sacramento