California Assembly District 16
Job Description
This fall, California’s lower legislative chamber will again be filling all 80 of its elected member positions.
Working conditions will depend on the partisan breakdown of all new hires. With the current composition of the Assembly—55 Democrats and 25 Republicans—Democrats are holding on to their two-thirds supermajority by only one seat. A supermajority in both the Assembly and Senate would allow Democrats, if united, to raise taxes, override vetoes, place constitutional amendments on the ballot, and largely ignore their Republican colleagues.
Job duties include:
- Spend months drafting, discussing, and haggling over bills that will affect the lives of all Californians
- Retain the option of waiting until the very last week of session before passing or dumping most of said bills in a flurry
- Spend months drafting, discussing, and haggling over resolutions that will affect the lives of virtually no Californians
- Help craft a multi-billion-dollar budget for the state
- Strive to represent the interests of 500,000 constituents, most of them strangers
Applicants
Rebecca Bauer-Kahan
Law Professor/Mother
Catharine Baker*
California State Assemblymember
HR Note
Incumbent Party: Republican
Democratic vs Republican Voter Registration: 12.7% D
Trump vs Clinton Margin, 2016: 35.2% Clinton
Margin of Victory in Last Election: 11.8%
Top Two Primary Applicants, June 2018: Catharine Baker (56.6%), Rebecca Bauer-Kahan (43.4%)
Democratic vs Republican Vote Share, June 2018: 13.2% R
Democrats have been trying to win this seat back ever since Republican Catharine Baker surprised the political establishment by winning it in 2014, becoming the only GOP legislator from the San Francisco Bay Area. But Baker has built a record as a moderate Republican who collaborates with Democrats (earning the endorsement of gay-rights group Equality California), and handily won re-election in 2016 despite living in a solidly Democratic district. She is being challenged this year by Democrat Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, an attorney who teaches at the Santa Clara University law school and has the support of the Sierra Club.
