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PaperclipPerfector  2yr ago (text post)   30341 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 2, 2023

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So Newsom makes no enemies within the party by favoring one candidate or another.

If reports are true, Lee is angry about not being picked. Does this mean she's not as favoured as thought, or that Newsom thinks he can weather any action against him she might take in the party?

On Sunday, Congressional Black Caucus Chair Steven Horsford wrote to Newsom urging him to appoint Rep. Barbara Lee, a candidate for the Senate whom the governor recently ruled out over worries about giving someone a leg up.

Newsom fulfills the promise he made to name a Black woman to the upper chamber following the departure of Harris to the vice presidency and his selection of Sen. Alex Padilla to her old seat in 2021. Newsom also avoids veering directly into next year’s Senate contest between rival Reps. Katie Porter, Adam Schiff and Lee, all Democrats from California. Lee had spent years angling for the possible Senate appointment, only to learn in recent weeks that Newsom was intent on not tipping the scales in her favor, prompting her to sharply rebuke his public pronouncement.

Either he miscalculated, or he wouldn't pick Lee anyway so he was going to piss her off in any case, or he figures her support would have been worth less than the enmity of the others had he picked her.

Does this mean she's not as favoured as thought

She is not favored at all, neither by the polls nor by fundraising.

Yikes. On the money end, Porter and Schiff are way ahead of her (for now). No wonder she wanted to be a shoo-in by Newsom. I guess this demonstrates he really does know how to play the game in Californian Democrat internal politics, and that he figures pissing off Lee won't be enough of a liability to harm him when he goes for the big stage, because Butler will deliver the black women's vote for him in quid pro quo.

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