● CA-Sen: Every single poll of the race for the Senate seat left open by Barbara Boxer's retirement showed two Democrats advancing in the top-two primary, and every single poll was right. State Attorney General Kamala Harris, the frontrunner from day one, led the way with 40 percent of the vote Tuesday night, while Rep. Loretta Sanchez secured the second spot with 19 percent. The nearest Republican, former state GOP chair Duf Sundheim, finished in third with just 8 percent. (Evidently, voters decided they did get enough of that wonderful Duf.)
Now Harris and Sanchez will face off again in November, in the first statewide race in California to feature two members of the same party since the top-two primary was first used in 2012. Harris is the choice of the California Democratic establishment as well as influential national Democrats like Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten Gillibrand. By contrast, Republicans are rooting for Sanchez, who, as a member of the Blue Dog Coalition, is unquestionably the more conservative of the two candidates.
Harris will almost certainly continue to run a better-funded campaign than Sanchez, but if Sanchez can secure the Republican vote while holding on to just enough Democrats, the race could be quite competitive. That’s not going to be an easy tightrope for Sanchez to walk, though, especially since many Republican voters may just decide to skip over a D vs. D contest instead of supporting Sanchez.
Harris’ 40-19 win also is a pretty good omen for the attorney general. However, she shouldn’t get too comfortable: Using the top-two results as a predictor of what will happen in the fall is always fraught with peril. In past election cycles, Democratic candidates up and down the ballot have almost universally won a higher share of the vote in November than in June. But this time could be different, since Donald Trump long ago sewed up the GOP nomination while the Democratic primary for president still held a lot of interest to many voters.
By way of illustration, in 2012, Democrats won just 52 percent of the overall vote in the June presidential primaries, which were virtually uncontested on both sides. This time, Democrats took 69 percent. (Note that the counts are still preliminary, since it takes a long time for California counties to finish tabulating ballots, most of which are cast by mail. However, the topline numbers probably won't budge very much.) In other words, contrary to years past, it's possible that the November electorate will look a bit more conservative than the one that just handed Harris a huge lead over Sanchez.
A couple of polls taken before the primary showed Harris ahead, and for now, she looks like the favorite. But both surveys had substantial numbers of undecideds, and given the unusual contours of this race, it may be a while before we get a clear read on where things are headed.
● CA-21: National Democrats had hoped attorney Emilio Huerta, the son of famed labor leader Dolores Huerta, would advance past the top-two primary to take on GOP Rep. David Valadao, but it looks like he's fallen just short. Right now, Valadao has 58 percent of the vote, while another Democrat, Fowler City Councilor Daniel Parra, is at 21 and Huerta at 20. Huerta hasn't proved to be a particularly strong fundraiser, but Parra's fared much worse on the money front, which is why Republicans tried to boost Parra ahead of the primary—a move that may have worked.
However, the AP has not yet called the race, and many votes remain uncounted. The two Democrats are divided by 467 votes, and it would not be unheard of for that margin to shift. If it doesn't, though, outside Democratic groups are unlikely to show much interest in this seat. Then again, there’s the Trump factor to consider: In a heavily Latino district like this one, even a weak Democratic could get sucked into office by The Donald's desructive vortex. At present, we rate this race as Likely Republican.
● CA-24: Democrats dodged a hailstorm of bullets here on Tuesday night, as Santa Barbara County Supervisor Salud Carbajal easily took first place with 33 percent of the vote, ensuring that the party would be represented in the November general election. But that seemingly simple development was no sure thing.
At least a month before the primary (if not much earlier), Democrats began to fear that they might get locked out of the general, despite the fact that Barack Obama won this open seat by a 54-43 margin. However, a second prominent local Democrat, Santa Barbara Mayor Helene Schneider, was also running, and private polls (none of which were ever made public) evidently showed that the pair might split the left-leaning vote and allow two Republicans, Assemblyman Katcho Achadjian and businessman Justin Fareed, to both advance.
