Christmas Comes Early for Furutani: After losing his first bid for the 55th Assembly seat last year, Warren Furutani looks like he is headed to the Assembly on his second try, after defeating fellow Democrats Mervin Evans and Mike Gipson, city councilman from Carson, to win the Democratic primary.
As a result of the special election on Dec. 11, Furutani garnered 49.2 percent of the votes. Gipson came in second with 38.4 percent. The remaining votes were divided among three other candidates. Furutani was just 150 votes short of avoiding a runoff election scheduled for Feb. 5 in conjunction with the California presidential primary. The runoff will be against Libertarian Herb Peters and American Independent Party candidate Charlotte Gibson. There is no Republican opponent in this heavily democratic district.
A Victory for Cross-Coalition Politics: Furutani, who started his career in the late 1960s, became one of the most vocal leaders working to empower a politically impotent Asian Pacific American community during those times. Whether it was fighting for Japanese redress, against racial discrimination, promoting farm workers’ rights or working with the Martin Luther King movement, Furutani made sure APAs had a presence in these civil rights battles. His fiery oratorical skills put him on equal footing with the other civil rights champions during this era. When he spoke, people listened.
Recent years have shown the California Legislative Black Caucus losing members, while the Latino and APA legislative caucuses have been growing. This is why Laura Richardson’s victory over Furutani for Assembly District 55 in 2006 was a major boost to the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC). When Richardson left the Assembly to fill the late Juanita MacDonald’s congressional seat, the Black Caucus sought to replace Richardson with Mike Gipson, another African American.
What I found disappointing about their decision was that Furutani has been one of the most passionate APAs working on behalf of African American issues. Furutani has endorsed and supported many African American candidates for elected offices. Furutani’s candidacy represented an opportune time for the CLBC to demonstrate the spirit of cross-coalition politics — supporting an individual who has a history and close ties with their community, even though he is not African American.
But the disappointment was overcome by a special kind of leader in the African American community — Assemblyman Merv Dymally. Dymally, an institution in the APA community with former APA staffers such as Miya Iwataki and Ron Low, took a bold step by endorsing Furutani instead of Gipson. Dymally helped raise money and introduced Furutani to district leaders. Dymally’s name also helped galvanize African American voters for Furutani.
Furutani’s close ties with the Latino community also paid off. As protégés of the late Mas Fukai, Furutani and former Long Beach Port Commissioner Carmen Perez shared a deep friendship for many years. The Latino political names popular with APA voters, and who supported Furutani, included: Congress members Lucille Roybal Allard, Xavier Becerra and Hilda Solis, and state senators Gilbert Cedillo, Gloria Negrete McLeod and Jenny Oropeza. Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, Assemblyman Kevin DeLeon and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa also played major roles in this victory.
The anchor of Furutani’s campaign was the APA Legislative Caucus, led by Assemblyman Alberto Torrico, Senator Leland Yee and Assembly members Mike Eng, Ted Lieu and Fiona Ma. Their campaign contributions, their phone calls, and their efforts to bring in volunteers all played a role in this victory. Furutani also was helped by the strong support of state Controller John Chiang and Board of Equalization members Judy Chu and Betty Yee. This united team effort of the California API Legislative Caucus showed that with the right candidate, they can effectively compete against other caucus candidates when it comes to winning legislative races. This is a long time coming.
Furutani’s Valor: When Furutani lost in 2007, his supporters were devastated. Furutani took the loss harder than anyone else, because he felt he disappointed his family, friends and supporters. In APA culture, losing a battle is like losing face in the community. This is often why APAs are afraid to seek public office, because there is a 50-50 chance of losing and the risk is often too hard to bear.
Furutani already lost two high-profile races, once for City Council and once for the state Assembly. Would he want to put himself in a position to potentially lose a third time?
Would he want to put his family and supporters through this agony and pressure for the third time? It took a lot of courage for Furutani to decide to run again, but it paid off. His victory demonstrates that losing should not be deemed a defeat, but as an experience to make one a better candidate the next time around. Hopefully, other APA candidates who have not succeeded the first time can learn from Furutani’s lesson.
A Look at Warren Furutani’s Career
1987-1990s: Member, Los Angeles Unified School District Board of Education
1998-2000: Senior Consultant, Assembly Speaker Antonio R. Villaraigosa
1999-Present: Member, Board of Trustees of the Los Angeles Community College District
2000-2002: Senior Consultant, Assembly Speaker Robert Hertzberg
2002-2004: Senior Consultant, Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson
2004-Present: Senior Consultant, Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez
2006: Primary Candidate for AD-55 (Lost; 45.8%)
December 12, 2007: Democrat Warren Furutani won 49.24 percent of the vote in Tuesday’s special election, outpolling fellow Democrat Mike Gipson by nearly 10 percentage points.