Politics
The far-left network that helped put Alex Pretti in harm’s way, then made him a martyr
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The skirmish that led to Saturday’s fatal shooting of an agitator by Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis and the response that followed were driven by a complex network of far-left organizations with a wide range of causes, a Fox News Digital investigation found.
A coordinated web of encrypted chats, street alerts and tracking of ICE “Abductors” in a sophisticated database reviewed by Fox News Digital shows that agitators were already mobilized at the scene where 37-year-old Alex Pretti was killed minutes before any shots were fired.
ICE and Border Patrol agents were there to arrest an illegal immigrant criminal, and Pretti and others were there, outside a donut shop, to meet them as part of a strategic pattern of organized interference with law enforcement operations.
Over the following hours, a national network of socialist, communist and Marxist-Leninist cells in the United States leveraged the tragic fatality into a nationwide protest operation. While grief and outrage over Pretti’s death is genuine, the network’s real-time rapid response, using short sensational video clips and emojis as weapons of propaganda, offers a window into the disciplined logistics, messaging and coordination of far-left warriors fomenting insurgency-like confrontation with authorities.
VANCE CALLS MINNEAPOLIS UNREST ‘ENGINEERED CHAOS’ AFTER DEADLY SHOOTING
“Rapid Responders” swarmed to the site of Glam Doll Donuts before the shooting occurred, documenting alleged ICE vehicles in the area in a sophisticated tracking database. (“MN ICE DATABASE”)
“This level of engineered chaos is unique to Minneapolis. It is the direct consequence of far left agitators, working with local authorities,” Vice President JD Vance observed in a Sunday post on X.
The encrypted Signal messages obtained by Fox News Digital in real time show that anti-ICE “rapid responders” were actively tracking, broadcasting and summoning “backup” around federal agents outside Glam Doll Donuts on Nicollet Avenue, where the shooting happened. Local “rapid responders” made at least 26 entries into a database called “MN ICE Plates” in the critical hours before and after the killing, documenting the license plate numbers and details of alleged ICE vehicles they claimed to see around Nicollet Avenue.
The entry at row 344 read, “At the nicollet [sic] murder,” chronicling a black Jeep Wagoneer at the location with agents allegedly “involved in shooting.” Row 338 had a “Glam Doll Donuts” entry, tracking a black Ford Taurus.
BONDI BLAMES MINNEAPOLIS LEADERS AFTER ARMED SUSPECT KILLED, UNREST ERUPTS DURING ICE OPERATION
Members of an ICE Watch “Rapid Response” team tracked federal agents to the street, calling on more protesters to come to the street, where an anti-ICE demonstrator was killed minutes later. (Obtained by Fox News Digital)
At 9:50 a.m. ET, just before the killing, a user identified as “Willow” shared a 22-second video on an encrypted Signal chat for anti-ICE “rapid responders.”
“26and 3rd,” wrote “Willow,” quickly following up with, “Outside Glam Doll.”
The video showed two agents, one wearing a vest marked “POLICE,” studying the front door of Glam Doll before walking away, past a sign in the window that read, “ICE OUT OF MINNESOTA.”
As the camera rolled, the person filming yelled, “No!”
The camera followed the agents as they returned to a maroon Dodge Durango, passing another sign in the window that read, “ALL WELCOME HERE.”
In the video, someone shouted, “Get out of here!”
Just three minutes later, at 9:53 a.m. ET, a second Signal user, “Salacious B. Crumb,” escalated the alert, summoning additional responders and citing the same vehicle and agents.
“Backup needed at the Black Forest Inn parking lot on Nicollet Ave just south of 26th Street,” the message read.
DHS SAYS ICE AGENTS RAMMED BY VEHICLES AMID MINNEAPOLIS ENFORCEMENT SURGE: ‘AGGRESSIVELY ASSAULTED’
“Multiple vehicles with many agents appear to be staging there,” the alert continued. “One confirmed ICE vehicle seen was a maroon Dodge Durango [plate number], but it has driven away northbound on Nicollet.” Fox News Digital has redacted the Florida license plate number included in the original message.
ICE Assistant Director Marcos Charles said Sunday that the violence on the streets was “not a coincidence,” considering the “chaos and mayhem” that agitators are fomenting in Minneapolis. At the same press conference, Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) Commander-at-Large Greg Bovino confirmed that Pretti was “on the scene several minutes” before the fatal shooting.
