Less than a week to go until the March 17 special election for the 37th Senate District, and the mail continues to pour in. Former OC Supervisor John Moorlach continues to be pounded by independent expenditure mailers. The California Statewide Law Enforcement Association IE Committee send out two mailers in the last couple of days. This hit piece:
And this comparison piece:
And another comparison piece:
The California Homeowners Association is back in action with this comparison piece that unfavorably compares Moorlach to Assemblyman Don Wagner:
Wagner’s Continues to Hold A Huge Fundraising Advantage
While Moorlach is raising more money than I think he ever has, Wagner continues to outraise him by orders of magnitude.
Wagner has raised at least $480,820, compared to at least $148,857 (I say “at least” because campaigns aren’t required to report contributions of less than $1,000 during the 24-hour reporting period).
Since March 1, Wagner has raised $109,650 to Moorlach’s $49,000.
While Moorlach is raising much less than Wagner, he is also more unpaid bills: $41,691 as of February 28 versus $21,177 for Wagner. Moorlach’s unpaid bills are almost entirely to his consultants and vendors for mail and postage; in other words, Clark Strategy Group and DMH Meyer have been fronting the cost of the mail and postage, and banking on the candidate raising enough to pay them back. Even Moorlach’s campaign manager, former Villa Park Councilwoman Deborah Pauly, is paying for postage. Campaigns do what they have to do to get the mail out.
Moorlach’s mail seems to be hitting in batches — one part of the district one day, another part on another day — rather than hitting at the same time district-wide, as is usually the case. Again, this is symptomatic of a campaign with strained resources. A downside to this less efficient method is it increases the likelihood of wasting mail on households that have already voted. I’ve heard anecdotal evidence the Moorlach campaign has outdated lists: athe precinct walk sheet being used by a Moorlach volunteer in Irvine still showed former Assemblyman Chuck DeVore as registered to vote in Irvine: DeVore moved to Texas in 2011.
Wagner Targets Asian Voters
The able Chris Nguyen reports over at OC Political on the Wagner campaign’s targeting of Asian voters in the 37th Senate District:
According to PDI, there are 11,980 Vietnamese voters in 7,255 houses in the 37th Senate District.
Wagner’s mailer features his endorsements from the two of the highest-ranking Vietnamese American elected officials in California: Senator Janet Nguyen and Supervisor Andrew Do. It also features the endorsement of Congressman Ed Royce, who is popular in the Vietnamese community.
Wagner’s mailer also hits on three issues near and dear to Vietnamese voters: small business, education/affirmative action, and taxes.
This is a very smart move by the Wagner campaign. In April 2006, Assemblyman Tom Harman and Dana Point Councilwoman Diane Harkey squared off in the 35th Senate District special election. Harman won a squeaker, beating Harkey 38.8% to 38.5%. Harman owed his victory to his campaign’s targeting of Asian voters, whose characteristically late balloting pushed him into the lead. Like the SD37 special election, the Harman-Harkey contest was dominated by absentee ballots, which constituted 73% of the votes cast.
Naz Namazi’s Increasingly Bizarre Campaign
Naz Namazi is running one of the weirdest campaigns I have seen in a long time. Her campaign essentially consists of shopworn cliches, harping on how honest she is and harsh personal attacks against Wagner and Moorlach.
On Tuesday, she sent out a robocall that took her candidacy to a new level of kookiness. Chris Nguyen has posted the audio file over at OC Political, but here is the script:
I’m Naz, N-A-Z, Naz, and I’m running against two men: a liar and a hypocrite.
I am a legal immigrant who’s lived in Orange County for 33 years and graduated from UC Irvine.
I’m Naz, and of course, I approved this message. VoteNaz.org. Vote honesty. Vote Naz.
Holy smokes.
Click here to read Chris Nguyen’s analysis of why he judges this to be the worst robocall he’s ever heard.
Matt, I believe you may be referring to my facebook post about being in the Irvine precinct that the DeVore’s used to live in. For the record Chuck and Diane were not listed on the voter list in fact nobody at their former residence was listed. I just happened to be walking down their old street during the precinct walk.
Aah – thank you for the correction, Scott!