California Ballot Breakdown

Local Edition: Berkeley and Vallejo

First: Wayne Hsiung is mounting a left-flank challenge to incumbent Berkeley mayor Jesse Arreguin that is quite well-financed and -organized for someone who’s never held office.
Hsiung’s also a hardcore animal rights activist, leading a group some ex-members describe as cult-like, who co-authored a strategy document calling for supporters to move to one city, take over its government, and work from there towards getting legal personhood for animals into the US constitution.
Needless to say, this has not made it into the campaign’s literature.

Also: the Vallejo mayoral campaign of Hakeem Brown is bleeding endorsers, after a nonprofit news outlet documented his extensive history of domestic violence charges and convictions.

  • 00:55 Frances Dinkelspiel is co-founder and executive editor of Berkeleyside, where she’s covering Berkeley elections. 
  • 14:30 Geoffrey King is an attorney and journalist, and founder of Open Vallejo, a new non-profit newsroom. 

Music credits:

T Shirt Weather” by Poddington Bear, used under CC BY-NC 3.0 US

 “Something Elated” by Broke for Free, used under CC BY 3.0 US

Browse through all our election segments here. Subscribe to get new ones with Apple PodcastsGoogle PodcastsTuneInSpotify, or by pasting this link into any podcast player.