53rd District race: Butler taps lawyers, Mintz taps engineers
Campaign contribution reports in the 53rd Assembly district race reveal broad differences not only in dollars the candidates have received, but in their contribution sources.
Democratic Party Candidate Betsy Butler has received $532,409 in contributions since the start of the year, according to the Secretary of State’s office. She had $70,014 remaining as of last Thursday, with the election just 11 days away.
Republican candidate Nathan Mintz had received contributions of $167,806 since the start of the year and had $63,686 remaining as of last Thursday.
Of the 984 contributors listed on Butler’s financial report, 222, or approximately 22 percent, list their occupation as attorney. Butler formerly worked for the Consumer Attorneys of California.
Mintz had more engineers (21) than attorneys (18) among his 321 contributors. Mintz is an engineer with Raytheon.
Voter registration in the 53rd Assembly District favors Democrats by 12 percentage points. The Democrats have 109,865 registered voters (42.4 percent), versus 78,267 for the Republicans (30.2 percent). A significant number – 58,709 (22 percent) are registered as declined to state. Of the remainder, 5,580 are registered as American Independent, 1,872 as Green, 820 as Peace and Freedom and 2,918 as other.
Despite the Democrats edge in registration, district wide, Butler, who lives in Marina Del Rey, had fewer beach city contributions than Mintz, who lives in Redondo.
Butler had 30 Manhattan Beach contributors, versus Mintz’ 43. Butler had nine from Hermosa, versus Mintz’s 17, and Butler had 10 from Redondo, versus Mintz’ 55.
Butler listed 64 contributors from Sacramento. Mintz had none from Sacramento. ER
