Attorney Reverses Vow to Fight for Assembly Seat
Attorney Roberta Achtenberg says she will not run against newly elected Assemblyman John Burton in the June 7 primary, reversing her pledge to begin a “long fight” against the old-guard Democrat.
The civil rights attorney told Burton on Thursday, hours after he was sworn in to represent the Eastside of San Francisco, that she does not want Burton’s “energy or the money of the Democratic Party spent on a political battle” over the 16th Assembly District.
“I want them spent on the fight for stopping AIDS, improving delivery of medical services and public education, subsidizing child care, protecting the environment, fighting discrimination and all the other priorities you and I have articulated over the last month,” Achtenberg told Burton in a letter.
Political Comeback
Burton, 55, staged a political comeback on Tuesday, recapturing the Assembly seat he held for a decade and the political career cut short in 1982 when he resigned from Congress to seek treatment for cocaine addiction.
Achtenberg’s decision not to run in the primary in the heavily Democratic district makes Burton the likely winner for the 1988-90 term of the seat, vacated when Mayor Art Agnos was sworn in on Jan. 8.
Achtenberg, 37, director of the Lesbian Rights Project, was a political unknown until she captured 36% of the vote in the special election.
She said after her defeat that the election was just the beginning of a “long fight” and that the June primary would be the next test.
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