CA-10: Garamendi Poised For Victory, Only Woods Has Momentum

As John Garamendi touts in a diary here, the most recent SurveyUSA poll shows the Lt. Governor with a comfortable lead in the CA-10 primary set for Tuesday. I am surprised that another candidate hasn't talked it up as well, however, because the only candidate showing movement from the previous SurveyUSA poll is Anthony Woods.

In fact, this new poll, from 8/26-8/27, has Garamendi at 25%, Sen. Mark DeSaulnier at 16%, Asm. Joan Buchanan at 12% and Anthony Woods at 9%, with 5% undecided. The last poll, from 8/10-8/11 was Garamendi 26%, DeSaulnier 15%, Buchanan 12% and Woods 5%. I don't think there are enough undecided voters to push Woods much further, but he's running the only race drawing undecided voters, if the polls can be believed.

Among those who have already voted, the numbers are similar: Garamendi 27%, DeSaulnier 18%, Buchanan 13% and Woods 10%.

Certainly, Garamendi looks very strong for victory, and there aren't likely to be enough voters Tuesday to favor a late riser, but Anthony Woods is running the only race moving from no built-in support to a credible challenge. As for the relative flatness of the two state legislators, I'd say the choice by Sen. DeSaulnier to decide on a monomaniac focus on Garamendi's residency issue, which simply has not moved voters in numerous other instances, instead of giving voters a reason to support him, would offer some answer. Buchanan has run a self-funded campaign focused mainly on finding female support, but not necessarily a larger message. In an environment with three safe or fairly lackluster campaigns, the expected form is holding. Only Woods appears to be taking in new support, but his uphill battle was perhaps too high to climb.