November 14, 2012 – Last week, voters in America’s eighth-largest city may have put the brakes on reform at city hall. Republican city councilman Carl DeMaio—a libertarian crusader who ran for mayor of San Diego pledging to change how government provides services and pays its workers—lost to veteran Democratic congressman Bob Filner, 51.4 percent to 48.6 percent. Democrats across California made nearly a clean sweep of close races, thanks to President Obama’s coattails, which lifted turnout among young voters. In San Diego, DeMaio’s candidacy was also undercut by his frosty relationship with popular outgoing mayor Jerry Sanders, a Republican, and by his own homosexuality, a topic that Filner brought up repeatedly. In the aftermath, local Republicans worry that Filner will work with public-employee unions and a rogue state agency, the California Public Employees Retirement Board, to unravel the major reforms that DeMaio, Sanders, and the local business community have already enacted.
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