Politics
How Trump propelled Schiff to the general election — and likely a Senate seat
For all of California’s ills and hardships, nothing animated the state’s left-leaning electorate in this year’s Senate race more than the specter of former President Trump returning to the White House.
The omnipresence of Trump’s legal travails and his dominance in the Republican presidential primary ensure his shadow over the 2024 election will remain through November, and only increase Rep. Adam B. Schiff ‘s already heady chances of becoming California’s newest U.S. senator.
As the lead prosecutor in the first impeachment trial of Trump in the House of Representatives, the Burbank Democrat — once mocked by the former president as a “little pencil neck” — used Trump’s animus to propel himself to national fame and a top-two finish in California’s competitive Senate primary election on Tuesday.
Schiff already has signaled plans to use the ample contempt for Trump among most California voters to skewer his opponent in November, Republican and former Dodgers star Steve Garvey, as a Trump acolyte.
“He has received that national attention because he was the face of the resistance when Trump got elected,” said Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-Los Angeles), who endorsed Schiff.
“He always got the headline because he said this right thing.”
That notoriety helped Schiff best two Democratic rivals, Reps. Katie Porter of Irvine and Barbara Lee of Oakland, in the race to replace the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who had represented California in the Senate since 1992. Schiff and Garvey, a political neophyte who nevertheless was the most prominent Republican running, were the top two finishers in the primary, sending them to a one-on-one contest in the November general election.
A recent Times poll found that Schiff starts with a significant lead in a two-way matchup, 53% to 38%, with 9% undecided.
Garvey faces a seemingly insurmountable challenge in a state where no Republican has won a statewide race since 2006 and where Democratic voters outnumber Republicans by a 2-1 margin. In California, President Biden trounced Trump in the 2020 presidential election.
Garvey, a former first baseman for the Dodgers and San Diego Padres, voted for Trump that year and in 2016, and now will have to reckon with his past support of the former president. Garvey has yet to disclose whether he voted for Trump in this year’s presidential primary.
It’s a balancing act for politicians in much of the country, but in a state like California, it’s born of necessity — millions of the state’s GOP voters are stalwart supporters of the former president, but they are grossly outnumbered.
While California is home to more registered Republicans than any other state in the nation, it is also home to many GOP voters who are moderates, college-educated and suburban women — the electoral blocs that have sometimes blanched at Trump’s antics and policies. When Trump was on the ballot in 2016, Orange County voters chose a Democratic presidential candidate for the first time since the Great Depression.
Asked how Garvey voted in Tuesday’s presidential primary, Garvey’s spokesman Matt Shupe repeatedly said, “You’ll have to ask him.”
In his limited public campaign events, Garvey highlighted his affable demeanor while raising concerns shared by many Californians about issues such as homelessness, crime and inflation. He avoided the inflammatory language favored by the former president. During appearances on conservative media, Garvey made sharper statements, such as on Sunday when he said on Fox News, “Really, the true war is the war against America by illegal immigrants.”
That line of attack is expected to be central to Garvey’s campaign, but, while it may rally Republicans and play to the audiences of conservative news outlets, it’s unlikely to sway enough California Democrats.
Political attacks from the left, however, may wipe some of the luster off Schiff’s powerhouse campaign.
During the primary campaign, Hamas’ attack on Oct. 7 and the ensuing invasion of Gaza by Israel created an opening for Schiff’s opponents to use the issue to differentiate themselves from the rest of the field.
Lee quickly called for an unconditional cease-fire, while Porter took a more middle-ground position. Schiff refused to call for something similar — instead supporting the Biden administration’s efforts to find a diplomatic solution to end the war.
Protesters yell as Adam Schiff speaks during an election party at the Avalon in Los Angeles on Tuesday. Camilo Rafel Pineda is pictured on the right.
(Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)
It’s an opinion that angered some Californians, including voters like Camilo Rafel Pineda, 25, who lay in wait at the Schiff victory party Tuesday night, and when the politician took the stage, he let Schiff know it. He yelled, “Let Gaza live,” so loudly that he became hoarse. After he had been escorted out, he told The Times that it was important people knew the incredible human cost to this war and this country’s complicity in the deaths.
Pineda, who is Jewish, said he and many of his friends voted for Lee.
He pointed to American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s support of candidates this election as one of the reasons Lee failed to launch and Schiff did. The Jewish American group’s political arm plowed $5 million into a super PAC supporting Schiff. That group was one of several that spent close to $21 million this primary attacking Porter and boosting Garvey.
