2 Democrats Vie For Vacant California Assembly Seat

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Two Democrats are competing in a special election Tuesday to fill a Los Angeles seat in the California Assembly.

Wendy Carrillo and Luis Lopez are seeking to represent a district that includes the Echo Park, Silver Lake and Chinatown sections of LA.

Carrillo, a former union organizer and radio host, earned about 22 percent of the vote and finished first of 13 candidates in the October primary where the top two vote-getters advanced. Lopez had about 18 percent in an election that only saw about 10 percent of registered voters cast ballots.

The seat opened when Democrat Jimmy Gomez was elected to Congress after U.S. Rep. Xavier Becerra became state attorney general.

Carrillo, an immigrant from El Salvador who became a legal resident of the United States at age 13, has been endorsed by Gomez and the state Democratic Party.

Lopez, the director of government affairs for City of Hope Medical Center, has won the endorsement of Planned Parenthood and Equality California, an LGBT rights group. He previously ran for the seat in 2012, losing badly to Gomez.

When the winner takes the seat, Democrats will increase their supermajority in the Assembly to 54 of 80 seats.

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