Political Career
In addition to his professional career, Westly has maintained a concurrent career in the Democratic Party. At age 23 in 1981, he was elected as Northern Treasurer of the California Democratic Party, the youngest party officer ever. He was subsequently elected State Controller of the California Democratic Party in 1983, Northern Chair of the California Democratic Party in 1985, and Vice Chair of the California Democratic Party in 1987. In 1989, he was defeated as State Chair of the California Democratic Party by former Governor Jerry Brown. Despite that loss, Westly continued his activism within the party by being elected to the Democratic National Committee in 1988, as the highest vote getter, and was reelected in 1992, 1996, and 2000.
Westly ran for California State Controller in 2002 against State Senator Tom McClintock and won by a margin of 22,730 votes (out of 7,258,758 votes cast). Westly garnered 3,289,839 (45.4%) votes while McClintock won the support of 3,273,028 (45.1%) people. Three other candidates won 695,891 (9.5%) votes.
Read more about this topic: Steve Westly
Famous quotes containing the words political and/or career:
“Our democracy, our culture, our whole way of life is a spectacular triumph of the blah. Why not have a political convention without politics to nominate a leader who’s out in front of nobody?... Maybe our national mindlessness is the very thing that keeps us from turning into one of those smelly European countries full of pseudo-reds and crypto-fascists and greens who dress like forest elves.”
—P.J. (Patrick Jake)
“John Brown’s career for the last six weeks of his life was meteor-like, flashing through the darkness in which we live. I know of nothing so miraculous in our history.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)