Publication Date: Friday, March 05, 2004
ELECTION '04
Joe's knockout blow
Joe's knockout blow
(March 05, 2004) Simitian steamrolls Lempert to gain Democratic nomination for state Senate
by Don Kazak
Joe Simitian had a plan to defeat Ted Lempert: Lock up the support of elected officials early in Santa Clara and Santa Cruz counties, and then hammer away at Lempert's natural base in San Mateo County.
"He (Lempert) was a known quantity there (San Mateo County)," Simitian said.
That strategy paid off handsomely Tuesday, turning a hard-fought campaign into a romp and winning the Democratic nomination for the 11th District state Senate seat by a margin of 57 percent to 43 percent.
Simitian held Lempert to a 53.7 percent to 46.3 percent advantage in San Mateo County -- the territory Lempert represented off and on since 1988. He then won big, 61.5 percent to 38.5 percent in Santa Clara County and 59.5 percent to 40.5 percent in Santa Cruz County.
"I think the intensity and the kind of race you had between two really extraordinary candidates really upped the ante and made them both run harder," said Santa Clara County Supervisor Liz Kniss, a Simitian supporter. "I haven't seen such intensity in a race in years."
Both campaigns mounted major efforts in Santa Cruz County, parts of which were recently added to the 11th state Senate District.
Simitian won support from four of the five members of the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors and six of the seven members of the Santa Cruz City Council.
"It's so compact it lends itself to running the kind of person-to-person campaign we are used to on the Peninsula," Simitian said.
In contrast, Lempert was more successful winning endorsements in Sacramento from state senators, many of whom he had known in the Assembly.
"Every member of the state Senate who endorsed in this race endorsed him," Simitian told 100 or so cheering campaign volunteers at the Blue Chalk Café Tuesday night. "He had them, I had you."
About a half-hour later, with the vote gap widening, a gracious Lempert called Simitian to concede.
Earlier that evening, Lempert and a smaller band of his supporters watched returns from his campaign headquarters in Menlo Park. Despite taking a brief lead early on, Lempert's camp expressed muted optimism soon to be dashed.
"If we don't win, I'm proud I talked about the things that I cared deeply about," Lempert said.
Lempert tried to make campaign spending a major issue, since there was nary a difference on policy issues between the two candidates. Lempert followed a voluntary campaign spending limit of $637,000 set by Proposition 34 while Simitian raised more than $1 million in contributions.
Both candidates benefited from more than $300,000 each in independent or "soft" money spent on their behalf, resulting in a spate of "attack" mailers sent to voters.
But the campaign spending limit apparently didn't translate into votes.
"Joe was successful in getting people sidetracked from that until late in the campaign," Lempert said.
Simitian will now face Republican Jon Zellhoefer and Libertarian Allen Rice in the November general election. He'll be the prohibitive favorite because of an almost 20-point edge in registered Democrats over Republicans.
Don Kazak can be e-mailed at dkazak@paweekly.com
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