There isn’t. Otherwise she would be senator.
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Ditto to what you’ve said. Also, Ro Khanna is endorsing Steyer, but I figure that’s because he probably got a big donation from Steyer. I like Becerra but he needs an Obama endorsement and more publicity.
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I wish MAGA era politics didn’t have to be so nationalized, so online, and so “blue no matter who”. I assume the lieutenant governor chose to run for treasurer instead of governor because her “blue no matter who” rise didn’t have enough deep popular support behind it to get her into the top spot.
I’m a Californian and a Democrat, and all things being equal and absent scandal, in normal times people would think of a lieutenant governor, or even one of the other statewide officeholders running (Thurmond and Yee) as being “next-in-line normal”. And certainly someone like Becerra fits this bill – recently AG, more recently HHS secretary under Biden, long-term but not too-long-term congressman before that. (I think he might have been my rep briefly when I still lived in L.A. but I think there was some re-drawing at the edge of Henry Waxman’s district so I’m not certain.) But now everybody with actual experience is called “establishment,” anyone over 55 is part of the “gerontocracy,” and anyone who hasn’t gone viral in the last six months is “nobody’s heard of them” or “won’t stand up to MAGA”. I do hope the Democrats survive the jungle primary – I suppose Swalwell’s departure at least makes the fiasco scenario less likely – but I kind of wish we could just run a regular school-board-to-assembly-to statewide Dem and not a “sensation” or “populist billionaire” or “charismatic superstar” and just have normality again. Not an original post-2016 wish, but a wish all the same.
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Yes. This. But also, the Dem party allowing room for people to move up through the ranks so that we don’t have another Dianne Feinstein situation.
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Swalwell resigning from Congress, Bloomberg reporting.
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She didn’t. She continued working for him for awhile after the first assault, without further incident. Then in ‘24 she attended a gala where he was also present. They got drinks as part of a group afterwards, and she described him as behaving professionally. At some point as she was becoming more intoxicated they separated from the group and she later blacked out, came to in a hotel room while he was assaulting her, tried to stop him both verbally and physically but he continued assaulting her. She suffered bruising and lacerations.
At least one of the other women similarly describes becoming disoriented while out drinking with him. Makes me wonder if he was spiking their drinks.
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California needs ranked-choice voting. In fact, the whole country wound benefit from a ranked-choice voting system. It wouldn’t solve all of our electoral problems, but it would be a huge start.
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Yeah. that is a huge question-mark about Porter. She practiced law (presumably as an associate) at Stoel Rives in Portland, OR, before joining the faculty of UNLV’s law school. She was a bit of an academic gypsy, moving to University of Iowa and then UC Irvine. She was the independent monitor for the State of California in the mortgage settlement. That’s probably as close as she got to executive experience beyond running her congressional office.
I think if I were still voting in California I’d take a chance on Porter rather than the billionaire, because running a venture capital firm and running a government are very different things. Steyer doesn’t really have any more pertinent executive experience than does Porter.
ETA: Just to clarify, my impression is that the state of polling on the Democratic side was Swalwell, Porter, and the seven dwarves. I’d give Porter my vote because I remain concerned about the possibility of two GQPers running in the November General.
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Back during the 1998 Democratic primary for California Al Checchi, who was a prominent airline CEO blew around $50 million on the campaign, one of the most costly self financed campaigns to that day. A Steyer like campaign. He that his business acumen would be a major selling point. Instead he finished in the middle of the pack. People ended up calling him Al checkbook.
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Remember when former eBay CEO Meg Whitman tried to buy the governorship of CA with $144,000,000 of her own money? I was so glad when she lost.
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Support for Becerra was all over my social media yesterday.
Not sure if this was an organized or spontaneous thing.
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this man abuses a woman thing is really getting old… why did these so-called victims of this man wait so long to complain about this guy..did any of them file charges against him…? apparently ; not…maybe he was never in a position where it was worth any money to them to file formal charges..did any of them offer any proof??? this is what parents should be warning their sons about; it is so easy to villify a man.or even a boy with sexual stuff…this in a country that elected a man like trumpf.[with all his trash] to the highest office…
it seems likely that she simply drank too much and passed out..but blame the guy for spiking her drinks.
i despise people who make these accusations and offer no proof..PORTER sounds like another bad-man vs.good woman person…
California is an incredibly influential state: largest by population, third largest by land area, a powerful economic engine and political voice in national government. The leadership role of the state governor is critical as manager of a large, complex government and as a political voice.
While a billionaire hedge fund manager lacks both business and political experience and is a questionable choice, I would point out that California has a history of political neophytes (Reagan and Schwarzenegger come to mind) who weren’t horrible governors. Tough call.
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Did not pay a lot of attention to Katie Porter in the House, but with her ‘whiteboard’ she stood out as being effective in holding Republicans to account. When she ran against Schiff for the Senate seat, it struck me as unfortunate, because both were credible candidates, but Schiff was senior, had paid his dues and earned the Senate seat, and Porter as runner up was lost to the House.
When she lost the primary, it seems she ‘lost it’ (the voter fraud accusation, for example). Not a strong contender to run the state of CA. One person’s more-of-an-impression than an opinion.
A corollary observation from the current cycle is the loss of Jasmine Crockett, a much stronger and effective voice in the House, young with a bright future, who came second in the Dem senate primary in Texas and will not longer be serving in the House. Same primary dynamic, a greater loss.
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Yeah, it is. Women are really tired of it.
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i don’t get why they wait so long to file charges
Here you go:
Katie Porter Doubles Down on Claim Her Election Loss Was “Rigged”
Rep. Katie Porter’s 2024 Report Card
High staff churn haunts Porter’s governor bid
As if guys never spike women’s drinks? C’mon. We have all known for decades that men spike women’s drinks to rape them. We were all taught from our teens never to imbibe a drink brought from a bar by a random man. A guy drugs a woman and she wakes up …
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