San Diego Politics: Do Endorsements Matter?

We will have an update on the new stadium plan and just ahead everyday there is a new political endorsement on the national stage former presidential candidate Jeb Bush just endorsed Senator. Ted Cruz for President. Locally both the Republican and Democratic San Diego County parties of now endorsed candidate were there any surprises in those endorsements and do they make a difference to voters? Joining me is that cows are is a professor of political science welcome Thad. Coral welcome. It is good to be back. Let's go to some of the endorsements + me by Democrats in the most closely Ross traces the party endorsed Chris Ward for District 3. What you think about that Carl? When you look at city Council endorsements they come with that old reason you do endorsements is to identify the parties behind going into the primary they hope they make it to the runoff election, and to mobilize support. You can now access people to help you put up yard signs you can access money. So when city Council races particularly were a lot of voters may not be up on the partisan it filiation to the good sign to Democrats and also it is a red light to Republicans. I believe if I am right fact that there is no Republican running industries all right? Yes, I have followed that was closely that Carl is absolutely right the endorsement helps and hurt so research and experiments in the ones I have done so it helps members in your own party but it helps to with the opponent party. The curious thing about with the Democratic Party did last night as they did not endorse in the city attorneys race or in the district 9 race. Both of which have multiple Democratic candidate running. Carl, why indeed would a party decide not to give the endorsement to a particular person and therefore sort of, I guess in a way, solidify Democratic votes towards that one person? There a couple of reasons Marine first you don't know will win and you do not want to offend and eventual winner and I can if you have a lot of Democrats running in a have a good chance for two or one to make the runoff, and you want to support whoever wins the primary to go to the runoff. To number of the bridge. Unless there is a real reason from past history and people with experience to support a particular Democrat or a particular Republican the parties are more [INAUDIBLE] look at the national level for who you should endorse at the political level for president. So this is a strategy for if you have more candidates of the opposing party in the primary race it makes it less likely that the Republican will run off with 51% of the vote? It is a possibility got to stop or push a runoff but also when you say the party is if there is one strategist sitting here trying to figure out what is going to be most optimal for the party, that is not how these endorsements work. They are the collections of lots of party activists each of whom have their own party loyalties and so is always the city attorneys race car you saw some have years coming out and arguing in favor of no endorsement because their favorite candidate was not close to getting the endorsement and that brought their followers along and so what you see is this is a many election and a fight within the group of act of this not just a decision by one strategist to decide what is best for the party as a whole. So this is almost like a mini caucus? Absolutely. You see the same kind of site in nominating conventions they look very much like Nevada or I/O dial political Caucus. With me to the Republican side, there really are no big surprises here, we have Kevin Faulconer getting the nod for mayor, Ray Allison city Council District 1, Mark are seeing Council District 5, Scott Sherman in Council District 7, and Robert Hickey gets the endorsement of the county GOP heart party for city attorney is the only Republican running in that race. This is a more sort of straightforward down the line endorsement by the GOP, is that emblematic of the difference between the two parties in San Diego County Carl? It is when you have one candidate running what Republicans have been trying to do too maintain a diminishing population in San Diego is unified like you saw behind Kevin Faulk in the special election. Now you have for County Board of Supervisors Diane Jacobs was facing a Republican challenger from her own party and the partier jumped on that and to the status of women and backed them up immediately but now she has got the seat. It's going to be her. They may have burned a bridge there. Back in the film alert election the party could has chosen Nathan Fletcher and called a mile and Fletcher bolted the party. Increasingly the party locally has been trying to get one person to run so they can try to avoid the runoff election when they do weaker in November. Now that you have actually researched what kinds of endorsement really make a difference in the candidates outcome. What have you found? What we have found is that endorsements matter but not nearly as much as you see the first glance if you just needed to get the party endorsement they get 40 percentage points better than candidates to do not get in and endorsement and that primary. If the party is hopping on the bandwagon of a strong candidate the way to figure out how much the endorsement actually gives a boost to the candidate is to look at people with barely getting endorsements are barely lost the endorsement the people on either side of whatever threshold of votes they needed to capture the endorsement. When you do that, it turns out that that sort of 1% percentage over the threat will translate into about a tent percentage boost at the polls. That is consistent with experiments and run the endorsements. There are 10 percentage points more in the primary. The endorsements that really make the difference that what you have found? This is an Cal of one your assemblies and and congressional. Okay. And a candidate who decided the endorsement win? Yes. You see that all the time. Donald Trump is doing well because he is antiestablishment you can have a congressional Doug Duncan Hunter a few weeks ago so a lot of things voters make up their mind and high-profile races with a get to know candidate personally, in the below the radar races like an assembly district or a city Council, where who knows who these four Democrats are having a party endorsement can give a big boost. Okay have been speaking with that cows are who is that you see San Diego and Carl Luna I and director of the Institute for civil cynic engagement at U. S. the. Thank you both very much. Thank you. Thank you.