Essential Politics: Villaraigosa to wait it out through this election

April 4, 2016 3 AM PT

I’m Christina Bellantoni. Essential Politics begins today with several quotes that might just illustrate where we are in the presidential race.

“I’m gonna have to see how I was treated. It’s very simple.”

That was Donald Trump on “Fox News Sunday,” refusing to rule out an independent bid for the presidency should someone else become the GOP nominee.

“I am the strongest candidate to defeat Donald Trump.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders making his pitch to Wisconsin Democrats this weekend ahead of Tuesday’s primary.

“California has been uncommonly good to my family.”

Former President Bill Clinton, campaigning here for his wife Hillary Clinton.

“He is not a racist. Absolutely not. They want him to appear that he is, but he’s not.”

That was Melody Jackson of Oildale, Calif., defending Trump as the candidate she’ll vote for on June 7. Brittny Mejia takes readers into the heart of the Central Valley to get at the complicated feelings some of the state’s hardest-hit regions have when it comes to immigration policy and the economy. Don’t miss the video attached to the story.

“Mr. Trump, he’s single-handedly bringing back freedom of speech. He’s enabled students to voice whatever we believe in a thoughtful way.”

College student Jake Lopez on why he is trying to turn classmates into “Trumplicans.” Rosanna Xia takes readers to Westmont College in Santa Barbara to examine what the movement looks like on college campuses.

VILLARAIGOSA’S BIG DECISION

Phil Willon is hearing that former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa plans to wait until after the June 7 primary election — and possibly even after the November election — to announce if he will run for California governor.

Villaraigosa, who recently got engaged, plans to spend most of his time in the coming months helping with Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid, and rallying Democrats against Trump, according to a well-informed source.

The former Democratic mayor also will work on efforts to increase Latino voter turnout.

Villaraigosa has spent the past few months on a “listening tour” up and down the state — and is expected to jump into the 2018 governor’s race.

CAMPAIGN COMING TO CALIFORNIA

Seema Mehta has the details of two additions to the state Republican convention at the end of this month.

Sen. Ted Cruz will speak at a luncheon, and a source tells her Ohio Gov. John Kasich also will join the three-day confab in Burlingame.

Kasich is hiring staff and looking for office space in California in preparation for the state’s June 7 primary, according to his new California co-chairman Rick Caruso, who described the governor’s plan to make a “big push” here.

Mehta also reported on Clinton’s Golden State efforts, about two months before the June 7 primary.

“Remember, I was president the last time we all rose together,” Bill Clinton told a group of his wife’s supporters at the Los Angeles Trade-Technical College on Sunday. The former president was making an economic pitch and hailed California for the minimum wage hike about to become law.

MINIMUM WAGE MONDAY

Within two hours of one another, the governors of California and New York today will sign legislation (gradually) increasing their statewide minimum wages to $15 per hour.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo is scheduled to officially bless his state’s measure at 8 a.m. Pacific time.

At Cuomo’s side just after the ink dries will be Hillary Clinton, campaigning ahead of the New York primary.

Gov. Jerry Brown is scheduled to sign the California measure, which goes into effect in stages until 2022, in downtown Los Angeles at 9 a.m.

George Skelton hints at the Brown-Cuomo rivalry in his Monday column, which also looks at how voters are in a better mood because the Legislature is getting things done.

Patrick McGreevy noticed Friday that five Democrats got campaign checks from the Service Employees International Union the same day they voted to raise the minimum wage.

We’ll be reporting live from Brown’s event on our Essential Politics news feed and also via Snapchat. Are you following us at losangelestimes and latimespolitics? We’ll be watching Cuomo and Clinton on Trail Guide and via @latimespolitics.

And if you’re wondering how your lawmaker voted on California’s wage hike, we’ve got you covered.

WHY FRESNO MATTERS THIS TUESDAY

There’s a little-known special election Tuesday in the Central Valley, and it could turn a blue Assembly seat red for the first time in 40 years, Christine Mai-Duc reports.

The battle — with Fresno City Councilman Clint Olivier, a Republican, and Democrat Joaquin Arambula, an emergency room doctor and son of former assemblyman Juan Arambula, as the top two candidates — finds Republicans with a chance to eke out a win, despite a 20-point voter registration deficit.

The contest is thanks to the surprise resignation of former Assemblyman Henry Perea.

TROUBLE AHEAD FOR TRUMP?

Cruz’s expected strength in Tuesday’s Republican presidential primary in Wisconsin is threatening to obstruct Trump’s path to the nomination and heighten the odds of a contested convention in Cleveland. The senator from Texas is favored to win most of Wisconsin’s 42 GOP delegates at the same time signs are emerging that Cruz is outmaneuvering Trump in battles among party insiders for the loyalty of delegates.

The gender gap is another reason Trump is struggling. Cathleen Decker sees his abortion stumble as a sobering look at his vulnerability — a bracing reminder of what can happen when Trump’s blustery confidence mixes with his lack of experience.

LOOKING AHEAD TWO YEARS

Don’t ask Dianne Feinstein just yet whether she plans to run for a fifth full term in the U.S. Senate.

“I’ve got two years and nine months — ask me that in about a year,” Feinstein said last week as she met with Los Angeles Times editors and reporters. “I’ll give you the answer then.”

Decker reports that Feinstein said her health will be the determining factor, and that she won’t endorse in the race to replace her retiring colleague Sen. Barbara Boxer until after the primary.

She also said that she had not worked much with Sanders despite the nine years they have overlapped in the Senate.

“He, with me at least, has always lived in his own world,” she said. She noted that she’d developed relationships with Republican senators from working alongside them, but not with Sanders. “He’s not as easy to be friendly with.”

TODAY’S ESSENTIALS

— Decker finds the high numbers of Latinos and women in California’s electorate are making things harder for Trump and Sanders.

— Well, that’s one way to get attention for your STD testing campaign.

— Cartoonist David Horsey introduces you to Trump Nation.

— Susan Sarandon and Debra Messing had a fight about politics on Twitter.

— The June 7 primary could usher in a liberal “supermajority” on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors for the first time in modern history.

— Top California Democrats joined an amicus brief backing President Obama’s Clean Power Plan.

— The Festival of Books is this weekend. Here are details on the program, which will include panels featuring Team Politics.

LOGISTICS

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