The State Assembly, the lower house of the state legislature, has 80 seats. The decennial redistricting for the state legislature was just completed last month and Douglas swiftly announced her candidacy for the newly redrawn 76th District that encompasses her area and does not include any incumbent Assembly member.
Douglas is a Republican and the area of the district—north of the city of San Diego—is generally Republican. The district straddles I-5 and lies on the Pacific Ocean in northern San Diego County.
Douglas does not hide her Iranian origins. In fact, in the announcement of her candidacy on her website, she refers to her Iranian-birth in the third sentence.
In an interview with the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA), Douglas said she will need financial backing from Iranian-Americans to make her campaign viable.
She said, “The most important obstacle to overcome is the fact that I am an immigrant from Iran. I need the Iranian-American community in California and in America to support my candidacy with funds and volunteers. Should I win, this will be one of the highest elected positions that an Iranian-American holds in America.”
No other candidates have as yet announced their candidacy for the seat. But the primary isn’t until next June, so there is ample time for others to enter. The general election for the seat will be in November 2012, the same day as the election for president.
Douglas said, “It will take approximately $350,000 to win this election. The majority of the funds will be spent from October of 2011 through the primary election of June of 2012,” indicating that she expects a serious primary race but an easy glide after that if she wins the primary.
“It is critical to raise $100,000 as soon as possible in order to prove to the Sacramento political establishment that I’m a credible candidate and deter any potential challengers.”
The maximum amount an individual can contribute to an Assembly candidate in California is $3,900.
Douglas is trying to move fast to discourage opposition. In fact, she moved so fast to convert her City Council candidate website to a state assembly candidate website that the platform on the site is still the one she used a year ago in running for the Carlsbad Coty Council.
Her campaign website is www.farrahdouglas.com.
If Douglas wins the Assembly seat, she will be the first Iranian-American to sit in any of the 50 state legislatures. There is, however, one Iranian-born member of both the Ontario and Quebec provincial legislatures in Canada
A California Assembly district has a population of about 425,000 citizens. Douglas would not represent the largest number of constituents if she wins. Three Iranian-Americans hold Superior Court judgeships in California and thus represent more citizens. Ross Mir-Karimi, the American-born son of an Iranian father and Russian mother, is running for sheriff of San Francisco this coming November and will represent 750,000 citizens if he wins.
Altogether, 11 Iranians holds elected office in North America—two in Canada, one in Texas and eight in California.
Douglas, 60, was born in Iran where she put herself through college, earning a B.A. in English and French literature. She then worked in Iran as a journalist, reporter, writer, translator and interpreter.
She married Rich Douglas, an American working in Iran for Bell Helicopter. After the revolution, she immigrated to California with her husband and toddler son. There she attended Mira Costa College and Palomar College and obtained her real estate license and began working as a real estate agent. She later received a master’s degree in philosophy from San Diego State University.
Douglas, who currently owns CDS Printing with her husband, has been active in the community life of Carlsbad, serving as chairman of the board of the Carlsbad Chamber of Commerce and on the board of directors of the Boys and Girls Club of Carlsbad, the Carlsbad Library and Arts Foundation, and the Carlsbad High Noon Rotary, among other organizations. Such civic activity is the most common route to local elective office in the United States.
In Iran, Douglas worked as an English translator for the Iranian military, assisting Iranian generals during discussions with American defense contractors. It was there that she met her husband. After the revolution, she said she wanted to flee the country, but she feared the new government wouldn’t let her take her baby with her. Eventually, her husband was able to alter his passport to make it look like their son hadn’t been born in Iran.
They fled to the airport in the middle of the night, hoping to board the last flight out. Douglas said revolutionaries almost held her from the flight—gunmen pulled her out of line at the airport and spent hours unsuccessfully trying to figure out whether she worked for the Shah.
“After two and a half, three hours, he looks up and says, ‘You can go,’ and throws my passport at me. My knees were so weak, I couldn’t stand,” Douglas said.
“Never for a single day since I arrived in the United States—not a single day—have I taken for granted the freedoms and quality of life in our country and our community. I am living the American dream; here I have found security, freedom and opportunity. Gradually, I have also found a sense of belonging. I arrived as a woman with no country … and came to love this country.”
She only returned home once—in 2003, after her father died—but said it no longer felt like home. “I feel that here [in America] I am home.”
