Democrats appear to be the big winners in this year's election. The scope of the rout was seen in the morning after election night, with councilmember Carl DeMaio giving his concession speech at 10am inside the lobby of the U.S. Grant hotel and Scott Peters holding on to a small lead over Republican counterpart Brian Bilbray.

And it's no surprise that the San Diego Democratic Party had some major help, and serious funding, from local unions.

One of the largest donors to the San Diego Democratic cause was the political committee Protect Neighborhood Services Now, a pro-union committee sponsored by the San Diego Municipal Employees Association and headed by its general manager, Michael Zucchet.

Zucchet's committee started writing big checks to the local Democratic party back in May 2012. During that month, the Protect Neighborhood Services Now donated a total of $45,000.

The contributions didn't stop there. In September the pro-union group nearly quadrupled that number, giving the San Diego Democratic Party $205,000 in just five days time. And then, in October 23, Zucchet wrote two checks of $10,000 each to the local democrats. In all, Protect Neighborhood Services Now contributed a total of $280,000 since May.