California Senate 2024 - Schiff (D) vs Garvey (R)

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Yeah, Schiff is definitely the right candidate here and the fact that he's likely to hold his powder until Feinstein actually decides to retire will help him get establishment support. There is no real risk of two strong Republicans in a crowded primary, so there's no risk of letting three credible Dems battle it out, but I think this field will probably scare off other candidates like Khanna (hopefully) and Barragan (unfortunate).

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Curious to see how much ‘Porter is a loathsome personality’ sticks and how many enemies among Ds she’s made along the way. I’ve never heard great things about her…

I don't think Porter is as extreme a case, but this is almost definitely what screwed up Yuh-Line Niou in NY-10. It definitely does play a role when your colleagues don't like you.

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Honestly, I don't care about Lee's age at all here. Even if she only serves one term, it'd be worth it to see her elected to the Senate. She's been an icon to the left for decades and would be amazing even for just one 6-year Senate run.

I'm 100% in on team Lee at this point. Maybe even considering throwing a job app in.

Gross.  It’s bad enough having that nutcase in the House; hopefully she loses the primary and the country can finally be rid of her.

Imagine thinking the only person who called the Afghanistan War for what it ended up being "a nutcase" FYI Soylent Green is made of people.

This. Plus it’d give the left six years to come up with a good candidate in 2030 (Scott Wiener)?

Thankfully, Scott Wiener is going nowhere. Replacing Lee with him would be a major downgrade. I would bet though that she has something worked out with Khanna, given how he is being deferential af to her. And even if he's in Congress by then, Scott will be a lightweight compared to someone like Khanna. Not sure where this leaves the gov race tho

If California Republicans were smart they would throw their support to a moderate dem although I have no idea who that would be.

But the CA GOP will just run several candidates with no shot of making the top 2

It's Adam Schiff, setting up the CAGOP for a real Sophie's Choice of a general election if its Schiff v Porter or Schiff v Lee, as I expect it will be.

Imagine thinking going to war with Al-Qaeda and its Taliban protectors right after 9/11 was the wrong decision.  With all due respect, it is simply a deranged position that doesn’t come close to passing the laugh test.

Seriously, as soon as the Taliban refused to turn over Bin Laden for trial, it was a done deal. Afghanistan was 100% a justified and essential war, and then we spent 20 years without a plan for what to do next.

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This race largely depends on whether Schiff and Porter spend the entire time going after each other while letting Lee have a lane to herself, or whether Porter and Lee battle for the progressive mantle and let the establishment coalesce behind Schiff. Either way, I have a feeling Porter gets the most media attention by a mile and is destined for third either way. The other two have built much stronger local support networks.

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A lot of factors are national. The two main things that stand out are A) as long as Schiff is the establishment favorite and Porter/Lee are both in the race, Schiff has a very good chance at a top two spot, and B) assuming a D vs. D race in November, it'll heavily depend on whether the locked-out Republicans are voting based on politics or petty stupidity. My gut says Lee would be a slight favorite over Schiff while Schiff would be a slight favorite over Porter in November, but there are a lot of intangibles.

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And now the entire California establishment machine comes down for Schiff.

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Porter and Schiff just voted for MORE WAR IN SYRIA while Lee voted against it. The true progressive is obvious.

I'm not sure running against party leadership and for limiting the powers of the President of the same party is the winning message in a California Senate race, but we'll see. I'm very interested to see how Porter campaigns given this, though - some distance seems to be emerging between her and Lee.

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I thought domestic policy was going to be the focus of the race.

It probably will. I don't think any of the three want this vote to be the crux of the election - including Lee, given that she knows she bucked the party establishment on it.

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https://twitter.com/scottshafer/status/1647061002385768451?cxt=HHwWhoDSqarQxNstA...

I’ve seen people criticizing this.  What do they want her to say?  That she would just refuse to accept an appointment?

Yeah, nothing wrong with her statement. On the other hand, one of her top endorsers leading the charge for Feinstein to resign feels rather scummy.

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https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1647750731678597121

So that didn't work out, I'm guessing.

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Absolutely the right choice - especially since I don't think Lee would even be guaranteed a victory if she was given the appointment. She's in third in all polls, Schiff has the most mainstream support, and Newsom trying to put his finger on the scale would anger his backers and likely result in a nastier, harder-fought race. Short-circuiting a primary race like this just isn't done.

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Honestly, though there's no way Newsom will do it, Nancy Pelosi being a Senator for a year would be an excellent capstone to her career.

I've heard some people say the same thing about Maxine Waters.

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I think criticizing Lee's bitter response is fair but assuming it ends her campaign is wrong; this brings her attention and could polarize the race into for- and against-Lee camps, which are both to her benefit.

She's a distant third and it's now clear that her strategy for this race was to bypass the primary process. Why would any Schiff or Porter voter switch to her now?

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Who would Karen Bass endorse in a Porter vs Schiff matchup?

