The Consequences of California's Top-Two Primary

In an article by Christopher Caen in The Atlantic, he writes" The system was set to encourage candidates to reach out to independents and moderates—but instead paved a way for them to interfere with the state’s election."

The top-two primary inadvertently created an incentive for candidates to broaden the field, recruiting additional candidates to dilute support for their most dangerous opponents.

This became evident in the 2014 Congressional race between Mike Honda and Ro Khanna.
Khanna, an Obama appointee, challenged Honda. He positioned himself as the modern Democrat, a pro-business candidate who would represent his district’s technology interests in Washington. If Khanna could make it to the General Election, the thinking went, he could get enough independent and Republican votes to win. But to get to the runoff, Khanna needed to get more votes than the Republican candidate, Vanila Singh.

A lawsuit filed in 2014 alleged that Khanna “recruited candidates to enter the race as Republicans to split the Republican vote three ways, effectively diluting votes that would otherwise be cast in favor of Singh.” Shortly before the filing deadline, Vinesh Singh Rathore and Joel Vanlandingham, two Republican candidates, entered the race. The suit also alleged some of those who had signed the candidates’ petitions were supporters of Khanna.

High drama ensued. A lawsuit was filed to throw both last-minute GOP candidates off the ballot and a judge tossed the candidacy of Rathore because of a problem with his signatures. The law firm that brought the lawsuit was Dhillon & Smith. One partner at the firm, Harmeet Dhillon, was also the Vice Chairwoman of the California Republican Party. In short, Democrats were trying to get Republicans to run against Democrats, only to get stopped by a leading Republican.

Maldonado defends the top-two primary, but is also not surprised by how it has unfolded. “It’s people trying to twist the election process. They have done that in the past. Prior to the open primary, and through the open primary,” he said.

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