The money meant a candidate like Lee had little chance, Pineda said. His showing up, he said, was essential so that Schiff, who is Jewish, knew how the policies he supported affected women and children in the Gaza Strip.
Israel “is using the cover of Jewish identity to commit genocide on Palestinian women and children,” Pineda said. “Schiff needs to hear that as much as possible.”
Ultimately it was older voters and not Pineda’s peers who showed up in droves to vote. As of Wednesday, about half of the returned ballots came from voters older than 65, according to Political Data Inc., a campaign research company.
Photos of Rep. Adam Schiff, left, and Republican opponent Steve Garvey flash on a television screen during an election night party for Schiff in Los Angeles on March 5, 2024.
(Jae C. Hong / Associated Press)
Garvey has also said he opposed a cease-fire and backed Israel’s response. Unlike Schiff, who believes the United States should be working toward a two-state solution, Garvey said the prospect of that is “naive, because one of those states will always try to annihilate Israel.”
During the primary race, Schiff’s campaign spent close $25 million on advertising overwhelming the airwaves with the message that Garvey was “too conservative for California” and that Schiff had taken on the tough fights with Trump.
Each of the Democratic candidates did their best to burnish the bona fides about who would be the best bulwark against the former president.
Still, Schiff presented as the most forceful foil of Trump — who regularly called Schiff out at rallies and insulted him on social media. Voters regularly saw Schiff on cable news after developments in Trump’s various legal sagas.
“The biggest issue that people are looking at, especially as we set up this Trump-Biden rematch is that our democracy is on the ballot, and that is what Adam is all about.” said political strategist Erica Kwiatkowski Nielsen, who helped run Standing Strong, a super PAC that backed Schiff.
“That trumps everything else and that was so much a part of setting up this contrast with Garvey. We know that is going to be what the general election will look like and he was trying to run away from his record of not being for Trump even though he is.”
In rallies across the state, Schiff talked about his fights with the presumptive Republican presidential nominee almost as much as he talked about homelessness or climate change.
During a campaign rally at a Burbank union hall Monday, Schiff paraphrased former President Franklin D. Roosevelt, saying, “there are times when you can judge a person by the enemies they have made.”
“By Roosevelt’s standard, I’m doing pretty damn well,” he said.
Mark Lampert and his daughter came to a campaign event in the Dogpatch neighborhood of San Francisco over the weekend, hoping to get a chance to meet the Burbank congressman.
Lampert watched Trump’s first impeachment trial religiously and came away impressed with Schiff’s willingness to stand up to Trump.
He said he hopes Schiff is elected for one reason: “I worry about Donald Trump.”
Porter, Schiff’s most formidable Democratic rival, tried to chip away at that image of Schiff, assailing him for taking money from corporate political action committees. She called this money “dirty” and emblematic of why voters despised career politicians. This dovetailed with how she framed the race, as a contest about generational change in which she was going to “shake up Washington.”
But it appeared to have little impact.
On Sunday, Porter hosted a capacity crowd at Manny’s, a community space and cafe in San Francisco’s Mission District, which included Anthony Lepe, 67. His wife supported Porter, but he was leaning Schiff —and it had mostly to do with following the lawyer throughout the Trump years.
“He stood up to Trump,” Lepe said. “That’s the most important thing we need now.”
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Minnesota filed a federal lawsuit Monday against the Trump administration, accusing federal health officials of illegally withholding $243 million in Medicaid payments from the state.
Attorney General Keith Ellison and the Minnesota Department of Human Services sued the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), arguing the funding freeze violates federal law.
The state is seeking a temporary restraining order to immediately block the action.
The dispute stems from a January notice in which the Trump administration said it would withhold more than $2 billion annually from Minnesota’s Medicaid program over what it described as “noncompliance” with federal regulations, specifically, alleged failures to “adequately identify, prevent, and address fraud in its Medicaid program.”
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison speaks during a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing on Capitol Hill. (Tom Brenner/AP)
State officials say they have not been told specifically how Minnesota is out of compliance or what changes the administration wants to see.
The lawsuit follows a Feb. 25 announcement from CMS that it was deferring roughly $260 million in quarterly federal Medicaid funding to Minnesota, including about $243 million tied to “unsupported or potentially fraudulent” claims.
CMS said the deferral is part of a broader fraud crackdown and cited unusually high spending and rapid growth in personal care services, home- and community-based services, and other practitioner services.
