The 80th Assembly District falls entirely within the boundaries of San Diego County. Lorena Gonzalez (D) is the incumbent in this race. Gonzalez won a special election in 2013 after the resignation of Ben Hueso.
This district shows the following party registration for the three largest political groups (the source is http://www.l2political.com):
Republican- 15.7%
Democrat- 47.8%
NPP- 30.6%
Here are the result for the June 2018 race:
Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher (D)- 70.5%
Lincoln Pickard (R)- 29.5%
Joseph Viveiros (R) (Write-In)- 0.0% (3 Votes)
We saw a total of 54,559 ballots cast in the primary. Gonzalez easily won in November by a margin of 66.8% to 33.2%
With Gonzalez coming out as the face of AB 5 which attacks the gig economy (e.g. Uber, Lyft, etc…), I saw potential for a Dem challenger coming in and taking her seat. Only Republicans challenged her in the primary though. Here are the March 2020 results:
Lorena Gonzalez (D)- 72.7.7%
Lincoln Pickard (R)- 9.4%
John Vogel (R)- 17.9%
78,205 ballots were cast in this race. The increased turnout and lack of a challenger from the left (Note what happened to Tyler Diep).
We will now see a matchup between Lorena Gonzalez (D) and John Vogel (R). Gonzalez is the elected incumbent and Vogel works for the San Diego Health & Human Services Industry.
If Vogel was a Democrat, I would bet that companies impacted by AB 5 would rally behind him. Since he is not, he will likely be left on his own. I predict that Lorena Gonzalez will win in November.
I agree with your analysis Chris but I would also add that it is sad that voters in her district would return her to office given AB5 and her mindless defense of it. And so many people voted for her in the primary means people who were hurt by AB5 still voted for her. Those folks who did should not complain about AB5 at all. You get what you vote for.
LikeLike