The Votes Are In!
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View Winners → Politics Dec 13, 2023
Ballot box. | Photo courtesy of LA County Library / Facebook
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By Steven Herbert
Wednesday is the deadline to file to run for offices in the March 5 primary in which an eligible incumbent did not file to run for re-election, including three Los Angeles County congressional seats.
Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Burbank, is running for the U.S. Senate seat formerly held by the late Dianne Feinstein, while Reps. Tony Cárdenas, D-Pacoima, and Grace Napolitano, D-Norwalk, have announced their retirements.
A field of 16 candidates — 12 Democrats, two Republicans, one Peace & Freedom Party candidate and one with no party preference — has completed the filing process seeking to succeed Schiff to represent the predominantly Democratic 30th District, which stretches from West Hollywood to Pasadena and Echo Park to the Angeles National Forest.
Democrats who have filed include former Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer; state Sen. Anthony Portantino, D-La Cañada Flintridge; Assemblywoman Laura Friedman, D-Glendale; Los Angeles Unified School District Board of Education member Nick Melvoin; West Hollywood Mayor Sepi Shyne; Dr. Jirair Ratevosian, a former State Department official; and actor Ben Savage.
Schiff has not made an endorsement.
Cárdenas, D-Pacoima, has endorsed Assemblywoman Luz Rivas, D-North Hollywood, in the race to succeed him in representing the 29th Congressional District in the Northeast San Fernando Valley.
Community organizer Angélica María Dueñas, a Democrat who lost to Cárdenas, 56.6%-43.4% in 2020 and 58.5%-41.5% in 2022, is among the three other candidates who have filed, along with Republicans Benito “Benny” Bernal, a family and youth advocate, and María Margarita Carranza, who did not list an occupation.
Napolitano has endorsed Sen. Bob Archuleta, D-Pico Rivera, in the race to succeed her in the predominantly Democratic 31st Congressional District in the San Gabriel Valley. Former Rep. Gil Cisneros, who from 2019-21 represented the then-39th District, which ran from Walnut in the north to Chino Hills in the east, Hacienda Heights in the west and Fullerton in the south, is among the five other Democrats to have filed.
Sen. Susan Rubio, D-Baldwin Park, Mary Ann Lutz, a member of the Citrus Community College District Board of Trustees, workers’ rights advocate Greg Hafif and health care advocate and businessman Kurt Jose are the other Democrats who have filed.
Three Republicans have filed — clinical psychologist Pedro Antonio Casas; lawyer/entrepreneur/educator Daniel Jose Bocic Martinez; and government affairs administrator Elvira Moreno — along with two candidates without a party preference, teacher Erskine Levi and commissioner Marie Manvel.
The filing period concluded Friday for most county, state and federal offices in Los Angeles County for the March 5 primary election. Under state law, the filing period is extended five days when an eligible incumbent does not file to run for re-election.
The March 5 ballot will also include primaries for president, all of California’s 52 congressional seats, 20 of the 40 state Senate seats, all 80 seats in the Assembly, three seats on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and Los Angeles County district attorney.
The list of candidates who have qualified for the ballot will be announced Dec. 29, according to the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk.
