California’s general election season started Wednesday, hours after state Treasurer Phil Angelides claimed the Democratic nomination to oppose Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
After months of vitriolic campaigning, Angelides claimed victory early Wednesday, and his challenger, state Controller Steve Westly, conceded.
The Democratic nominee had a few hours to catch his breath before beginning a victory tour in Sacramento, Los Angeles, San Diego and Oakland. He planned to spend Thursday in Boston, where his daughter is graduating from Harvard University.
Facing no serious opposition, Schwarzenegger easily won the Republican nomination and set out Wednesday on a bus trip as the formal kickoff of his re-election effort.
“Are you with me? Are you with me?” he shouted after he had jumped onto a table in a Humboldt County restaurant.
Schwarzenegger got an early taste of what’s to come at the Samoa Cookhouse, a former lumber camp near Eureka. About 50 protesters were outside the restaurant, waving Angelides signs and shouting. His choice to launch the campaign in Humboldt County, a Democrat-leaning region in the state’s northwest corner, underscored the governor’s need to reach out beyond his GOP base.
A day earlier he said, “People want to hear about what each candidate wants to do with the future of California– what we want to do with education or with health care. … Those are the important issues.”
Schwarzenegger’s other scheduled stops Wednesday include Redding, Chico and Auburn, a Sierra foothills town east of Sacramento.
Angelides pledged to debate Schwarzenegger and said the election was a clear choice between progressive values and the governor’s agenda of “helping those at the top.”
Westly joined Angelides on stage in Los Angeles at a unity rally Wednesday morning. Westly endorsed Angelides and said he would work with him to win the general election.
“He is a fierce debater, a driven campaigner, and someone who I think can carry this party to victory in November,” Westly said, adding that with the GOP dominating national politics, “our party needs unity like it never has before.”
When Schwarzenegger took office in 2003 after the recall election, Angelides immediately staked his ground as the governor’s loudest critic.
In the race to serve the final seven months of the term of disgraced ex-Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, Republican Brian Bilbray beat Democrat Francine Busby. Bilbray grabbed 49 percent of the vote to Busby’s 45 percent. Two right-of-center minor candidates took 5 percent.
