There are 10 candidates running for governor of California

from Yue Stella YuCalMatters

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It’s official: Eight Democrats and two Republicans say they’ve filed for the June 2 primary ballot in California’s gubernatorial race, setting up a wide-open race in which two Republicans who have consistently led in polls can exclude all other Democrats.

Here are the 10 candidates:

• Xavier Becerra, Democrat, former US Secretary of Health and Human Services and former California Attorney General
• Chad Bianco, Republican, Riverside County Sheriff
• Steve Hilton, Republican, Fox News contributor and former adviser to conservative British Prime Minister David Cameron
• Matt Mahan, Democrat, Mayor of San Jose
• Katie Porter, Democrat, former U.S. representative representing Orange County
• Tom Steyer, Democrat, billionaire entrepreneur and former presidential candidate
• Eric Swalwell, Democrat, U.S. Representative from the Bay Area
• Tony Thurmond, Democrat, State Superintendent of Public Instruction
• Antonio Villaraigosa, Democrat, former mayor of Los Angeles and former Speaker of the Assembly
• Betty Yee, Democrat, former state comptroller

Steyer became the latest to officially file on Friday, the application deadline.

Former Assembly Majority Leader Ian Calderon dropped out of the race earlier this week, endorsing Swawell instead.

what’s next

The secretary of state’s office says it will review the documents filed by their campaigns and release an official list of primary candidates by March 21.

The top two vote-getters in the primary, regardless of party, will advance to the general election. But the two Republican front-runners enjoy more consolidated support from their base than their Democratic counterparts, who risk splitting the Democratic vote. At the Democratic state convention in February, delegates were so divided that no candidate won enough votes for party approval.

With the current field, there is a 27 percent chance of a Republican matchup in November, according to statistical modeling by Democratic Party strategist Paul Mitchell.

The prospect is troubling for many Democratic leaders, including state party leader Rusty Hicks, who earlier this week wrote an open letter urging those without a “viable path” to victory to drop out before Friday’s filing deadline. And for those who remained, he asked them to quit by April 15 at the latest if they could not make “significant progress.”

The call appeared to have gone unheeded, as eight of the nine announced Democratic candidates remained. Even if someone drops out now, their name will continue to appear on the primary ballot as long as they qualify, risking draining votes from other Democrats.

Risk reduction

When asked about the risk of a November shutdown at a gubernatorial forum Thursday, several Democratic candidates shrugged it off, insisting that each would be the best choice for voters.

Villaraigosa told CalMatters that the GOP base will rally behind just one candidate when President Donald Trump endorses him.

“When that happens, that guy will rise and the other (Republican) will fall, it’s that simple,” he said.

Of the Democrats attending the forum, only Porter acknowledged the risk of an overcrowded Democratic field.

“I think it’s horrifying to think what Trump would do to Californians if we had a governor who at every turn cooperated with him instead of protecting our California values,” she said. “So I don’t think it’s certain, but I think it’s a risk, and I think the stakes are very, very, very high.”

This article was originally published on CalMatters and is republished under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives license.