Incumbent Republican Kristin Gaspar Holds Large Lead In Third District County Supervisor Race

Speaker 1: 00:00 And now we're going to turn to the San Diego County board of supervisors racists district one is going blue States and it or been way, so a Democrat is leading in the brace to fill the seat in the County board of supervisors. He currently has 31% of the vote. It's looking like he will face Rafael kassianos or Nora Varguez. Both Democrats and the November run off to replace Republican Greg Cox on the board. The two are separated by just over 100 votes in district two on the board. It's looking like former state Senator Joel Anderson and Poway mayor Steve Voss. Both Republicans are headed towards the November runoff to replace supervisor Diane Jacob, but it's the district three board of supervisors see to that is the most closely watched because it could flip the political makeup of the board. Currently leading his incumbent Kristin gas bar, a Republican with 46% of the vote following her is Democrat, Terra Lawson Riemer, a professor at UC San Diego with 29% of the vote. She joins me now. Tara, welcome. Speaker 2: 01:02 Hi, welcome. Happy to be here. Speaker 1: 01:04 How confident are you that your 4% lead ahead of Olga Diaz will hold? Speaker 2: 01:09 I think we're looking pretty good. You know, most of the ballots are in by now about two thirds reporting, but we are still waiting to see. Speaker 1: 01:18 And if your lead holds, how will your approach to the November runoff be different from how you approach the primary? Speaker 2: 01:24 Well I think the big takeaway from this election is that the majority of voters of district three have voted for change and voted for new leadership on the board of supervisors. A majority have rejected Christine Gaspar and have supported someone else. And I'm excited to be that someone else because the majority of voters in district three know we need the kind of leadership that can really speak to the real needs of San Diego's communities and San Diego's families can take on the traffic and congestion crisis that we face on a daily basis that really prioritizes protecting our beaches and coastlines. That takes leadership on the homeless crisis that's ready to jump in on day one. I have to do something about affordable housing in our County. So I think we're really well positioned to run a race and beat Christine gas bar in November. Speaker 1: 02:11 You know, registered Democrats currently outnumber Republicans by 26,000 in the district, but gas bar is the incumbent. How much of a challenge do you think that will be for you and how might you overcome that? Speaker 2: 02:23 Well, as I said, the big takeaway from last night is that the majority of voters in the district have rejected Kristin Gaspar already have have said that they're ready for new leadership and we're excited to be that new leadership on the, on the County board. And I think that's across the board. This is not about Democrat or Republican or declined to state. It's not about party preference. It's about a quality of life for us in San Diego County and for our children. And um, I think folks are ready for leadership that's willing to do the work to deliver for residents here in our community. Speaker 1: 02:56 And there are more nonpartisan voters in the district, registered Republicans. How do you plan to attract them to your campaign? Speaker 2: 03:02 I honestly, I've been out in the doors talking to voters for almost a year now and I'm talking to everyone. I'm not only talking to Democrats, I'm talking to Republicans, I'm talking to no party preference voters. I'm talking to all the voters in the district and there's a lot of shared concerns and shared priorities and those are my priorities as well and are really the reasons I decided to run for the race in the first place. There's a lot of concern about traffic and congestion and sprawl and ending sprawl development. There's a lot of concern in my district about protecting our beaches and our coastlines about taking action to combat climate change. So again, we're talking about quality of life issues that are shared among everyone in my district and I'm really excited to be able to be a champion to deliver on the things that matter the most to communities in San Diego. Speaker 1: 03:49 I've been speaking with Terra Lawson reamer candidate for district three County board of supervisors. Tara, thank you for joining us. Speaker 2: 03:56 Thank you so much. Speaker 1: 03:57 We reached out to Kristin gas bars campaign and she declined our request for an interview. Joining us with more analysis on San Diego County election results is Mesa college political science professor Carl Luna, who has been in studio with this. Carl, welcome back. Thanks for having me. So we just heard about Democrat terror, Lawson reamer who looks to be headed to the November runoff in the San Diego district three supervisor's race. How do you think she'll perform against Republican incumbent Kristin gas bar in November? Speaker 3: 04:25 Well, if you look at the, the actual vote, uh, she and her democratic colleagues collectively got more of the vote than a Kristin gas bar. Yeah. In November you'll have an even bluer voter turnout. So I think there is a really good chance that since district one has gone to the Democrats and Nathan Fletcher has got a seat that you could end up with a three, two democratic majority on the board of supervisors in which case comes sometime in November. They may be skating down in Haiti's Speaker 1: 04:52 and the County democratic party has called the D three supervisor's race the most important race of 2020 in the County. Why is that? Speaker 