Elections 2004

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca's promotion of an initiative to allow slot machines at card rooms and racetracks could benefit one of his biggest donors, a review of his campaign finances shows. Card clubs, horse tracks and people affiliated with them -- who could profit from the measure if it makes the ballot and passes -- have given Baca $50,000 since he was elected five years ago. While that is a fraction of the $2.

Republican candidate for governor Steve Poizner, who is running as a conservative, took liberal positions on a range of issues related to abortion when he ran for state Assembly in 2004, according to a document obtained by The Times. A questionnaire that Poizner completed for Planned Parenthood Mar Monte, in San Jose, earned him a 100% rating on abortion rights from the group when he ran, unsuccessfully, against Democrat Ira Ruskin in the 21st Assembly District. On the form, Poizner, who is now California's insurance commissioner, said he supported sex education that includes discussion of contraception.

Guy Mato, the former Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy challenging county Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke in the March 2 election, was involved in a major police brutality case against sheriff's deputies in Lynwood in the early 1990s. In 1995, a federal jury ordered Mato to pay $40,826 to Darren Thomas, an African American man from South Los Angeles.

Tens of thousands of protesters descended on Georgia's parliament Friday demanding new elections in the largest popular movement since the 2003 Rose Revolution swept President Mikheil Saakashvili to power with promises of democratic transformation. In a scene that in its sheer numbers bore a remarkable resemblance to the bloodless uprising that toppled the government of Eduard A.

Five months after irascible Californians fired their governor, millions return to the polls today for presidential, U.S. Senate and other primaries, along with statewide votes on school bonds and proposed remedies for the fiscal crisis. With no sign of a competitive presidential primary in California, the leading Democratic contenders ignored it on Monday, dashing instead across three other states that vote today: Ohio, Maryland and Georgia.

A growing dispute among California Republicans over illegal immigration threatens to undercut the party's struggle to recover from the devastating Latino backlash against its support for Proposition 187, the landmark 1994 ballot measure. The March 2 Republican primary has heightened tensions within the party as candidates up and down the ballot sharpen their rhetoric. A conservative faction is in open revolt against steps that Gov.

A black candidate was declared the winner in Quincy after a recount in the racially charged campaign for sheriff in Florida's only majority black county. Morris Young became Gadsden County's first black sheriff since Reconstruction. Young, who had a 70-vote lead going into the recount, defeated Chief Deputy Ed Spooner by 115 votes. He said he would work to unite the racially divided county and convince supporters of Spooner, who is white, that he could do the job.

In a direct challenge to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Indian tribes that own major casinos are embracing what could be a $50-million initiative war to gain casino expansion rights without his consent, tribal representatives said Friday. The initiative, if passed, would unravel deals struck last month by Schwarzenegger and five other tribes authorizing them to expand their gambling operations in exchange for large payments to the state.

An all-star list of businesses has poured more than $15 million into a campaign to pass Proposition 64, an initiative aimed at limiting citizens' rights to file lawsuits under the state's Unfair Competition Law. But the bankrolling of television advertisements by big companies -- including Microsoft Corp., Target Corp. and Pfizer Inc. -- may not spell victory Tuesday for a coalition of large and small employers that wants to stop what it calls "shakedown lawsuits."

With television advertising campaigns intensifying, California voters currently favor two closely watched ballot initiatives -- one authorizing $3 billion in bonds for research using stem cells taken from embryos, and another that would ratify a state law requiring small- and medium-sized businesses to provide health coverage for workers, according to a new Times poll.

It hasn't been much of a political honeymoon for Gov. Christine Gregoire. In a normal political atmosphere, she would have been guaranteed time to convince voters that the 9.5-cent-a-gallon gasoline tax increase she pushed through the Legislature a few days ago was the right thing to do. Before being asked to cast their ballots again, voters might have seen the fruits of her plan to ease the Puget Sound region's mind-boggling transportation problems. But this isn't a normal political world.

The judge presiding over a GOP challenge to Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire's close election said he is not going to be rushed. The state Republican Party had suggested an April 4 trial date. But Superior Court Judge John E. Bridges said in Wenatchee that he would not set a date until both sides had completed discovery, the legal term for the exchange of information. Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi and the GOP contend that Gregoire's victory by just 129 votes out of 2.

A judge ruled Friday that even if Republicans were to win their court challenge of Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire's election, he could not legally order a revote. "The court doesn't have that authority," Chelan County Superior Court Judge John E. Bridges told a packed courtroom in Wenatchee, about 100 miles east of Seattle.

A judge on Wednesday upheld the November election victory of Mayor Dick Murphy, rejecting 5,551 votes for write-in candidate Councilwoman Donna Frye because people did not fill in the oval next to her name as required by state law. "I find that [the] election code ... should be given its plain meaning.... That to cast a vote you have to fill in the oval," said Superior Court Judge H. Michael Brenner from Orange County. "Those votes should not be counted. The challenge fails."

One voter wrote in mayoral candidate Donna Frye's name followed by three exclamation points. Another crossed out the name of her opponent, Mayor Dick Murphy, and wrote in Frye's name. A third voter scribbled "No," next to Murphy's name, and wrote Frye's name. None of those votes -- and many like them -- counted for Frye, Registrar of Voters Sally McPherson testified Tuesday, because voters failed to darken the accompanying oval as required by state law.

Two of Mayor James K. Hahn's challengers stepped up their attacks on his record and ethical standards Tuesday as one proposed toughening campaign money laws and the other unveiled a plan to hire new police officers. Taking shots at Hahn from the steps of City Hall were Councilman Antonio Villaraigosa, who released his ethics reform proposal, and Sherman Oaks lawyer Bob Hertzberg, who put out his police hiring plan hours later.

A sense of arrival rippled along the avenues of Little Saigon on Wednesday as newly elected Republican Assemblyman Van Tran placed a bouquet of pink carnations at the foot of the Vietnam War Memorial in Westminster. He lighted incense and placed it inside an urn with a statue of an American and a South Vietnamese soldier -- a symbol of lasting friendship between the countries -- rearing up behind him. "I'm a product of the Vietnam War," said Tran, 40.

His uncles have been a U.S. president and senators, his father ran for vice president, and his movie star brother-in-law was elected governor of California. Now the political wasp has stung Bobby Shriver. At 50, the nephew of U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and the late John and Robert F. Kennedy and the brother of Maria Shriver, wife of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, is making his first bid for political office -- for the Santa Monica City Council.

Hampered by staff turmoil and a shortage of money, City Councilman Bernard C. Parks is struggling to remain a viable contender for mayor of Los Angeles as supporters fret that he may have botched his campaign. The former Los Angeles police chief entered the race last spring with notable advantages, including a solid base of support among African Americans and a name familiar to voters citywide.

A Republican state senator may not take any official action or get paid because she was not a qualified resident of Kentucky before the election, a judge ruled Friday. Franklin County Circuit Judge William Graham's temporary injunction prohibits Dana Seum Stephenson from "sitting as a state senator, from performing any official duties of the office as state senator, from receiving or accepting any pay for the office of state senator and from participating in the affairs of the General Assembly."