By Ken Stone
Times of San Diego
SAN DIEGO — When Sara Jacobs first ran for Congress in 2020, she was hammered as being a carpetbagger and a Qualcomm heiress.
One fellow Democrat said: “We need more democracy in this country, not more oligarchy.”
It didn’t work. She won easily.
Now comes Mayor Bill Wells of El Cajon, a Republican seeking to oust Jacobs in the 51st District with similar talking points.
Tuesday night at the U.S. Grant Hotel, where partying Republicans booed Democrats as their names were displayed in county results, Wells said:
“Sara is an outsider. She comes from a billionaire family. She doesn’t understand what it’s like to be a regular person in San Diego County. Now maybe that’s not her fault. But I kind of think that people want somebody … who’s had trouble paying the rent some time (and) had to get on the phone with SDG&E and make arrangements.”
As all five of the county’s congressional incumbents cruised to November runoffs, Wells (trailing Jacobs by 16 percentage points) shared his path to victory.
Democrat Sara Jacobs has represented the 51st Congressional District since 2021. He said he won mayor with 84% and 71% of the vote in his two elections despite El Cajon leaning blue. (Democrats outnumber Republicans 38% to 30% in the city.)
“So I think it can be done and I think it’s really just a matter of talking to the people in ways that they care about,” he told Times of San Diego. “You know, not telling them what they should care about (but) talking to them and listening to them — finding out what’s bothering them and trying to find solutions to their problems.”
The 51st District is bluer than El Cajon, however — with Dems holding a 43% to 25% edge over Republicans.
Wells, with two years left as mayor, hopes he can build on the $600,000 he’s raised locally.
He hasn’t gotten GOP help financially — locally or from the national party. But he “sure hopes” to.
“I haven’t got any PAC money,” he said.
Wells said he’ll try to win votes by explaining the “stark differences between her and I.”
“I’m a local guy, was born and raised here in a single-parent family,” he said. “Started working when I was 11 and I’ve done every kind of job you can imagine since then up until getting my doctorate and then having my own healthcare company. Raised my kids here. Got married here. Went to church here.”
He said he put himself through San Diego State on work that paid $5 an hour.
“That’s not a bad thing — a lot of people do that,” he said. “But I think that when you’re a billionaire and you’ve never had a real job, I think it’s really hard to say that you understand the people that you’re supposed to represent.
“Like I said — it’s not her fault, but I think part of my job is to point out those differences and to really ask people: Do you want an elitist running your world or do you want somebody who’s your servant, not your master?”
In other races, incumbents took strong, early leads in Tuesday’s primary and appeared certain to be in November’s general election runoff.
In the heavily red 48th District in East County, Republican Rep. Darrell Issa led Democrat Stephen Houlahan 61.1% to 15.2% with Democrat Whitney Shanahan in third at 11.9%.
In Issa’s former district — the 49th, which straddles north coastal San Diego and south Orange counites — Democratic Rep. Mike Levin had 50.7% of the vote to Republican auto dealer Matt Gunderson’s 25.7%. (The GOP’s Margarita Wilkinson and Kate Monroe trailed with 11.3% and 9.7% respectively.)
“Huge thanks to our incredible volunteers and campaign team for their hard work,” Levin said on X. “Because of you, we had fantastic election results this evening!”
Six-term Rep. Scott Peters, a Democrat who represents the 50th District in coastal San Diego County, led Republican challenger Peter Bono 56.9% to 24.1%.
Another big early lead was held in the 52nd District by Rep. Juan Vargas with 63.9% to Republican challenger Justin Lee’s 36.1%.
The top two candidates in each race advance to the November general election.
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Ken Stone is a contributing editor of Times of San Diego, with which San Diego Jewish World trades stories under auspices of the San Diego Online News Association.