By the Daily Post staff
A confrontation in next year’s primary between Assemblymen Mark Berman and Evan Low was averted today when Low announced he would run for re-election in another district.
Low will move into the newly created 26th Assembly District, which includes Sunnyvale, Santa Clara and parts of San Jose and Campbell. That averts a incumbent-on-incumbent battle in Berman’s 23rd District, which includes Palo Alto, Menlo Park, Mountain View and Los Altos.
Usually state Legislators are re-elected in California without much difficulty. But the citizens committee that is in charge of redistricting this year decided to extend Berman’s district into Campbell, where Low lives.
Pitting two incumbents against one another would result in one Assemblyman losing his job. Both politicians are Democrats.
After the final map for the Assembly districts was released Dec. 20, Low and Berman said they would meet to discuss their next moves. They even sent out a TikTok video before their meeting of them having a pillow fight.
Today they announced their compromise on Twitter.
At 12:37 p.m., Low tweeted the following:
“I’m honored to announce that I will be running for re-election in Silicon Valley’s newly formed Assembly District 26. The last two years have shown that the Legislature has more work to do on behalf of South Bay residents and I am excited for the opportunity to continue serving.”
Eight minutes later, at 12:45 p.m., Berman tweeted this:
“I’m excited to announce my campaign for re-election to what will be the 23rd Assembly District. Due to redistricting, I will sadly no longer represent the communities of Belle Haven (in Menlo Park), East Palo Alto, North Fair Oaks and Sunnyvale. It has been a tremendous honor to represent the constituents of these communities over the last five years, and I look forward to my final year as their assemblyman. I look forward to representing new communities on the Coastside and in the South Bay in the new 23rd AD.”
Berman’s big accomplishment was changing the election rules so everyone gets a ballot in the mail, whether they wanted one or not. That’s just ripe for fraud. How many people are getting ballots for dead relatives who used to live with them? Or if you rent an apartment, you’ll probably get a ballot for the previous renter. Go back to one person, one vote at a polling precinct.
In California, county election departments are notorious for not removing dead people from their voter rolls. Last check, 111% more voters were registered to vote in San Mateo County than there were people of voting age. (https://padailypost.com/2019/01/08/legal-group-says-san-mateo-county-has-more-voters-than-adult-residents/) If you read the comments section, you’ll see that people are complaining that they’re still getting ballots for people who don’t live in their homes anymore. Berman wants to perpetuate that system.
A couple of carpetbaggers