Video of the scene shows that as Pretti stepped into the middle of Nicollet Avenue to direct traffic, fellow agitators could be heard blowing whistles to alert locals that ICE officers were around. Soon after, Pretti ended up in a street confrontation with CBP agents, across the street from Glam Doll Donuts outside a worn storefront marked “NEW AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT CENTER,” a nonprofit focused on immigration entry programs for Somalis.
Within minutes, at about 10:05 a.m. ET, at least one CBP agent shot Pretti, killing him.
MINNESOTA ICE OFFICIAL URGES PROTESTS TO REMAIN PEACEFUL AMID TENSIONS ‘LIKE NOTHING I’VE EVER SEEN BEFORE’
At 10:18 a.m. ET, the Signal network erupted.
Using a red phone emoji to signal an all-points alert, a message blasted out: “☎️ easy. URGENT: observers urgently requested at glam doll donuts @ 26th & nicollet [sic],” the alert continued. “an observer has been shot by ice, unknown condition, emts [emergency medical technicians] present, please be safe. EDIT: medics requested to join perimeter in case agents start gassing. be aware there are many agents and mpd [Minneapolis Police Department] officers present.”
Within minutes, far-left activists descended on Nicollet Avenue. Soon after, a video showed corrugated boxes of supplies apparently lined up on a Minneapolis sidewalk for protesters, including boxes marked “DESINER MASKS” [sic] and “FREE WINTER HATS,” next to piles of bottled water.
MINNESOTA AGITATORS STALK, PELT BORDER PATROL AGENTS WITH FOOD AND SPIT AT GAS STATIONS, DHS SAYS
Within hours, socialist leaders turbocharged their “rapid responders” in Minneapolis and mobilized street protesters from New York City to Los Angeles.
Media outlets, including CNN and MSNOW, described “angry protesters” but failed to identify the ideological networks behind the mobilization, even as protesters flashed their signs with their logos and names, touting socialism, communism and Marxism, on camera.
The Minneapolis activation marked the beginning of an almost instantaneous weekend surge by far-left organizations, including hardened socialist and communist groups operating in an ecosystem that national security experts describe as an insurgent-style operation designed to exploit tragedy to wage a domestic political war.
The strategy mirrors past mobilizations, including the aftermath of George Floyd’s killing in May 2020, and exploits well-intentioned public sympathy by rapidly framing Pretti — an intensive care unit nurse at a Veterans Administration hospital — as a symbol of resistance, much like Renee Good, the first victim of an ICE shooting in Minneapolis.
Just as they responded in real-time to mobilize “comrades” to march on the streets within 12 hours of the U.S. arrest of Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro in early January, socialist, communist and Marxist-Leninist groups now frame their activation as an action within the “belly of the beast” against the “hyperimperialism” of the United States.
VANCE CALLS MINNEAPOLIS UNREST ‘ENGINEERED CHAOS’ AFTER DEADLY SHOOTING
Propagandists for socialist groups, including BreakThrough News, the Party for Socialism and Liberation and the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, sprang into action to demonize federal officials after Alex Pretti’s killing in Minneapolis. (BreakThrough News/X, Party for Socialism and Liberation/X, Freedom Road Socialist Organization, X)
Based on a digital analysis of scores of rapid-response messages following the killing on Saturday, a hub of communist and socialist nonprofit organizations emerged as key organizers of the protests. Many of them are funded by American-born billionaire Neville Roy Singham, a self-declared Marxist-Leninist living in Shanghai. Some are also offshoots of the People’s Forum Inc., a nonprofit hub Singham has funded in New York City since 2017 as an “incubator” for socialist and communist groups. The People’s Forum declined requests for comment.
At 10:48 a.m. ET, BreakThrough News, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and propaganda arm of the People’s Forum, broke the news widely of the killing, sharing a video recorded from inside the Glam Doll Donut shot of the tussle outside, punctuated by gunshots and frantic narration, “Holy s–t. What the f—!…Did they f—ing kill that guy? F—ing kidding me, dude.”
BreakThrough News put a dramatic black-and-white caption over the video: “BREAKING: Another CBP Shooting in Minneapolis.” By Sunday afternoon, the video had 4.1 million views, alongside the outlet’s calls to support the People’s Republic of China, Venezuela’s Maduro and the communist revolution in Cuba.
Before the video cuts off, someone can be heard saying, “Yo, we need people on site!”