3: 04:59 Cause that's the real swing. Jay did that. That's the one that could tip this over. Finally to the Democrats that control the agenda goes to the Democrats and a more progressive agenda, whatever that might be, comes in with implications for homelessness, healthcare. Uh, how did they spend their jet, their, their reserves? Uh, it's, it's in San Diego. This is a sign that the County itself is now bluing, not just the city which has gone full blue Speaker 1: 05:23 in the San Diego mayor's race. Carl, if Scott Sherman's lead holds, does that mean there is still hope for the GOP in the city of San Diego? Slim? Speaker 3: 05:33 I mean the, you look at again the between, uh, Barbara, Brie and Todd Gloria. It was almost 60, 60% of the vote went Democrat and lb even bluer again in November. I think Todd Gloria is going to have a comfortable way to go in, but he'll have to compete though will be a debates. And you'll have to be able to show that he can do a message to bring out the more conservative, uh, moderate Barbara Bree voters, just like the Democrats are doing at the national level. Todd Gloria media emerged as a consensus mayor coming out of this, and I think the race was Scott Sherman will help him. Uh, that doesn't mean Sherman can't win, but he would require a real turn in fortunes to be able to do that. Uh, he's been the good Republican soldier making this competitive, but it is remarkable that less than 20 years ago, you had races where there were no Democrats on the ballot. Speaker 3: 06:22 And now you almost had two Democrats on the ballot. And for the second time a Democrats likely to win this race. And you know, Georgette Gomez was originally thought to be a shoe in for the 53rd congressional district bad. Sarah Jacobs, outspent Gomez and came in first in the primary. Uh, well, money continued to be a problem for Gomez and the runoff. Well now that you've got the issue going forward that you had the president city council trying to make it from that uh, that's kinda off-Broadway to the Broadway of uh, Congress. Uh, Ms. Jacobs has the advantage of money and nature to the family name recognition and political connections. It could be a different race though. Come November you have to see all the money now breaks and now they're down to two candidates and how progressive the message will be for the electorate going into that. Speaker 3: 07:06 It's not a shoe in for either of them. At this point, voters countywide weighed in on two land use related measures. There's measure a, it asked voters whether they should get a say in housing developments that don't comply with the county's general plan. Election night results show measure, AA is failing. Now opponents made the case that measure a was Andy housing and ballot box planning at its worst. But my question is do you think voters had a clear idea of what measure a was all about? I think they kind of did Marine, it's the idea again, how do we deal with our housing problem? And so in the generic idea, should you challenge every decision of the board of supervisors? The general plan, I think voters were uncomfortable with that. Even though there was a pretty well funded campaign to push proposition a from the golden door and other homeowners groups. Speaker 3: 07:55 It was a classic case of nimbyism. But at the same time, prop B said, look, you guys gave an exemption to this housing development. We don't like that. And then by [inaudible] failing, you've cut down the out that development. So I think it's a sign that collectively we are uncertain about how to deal with housing. We don't want too much back country sprawl. But on the flip side, do you really want to increase interest in inner densities and the core city until we resolve that debate? You're going to keep on getting this mixed message, you know, measure B. Uh, as you mentioned, it was one of the most expensive issues on the ballot. Is that right? Yeah. And you saw a huge spending from the developers who wanted to do the 2000 houses and from others like the golden door spa and upper end spa that wants to be in the back country unhindered by traffic a while you had conflict between two moneyed interest groups. Speaker 3: 08:45 It also brought in that basic notion cause this is a County wide vote. Do we want more sprawl out in the countryside with fired issues with traffic and congestion with a fairly weak sauce, a promise for more affordable housing. In prop B, a voter said this is not the measure of the expansion we want for measure B. Measure C in the city of San Diego asked voters to raise the hotel tax to pay for the convention center expansion and for homeless services and road repairs. Unofficial results show it's failing with just 63.6% of the vote, but it needs 66% of the vote to pass. Now mayor Faulkner and convention center supporters have been pushing for this expansion for years. What does the outcome mean for the future of the convention center in 30 seconds or less? We have a love hate relationship with that center. You took multiple attempts to get it built and expand it in the first place. Speaker 3: 09:37 The current model of tying it to homelessness was seen as something of a SOP to try to buy support at some point, if you want to expand it, you might have to look at a bond issue or alternative funding, but it, there's a sense of inevitability always with this convention center, if you can show that this will benefit the broader city as a message, I think they have a chance of getting it in a future ballot, but maybe we're moving into a post-convention center era. Anyway, we've been speaking with political science professor Carl Luna, and thank you so much. Thank you.