Will Tramutola Throw Perata Under the Bus After the Oakland Election Loss?

I did a bit of research on political consultant Larry Tramutola after finding out he was campaign manager for Don Perata’s failing 2010 bid for Oakland Mayor.

Interestingly enough, what popped up first was a Bay Citizen article with the headline “Strategist: SunCal Ignored My Advice.” It was a surprisingly candid article with Tramutola where he said, in so many words, that the failure of the Alameda project was due to the client. These days, I don’t know of many consulting firms that would blast their clients like this in the media. I wonder how many more contracts that article got the firm…

I dug a bit further, and Tramutola’s track record didn’t improve. Perata, Tramutola’s client, was quoted on the campaign trail as saying that he didn't really understand ranked-choice voting.
Well, either Perata was playing dumb because he knew ranked-choice voting would hurt him or his campaign manager Tramutola was sleeping on the job. The East Bay Express covered some of Tramutola’s early campaign mailers for Perata, which were “full of ridiculous errors that raise serious doubts about the intellectual capacity of Perata’s close associates.”

As campaign manager, Tramutola should have been prepared for the new ranked-choice voting system. Even following the campaign peripherally, it was easy to see that ranked-choice voting would be a force to be reckoned with in the Oakland mayoral election… also because it was all over the news. A hard one to miss, especially for someone as involved as a campaign manager.

Now the million dollar question: will Tramutola come out and say that Perata “ignored his advice” and blame Perata?

The Ranked Choice Voting System Rages on in Oakland

I covered Ranked Choice Voting back in April (full article here) speculating that the system could help Oakland mayoral candidate Kaplan.


Well, candidates Kaplan and Quan put their heads together and effectively beat the system. Projected winner former State Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata actually won the popular vote, at 35%. But it wasn’t enough. He lost the race to Quan, who understood the in’s and out’s of Ranked Choice Voting and used them to her advantage.

Basically, having a strong support core is not enough to win a ranked choice voting election. To win, candidates must have both a strong support core AND a broad base of support. In highly polarized elections where the vote is divided, it can be anyone’s game.

But Kaplan and Quan saw ahead of the curve and focused on voters that would rank Kaplan and Quan first and second, knocking Perata down a spot or two. He did manage to keep his core support, but Kaplan and Quan knocked out his broad base of support, which cost him the election. Quan racked up 25% of the popular vote, but also won a lot of second place votes. Who says number two is the first loser? Now Quan is the Mayor of Oakland.

Makes me wonder what would happen in other cities like Alameda if Ranked Choice Voting was instituted. Maybe Marie Gilmore wouldn't be mayor after all...

Apparently Perata mentioned on the campaign trail “that he didn't really understand ranked-choice voting.” I’m betting Perata’s election strategists are feeling a bit sheepish right about now. I’m also betting we’re going to see some more legal action against Ranked Choice Voting.