It's likely the entire California Dem caucus would come down for Schiff if it's down to the two of them, with the exception of maybe a few like Ro Khanna. Porter doesn't have a great reputation with her fellow Dems, and she and Maxine Waters in particular have a poor working relationship.

The idea that that Porter could beat Schiff with crossover voting in the general is interesting, but it would likely require her keeping it close among Dems. I'm not sure how many Republicans are going to go "I hate Schiff, so I'm going to vote for the feminist to his left who sounds a lot like Elizabeth Warren".

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https://twitter.com/BarbaraLeeForCA/status/1704269965871005871?s=20

Not surprising - there's probably a bigger gulf in policies between Lee and Porter than Porter and Schiff. Lee is definitely the likely choice for Bernie supporters. The problem is, Porter already has a pretty big netroots support just because of her persona, so the two will likely be in direct opposition now.

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How would Lee do in a D vs D race? Are Porter and Schiff really DINOS?

Neither one is a DINO or close. Schiff is pretty much a lockstep Biden Democrat - you'd struggle to find any issue where he's out of the party orthodoxy, although most people would define him as somewhat moderate especially on foreign policy. Porter usually aligns herself with Elizabeth Warren pretty heavily, but outside her stances on big business her votes trend more towards the Dem mainstream.

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I said it a couple months ago, and I'll say it again, a debate would be immensely useful in this situation and it's a shame there isn't going to be one, and there hasn't even been much pressure to hold one. Does it have to do with the jungle primary or something? I know even De Leon and Feinstein had one debate afaik.

Yeah, I imagine a debate in a jungle primary would be very hard to pull off. You can't really exclude the Republicans.

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Newsom has previously indicated he’ll name a caretaker who doesn’t run for 2024, right?

Yep. Lee's tantrum put the kibosh of any chance of him stepping into the race and picking one of the three.

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I’m gunning for London Breed to be the placeholder, young, a woman of color, Mayor from the same city DiFi was once mayor of. It’ll be perfect

Also, I hope that this shows all the other geriatrics in congress what’s coming to them COUGHmitchmcconnellCOUGH and starts a precedented retirement wave either next year or 2026

I'd be surprised if it was someone with a major current position like Breed. I assume she'd prefer to remain Mayor instead of taking a job that ends in a bit over a year.

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It's incredibly unprecedented for the third-place candidate and her surrogates to repeatedly demand the seat be given to them in the middle of an ongoing race. Bizarre.

I almost hope Newsom goes ahead and taps Schiff as the party choice at this point.

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This bashing of Lee is a little much. Newsom said he would appoint an African-American woman. Lee is the most obvious choice to fill that. This is a problem of Newsom’s own making.

She's not the most obvious choice because she's running for the seat and is well behind in the polls. This is the equivalent of if Cardin had to resign suddenly and Moore appointed Trone despite Alsobrooks being the favorite. Short-circuiting a primary race is very rarely done, and doing it in favor of someone running behind is much more so.

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Also, I honestly don't believe that if Lee got the appointment at this point, it would end the primary. It would be seen as such an affront to Schiff and the party brass that they would likely step up the support for him and make the primary even more brutal. Porter would be done, of course, but that's it. This has the same energy as the way the Bernie backers were shocked, shocked that candidates dropped out and consolidated their support, as opposed to letting him clinch victory with 30% in every state.

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https://twitter.com/secupp/status/1708464810763919811

Press X to doubt.  Media wishcasting does not make it so.

Also reminder that this is The Daily Mail.

What IS the daily mail? Some tabloid piece or the British answer to Fox News?

A British tabloid with a notorious right-wing bias. I would say it's more equivalent to the New York Post.

Really more like the NY Post crossed with the National Enquirer. The Post's journalism is usually biased but less based around blatant speculation and gossip-mongering.

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If it is Lee, I wonder if Schiff or Porter drop out.

With Dave Min having legal troubles from his DUI, and no real frontrunner down there, maybe Porter suspends her campaign, endorses Lee, and runs for re-election in her swing district.

Schiff could do the same or continue to run against Lee.

It's possible that they turn their attention to 2026 statewide elections, like the open Governors mansion or AG (should Bonta decide to run for Governor).

Why would they? IMHO Shiff & Porter are still likely to finish 1/2 in the primary even against Senator Lee.

Yeah, I don't know what Porter's path would be - she has the fewest endorsements and least institutional support of the three - but Lee getting the seat this way would be such an unprecedented tactic that I wouldn't be shocked to see her be greeted by dozens of in-unison endorsements of Schiff for the election.

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If Newsom is committed to picking a Black woman, but he isn’t willing to appoint the one Black woman supported by the CBC and the Black CA establishment then who was his commitment even for? 

For what it’s worth, I think if this had all happened in April, Newsom would have just appointed Lee without question - it’s perfectly beneficial for him to do so. His more recent statements seem to be a result of being close enough to the election that he thought he would anger people if he didn’t say anything of the sort.

Her inability to gain any traction in the polls definitely makes it trickier as well.