San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan announced Friday he is endorsing Anthony Tordillos for San Jose City Council District 3.
Tordillos will face Gabby Chavez-Lopez in a June runoff to replace disgraced former councilman Omar Torres.
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WATCH HERETordillos, who currently serves as the city's planning commission chair, got into the runoff by edging out the mayor's original choice and chief of staff Matt Quevedo by six votes in a recount.
Chavez-Lopez, who is the executive director of the Latina Coalition of Silicon Valley, took first place in the primary by more than 700 votes.
In a joint announcement held downtown on Friday, Mahan praised Tordillos and shrugged off the notion that the race will tilt the balance of power between labor and business factions on the council.
"As outsiders who worked in tech, who are focused on outcomes, who like to measure performance and are not overly hung up on a particular ideological orthodoxy or there being just one way to solved problems," Mahan said.
Tordillos agreed the key is their common approach to problems.
"Very much agree with all of the emphasis he's placed on focusing on housing development downtown near transit, on really focusing on quality of life issues like public safety and here in District 3 focusing on revitalizing our downtown, and looking toward the future of downtown looks like in the decades ahead," Tordillos said.
Chavez-Lopez said the high tech business approach by the mayor and Tordillos reminds her of Elon Musk.
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SIGN UP "I think this idea that government needs to move fast and break stuff in the process is something that isn't working for folks on the ground," Chavez-Lopez said. "We see it happening at the national level because there are human impacts -- there are impacts that really affect people."
Many political observers see the June 24 runoff as very fluid. A lot depends on whether the votes that went to the mayor's first choice move to his second, and where the couple of thousand votes that went to the other candidates end up.
