--- title: Leland Yee Wins Almost 300,000 Votes Despite Dropping Out of Race description: Nearly 300,000 people voted for a primary candidate who dropped out of the race facing federal charges. canonical: https://time.com/2822700/state-senator-votes/ author: Maya Rhodan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-06-04T17:27:16.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-21T08:12:54.125Z article:section: Politics og:title: Leland Yee Wins Almost 300,000 Votes Despite Dropping Out of Race og:description: Nearly 300,000 people voted for a primary candidate who dropped out of the race facing federal charges. og:url: https://time.com/2822700/state-senator-votes/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt53e040bbffca3df3/69869629d0b6f2fe2f304b5a/leland-yee.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: Leland Yee og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Leland Yee Wins Almost 300,000 Votes Despite Dropping Out of Race twitter:description: Nearly 300,000 people voted for a primary candidate who dropped out of the race facing federal charges. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt53e040bbffca3df3/69869629d0b6f2fe2f304b5a/leland-yee.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Embattled State Senator Gets Nearly 300,000 Votes Despite Dropping Out > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Jun 4, 2014 5:27 PM UTC  California state Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, right, leaves the San Francisco Federal Building in San Francisco, March 26, 2014. California state Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, right, leaves the San Francisco Federal Building in San Francisco, March 26, 2014. Ben Margot—AP by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Jun 4, 2014 5:27 PM UTC Nearly 300,000 Californians [voted](http://vote.sos.ca.gov/returns/secretary-of-state/) for Leland Yee in a Democratic primary Tuesday, leading the embattled state senator to garner 9.8% of the vote in a race to be named his party’s candidate for Secretary of State. But there’s just one problem: Yee dropped out of the race in March, but not before a deadline to remove his name from the ballot had passed. The collection votes would hardly qualify Yee for a spot on the general election ballot. Still, the state senator — who plead not guilty to federal gun trafficking charges in April — finished second in the state’s Democratic primary. A total of 287,590 people voted for him. The 65-year-old San Franciscan Democrat was indicted on federal gun trafficking and corruption charges in March. The charges followed a Federal Bureau of Investigations operation after which Yee was accused of accepting money from undercover agents to cover campaign debt. Yee also allegedly agreed to help the agents obtain illegal firearms. Yee was suspended from the state senate without pay in March following the indictment. Democrat Alex Padilla and Republican Pete Peterson will face one another in a general election this November. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/2822700/state-senator-votes/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/2822700/state-senator-votes/"},"headline":"Embattled State Senator Gets Nearly 300,000 Votes Despite Dropping Out","datePublished":"2014-06-04T17:27:16.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T08:12:54.125Z","description":"Suspended California State Senator Leland Yee won nearly 10% of the vote on Tuesday, even though he dropped out of the race in late March","url":"https://time.com/2822700/state-senator-votes/","keywords":["2014 Election","California","politics","corruption"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt53e040bbffca3df3/69869629d0b6f2fe2f304b5a/leland-yee.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Maya Rhodan","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt53e040bbffca3df3/69869629d0b6f2fe2f304b5a/leland-yee.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Leland Yee","caption":"Leland Yee","creditText":"Ben Margot—AP","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/2014-election/","name":"2014 Election"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/2822700/state-senator-votes/","name":"Embattled State Senator Gets Nearly 300,000 Votes Despite Dropping Out"}}]}] ```