Exception political law attorney Dana Reed send this along. Pardon if the formatting is messed up as this is being posted from a Blackberry PDA:
FROM DANA REED:
"The Democratic primary election to succeed Senator Joe Dunn in the 34th SD (Central Orange County) was expected to be one of the most expensive legislative races in California’s history. Assemblyman Tom Umberg and County Supervisor Lou Correa were poised to re-enact the Gunfight at the OC Corral, and spend over $1,000,000 each in doing so.
The lines were drawn in the sand. Business interests and moderate Democrats were supporting Correa. Trial lawyers and environmentalists were on Umberg’s side. It was going to be fun to watch.
But Correa has shot himself in the foot and his name might not appear on the ballot. If Umberg’s attorneys are successful, Correa will be forced to run as a "write in" candidate, a daunting task at best.
What happened?
Well, the Correa campaign failed to follow the rules in submitting the proper number of signatures on their candidate’s Nomination Documents, and they got caught. You see the Orange County Registrar of Voters simply accepted Correa’s papers without returning those signatures over the maximum number allowed.
And, without those extra signatures, everyone agrees that Correa would not have qualified.
Kudos to the Umberg campaign apparatus for spotting this screw up on the part of Correa’s camp. I bet that in most contested primaries, this type of foul-up would go unnoticed.
Of course the story isn’t over yet. A Sacramento Judge might look kindly upon poor old Lou and let him on the ballot anyway. Those things happen all the time.
But if the Judge is a strict constructionist (the kind of Jurist the GOP usually favors), then Supervisor Correa is toast and we can look forward to a Daucher-Umberg matchup in the Fall.
In the meantime, for a relatively modest expenditure in attorneys’ fees and costs, the Umberg campaign has thrown the Correa campaign completely out of kilter. I suspect that Lou’s fundraising comes to a complete stand-still until this matter is finally resolved.
And I suspect that finger-pointing (a political campaign’s most cherished
tradition) must be rampant."