Mary Hayashi

STATE SENATE | 10th DISTRICT | Despite the bloody turn in the race for the East Bay’s 10th State Senate District seat, Mary Hayashi’s campaign says a poll shows she is leading Assemblymember Bob Wieckowski by percentage points, although the poll by Lake Research Partners also shows almost half of all voters are taking a wait-and-see approach to the race.

According to the poll of 400 likely primary voters conducted through a phone survey May 6-8, Hayashi leads the pack at 21 percent, followed by Wieckowski at 18 percent. To further tighten the race, the poll has a relatively high margin of error of +/-4.9 percent.

Republican Peter Kuo registered seven percent support, along with Fremont Planning Commissioner Roman Reed at five percent and former Assemblymember Audie bock with two percent. In addition, 47 percent of those polled said they were undecided. The top two finishers in the June 3 primary, regardless of party affiliation, advance to the November general election.

Hayashi’s campaign is painting the poll as an indication the barrage of negative attacks unleashed by Wieckowski in the last 10 days, including a Web site named MugShotMary.com, has done little to undermine her campaign.

“The voters are seeing through these personal attacks,” said Hayashi campaign manager Josh Pulliam. “What this race is really coming down to is a choice between a true champion for working families and women for 26 years, or a bully who built his career on protecting the trial attorney agenda, even when that meant standing up for attorneys and convicted rapists instead of protecting victims.”

Last week, Hayashi responded to the Web site with her own, slamming Wieckowski’s for initially voting against a bill that prohibited spouses convicted of domestic violence against their partners from receiving benefits such as alimony.