MINNESOTA SOCIALISTS TELL WORKERS TO FAKE SICK LEAVE FOR ANTI-ICE PROTESTS
The Party for Socialism and Liberation used Alex Pretti’s image on posters for its anti-ICE efforts. (Party for Socialism and Liberation/X)
At 11:40 a.m., BreakThrough News broadcast a 39-second video showing Minnesota National Guard soldiers charging across a street with batons, some falling as clouds of breath rose in the cold air.
Soon after, at 12:24 p.m., the Party for Socialism and Liberation – a political wing of the movement, working with shared leadership at the People’s Forum – published a quickly-made graphic, “CBP MURDERS ANOTHER IN MINNEAPOLIS,” and the message, “EXPAND THE GENERAL STRIKE!”
The call for a “general strike,” a classic communist tactic, refers to coordinated mass work stoppages aimed at paralyzing civil society to force political – and economic – outcomes.
At 12:33 p.m., the People’s Forum blasted out a bold red-and-white poster to followers, calling for an “EMERGENCY PROTEST” at 4 p.m. ET at Union Square in midtown Manhattan, with the message, “STOP ICE TERROR.”
DEMOCRATIC SOCIALISTS OF AMERICA IN NYC TRAINING THOUSANDS OF ACTIVISTS TO COUNTER ICE: REPORT
Democratic Socialists of America, People’s Forum and other groups that identify as Marxist-Leninist activated foot soldiers on social media. (Democratic Socialists of America/X, People’s Forum/X, Defend 512/Instagram)
In lockstep, at 12:57 p.m., Democratic Socialists of America, the 501(c)(3) nonprofit that elected Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York City, posted a stark black-and-white graphic on X, calling the killing an “execution” and demanding, “ABOLISH ICE NOW.”
At the protest, Linda Sarsour, a Palestinian political operative who has led virulently anti-Israel protests with socialist organizations after the Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel by Hamas terrorists, rallied the crowd at the 4 p.m. protest, yelling, “We will bring this country to a halt!” The People’s Forum shared the 22-second video clip with the caption: “🚨HAPPENING NOW IN NYC.”
Other groups mobilized simultaneously, including Freedom Road Socialist Organization, a self-described Marxist-Leninist group that has waved its red flag with its acronym, “FRSO,” in the middle of the protests since Good’s killing.
Also active: the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee, which has led many of the rapid-response efforts and Black Lives Matter chapters, which led the recent stampede through a local Christian church.
ANTI-ICE AGITATOR ALLEGEDLY BITES OFF FEDERAL OFFICER’S FINGER DURING MINNEAPOLIS ATTACK
By early evening, the narrative had coalesced into a chorus of voices within the far-left propaganda apparatus, adopting charged historical language to brand federal officials as Nazi-like figures. At 4:12 p.m. ET, Calla Walsh, a controversial communist activist filmed this past summer in Iran shouting, “Death to America! Death to Israel!” shared a 32-second video showing barricades built with Republic Services dumpsters.
She wrote, “People of Minneapolis build barricades, trapping ICE Gestapo at the scene of their latest murder in broad daylight. Not far from where they killed Renee Good a couple weeks ago, not far from where George Floyd was killed in 2020.”
By evening, CNN was reporting from the 4 p.m. protest in New York City but did not identify the ideological affiliations of the organizers, even as activists openly carried signs from the Party for Socialism and Liberation, with the group’s full name printed across the bottom.
FREY, KLOBUCHAR CALL FOR ICE TO LEAVE MINNEAPOLIS FOLLOWING DEADLY CBP SHOOTING IN CITY
Another CNN segment from Minneapolis interviewed Chris Gray, describing him only as Pretti’s “next-door neighbor.” Gray spoke about Pretti while delivering a well-scripted appeal for a general strike to dismantle the “Trump regime” and promote “non-violent resistance.” The segment did not disclose that Gray is a member of Socialist Alternative, the U.S. affiliate of the International Socialist Alternative, a “global fighting organization of workers, young people, and all those oppressed by capitalism and imperialism,” seeking to create a “socialist world.”
Soon after, however, Socialist Alternative shared the interview proudly on Instagram, noting, “Chris Gray, Socialist Alternative member and next-door neighbor of Alex Pretti, speaks out.”
