…. Resources for a discussion on the ethics of money in politics with a focus on CA Senate Districts 14 and 34.
CA District 14 and 34 are the two races the HCDCC has chosen to contribute to (so far) heavily after having received large union donations. A1 and John Fullerton have asked some pointed questions or have some made sharp accusations regarding HCDCC spending. Here is the context before addressing their concerns.
First a basic primer about the California State Senate. Here is a map of the Senate districts. You will find in a little blurb in the legend of the map the fact that 2014 will be the first election post redistricting for the red or even districts. This includes District 2, even though the election is all but certainly more of a ceremony rather than an election for Sonoma Supervisor Mike McGuire.
The races the HCDCC has contributed to are:
a) Chavez (D) vs. Vidak (R) in Fresno’s California Senate District 14 . In the last election in 2010 which was pre-redistricting there was a 47% Republican and 34% Democratic population. This time District 14, which has moved significantly has 49% Democratic registration to 29% Republican as of 9/5/14.
and b) Solorio (D) vs. Nguyen (R) in Orange County’s District 34. Pre and Post -re-districting took the voter registration in this district from 44% (D) to 33% (R) to 39% (D) to 34% (R) as of early September.
Below are the contributions as of early yesterday morning including all contributions above $1,000 after 9/30 and all contributions from 7/1/14 to 9/30/14. As we know from our local election news, all contributions over $100 are itemized. I’ve included excel spread sheets with all the reported contributions, and for those without access to a spreadsheet, this post ends with screen shots of the candidate’s top donors.
a) CA Sentate District 14:
$1,213,391.49 from 762 contributors.
$1,415,199.28 from 211 contributors.
b) CA Senate District 34
$1,445,804.48 in contributions from 539 contributors.
$1,498,404 in contributions from 974 contributors.
John and A1, I’ve done most of the hard work for you, all you have to do is click the links so we can have an informed discussion about the ethics of money in politics and who should be pointing and crying “for shame” to whom.
I’d also like to frame the issue with this graph of income inequality (as always) and this graph below of declining worker compensation for increased productivity over the past 30 years (From the working class oriented Economic Policy Institute). You of course are welcome to link or reference your own charts.
For those readers without a spreadsheet program (one of the major disadvantages of our push to mobile computing) here are screen shots of the top donors for each of the candidates mentioned above.
District 14:
Vidak (R)
Chavez (D)
District 34:
Nguyen (R)
Solorio (D)
(d)emocratic Humboldt 
