CA-Gov: Brown Announces
Jerry Brown, former governor and the state's current attorney general, announced his candidacy via web video yesterday.
Per Brown's "lean campaign" model, the lone Democratic hopeful inexplicably had no scheduled events on the day he announced. He did, however, appear on Larry King Live.
The strongest argument Jerry Brown and California Democrats can make this fall is that Meg Whitman is more of the same. A political novice with no prior elected office experience. Californians know where that leads. Just look at the last seven years under Arnold Schwarzenegger's governance. The state is in shambles.
Read more from Calitics, including the Brown press release on the announcement.
Remainders
John Perez is the next Speaker of the Assembly and also the first openly gay official to hold the post.
Arnold Schwarzenegger delivered his final State of the State address this week with the help of a former Reagan speechwriter. Contra Costa Times reporter Josh Richman liveblogged the event. In the speech, the governor outlined a jobs plan estimated at roughly $500 million.
The state is moving closer towards resuming executions in California.
San Jose Mercury News and other Bay Area New Group papers seek copies of the four gubernatorial candidates' federal and state tax returns from the past decade.
Alberto Torrico, a candidate for state's top cop gig, takes on the role as the chair of the Assembly's prison reform committee. Chris Kelly, an executive officer at Facebook, donated $2 million to his campaign for attorney general. The pool of Democratic candidates tallies half a dozen, including Kamala Harris, district attorney for San Francisco.
It is not like billionaires Steve Poizner or Meg Whitman need his money, but major Republican donor Rick Caruso is backing Jerry Brown for governor.
Jeff Takada, a Republican seeking the nomination to challenge Jerry McNerney, says his fellow candidates "leave me with a lot of questions."
Marriage equality activists sought to have the proceedings of the Proposition 8 trial televised. It looks like they will have to settle for delayed video.
Several Bay Area educators were honored at an event held at the White House.
CA-Gov: Whitman Leads GOP Candidates, Brown Leads All
A recent poll shows Meg Whitman well ahead of fellow contenders for the Republican gubernatorial nomination. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, Whitman pulls 32 percent to Tom Campbell's 12 percent, and Steve Poizner's 8 percent.
Jerry Brown, the presumptive Democratic nominee, leads all three Republican candidates in hypothetical head-to-head matches by six, twelve and sixteen points, respectively. CNN:
In a hypothetical general election matchup, the poll indicates Brown, the state's sitting attorney general and former two-term governor from 1975 to 1983, has a 6 point lead over Whitman. Brown, who has yet to declare his candidacy for governor, leads Campbell by 12 and Poizner by 16 points in possible matchups next year. About one in five voters are undecided in the general election matchups.
Full PPIC report here.
CA-Gov: Rasmussen: Brown, Whitman Tied
Swing State Project passed along the numbers from a recent Rasmussen poll in the California governor's race that shows a tie between Jerry Brown, the Democratic attorney general and former governor, and Republican political neophyte Meg Whitman.
Jerry Brown (D): 41 (44)
Meg Whitman (R): 41 (35)
Some other: 3 (3)
Not sure: 14 (18)
The poll also showed larger Brown margins over other Republicans vying for the nomination: Tom Campbell (+9) and Steve Poizner (+12).
Rasmussen polls typically skew in favor of Republicans and readers at Swing State Project don't buy these numbers at all, either.
It is hard to imagine what Whitman has done to boost her numbers by six points. Lie about state government spending? Petty purity fights with Steve Poizner?
Swing State Projects questions the sampling used by Rasmussen:
Although Californians are understood to be in a surly mood these days, all the candidates clock in with positive favorables: Brown is at 48/41, Whitman is at 47/27, Campbell is at 40/20, and Poizner is at 36/26. I'm a little surprised at this level of name-rec for the Republicans, considering how little-known they have tended to be in other polls. Another tidbit that points to the effect of Rasmussen's likely voter screen: Barack Obama has a 55/43 approval -- a good number, to be sure, but most pollsters have had Obama in the low-to-mid 60s in California, as it usually tends to be one of his best states for approval ratings (in fact, given California's size, it's probably single-handedly responsible for keeping Obama's nationwide approvals in the mid-50s).
Essentially these numbers mean bupkis.
CA-Gov: Poll: Brown, Newsom Ahead of GOP Candidates
Brown holds a strong lead over each Republican candidate as he looks for another stint as governor.
Associated Press reports that both Jerry Brown, the state's attorney general, and Gavin Newsom, mayor of San Francisco, would fare well against any of the three Republican candidates in the general election a year from next month, according to the latest Field Poll.
A new Field Poll shows California Attorney General Jerry Brown with a strong lead in next year's race for governor, even before he's declared himself a candidate and despite months of campaigning by his Democratic rival and three Republicans vying for their party's nomination.
The poll released Thursday found that Brown, the former governor, or fellow Democrat Gavin Newsom, the mayor of San Francisco, would fare well against any of the three Republicans.
It found that half of Republican voters had yet to make up their minds in the contest between former eBay chief executive Meg Whitman, former congressman Tom Campbell and state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner.
The latest poll does not provide much good news to Steve Poizner as he continued to camp out in third place with only nine percent.
The poll found that 49 percent of GOP voters are not ready to favor a particular candidate, unsurprising with the election so far away. The primary is next June.
Among those who do have a preference, Whitman and Campbell were in a virtual tie, at 22 percent and 20 percent respectively. Poizner trailed with just 9 percent support among GOP voters surveyed.
It may be in Whitman's interest to pay more attention to the relatively quiet Tom Campbell. It appears his strategy has been to let Poizner do his bidding in attacking Whitman while the latter continues to implode from her own mistakes and is forced to go negative against a candidate that continues to show poor standing in the polls.
Updated Robert Cruickshank dives into the numbers at Calitics.
Updated Jonathan Singer with analysis at MyDD.