By evening’s end, at 9:44 p.m. ET, Gloria La Riva, a co-founder of the Party for Socialism and Liberation who has described herself as “a communist,” posted a message on X, using the inflammatory language now normalized: “Alex Pretti was murdered in cold blood, everyone knows that. 10 shots in his back. All of Trump’s, Noem’s, Bovino’s lies cannot cover it up. The people’s struggle will only grow!”
TRUMP CITES ARMED SUSPECT, LACK OF POLICE SUPPORT FOLLOWING FATAL BORDER PATROL SHOOTING IN MINNEAPOLIS
“Rapid Responders” in Minneapolis track the vehicles they suspect belong to federal officials, including ICE agents, and upload details about their alleged vehicles in a database. (“MN ICE PLATES AIRTABLE DATABASE”)
The maroon Dodge Durango in the early Signal alerts from Saturday morning is Entry No. 2069 in the publicly shared database, “MN ICE PLATES.” It included a gallery of photos of alleged ICE vehicles.
At last count on Sunday, the database had 4,626 records of license plate numbers organized as “Highly Suspected ICE,” “Confirmed ICE,” “Suspected ICE,” “Cleared – Not ICE” and “Unknown.”
The total number of “Confirmed ICE” entries is 2,933 records. The total number of records labeled “Abductors” is 455.
A fine-print disclaimer states that the data is “for informational purposes only” and that its organizers “do not condone its use to forcibly assault, resist, oppose, impede or interfere with the official duties of any officer or employee of the United States, or of any agency in any branch of the United States Government, while engaged in or on account of the performance of official duties.”
Alleged ICE vehicles outside the shooting were included in a database compiled by Minneapolis citizens who have joined a “Rapid Response” team to track the movements of federal officials. They had swarmed the street minutes before the shooting occurred Saturday morning.
One guide, “Best Practices Guide for Neighborhood or Area Patrol / Monitors: 612,” includes a key to emojis and the jobs they represent for rapid responders:
“🚗💨= Mobile Patrol / Commuter – In a vehicle driving around, looking for agents”
“🚗📍= Stationary Patrol/Monitor – In a vehicle positioned at key places in the area, looking for agents”
“🏃🏻♀️= Foot Patrol – On foot, looking for agents”
“☎️ = Dispatch – Live on the Monitor / Patrol group call”
“📟 = Hyper-local group messenger – Ready to pass on word to individual neighborhoods and blocks”
‘🦺 = School / event safety spotters – Assigned and connected to a specific school or event”
“🍽️ = License plate checker – Ready to check a plate against the list of known license plates’
“⛑️ = Medic – Ready to offer medical care”
“❤️🩹 = Aftercare provider – Available to connect with responders after an event”
The maroon Dodge Durango that was allegedly outside Glam Doll Donuts on Nicollet Avenue is listed with three prior sightings: Jan. 11 at 3 p.m. at the Whipple federal detention facility, Jan. 13 at 1:15 p.m. and a final sighting at Powderhorn Park parking lot on 35th Street and 14th Avenue.
It’s listed with the tags, “Seen in a convoy, Tinted/blacked-out windows, ICE agent(s) seen in vehicle,” and a final verdict: “Confirmed ICE.”
As socialist organizations continued to dispatch their foot soldiers to Nicollet Avenue on Sunday evening, the Signal groups were as active as ever on Sunday, an alert going out at 4:37 p.m. ET, with rapid responders now chasing a black Dodge Durango around town.
“2 confirmed ICE vehicles,” the alert read, “…at least 2 agents in each vehicle.”
But while that is a new element in the talks, the cultural divide in how to negotiate is not.
That divide was evident 11 years ago, in the gilded halls of the 160-year-old Beau-Rivage Palace Hotel in Lausanne, Switzerland, where Secretary of State John Kerry and his counterparts from five other countries struggled to close a preliminary agreement with Iran. It was, perhaps, the closest analogue to what is unfolding now in Islamabad.
Every day the American delegation would speak about how many centrifuges had to be disassembled and how much uranium needed to be shipped out of country. Yet when Iranian officials — including Abbas Araghchi, now the Iranian foreign minister — stepped out of the elegant, chandeliered rooms to brief reporters, most of the questions about those details were waved away. The Iranians talked about preserving respect for their rights and Iran’s sovereignty.
“I remember we finally got the parameters agreed upon at the hotel,” Wendy Sherman, the chief U.S. negotiator at the time, said on Monday. “And then a few days later the supreme leader came out and said, ‘Actually, some very different terms were required.’”
