Upset winner Gray Davis on California’s last wide-open governor’s race
The year was 1998. Bill Clinton was in the White House, Titanic was packing movie theaters and a startup with a funny name, Google, was just launching.
In California, voters were choosing their next governor.
There was great anticipation surrounding a political heavyweight and whether she’d jump into the race. There was a rich businessman whose free-spending ad blitz made him inescapable on the airwaves. And an underdog who stayed in the contest in defiance of steep odds and, seemingly, common sense.
Those elements could very well describe the current gubernatorial race, which, as it happens, is the most wide-open since that volatile campaign a generation ago.
The outcome was one few anticipated, with Gray Davis romping to victory in the Democratic primary, then winning the governorship in a landslide.
Less than three months before the June primary, Davis had been running dead last, behind two well-heeled Democrats and the eventual GOP nominee. The number of people who told him to quit would have filled the L.A. Coliseum, Davis recalled this week. But he never considered dropping out; the pressure only made him more determined.
“Sometimes it’s meant to be. Sometimes you get every break,” Davis said. “Sometimes it’s not meant to be and you get no breaks.”
His bottom line: “Anything can happen.”
Of course, no two campaigns are the same.
This gubernatorial contest is being conducted under a system in which the top two vote-getters, regardless of party, will advance to a November runoff. In 1998, California held an “open primary,” under rules later voided by the Supreme Court. All candidates appeared on the same ballot, with the top finishers in each party guaranteed a spot in November.
Beyond that, the world has vastly changed: politically, socially, culturally. (Google is now one of the most valuable companies on the planet, pulling in a record $403 billion in revenue in fiscal 2025.)
Voter attitudes are different. One of Davis’ greatest assets was his position as lieutenant governor; that currency — incumbency and government know-how — no longer trade at the same high value.
The media landscape has fractured — back then newspapers set the political agenda, fewer than half of voters were online and streaming was something mostly done by water. Californians aren’t nearly as tuned in to the governor’s race as they were then.
“There’s a sideshow going on internationally and nationally and people are like, ‘Oh, right, there’s a governor’s race happening,’” said Paul Maslin, who was Davis’ pollster and is now working for Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Betty Yee. “Whereas in ‘98, that was clearly the big act in town.”
Having said all that, luck and an opportune break or two are still key ingredients to political success, as Davis suggested.
In his case, the first stroke of good fortune was Dianne Feinstein’s decision to not run. (This go-round, it was former Vice President Kamala Harris who held the race in suspension until she finally opted out.)
Feinstein, the state’s senior U.S. senator, had nearly been elected governor in 1990 and her lengthy deliberations froze out other potentially strong contenders. Had Feinstein run, she very probably would have blown away the field and made history by becoming the state’s first female governor.
Davis also greatly benefited when a federal court tossed out strict contribution limits, allowing him to go from collecting bite-size donations to much greater sums. Though he was vastly outspent by his two rich Democratic opponents, multimillionaire Al Checchi and then-Rep. Jane Harman, the decision allowed Davis to remain competitive and eventually pay for the statewide ad blitz that is indispensable in California.
Checchi, in particular, barraged voters with an unrelenting flood of ads. (Shades of the omnipresent Tom Steyer.) In one of them, a spot attacking Harman, Checchi included a photo of the lieutenant governor — and not a bad-looking one at that. The glimpse reminded voters that Davis, who was husbanding his resources for a late advertising push, was still in the race. He enjoyed a significant boost in polls.
Still, Checchi and Harman saw each other as the main opponent and their strategists acted — and tailored their advertising and campaign messaging — accordingly. The result was “a murder-suicide, as the term went at the time,” said Garry South, who managed Davis’ campaign. “They decided to focus so much fire on each other and ignore us that we simply slipped through the hole.”
Davis can well relate to those gubernatorial hopefuls in the position he once was — dissed, dismissed and bumping along near the bottom of horse-race polls. Speaking from his law office in Century City, he had this simple advice:
“Follow your heart,” he said. “Do what you think is right.”
“It’s fine for someone else to tell you you should get out, but that’s not their business,” Davis said. “You’re the candidate, and if you think for whatever reason you want to stay in the race, you should stay in the race.”
The ex-governor, who was recalled in 2003 and replaced by Arnold Schwarzenegger, acknowledged his comments won’t please Democrats worried about the party’s large field splintering support, resulting in two Republicans advancing to the November runoff.
But Davis isn’t too worried about that happening. Moreover, he said, it’s easy for those watching from the sidelines to take potshots and offer unsolicited — and not particularly empathetic — advice.
“They’re not running for office,” he said. “Other people are putting themselves on the line. … [If] people have the wherewithal, the courage and the dedication it takes to put themselves in a position to run for office, if they really believe it’s the right thing to do, they should. They should follow their dream.”
Besides which, you never know what might happen come June.
