California held its primary elections last week on Super Tuesday and the results are gradually coming in. Two California elections you should be paying attention to are the 16th Congressional District and District 5 Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors races.
The congressional election selects one of California’s 52 House representatives, who then advocates for their district, offers amendments and introduces bills, among other duties. The Board of Supervisors election appoints a supervisor to oversee and approve Santa Clara County’s departments, programs and budgets.
Since Congresswoman and current District 16 representative Anna Eshoo announced her retirement last November, a mix of candidates are in the running to fill her spot. These include former San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo, Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian, state Assemblyman Evan Low and tech executive Peter Dixon.
With more than 21% of the votes, frontrunner Liccardo is guaranteed a spot in November’s general election. Trailing behind are Low and Simitian, with only a 57-vote difference. Simitian had a comfortable 2% lead over Low the night of the primary, but the margin thinned out before the two officially switched spots late last night.
The District 16 congressional election is the country’s most expensive House race. According to ABC7, Liccardo and Simitian raised $2,196,987 and $941,587 respectively throughout their campaigns. Dixon raised the most amount of money — $2,786,268 — despite having never held office before.
Simitian, who is endorsed by Eshoo, has 40 years of elected office experience and has served 14 of the 15 cities in the 16th District. Liccardo has his fair share of endorsements too, with support from organizations like the Mercury News and San Francisco Chronicle. Although the final results of the primary election have yet to be announced, it’s likely that the two will face off in November’s general election, which will determine District 16’s new representative.
Simitian, the current District 5 representative on California’s Board of Supervisors, is terming out of his current position and announced his decision to run for Congress shortly after Eshoo stated her retirement intentions five months ago. District 5 stretches from Palo Alto to parts of Sunnyvale and San Jose, and faces an increasingly significant budget loss of around $250 million in the coming fiscal year. Five candidates ran in the primaries to step up to the job of leading the district, with Mountain View City councilmember Margaret Abe-Koga and California State Board of Equalization member Sally Lieber making the top two.
Results for the race were released last Wednesday, which concluded that Abe-Koga garnered 41.16% of the votes, followed by Lieber with 24.41%.
Both Abe-Koga and Lieber have raised nearly $300,000 so far in their campaigns and have roots in the Peninsula. Abe-Koga was born and raised in the area and has served as Mountain View’s mayor twice, with a total of 16 years on its city council. Lieber has served on the California State Assembly as well as on Mountain View’s city council, and currently presides over 10 million Californians as a member of the state’s Board of Equalization.
The two finalists for both the District 16 Congressional race and District 5’s Supervisor election will go head-to-head in a runoff in November’s general election. Primary election results will be certified by the California Secretary of State on April 12.
