San Diego, California’s second-largest city, now has a Republican mayor. In a special election Tuesday, the city elected Republican Kevin Faulconer from the city council to become mayor.
Faulkoner will serve the remaining term of former mayor, Democrat Bob Filner, who resigned after revelations that he harassed women for years. Subsequent revelations showed that the California Democratic Party and leading party and media figures knew of Filner’s behavior, but did nothing about it for years. Filner pled guilty to felony false imprisonment in October 2013.
San Diego becomes the largest city in America with a Republican mayor. He defeated Democrat city councilman David Alvarez easily, 54.5% to 45.5%.
The Republican National Committee notes the significance of Faulkoner’s victory in a statement released today.
“The RNC was proud to work with the California Republican Party to help them implement our new national strategy of precinct-based organizing and targeting low propensity voters. We were able to provide them with a data-driven playbook to guide their turnout strategy, and Hispanic engagement staff talked with voters in precincts where the county party and local candidates hadn’t been in a long time,” RNC chairman Reince Priebus said in the written statement.
“Nationwide, Republicans have made a commitment to grow our party in urban areas and in states Democrats take for granted. Kevin’s victory shows that commitment is paying off. We will take the lessons learned from this race and apply them in races up-and-down the ballot this year. If President Obama and Governor Brown can’t convince voters to support a Democrat in a large city in California, the Democrats’ prospects for November don’t look good.”
More: John Fund writes that Obama’s vaunted turnout machine crashed and burned in San Diego.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member