The fall of Eric Swalwell was swift. Last week, Representative Swalwell was the Democratic frontrunner in the California governor's race. Now, only days later, he has ended his gubernatorial campaign and is no longer a member of the House of Representatives. As political flameouts go, the fall from being on top of the governor's race to just being an ordinary citizen was about as quick as could be imagined.

Rumors had been circulating online for weeks that Swalwell had sexually harassed women (or worse), but until last Friday no one had actually come forward and publicly accused him of wrongdoing. But then the San Francisco Chronicle published an account from one woman, which was quickly followed by three others making similar accusations to CNN. Today, a fifth woman accused Swalwell, this time of raping her and possibly using a date-rape drug to do so.

Initially, Swalwell denied everything. He swore he was going to fight back. But that soon morphed into him apologizing to his family for making "mistakes in judgment." He is still denying the accusations, but now he'll be doing so to law enforcement and perhaps in a courtroom, instead of out on the campaign trail or in the halls of Congress.

The political fallout will also be swift. Up until last week, Swalwell was one of three Democrats running for governor who had a viable amount of support in the polls. His exit from the race could help one or the other of them in a big way, or it could be spread across the whole field (there are a handful of other Democrats running, none of whom has broken into double digits in the polls yet).

The two remaining strong contenders are Tom Steyer and Katie Porter. Steyer has been the only candidate running lots of television advertisements so far (he is a billionaire and can self-fund a lavish campaign), but what was notable was that in the past few weeks he had begun running negative ads against Swalwell -- who Steyer obviously thought was the Democrat to beat. Now that Swalwell's gone it will be interesting to see if Steyer shifts to running anti-Porter ads, and it will be interesting to see whether Katie Porter will begin running some ads of her own.

They'll both be competing hard for Swalwell's supporters. Swalwell not only was leading in the polls (but only barely -- all three were regularly polling between 10 and 20 percent), but he also led with the number and quality of his political endorsements. All of his endorsers pulled out almost immediately after the accusations were made public, so there are powerful Unions and other high-profile political players whose endorsements will now be up for grabs.

Porter seems more likely to pick up Swalwell's voters than Steyer, but that's really just an educated guess for now (her campaign released polling showing that almost half of Swalwell voters picked her as their best second choice, which is at least some indication).

Whatever happens, it is going to happen fast. The primary will be held in early June, which leaves less than two months for the field to shake itself out after Swalwell's exit. There are also two Republicans running, which complicates the picture since California's primary system will only advance the top two from the primary (no matter their party) to the general election. Swalwell's exit will probably increase the chances that at least one Democrat will be on the general election ballot. There have been fears that the two Republicans might secure the top two spots, which would completely lock the Democrats out of the race in November, but that was when Democratic voters were spread between three strong Democratic candidates. With only two frontrunners to choose from, hopefully at least one of them will gain so much support that they win one of the top two spots in June. That's the theory, at any rate.

Swalwell's exit won't even show up in the polling for at least a week, perhaps even two. It was such a political bombshell that voters simply have not had time to react to it yet -- at least not to the extent of deciding which other candidate they might back instead. So nobody really knows how it will play out yet.

There's also the question of whether the current governor (Gavin Newsom) will call a special election to fill Swalwell's seat before November. It is already too late for him to do so during the June primary, but if he acts fast he could call for a special election in later June.

As things stand, the balance of power in the House will not be affected right away. This was due to a Republican also resigning his seat, after he admitted he had an affair with a staffer of his who later committed suicide by self-immolation. Tony Gonzales and Eric Swalwell both faced a vote of expulsion in the House as soon as this week, which is what convinced them both to just resign instead. But because one did so from either side of the aisle, it did not affect the balance of power in the chamber at all.

This could change, depending on whether California and Texas call special elections and when they actually take place. Either party could wind up with one more vote as a result, but not for very long. This normally wouldn't be that big of a deal, but the Republicans have such a slim majority that every edge changes the dynamics of it. Complicating this dynamic is that Swalwell's seat is solidly in the hands of Democrats, but the district Gonzales represented might actually now be competitive. If a Democrat managed to flip it, the Republican majority would get even more tenuous.

The political ramifications of Swalwell's exit are not yet completely clear, but that is due to how swiftly everything has happened. The dynamics of the governor's race will definitely change now, but there really isn't a lot of time before Californians go out to vote (ballots will be mailed out within a few weeks). We may have to wait until the votes are counted to fully see what Swalwell's exit means -- it may not even clearly show up in the opinion polls beforehand.

All I know is that if I were part of Katie Porter's team, I would have an ad ready to go that depicts her standing up for women. It seems like the obvious move, at this point.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant