Insurance commissioner candidates split key endorsements
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- State Sen. Ben Allen and former San Francisco Supervisor Jane Kim have split major party and labor endorsements, setting up a razor-thin contest for California’s next insurance commissioner.
- The down-ballot race comes as insurers flee California, raise premiums and face backlash over wildfire claims, heightening stakes for homeowners, renters and businesses from Pacific Palisades to the San Francisco Bay Area.
- Allen touts his legislative record and party backing, while labor-favored Kim leads narrowly in polls; with low name recognition, undecided voters could decide whose vision for fixing the market prevails.
State Sen. Ben Allen and former San Francisco Supervisor Jane Kim have split key endorsements, setting up a tight race for California’s next insurance commissioner.
Allen (D-Santa Monica), who represents the Pacific Palisades neighborhood severely damaged in the January 2025 firestorm, received the coveted endorsement last weekend of the California Democratic Party.
Kim, who led the field in June’s crowded primary, was endorsed Tuesday by the California Federation of Labor Unions, an affiliate of the AFL-CIO that represents more than 1,300 state labor unions.
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Parke Skelton, a retired veteran Democratic political consultant, said that he expects the slate mailers, field volunteers and other support that each organization can provide their endorsed candidate will wash out.
“I think it’s going to be very, very close,” he said.
Two Democrats are facing off for the first time in the general election for insurance commissioner due to the open primary system instituted in 2011, in which the two top vote-getters advance regardless of party affiliation.
Kim bested Allen in the primary with 27.4% of the vote to his 19.4%, with an online campaign poll conducted for Allen in July showing that likely voters still prefer Kim by 7 points. But it also found that the general election on Nov. 3 is wide open, with most voters undecided.
Allen secured his endorsement after getting at least 60% of the vote of the party’s executive board at its meeting in San Diego. Kim needed at least two thirds of the 1,000 delegates attending the labor federation’s Oakland convention.
The campaign to succeed outgoing Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara has drawn more attention than usual as insurers have withdrawn from the market and raised rates for several years. There also has been widespread dissatisfaction over how some insurers have handled January 2025 fire claims.
Who will replace Ricardo Lara in the California insurance commissioner’s race? More than a half-dozen candidates, four Democrats and five Republicans, are competing in the election.
Allen, 48, who has served over a decade in the Legislature, has campaigned on a platform that blends cracking down on insurer wrongdoing — citing his legislative record — while trying to fix the market so that more carriers will write policies.
He said his endorsement is a “reflection of the really substantive work that I’ve been doing for years to stand up for consumers and take on tough issues and standing by the fire survivors in my district.”
Allen also is backed by California’s two U.S. senators and the leaders of the state Senate and Assembly.
Kim, 49, a member of San Francisco’s board of supervisors from 2011 to 2019, has touted her advocacy for California’s first $15 minimum wage and making the city’s community college tuition free, among other progressive causes.
The centerpiece of her campaign is a plan to create a state-backed risk pool to handle disaster claims, while making insurance more affordable and available.
“We’ll be able to tell the voters of California that 2.3 million workers are behind this campaign — working Californians that get up every morning, every day, and work really hard,” she said of the endorsement.
Allen is not without labor support, including from the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California and the California Professional Firefighters.
Lorena Gonzalez, president of the labor federation, said that several unions endorsed both candidates but Kim had lot of backing from San Francisco Bay Area unions that knew her through her work on progressive issues in San Francisco.
The California Department of Insurance is seeking to suspend State Farm’s license and fine it millions of dollars, alleging widespread mishandling of L.A. wildfire claims.
She is backed by Bernie Sanders, the Vermont senator and progressive leader.
“I would say there was a lot of discussion about trust. I think our members and our unions trust her, and so I thought that was important,” said Gonzalez, a former Assembly member from San Diego.
Although the California Democratic Party has 10 million members, Skelton said that Kim’s support from labor, including the large Service Employees International Union and California Teachers Assn., could be more substantive.
“The Democratic Party doesn’t spend tons of money disseminating their endorsements,” he said, adding that neither candidate is likely to draw much support from Republicans.
Both candidates said they are campaigning up and down California, but Skelton said neither has enough money to mount a statewide campaign that would substantially raise their name awareness.
Allen raised $295,041 from May 17 to June 30, with $326,573 in cash on hand as of June 30, according to state records. Kim raised $260,852 over the same period with $198,925 in cash on hand as of June 30.
Although Allen can highlight that he is the party nominee in the official state voter guide, Skelton said most voters will walk into the polls not knowing either candidate.
An increasing number of insurance companies have made the decision to stop insuring homes in wildfire-prone California.
“It’s a down-ticket race in a high turnout election,” he said, with the governor’s race and billionaire tax measure on the ballot.
That means voters could place a high regard on each candidate’s ballot designation, he said. In the primary, Kim was listed as “Attorney/Consumer Advocate,” while Allen was identified as “California State Senator.”
“If someone put a gun to my head and then said, ‘Who’s going to win?’ I think my guess is that Jane has a slight advantage,” Skelton said.