HEAVILY-REDACTED AUDIT FINDS MINNESOTA MEDICAID HAD WIDESPREAD VULNERABILITIES
Vice President JD Vance looks on as Medicare and Medicaid Administrator Mehmet Oz speaks about combating fraud at the White House complex in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 25, 2026. (Oliver Contreras/AFP via Getty Images)
“For decades, Medicare fraud has drained billions from American taxpayers — that ends now,” HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a statement. “We are replacing the old ‘pay and chase’ model with a real-time ‘detect and deploy’ strategy, using advanced AI tools to identify fraud instantly and stop improper payments before they go out the door.”
Minnesota officials contend the move improperly uses a funding “deferral” mechanism and amounts to denying the state due process before any formal finding of noncompliance.
WALZ SLAMS TRUMP ADMIN FOR TEMPORARILY HALTING MEDICAID FUNDING TO MINNESOTA: ‘CAMPAIGN OF RETRIBUTION’
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The threatened cuts represent about 7% of Minnesota’s quarterly Medicaid funding and could force reductions in health care services for low-income residents, according to Ellison’s office.
“Trump’s M.O. is to cut first, no matter what the law says or who gets hurt, and ask questions later, if at all,” the attorney general said. “These cuts are the latest in a long series of efforts to go around the law to punish Minnesotans — but just as we fought back and won when they illegally tried to cut funding for childcare, hungry families, and our schools, we are suing them again today to make them follow the law.”
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Politics
Fearing GOP win, California’s Democratic leader urges unviable party candidates for governor to drop out
Fearing the prospect of a Republican winning California’s gubernatorial race, state Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks on Tuesday urged his party’s candidates who lack a viable path to victory to drop out.
“It is imperative that every candidate honestly assess the viability of their candidacy and campaign,” Hicks wrote in an open letter to the politicians vying to replace termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom. “I recognize my suggestions are hard for many to contemplate and may be even viewed as overly harsh by some.”
Hicks did not name the Democrats he wants out of the race, but such a public admonishment by a party leader is a rarity in California politics.
Even though the odds are relatively low, California cannot risk having a Republican elected as the next governor at a time when President Trump is in the White House, Hicks said.
“[S]o much is at stake in our Nation and so many are counting on the leadership of California Democrats to stand up and speak out at this historic moment,” Hicks wrote. “California’s leadership on the world stage is significantly harder if a Democrat is not elected as our next Governor.”
Hicks urged Democrats languishing at the bottom of the field of candidates to drop out before the Friday deadline to officially file to run for governor — to ensure their names do not appear on the June primary ballot.
Under California’s top-two primary system, the two candidates who receive the most votes in the June primary advance to the November general election, regardless of party.
With nine top Democrats running, the fear is that the candidates will splinter their party’s vote and allow the top two Republicans in the race to finish in first and second place. This is despite Democratic registered voters outnumbering Republicans in the state by almost 2 to 1, and no GOP candidate winning a statewide election since 2006.
Having two Republicans competing in the November election would be devastating to Democratic voter turnout and could hurt party candidates in pivotal down-ballot races.
“The result would present a real risk to winning the congressional seats required and imperil Democrats’ chances to retake the House, cut Donald Trump’s term in half, and spare our Nation from the pain many have endured since January 2025,” Hicks said in his letter. “We simply can’t let that happen.”
A recent poll by the Public Policy Institute of California found that five candidates lead the contest — former Rep. Katie Porter, Rep. Eric Swalwell and hedge fund founder Tom Steyer among Democrats and conservative commentator Steve Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, both Republicans. Hilton and Bianco have led all candidates in other polls over the last few months. No other candidate received the support of more than 5% of likely voters.
After Hicks issued his directive, two influential leaders in California Democratic politics said they shared his concerns.
Lorena Gonzalez, the head of the California Federation of Labor Unions, said she worries that Democratic candidates who are drawing low single-digit support in the polls and remain in the race could tilt the election.
“You’re in a situation where a candidate who pulls 2 or 3% could make all the difference whether there’s two Republicans and anti-union folks in the runoff or if there’s not,” she said.
Gonzalez said that while she believes the legislature, where Democrats hold super majorities in both chambers, would be a check if a Republican was elected the state’s leader, that might not be enough protect Californians from Trump’s destructive policies.
“We are seeing with Trump how much damage an executive who wants to ignore normal rules of engagement or the Constitution can do,” she said. “We can’t afford that.”
The federation began its endorsement process last week, and there were difficult conversations with gubernatorial candidates not only about their political beliefs, but also about their viability. The umbrella group of unions is expected to make an announcement about any potential endorsement on March 16.
Jodi Hicks, CEO and president of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, said it was imperative to block the “real possibility” of two Republicans advancing to the general election because of the deep cuts that the Trump administration has made to health care, including access to abortion.
