A couple months ago Sherry Hodges (once a staffer for Assemblyman Martin Garrick, then after some sort of fight now a staffer for Orange County Assemblywoman Diane Harkey) declared for State Assembly. The general feeling around town was that Hodges had the endorsement of Martin Garrick. I wondered about it though in a post a few weeks back… the Garrick people were acting weird.
Turns out I was right. Garrick has been calling around today to Republican leaders. He’s angry – really angry – seems Hodges is saying he “supports her” run for Assembly. I put that in quotes because the wording is important. Sounds like there was some kind of explosion recently over whether Hodges is telling donors that Martin “supports” her and if this is the implication (is that the right word) of an endorsement. Point is Garrick is working overtime to cut Hodges off. With Mark Muir and Marie Waldron and possibly Rocky Chavez in the race this is not a positive development for Hodges.
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I’m so sick of politicians playing with words. Schwarzenegger…Brown…Obama…just be blunt.
Of course Sherry has implied – yes that’s the right word – that Assemblyman Garrick endorsed her. Let me quote “He is supportive of my running for assembly”. What did I think? Of course I thought that that meant he endorsed her. What would anyone think.
OK. I feel like I fell off the Turnip truck. Why is ANYONE announcing for assembly prior to understanding how the districts are drawn? Heck, some of these candidates might not even BE in the district come the end of the summer. I understand that it takes a while to line up support, raise funds, etc. but it still seems to be that it would be far better to keep one’s powder dry until we see what the commission in Sacto will bring forth.
To be clear about what Hodges told me when I interviewed her in February, she did not have Garrick’s endorsement, as so noted at the end of this piece…
http://sdrostra.com/?p=12869
The endorsement list she sent me did not include his name, nor did she imply Garrick’s support. That was my personal experience in talking with her at the time of the above-linked story.
Good question, Erik. A strategic move that every possible candidate mulls. Because it’s redistricting time, do I wait until I know the lines and then risk not being the first in or not getting a head start on the opposition? Or, do I jump out there and lock down some endorsements and cash?…if I’m in the resulting district, great, I have a head start and perhaps even may have kept others out of the race when they see my support…if I’m not in the district, little harm done for being aggressive, but wrong.
I can see it either way.
I will tell you this with certainty. Within a few days of my FlashReport story linked from the Rostra piece above on Hodges, a handful of other candidates noted in the story went very quickly from being mum to saying they were considering a run, dependent on the final district. That wasn’t coincidence.
Tactically the biggest problem is that if you have to switch your opponent can wack you for being an opportunistic carpet bagger rather than actually committed to “the district”. I think we are going to see some “strange” districts in San Diego – the map is such that there could WELL be a competitive seat in North County. If winning was my key objective, I wouldn’t endorse until it is clear what that will look like. For instance, Waldron either is a good or a really BAD candidate depending upon what that district looks like. Not sure a Dem COULD win but I hate our chances if that new district is 40% Hispanic – something that could easily be the case if they carve out an east to west running district down the 78.