TIME MAGAZINE(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — After months of waiting for a candidate of their own, California Democrats were anticipating an announcement Tuesday from state Attorney General Jerry Brown, who is expected to enter the race for governor. The former two-term governor has held to his own timeline and approach to politics as Republicans who are seeking their party's nomination have been campaigning for nearly a year. See TIME's California covers. If he announces as expected, Brown will become the party's presumed nominee in this year's governor's race because there are no other serious contenders in the Democratic primary. The candidate filing deadline is March 12. Brown's entrance into the race would require that he start spelling out his vision for California and showing Democrats how he intends to reinvent himself for a new generation of voters. Brown did not have any events scheduled Tuesday but was expected to speak to reporters on Wednesday. "Stay tuned," campaign spokesman Sterling Clifford said. Brown, 71, argues that a seasoned politician is the only one who can cut through the political gridlock that has strangled Sacramento. See the best business deals of 2009. His legacy of public service and his family's political background — his father was governor from 1959 to 1967 and his sister was state treasurer from 1990 to 1994 — give Brown high name recognition in California and helped him edge out any other challengers without even formally entering the race. It also has helped him raise $12 million, a sum that in normal circumstances would be robust for a candidate who faces no serious primary challenger. But Brown is likely to face a deep-pocketed Republican in the general election, regardless of who wins that party's nomination. Front-runner Meg Whitman, the former eBay chief executive, has already given her campaign $39 million. State Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner has given his campaign $19 million. Brown has largely refrained from outlining his positions on a host of issues facing the state, although he has said he will not support tax increases to help fill the $20 billion shortfall projected through June 2011. Brown has devoted most of his life to politics. He was secretary of state before he ran for governor, made three attempts for the Democratic presidential nomination, ran for U.S. Senate in 1982 and served two years as state party chairman in the 1990s. See more like this at www.ProgressivePost.com |