“Given the severity of this moment, we urge candidates to consider how continuing their candidacy may put California’s values and reproductive freedom at risk,” Jodi Hicks said. “The stakes are too high for all of us, but especially for immigrant communities, transgender individuals, the over 15 million patients enrolled in Medi-Cal, and the over 25,000 patients a week who access essential health care at Planned Parenthood health centers.”
Discussions about the need for some Democrats to exit the race took place at last weekend’s California Democratic Party convention.
But a politically thorny issue is that nearly all of the Democrats lagging in the polls are people of color, as former U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra noted at a candidate forum Monday evening.
“There are people who are calling for candidates to get out of the race,” he said at the gathering hosted by Equality California and the Los Angeles LGBT Center at the Renberg Theatre in Hollywood. “Isn’t it interesting that the candidates they are asking get out of the race are the candidates of color?”
Rusty Hicks, asked about the effect on minority candidates who have spent years or decades of their lives in public service, did not directly answer the question but lauded the field’s accomplishments.
“We have a number of strong candidates. They have incredible stories, and they are reflective of the diversity of our party. That being said, there are some political realities of where we are at at this particular moment,” he said in an interview. “I’m not calling on any specific candidates to move in one direction or the other. I’m just calling on them to assess their campaign and determine if they have a viable [path] and if they don’t, to not file.”
During Monday evening’s gubernatorial forum, Porter said she is concerned about the prospect of two Republicans making the top two.
“I hear people say to me, it could never happen, but everybody said that about Trump too,” she said at the forum. “And I look at how much harm we’re suffering, and I think about all the political risks that people are facing every day, the risk of an immigrant to leave their home and walk on our streets, the risk of a kid who’s trans to try to play sports even in this state. And I just don’t think we can take any more political risks.”
Times staff writer Phil Willon contributed to this report.
Since moving back in, President Trump has significantly altered the “People’s House.” East Wing: gone. Oval Office: maximalized. Rose Garden: Mar-a-lago-ified. And the art? Lots of Trump.
Over the last year, The New York Times has captured at least nine paintings, posters, memes, and even a mugshot outside the Oval Office, that Mr. Trump added throughout the historic space.
Many of the selections are gifts from his supporters that highlight his political stature and reinforce the idea that Mr. Trump is invincible.
All presidents or first ladies add to and shuffle the art in the White House.
Barack Obama brought in abstract paintings.
George W. Bush decorated with images from his Texas roots.
In Mr. Trump’s first term, Melania Trump added a sculpture by Isamu Noguchi to the Rose Garden.
But never before has a sitting president displayed so much of his own image on the White House walls.
There is an “assertion of symbolic power that he wants to be on view essentially everywhere in that space,” said Cara Finnegan, a communication professor at the University of Illinois and author of “Photographic Presidents: Making History from Daguerreotype to Digital.”
Even outside his current residence, Mr. Trump’s visage has proliferated in unexpected places — on banners hanging from government buildings, on National Parks passes and on social media, where he has been likened to a king. There has also been talk of a U.S. Treasury-minted coin with Mr. Trump on both sides.
Break with tradition
In recent decades, each president’s official White House portrait has been unveiled in a ceremony hosted by his successor.
The Carters hosted the Fords:
The Clintons hosted the Bushes:
And the Bushes hosted the Clintons:
The mood has often been lighthearted, with political party tensions melting away.
“I am pleased that my portrait brings an interesting symmetry to the White House collection,” George W. Bush joked in a ceremony hosted by the Obamas. “It now starts and ends with a George W.”
In a break with tradition, Mr. Trump did not schedule a ceremony for the unveiling of the Obamas’ portraits during his first term. Joe Biden later did, in a ceremony with a “Welcome Home!” vibe.
Typically, the latest available presidential portrait — often a realistic oil painting — hangs in the main entrance hall, where heads of state are welcomed.
The Obama portrait was in the spot until April …
… when Mr. Trump replaced it with this painting by Marc Lipp, a Florida pop artist, last April.
It depicts a striking moment in 2024 when a bloodied Mr. Trump pumped his fist in defiance, soon after being shot at by a would-be assassin during a campaign event.
Presidential historians have criticized the departure from convention.
Though Mr. Trump had a portrait commissioned for the Smithsonian’s American Presidents collection after his first term, none was confirmed for the permanent White House collection, and the White House said that this is where that portrait would have hung.
It is not totally unprecedented for a president to hang a painting of himself in the White House during his term. Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft and Grover Cleveland all did, according to the White House Historical Association. But more often than not, paintings of presidents and first ladies are hung after they have left office, historians said.
