San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan has plans to end homeless camping and appeal to California’s center-right political sphere. But his efforts hinge on the City Council’s help to pass his policies — and some question whether the District 3 special election has exposed cracks in that support.
Early election results have been shaky for Mahan’s favored candidate in the race, Matthew Quevedo, his deputy chief of staff. Quevedo at one point fell into third place behind two other candidates supported by Mahan’s critics in the Democratic Party, despite having raised the most campaign cash. Some say it signals voters’ repudiation of the mayor’s promises to arrest homeless people and divert affordable housing money toward temporary shelter.
“I think the skepticism about Mahan’s accountability platform has been growing over the last several years,” Bob Staedler, a principal at San Jose-based land use and development consulting firm Silicon Valley Synergy, told San José Spotlight.
Quevedo declined to comment.
Only the top two vote getters will make it to the June runoff election to replace disgraced Councilmember Omar Torres and represent the city’s embattled downtown core. It’s still too early to tell if Mahan’s pick will make the cut, especially with razor-thin margins fueling talk of a recount.
Mayor’s future goal
Staedler, who unsuccessfully sought a temporary appointment to the District 3 seat, is skeptical Mahan will lose council majority support on his recent proposals, which includes linking pay raises for city executives to job performance. He added Mahan could still make a District 3 loss work for him politically.
“He can say, ‘My city had special interests come after me,’ and politically this gives him the alleged impetus to run for governor. He wins either way,” Staedler said. “But it would also be a huge black eye.”
Mahan blamed his disappointment with the race on special interests, with political action committees raising more than $800,000 in total to support or oppose Quevedo and Chavez-Lopez.
“I have never seen a council primary with such a wave of special interest money,” Mahan told San José Spotlight on election night.
Mahan argued Quevedo’s trailing position showed a contrast between his favored candidate and Latina Coalition of Silicon Valley Executive Director Gabby Chavez-Lopez, the top vote-getter, who he called the “establishment” candidate with special interest backing from oil and gas corporations such as Chevron and PG&E. Yet Quevedo had more than $300,000 in special interest money working to get him elected, including the California Association of Realtors and Silicon Valley Biz PAC.
“All I’ll say is, I disagree with that assessment,” Councilmember David Cohen told San José Spotlight. “Both sides had a lot of special interest spending to help and hurt candidates. I believe the voters tune those out — especially in a low turnout election.”
Cohen said money and spending only go so far in special elections.
“It’s about connecting with people,” he said. “The results this week are an indication of the hard work the candidates did to get people to the polls.”
Staedler agrees, arguing Quevedo is the establishment via Mahan, who was also seen as an establishment successor to former Mayor turned Congressman Sam Liccardo.
“It doesn’t get any more establishment than that,” Staedler said.
The mayor of Northern California’s largest city denied the notion that voters are rejecting his platform, arguing he ran on the proposal that public camping should not be a choice.
“(These proposals are) not new,” Mahan said on election night. “I ran on the idea that we should reject solutions that cost $1 million in order to take six years to build and should instead invest in basic dignified shelter for every person on our streets. I ran on the notion that when shelter and treatment beds are available, we should require people to use them. And I ran on the idea that we as public officials should not get raises without results.”
Cohen said he doesn’t believe the election will work to solidify factions on the council. But he said it may impact council support for Mahan’s homelessness and shelter policies.
“That’s because there’s nobody getting elected that’s automatically going to support those proposals, but will be considering them on their merit,” he said. “It seems to me that this election just shows that people are not going to rely on the word of the mayor or anybody else. They’re going to rely on their connections with the candidates.”
There’s speculation Mahan is eyeing a higher office — though he recently told Politico he’s not running for governor.
He’s worked to distinguish himself as a “common sense” foil to California Democrats, appearing multiple times for TV news interviews as far as Southern California to challenge the state’s housing-first approach to homelessness. He’s spearheaded campaigns for tough-on-crime measures such as the voter-approved Prop. 36, which ramped up criminal punishments for petty theft. He publicly ruffled Gov. Gavin Newsom’s feathers about the measure last August. Later, he appeared on FOX LA to cast doubt on the governor’s attempt to strategize Californian political resistance to another Donald Trump presidency.
“When you just talk to people about how they feel about their city, their quality of life — they want change,” Mahan said on election night. “They want to see everybody out of encampments. They want safer streets and cleaner streets and want City Hall to be more accountable for the delivery and results that are effective in their daily lives. I’m going to support common sense candidates like that in every race across the city.”
Contact Brandon Pho at [email protected] or @brandonphooo on X.
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