Editor’s Note: San Diego Jewish World plans to announce its official endorsements in October for national, state, and local offices as well as on ballot measures facing voters in the Nov. 3 election. In the meantime, we have invited our regular contributors, as well as members of the San Diego County Jewish community, to offer their personal endorsements, giving positive reasons for voting for a candidate of their choice. We anticipate we will receive endorsement columns from both sides of the aisle, and pro and con arguments regarding ballot measures. We hope they will be of assistance to our readers. If you’d like to submit an endorsement OpEd, please send it to donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com. Remember, we are looking for positive reasons to vote for your candidate, not attacks on the opponent! — Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO –Two years I wrote an opinion piece for San Diego Jewish World supporting my friend, Tim Nader, for San Diego Superior Court judge. I pointed out his superb qualifications for the position. The unstated subtext for the piece was that as a member of the San Diego Jewish Community, who had known Tim for more than 35 years, was vouching for the personal character of a Lebanese American lawyer.
In addition to his sterling legal background, I pointed out that as mayor of Chula Vista he had been responsible for hiring a Jewish woman as the city’s full-time environmental consultant. I noted that Tim’s father, a Lebanese Christian who immigrated as a child to the United States in the 1920s, helped liberate a Nazi death camp. I pointed out that Tim’s personal philosophy is related to our own duty to repair the world.
Tim Nader lost that election, but nothing I said in 2018 has changed. Now he is again running for judge, and I am enthusiastically supporting him.
I can again point out that Tim is a Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude graduate of the University of California, and that he also received his law degree from that school. I can note again that when I supervised his work in the California Attorney General’s Office, I found that his legal reasoning and analysis were outstanding.
But I want to tell you something new. I was contacted by a representative of the San Diego County Bar who was preparing the Association’s recommendation in Tim’s contest. I was asked the usual questions about qualifications, but then was asked one I had not expected: What has Tim Nader done to serve under-represented communities? I paused for a second – a long second.
Then I told the questioner about the South Bay region of San Diego. The area is poor and predominantly Latino but includes many minority groups. When students there look for higher education, for many their best hope is Southwestern Community College. But in 2010 the school was at risk of losing its accreditation, and with that the students of south San Diego County were at risk of losing their best chance to improve themselves.
Tim Nader ran for – hell, he was drafted – to run for the college’s governing board. He was not only elected, but as a rookie board member he was chosen to be the district board’s chair. His new colleagues knew he could run a meeting in a fair and civil manner.
Tim had to drain the swamp. Former district employees and vendors were convicted of crimes. A new chancellor was chosen. The school’s accreditation was saved, as were the hopes of minority youths in the South Bay.
That is pretty good service.
Tim has practiced criminal, civil, and family law in the state courts. Those areas make up the bulk of the superior court’s work. His opponent has primarily been a federal criminal attorney. So, Tim would be ready to do the job on his first day on the bench. We need to have judges like Tim who combine compassion and commitment to human rights with understanding of the need for the rule of law and for public safety.
This race is county-wide, so you can vote in it regardless of where in San Diego you live. It is difficult to raise money to reach 1.8 million registered voters, and particularly hard to do this in a COVID-19 year. This may be the only contact you will have about the race, but if you would like to find out more about Tim, please go to www.timnader.com
I hope you give this judicial contest the consideration it deserves and will also talk to your friends about it.
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Howard Wayne is a former Democratic state Assemblyman who represented San Diego.