To avoid this fate, the DCCC and the House Majority PAC started pouring in resources to help Carbajal, who had been endorsed by retiring Rep. Lois Capps and had emerged as the clear establishment favorite. Conversely, sensing an opportunity for an automatic pickup, the NRCC ran ads slamming Carbajal as a typical politician while also "attacking" Schneider for being too liberal, a mirror-image attempt to do what Claire McCaskill did to Todd Akin.
Fortunately for Democrats, the GOP's chicanery didn't succeed, and Carbajal easily took first place with 33 percent. Somewhat surprisingly, Fareed currently sits in second with 21 percent while Achadjian, who began the race with far greater name recognition, is out in the cold at 19. (Schneider wound up at 14.) But maybe not too surprisingly, since the HMP's ads attacked Achadjian for his anti-choice views, which might have sent some of his more moderate would-be supporters over to Carbajal—and helped Fareed into the second slot, which is what Democrats would probably prefer for the fall. (The AP hasn't yet called second place, but Fareed's 2,357-vote margin is likely to hold up.)
In hindsight, it's easy to wonder if DC Democrats got too freaked out, since Carbajal did prevail by a dozen points. However, that might have partly reflected the fact that the GOP presidential primary had petered out while the Democratic contest was still generating interest, a development that earlier polls wouldn't have been able to account for. And while the sums spent by the D-Trip and HMP were not insignificant—some $825,000—no amount of money could have saved this race had Achadjian and Fareed both won.
Indeed, had the two Republicans moved on, the accusations of political malpractice levied at Democrats would have been intense—and not undeserved, since the very same thing happened in the 31st District in 2012. The top-two primary is a terrible, terrible system, but both parties have no choice but to play by the rules, and that means spending big to avoid unthinkable outcomes.
With the unpleasantness of the primary out of the way, the question now is whether national Republicans will bother targeting this seat in the fall. Daily Kos Elections currently rates this seat as Lean Democratic, but it's eminently possible that the NRCC will wind up ignoring Fareed, especially since they'll be on defense in so many other seats.
● CA-25: Unlike in the 21st District, national Democrats got their man in the 25th. GOP Rep. Steve Knight came in first with 49 percent over the vote while attorney Bryan Caforio, who took 29 percent, will join him in November. Former LAPD officer Lou Vince finished out of the money at 15 percent, despite earning the formal backing of the state Democratic Party. Mitt Romney narrowly won this Los Angeles-area district in 2012 by a 50-48 margin, and there's reason to believe it's trending bluer. We rate this race Likely Republican, but Knight is a weak fundraiser and this seat could come into play.
● CA-44: State Sen. Isadore Hall turned in a strong performance on Tuesday, taking 41 percent of the vote in a 10-candidate field, but he'll face fellow Democrat Nanette Barragan, who took 22 percent, in November. Hall had the support of outgoing Rep. Janice Hahn (who is running for a seat on the powerful Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors), and he'll be the favorite in the fall in this dark blue seat.
But Barragan, a former mayor of Hermosa Beach, has the backing of EMILY's List, and if they decide to play here, we could see a more competitive race. Hall’s victory was also marred when his election night party was interrupted by a process server, who served him with a subpoena. However, as jarring as the moment might have been, the case appears to be a civil matter in which Hall allegedly owes some $10,000 in unpaid rent and utilities to his landlord—not, in other words, the stuff that major political scandals are typically made of.
● CA-46: Former state Sen. Lou Correa easily (and unsurprisingly) took first place in the race to succeed Loretta Sanchez, winning 42 percent of the vote. But he won in another crucial way, too: He won't have to go up against a member of his own party in the general election. The two other notable Democrats running, Garden Grove Mayor Bao Nguyen and former state Sen. Joe Dunn, finished in third and fourth place, respectively. The second spot went to utter Some Dude Bob Peterson, a Republican who has raised just $26,000. In this 61-36 Obama district, there's no way Peterson has a prayer here.