Court gives some June candidates extended statement deadline

Some around here are fond of saying that the code will get you every time, and today we present Exhibit A.

After discovering conflicting provisions in two different sections of California law, San Mateo County Superior Court Judge George Miram today ordered that the filing deadline for candidate statements for partisan State Assembly and Senate candidates who have accepted campaign spending limits be extended until 5 p.m. on Friday so that they can make specific amendments related to endorsements.

Sounds like a lot of fuss over some very fine print for these candidates running in the June 3 Statewide Direct Primary, but it’s worth at least trying to understand.

Candidate statements appearing in your Sample Ballot & Official Voter Information Pamphlet are designed for nonpartisan offices. However, Proposition 34, which went into effect in 2001, allows candidates for State Assembly or Senate the opportunity to purchase space for a campaign statement in the pamphlet if they accept campaign spending limits.  A reward, if you will, for accepting them.

Here is the provision from the proposition, which is now part of Government Code § 85601.

A candidate for State Senate or Assembly who accepts the voluntary expenditure limits… may purchase the space to place a statement in the voter information portion of the sample ballot that does not exceed 250 words. The statement may not make any reference to any opponent of the candidate. The statement shall be submitted in accordance with the timeframes and procedures set forth in the Elections Code for the preparation of the voter information portion of the sample ballot.

Following the direction of the last sentence, we turn to Elections Code. Elections Code § 13307, which is the only portion of the code concerning candidate statements, has very specific regulations about statements, the most relevant being this:

The statement may include the name, age and occupation of the candidate and a brief description, of no more than 200 words, of the candidate’s education and qualifications expressed by the candidate himself or herself.

Bottom line, if it’s not in the above sentence, it’s not allowed.

But the section also refers to the statements being for candidates for “nonpartisan elective office.” So if Proposition 34 tells this partisan group of candidates that their statements must be submitted in accordance with Elections Code, but Elections Code is only written for nonpartisan candidates, can Elections Code really apply? Would Proposition 34, which merely says that the “statement may not make any reference to any opponent of the candidate,” be the only governing regulation about a statement’s content?

The conflict between the two laws was brought to our attention by Richard Holober, a Democratic candidate for the 19th Assembly District who has accepted campaign spending limits, after he submitted a campaign statement that included endorsements. Long story short, a messy back-and-forth ensued of whether he could include the endorsements and what the intent of Proposition 34′s language was. You can read the account of it in the San Jose Mercury News’ Capitol Beat roundup.

Lawyers have spent the past few days arguing about it, and came the conclusion that he could allow endorsements. But because this came to light so close to the filing deadline, we petitioned the court to extend it.

“We went to the judge and said, ‘We’re asking you to extend the deadline because of the confusion,’” Elections Manager David Tom said. “Some candidates might not have been aware that they can include endorsements.”

So Miram extended the deadline until 5 p.m. on Friday solely to allow candidates accepting spending limits to amend their statements to include endorsements and delete the number of words necessary to keep the statement within the size limit. No other amendments will be allowed.

This ruling applies to four other candidates besides Holober:

· Catherine Brinkman, Republican for 19th Assembly District

· Gina Papan, Democrat for 19th Assembly District

· Annalisa Yenne, Republican for 21st Assembly District

· State Sen. Assemblyman Ira Ruskin, Democrat incumbent for 21st Assembly District

And on a final note, let us clear the air about this paragraph in the aforementioned Mercury News story: “(Holober) said he suspects the elections officials were trying to do (his opponent Jerry) Hill a favor, and would have ‘gotten away with it if I hadn’t caught them.’”

We are a nonpartisan office charged with administering fair, accurate and transparent elections for the citizens of San Mateo County that abide by all relevant state and federal election laws. We do not, under any circumstances, play favorites to candidates.