This week in politics: Special election and flock cameras debate

Well, this week, a winner was declared in the race to fill the remainder of former Congressman Eric Swalwell's term in the East Bay. State Senator Ayesha Wahab will head to Washington D. C. To represent parts of Alameda County in Congress for at least the next 4.5 months. But she will face off against opponent Melissa Hernandez again in November in the general election to see who will continue to represent that district for the following two years. To talk more about this and more of the week's political news. I want to welcome KTVU political analyst Nolan Higdon back to the show. Good morning, Nolan. Good morning. A lot of discussion about how close the District 14 special election was. What were the things that ultimately tipped the scales in Wahab's favor? Well, I think one of the things that really stands out is that this race is kind of a microcosm of what we're seeing across the Democratic Party right now, where these primaries are pitting so called establishment figures like Melissa Hernandez against what are seen as more progressive candidates like Ayesha Wahab. Uh, and it looks like it as is the case nationally in a lot of cases, the progressive seemed to edge out the victory here. Um, we see this across the country. This is one of the highest years on records where sitting incumbents have lost in primaries. I think there's a general feeling amongst the electorate that they just want change. Wahab was able to position herself as that change. Yeah, well, I was seen as the more progressive of the two candidates. They're both Democrats. Hernandez, the more moderate Democrat. National media focused and focused in and pointed out the fact that there was a lot of lobbying money that went into the campaign in the final weeks, specifically to the Hernandez campaign. How significant a role did that play? Because this was closer than what the Wahab campaign thought. Yeah, we've seen this over and over again. It made headlines this week that Alex Veneman, who was running in Florida, for example, lost despite out fundraising his opponent 16 to 1. Traditionally, more money and big endorsements are really good for a candidate. But there's a portion of the electorate, the Democratic Party, who now is skeptical of these endorsements and skeptical of people's ability to raise money, wondering if that means they have other interests in serving the people. And so it's one of those rare, I think, election circumstances were right now, depending on where this money comes from and who you get endorsements from, it actually could work against you. As we've seen, even some candidates reject endorsements from former Vice President Kamala Harris because they don't want to be seen as an establishment figure. And some of Wahab's supporters did point out that a lot of that lobbying money that went to Hernandez's campaign came from AIPAC, which has been in the spotlight in some of these other congressional races. Yes, AIPAC, at least in these Democratic primaries, increasingly seems to be the kiss of death for a lot of these candidates in that if they take AIPAC money, it's used against them. A lot of opponents of AIPAC have organized online. You can look up how much AIPAC money supposedly a candidate has taken. And so we see some candidates running away from AIPAC right now. And I think there's a debate in the Democratic Party very clearly about what the future role of the United States is in terms of its relationship with Israel. And AIPAC is a part of that discussion. And just to remind our viewers that there are two races and two elections with these same two candidates, Wahab and Hernandez. The one Wahab just won was to fill the remainder of Eric Swalwell's term, which ends in January of next year. But then there's a general election for a two year term for this same district in November. And I want to show a statement from the Hernandez campaign about that second race. She says, quote in a statement, The election for California 14 in November will be in the new district lines, adding 26,000 Dublin voters who didn't have the chance to vote for me in August. We're looking forward to winning this on November 3rd with a more favorable district and a much larger electorate game on. Is she right to be so optimistic? I don't know necessarily she's right to be so optimistic. But you know, I think what she's trying to do there is excite her voters. Clearly she lost. That's gonna lead to a lot of folks being skeptical of campaign, maybe not want to work for her, give money. And so she's using a promise like this. Like, no, no, this is a different election. There's different voters. We have new opportunity. I think it's a way to it to excite voters. But you never know what's gonna happen. November is a long ways away, politically speaking. So we'll have to see how this goes. All right, well, let's switch gears and talk about a subject that's gaining steam as a bipartisan grassroots issue. There seems to be a growing focus on license plate readers or flock camera systems in cities across the country, with politicians on the left and right of the political spectrum, criticizing the use of these cameras as a tool for mass surveillance. Flock supporters, meanwhile, say this is an important crime fighting tool. Here in the Bay Area, we have cities that have had these cameras for more than a decade. Is this going to be a campaign issue that we'll see in the election heading up to November? I think so. I think, uh, you know, there's a general feeling amongst the electorate. I think this goes left, right and center where we've seen just a skepticism of big tech or this idea that the tech is making our lives necessarily easier. And I think flock cameras are a part of that. These cameras, you know, do practice surveillance largely in an effort to try and identify crime or locate criminals. But they have all sorts of problems. One being sometimes they get false positives. So we've had people get cited for crimes when they weren't even in the area. They also are rife with abuse. We have the story is supposedly of a law enforcement officer who used flock to stock a former partner of theirs. So I think a lot of those concerns are what are feeding people's disdain for these flock cameras. And also the United States has a culture of believing in privacy. If you read the Constitution, a lot of it is trying to protect these concepts of privacy and flock cameras are out there seemingly just interrupting people's privacy. And I think that's why you see such a backlash to them. And I think just the prevalence and understanding of how prevalent A. I. Software now is in all technology, including the flock cameras, adds an extra layer of privacy concerns for some people. I think if a I wasn't as big as it is now, flock may be just going under the radar as it has for over a decade here in the Bay Area. KTVU political analyst Nolan Higdon. We always appreciate your time and your insight this morning. Thanks for being here. Always a pleasure. Thank you.