Gov. Brown to barnstorm state, releases new ad touting accomplishments

With election day just over a week away, Gov. Jerry Brown is hitting the campaign trail Monday and is debuting a new television ad in which for the first time he makes an explicit argument for his election to an unprecedented fourth term.

Though the ad, like all the spots Brown has released this year, focuses on the water-bond measure and state rainy-day fund proposals on the November ballot, it also features the governor touting his accomplishments during the past four years.

“We’ve made tremendous progress, stabilized the budget. Once again we’re creating jobs and supporting schools,” Brown says, speaking directly to the camera in the 30-second ad. “With Propositions 1 and 2, we can lock in progress for the future.”

“Prop. 1, the water bond, protects water so we’re prepared for drought. Prop. 2, the rainy-day fund, saves money in good times so we don’t have to cut vital services when money runs dry,” he says. “Save water. Save money. Save for the future.”

At noon on Monday, Brown will rally volunteers at the Alameda County Democratic Party Headquarters in Pleasanton, Calif., the first of several campaign events around the state in the lead-up to the Nov. 4 election.

The moves are the most overt the Democratic incumbent has made in his own reelection bid. He has virtually ignored his little-known GOP opponent, former U.S. Treasury official Neel Kashkari, and focused his efforts on getting voters to approve the two propositions.

Kashkari, trailing in the public opinion polls by double digits, tweaked his controversial television ad that features imagery of a drowning child. In the original version of the ad, Kashkari is referring to a recent court ruling about teacher tenure in a dispute in which Brown sided with the powerful California Teachers Assn., but the connection was unclear to a casual observer.

In the new version, Kashkari added text over the footage of the young boy struggling in a swimming pool that reads: “Failing schools sinking our children’s futures. They begged for rescue. But Jerry Brown betrayed them.”

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