OAKLAND, California — Forget a Barbara Lee blowout. It’s white-knuckle time for Oakland progressives.
Early returns from a special mayoral election show the former representative locked in a too-close-to-call contest with her chief rival, Loren Taylor, a moderate former member of the City Council who campaigned on an anti-establishment message and won over conservative funders. A race that once looked like it was Lee’s to lose will instead come down to mail ballots and the city’s ranked-choice voting system, revealing a sharply divided city — and Democratic base — at a time when progressives have absorbed repeated losses, even in deep-blue California.
The fact that the widely revered Oakland fixture is digging in for a slog — and allying herself with other candidates in a bid for every available vote — underscores the extent to which the race has become a hinge moment for staunchly liberal Oakland. It also reflects a larger Democratic Party struggle between centrists and the party’s restive left wing…