COMPTON, California — “Ryan, do you have a pen?”

Steve Garvey is sitting in the backseat of his Hyundai Genesis outside Ruben’s Bakery & Mexican Food in South Los Angeles; Ryan, his son, sits in the driver’s seat. Inside await a gaggle of TV cameras and on-lookers, eager for their chance to brush up against California baseball history.

It’s nothing Garvey, 75, hasn’t seen before. Since joining the Los Angeles Dodgers more than half a century ago, fans from all parts of the world have flocked to his side for a handshake or an autograph. But today is different. Garvey is on the campaign trail, promoting his Republican run for California’s open U.S. Senate seat.

He reaches back into the trunk, where he keeps a fresh case of tissue-wrapped Rawlings baseballs. He takes one, slides it into the pocket of his black puffer vest, and opens the car door.

It’s the third stop of what has already been a long day of campaigning in Southern California. As soon as Garvey steps into the bakery, cameras swarm. Smiling, he reaches across the metal countertop to shake the hand of Ruben Ramirez Sr., wearing a blue L.A. Dodgers ball cap for the occasion. Garvey then turns to shake the hand of Ramirez’s wife, Alicia, who is sporting a Dodgers’ scarf.

“Is this your daughter?” Garvey asks.

“My wife!” Ruben says laughing.

Later, after the baseball has been signed, Garvey is milling about among the trays of bread and conchas when he leans in with a sly confession. “‘Oh, is this your daughter!’” he tells me, recalling the interaction. “Works every time.”

Even more than 30 years after his retirement, it’s clear Garvey’s got game. At every stop along the campaign trail, he’s instantly recognized, with fans greeting him as he strolls down the street. His ability to connect with fans — especially those who grew up watching him play for the Dodgers and, later, the San Diego Padres — has made him a beloved figure among Californians and baseball fans broadly.

The question now, however, is whether he can turn that enthusiasm into votes.

He wouldn’t be the first to try. Celebrity politicians, while a somewhat rare breed nationally, have a longstanding history in California. Around the same time Garvey was first drafted into professional baseball, Ronald Reagan was beginning his first term as California’s governor. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced his own campaign for governor on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in 2003. And in 2021, Olympic decathlete Caitlyn Jenner made a half-hearted attempt at replacing Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in a recall election that ultimately failed.

But even with his starpower, Garvey faces an incredibly steep climb. Republicans haven’t won a statewide office in California since 2006, when Schwarzenegger clinched a second term as governor and businessman Steve Poizner was elected insurance commissioner. Since then, Democrats have dominated. For years, the Republican Party has struggled to register more than 25 percent of the state’s voters and is often outnumbered by Californians with no party affiliation.

It’s part of the reason Garvey’s entrance into the race last fall barely registered among California’s political class, which was more focused, at the time, on the three-way battle between Democratic Reps. Barbara Lee, Katie Porter and Adam Schiff.

But just last month, a POLITICO | Morning Consult poll clocked Garvey at 19 percent, placing him in a statistical dead-heat for second place behind Schiff, the Democratic frontrunner — and giving him a shot at making it out of the state’s jungle primary and into the........

© Politico