Flags, fists and faith from fans
In what has become something of a muse for many of the president’s artistic supporters, there are at least three other depictions of the fist-pumping scene in the White House.
The image “is in people’s garages when I walk around my neighborhood,” said Leslie Hahner, a Texas resident and communication professor at Baylor University, who studies visual political culture. “People love that image.”
Behind the Oval Office, one is in a small room that houses Trump merchandise:
Another was seen in the West Wing next to a “Still Life with Fruit” painting from 1850:
A statue form was spotted in the Oval Office:
The sculptor, Stan Watts, told a Utah TV station last year that he believes the president was saved by God that day. Many of Mr. Trump’s Christian supporters have echoed that sentiment.
At least two works by a self-described “Christian worship artist,” Vanessa Horabuena, are among Mr. Trump’s White House collection. He has called Ms. Horabuena, who often paints live in front of an audience, “one of the greatest artists anywhere in the world.”
In 2022, she painted a portrait of Mr. Trump at a booth at the Conservative Political Action Conference. When he saw it, he asked to meet her, Ms. Horabuena’s representative said. She most recently painted Mr. Trump live at a New Year’s Eve party at Mar-A-Lago.
One of her portraits was spotted in the Cabinet room in January.
It shows Mr. Trump, his eyes closed, in front of a mountain with a small cross on the top:
Ms. Horabuena hand-delivered it to the White House, according to her website.
Her other painting shows the president walking through a phalanx of flags. It was seen hanging prominently in a hallway leading to the Cabinet Room and the Oval Office:
“He’s positioned as this embattled warrior in a lot of these images,” Dr. Hahner said.
Historical figures Mr. Trump adulates are co-stars in some of the art he has chosen.
In an image created by the team of White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, Mr. Trump is pictured with William McKinley and Henry Clay, who, like the president, championed the use of tariffs:
Here, Mr. Trump is with two other Republican presidents, Abraham Lincoln (to whom he has compared himself) and Ronald Reagan (whom he is a fan of):
Titled “Great American Patriots,” the piece was painted by Dick Bobnick, an illustrator and Trump supporter from Minnesota. He said he mailed several prints to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, but he had no idea his work was on the White House walls until a USA Today reporter called him about it.
“I could hardly believe it,” said Mr. Bobnick. (He said the print is now his best-seller.)
If not in portraits, Mr. Trump’s image is reflected on mirrors that he has added to the White House complex.
Two are in the Oval Office …
… making his image visible from the Resolute Desk.
The mirrors, the portraits and the gilding mimic the look of his properties, like Mar-a-Lago, his Florida estate.
“Trump is obsessed with his image,” Dr. Hahner said. “And he is so controlling of his image.”
Trump everywhere, all the time
One portrait seen in the White House has become a communication tool between Mr. Trump and his supporters in the real world.
This is his social media profile picture.
It was seen last October hanging between former first ladies Laura Bush and Barbara Bush in the now-demolished East Wing:
The portrait was painted by Lena Ruseva, an immigrant from the former Soviet Union, who goes by the name MAGALANGELO. Mr. Trump invited her to his Bedminster golf club in 2022, and she gave it to him as a birthday gift.
“Every time social media or the news quotes the president and I see my artwork alongside it, I feel proud and grateful,” she said.
For a time, the same portrait hung next to Hillary Clinton, his political rival and a former first lady.
Supporters at that time lauded the placement on social media:
This example of a positive feedback loop demonstrates how Mr. Trump has used social media to redefine the presidency and presidential communication. Ms. Ruseva’s portrait was used on social media, hung up in the real world, then photographed and put back on social media by supporters who praised the president.
When Mr. Trump was elected to his first term in 2016, Dr. Hahner said that scholars referred to him as the first “meme president.”
Mr. Trump and his internet fans are used to a meme culture based on irony, and rehashing, repurposing and remixing existing images. The collection of White House artwork — much of it originating from his supporters — sits in an uncanny valley between realism and meme-ism, Dr. Hahner said.
Like memes that multiply, Mr. Trump’s image has been reproduced in other ways, outside the White House.
Last month, a huge banner with Mr. Trump’s face was draped outside the Justice Department headquarters …
Last year, similar signage was strung over the Labor Department building …
… and the Agriculture Department building (this one, alongside Lincoln).
At his request, Mr. Trump’s portrait was recently updated at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery:
Still, Mr. Trump wants more. The White House has suggested that the National Portrait Gallery add a separate section for Trump-related art.
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