Congratulations to Kevin Johnson, the first African-American mayor in Sacramento. And of course, I remembered him as the point guard for the Phoenix Suns.
Sacramento made a former NBA star its first African American mayor and San Francisco proved it's not quite the anything-goes place that both its fans and foes depict.
In Sacramento, they swept Kevin Johnson, a former player for basketball's Phoenix Suns, into the mayor's office. After a star-studded campaign with the likes of Magic Johnson and Michael Bloomberg, the 42-year-old Sacramento-area native beat two-term incumbent Heather Fargo by a 15-point margin.
A Democrat, he likened himself to Barack Obama, noting that both campaigned on a platform of change. Race was not an overt issue in Sacramento, where African Americans make up about 14% of the population.
"The mayor stared blindly into her rear-view mirror while Johnson was focused on the road ahead," said Doug Elmets, a Sacramento political consultant.
Johnson was seen by some as more conservative than his opponent. Unproven accusations of past misconduct with underage girls dogged his primary campaign, but he expressed conservative views that jibed with those of "the business community and the minority of Republicans that live in a very liberal city," Elmets said.
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