Brett Murdock, Democrat for Congress
In a blog post a few days ago, I laid out the simple case against Ed Royce, the 12-term Republican who represents parts of Orange and Los Angeles Counties in southern California. He is a far-right ideologue who does not represent the values or needs of his district.
Brett Murdock was recruited by the DCCC to run against Royce this year and has gathered great endorsements:
- California Democratic Party
- International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 11
- Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO of San Bernadino and Riverside Counties
- ILWU Southern California District Council
- Orange County Labor Federation, AFL-CIO
- Roofers and Waterproofers Union Local 36
- Orange County Young Democrats
- Chino Valley Democratic Club
- Evolve California
- Sharon Quirk-Silva
- Anaheim Councilmember Jordan Brandman
- Former Mayor of Irvine, Sukhee Kang
Brett served in government for the city of Brea both on the City Council and as Mayor. He is a lawyer in private practice and also teaches American Government as a part-time professor at Cal State Fullerton . A key theme of Brett’s work, both in his legal practice and in government, has been advocating for the most disadvantaged among us. He has focused on special needs children and adults in his pro bono legal work and is president of a non-profit providing housing for ultra low-income senior. One of his initiatives while in city government was to spearhead recreation facilities for the poorest areas of the city.
Reflecting his fairly-red (but getting blue-er) district Brett is a Democrat who strikes a fiscally-moderate stance of middle-class tax cuts and pro-free-enterprise. But he is also a solid progressive on many of our most important issues:
- Supports gun control
- Is pro-choice
- Supports a path to citizenship
- Believes that global warming presents a threat to our future
- Believes that preserving LGBT rights is essential to everyone’s liberty.
In other words, Brett is vastly superior to Ed Royce in a district that has historically been the Alabama of California.
Brett is running a low-key campaign and the conventional wisdom is that defeating one of the most senior Republicans in congress, who is generally perceived to be “one of the sane ones”, is a low-probability venture. But Ed Royce is extremely conservative for California and he only won by 40,000 votes (out of 252,000) in 2012, the last Presidential election year. We all know the headwinds facing Republicans up and down the ballot this year and Ed Royce has more than his share of them. I will put up another post soon that outlines the factors that line up to make the 39th district much more competitive this year.
In the meantime, even a few dollars will make a difference in Brett Murdock’s campaign to take out the “most conservative” congressman in California!