Ms. Sherman, who went on to become deputy secretary of state in the Biden administration, would go into these negotiations with a large posse. She often had the C.I.A.’s top Iran expert in the room, or nearby. So was the energy secretary, Ernest Moniz, an expert in nuclear weapons design. Proposals floated by the Iranians would be sent back to the U.S. national laboratories, where weapons are designed and tested, for expert analysis of whether the agreements being discussed would keep Iran at least a year away from a bomb.
But Mr. Trump’s negotiating team travels light, with no entourage of experts and few briefings. Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, the president’s son-in-law and the special envoy, learned their negotiating skills in New York real estate and say a deal is a deal. They say they have immersed themselves in the details of the Iran program, and know it well.
Politics
Soros-linked dark money network fuels Virginia redistricting push backed by national Democrats
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Virginians for Fair Elections, a main group fighting to get Virginia voters to approve a ballot referendum that will allow the state to redraw its congressional maps, has been pumped with millions in cash from a web of George Soros-backed dark money groups and top Democratic Party officials.
The money the group has garnered ahead of Tuesday’s vote, which is poised to allow Democrats in the House of Representatives to potentially take four seats from Republicans going into the midterms, also comes from leading Democratic Party figures and organizations like Nancy Pelosi and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT).
Other left-wing juggernauts pumping money into the Democratic Party’s redistricting effort in Virginia include the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Eric Holder’s National Democratic Redistricting Committee, which once championed the adoption of “independent redistricting commissions,” national green energy group the League of Conservation Voters, and the U.S. House of Representatives campaign arm for the Democratic Party, according to a Fox News Digital review of state campaign finance records and records from the Virginia Public Access Project (VPAP), which tracks public spending in Virginia.
VIRGINIA DEMS ACCUSED OF ILLEGALLY ‘STEAMROLLING’ STATE LAW THAT COULD UPEND REDISTRICTING CRUSADE
“Dark money is flooding into Virginia,” GOP strategist Matt Gorman told Fox News Digital. “Democrats talked all about the cost of living during the campaign, but all they did once in office was raise taxes and rig elections. It’ll be the same elsewhere across the country in 2026 too.”
A woman casts her vote at a polling place in Burke, Fairfax County, Virginia, in 2026. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg)
Fox News Digital reported in March that the left-wing group fighting to redraw Virginia’s maps raised more than $38 million, according to VPAP’s donation totals based on state campaign finance records. As of right before the mid-April referendum vote, just a handful of weeks later, that total ballooned to more than $64 million.
In 2026, the largest giver to Virginians for Fair Elections was House Majority Forward, the nonprofit counterpart of House Democrats’ House Majority PAC, which has donated over $38 million, records show.
Meanwhile, entities directly tied to Soros, or that obtained significant funding which can be traced back to the billionaire Democrat megadonor, come in second and third in terms of total giving to the group, per VPAP’s accounting of donation totals.
One of those groups, the Fund for Policy Reform Inc, was founded by Soros. The other, titled The Fairness Project, has been funded by groups like the Sixteen Thirty Fund, Hopewell Fund and the Tides Foundation, which Soros has given significant funding to.
George Soros pictured on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January 2020. (Simon Dawson/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
DAVID MARCUS: DESPERATE DEMS TAP OBAMA TO PITCH VIRGINIA GERRYMANDERING LIES
Another one of the top donors to the left’s Virginians for Fair Elections is American Opportunity Action, described as “a pure pass-through entity” by Parker Thayer, a dark money expert from the conservative Capital Research Center. The group is so new that it does not even appear to have any 990s filed with the IRS but is still one of Virginians for Fair Elections’ top donors, according to VPAP and state campaign finance records.
Top Democratic Party members of Congress from outside Virginia, including Reps. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., and Katherine Clark, D-Mass., also donated tens-of-thousands of dollars, according to a review of state campaign finance records. Democratic Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine’s leadership PAC donated $100,000 as well, while the Democratic Party of Virginia put up just shy of a million dollars, per VPAP’s accounting.
Meanwhile, a group founded by Obama wingman Eric Holder, who previously championed “independent redistricting commissions,” provided a more than $10,000 in-kind contribution to the left-wing redistricting group, state election filings show. The League of Conservation Voters, and the Soros-backed MoveOn.org were also among Virginians for Fair Election’s top donors. In terms of labor union support, SEIU gave half-a-million, while AFT gave $100,000.
