Democrat Al Muratsuchi and Republican Craig Huey will battle for the 66th State Assembly District that includes the Beach Cities.
Huey soundly defeated his Republican rival Nathan Mintz, with 38.54 percent of the vote to Mintz’s 20.56 percent.
“We won because we have a message that we have a crisis in California with jobs because of bad California economic and political policies, and that resonated with people,” Huey said as he celebrated his victory Tuesday night.
Muratsuchi, a state prosecutor and Torrance school board member, finished with 40.9 percent. Muratsuchi was expected to be one of the top two-vote-getters in Tuesday’s primary because he was the only Democrat.
Together, the two Republican candidates received 32,109 votes compared to Muratsuchi’s 22,225. But Muratsuchi expects a different turnout in November, saying Republicans had a choice in Tuesday’s election and that increased voter turnout. “Democrats turn out in a much higher rate in presidential elections, and high voter turnout favors Democrats. So we’re very optimistic,” Muratsuchi said.
Jimmy Gow, president of the Torrance Democratic Club, said Muratsuchi has a
chance to pick up voters who backed Mintz since Mintz ran as a social moderate. But Huey dismissed such a scenario.
“I can’t see Al picking up any of the Mintz voters,” Huey said. “The Mintz voters understood that we have an economic crisis. We’ve got to be able to do away with unnecessary regulations that are killing jobs.”
Huey, a political consultant and operator of a direct marketing firm, plans to pound his anti-regulation message against Muratsuchi.
“Al is career politician. He’s spent his whole career being a bureaucratic,” said Huey, who said his 35 years running a small business is the best experience for knowing what the economy needs.
Muratsuchi said he plans to run on the fact that he is the only candidate with any local, elected experience. Huey lost to Janice Hahn in a runoff election lat year for Congress.
Muratsuchi said the contrast between himself and Huey could not be more clear. “I’m a moderate Democrat and he’s a far right extremist,” Muratsuchi said. “We’re going to make sure voters know he’s an ideologue and a far right extremist… The problem with Sacramento is the place is dominated by ideologues who care about pledges more than they do about governing.”
Huey estimated that he received as much as 65 percent of the independent vote Tuesday, and said attacking him as an ideologue won’t work.
“The idea of an ideologue, it’s part of that rhetoric that will turn voters off,” Huey said. “They’ll recognize that California is failing and to say that [someone who wants to] to create jobs by bringing businesses back is an ideologue, they won’t go for it.”
