"California candidates pour on negative ads as election nears"

Great to speak with John Wildermuth at the San Francisco Chronicle for this story. 

“With negative ads, it’s more about defeating your opponent than getting yourself elected,” said Jessica Levinson, who teaches election law at the Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. “It’s always easier to say why you don’t like someone.”

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“Hail Mary” ads like Kashkari’s late in the campaign “don’t come from someone who’s a competitive candidate,” Levinson said. “It comes because a candidate decides that some buzz is better than no buzz.”

But it’s also an act of optimism, a sign of a politician’s natural belief that anything is possible until all the votes are counted, she said.