Mud, mug shots, money begin to fly in 2 East Bay races

Assembly Speaker John Pérez (right) at a golf fundraiser at Pebble Beach in 2011 hosted by AT&T, which is fighting the cell phone kill switch bill this year. Photo: Gina Ferazzi, Los Angeles Times

All eyes in the local political world are on the East Bay, where mud, mug shots and millions of dollars in special-interest money are at the center of a pair of legislative races that reveal a deepening split in Democratic ranks.
First up: the 10th State Senate District match along the Castro Valley-Fremont corridor featuring a pair of Democrats, former state Assemblywoman Mary Hayashi and Assemblyman Bob Wieckowski.
The race was quietly rolling along, with polls showing that despite her 2012 conviction for shoplifting $2,500 worth of clothing from Neiman Marcus in San Francisco, Hayashi had a shot at finishing in the top two out of a field of five and advancing to the November general election.
Then Hayashi, drawing on more than $600,000 in contributions from business groups - much of it amassed while she was still in the Assembly - started airing a feel-good TV ad about her accomplishments in Sacramento.