CBS HOST PRESSES FORMER AG ON DEFENDING PARTISAN REDISTRICTING EFFORTS IN VIRGINIA
Fox News Digital reached out to Soros’ Open Society Foundations and the other top donors pumping thousands or millions into the redistricting battle, but did not receive a response ahead of publication.
“No one wanted to take this action, but in a democracy, we can’t let entire states rig their congressional maps just to bend to the will of one person,” Alexis Magnan-Callaway, a spokesperson for The Fairness Project, told Fox News Digital in March.
“We have to respond. This amendment is a temporary, one-time exception that gives Virginia voters a voice and meets the needs of the current moment, while ensuring Virginia’s bipartisan redistricting process will resume after the 2030 census,” she continued. “This isn’t about favoring one party over another. This is about restoring fairness across the board by temporarily changing Virginia’s congressional districts.”
A main group in Virginia opposing the redistricting effort led by Democrats, Virginians For Fair Maps, raised a little over $3 million at the time of Fox News Digital’s late March report. However, the right-wing redistricting group in Virginia appears to have gained some ground since then as well, albeit still far behind the left’s Virginians for Fair Elections funding totals.
As of just before the referendum vote Tuesday, the anti-redistricting referendum group raised its fundraising total to nearly $20 million, with most of that money coming from a group by the same name that is also a significant donor to the Virginia Republican Party.
Other donations to the group come from a series of several much smaller donors, such as $50,000 from the National Shooting Sports Foundation and $100,000 from a wealthy D.C.-area real-estate investor, who donates primarily to GOP campaigns. That investor is the top individual donor at $100,000 out of just a handful of individual contributions, according to VPAP.
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin speaks during the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s Road to Majority Policy Conference at the Washington Hilton on June 22, 2024 in Washington, DC. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
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Former Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, has reportedly given more than $500,000 in efforts against the redistricting measure, per reporting from the Virginia Scope. He also has been a leading voice in Virginia holding events to campaign against the measure despite no longer being in office.
Wealthy tech entrepreneur and Republican donor Peter Thiel has reportedly donated to Justice for Democracy PAC, which has been part of the anti-redistricting effort alongside Virginians for Fair Maps as well.
The most unpredictable California governor’s race in recent history took another set of dizzying turns on Monday, with former Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra surging after former Rep. Eric Swalwell dropped out in the face of sexual assault and misconduct allegations, and former state Controller Betty Yee ending her bid.
The race to replace termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom is the first in a quarter of a century with no clear front-runner and a sprawling field of candidates who have been jockeying for the attention of Californians, who are just beginning to pay attention to the campaign two weeks before ballots arrive in their mailboxes.
“I certainly could not have imagined the twists and the disturbing turns that this race has taken,” Yee said as she announced she was dropping out. “But through it all, my values and my vision for California has never wavered.”
A poll released Monday by the state Democratic Party — its first since Swalwell (D-Dublin) dropped out — showed Becerra’s support jumped nine points to 13%, placing him in a tie with Tom Steyer, the billionaire hedge fund founder turned environmental warrior. Former Rep. Katie Porter of Orange County saw a slight bump to 10% from 7%, while the remaining Democrats in the contest were mired in the low single digits.
The party began the surveys out of concern that Democrats could be shut out of the governor’s race because of California’s unique primary system, where the top two vote-getters in the June 2 primary move on to the November general election regardless of political party.
“I continue to believe there are too many Democrats in the field,” California Democratic Party Chairman Rusty Hicks told reporters Monday. “My call for candidates to honestly assess the viability of their candidacy and campaigns still stands, especially if you are stalled in the single digits, seeing financial resources dry up and/or are failing to pick up additional support.”
Hicks and other party leaders and allies had unsuccessfully urged low-polling candidates to reconsider their candidacies before the filing deadline in an attempt to cull the field and avoid splintering the Democratic vote. Though most did not name candidates who they thought should think about their viability, Yee was widely believed to be among them.
Yee became emotional as she said on Monday that she decided to withdraw from the race because she wasn’t able to raise the resources necessary to compete in the state. She also said her message of competency and experience wasn’t resonating among voters who were seeking a fiery foil to President Trump, not “Boring Betty,” as she dubbed herself. Yee said she would assess the field before making an announcement on whether she would endorse one of her fellow Democrats.
Becerra was another candidate believed to be a target of party leaders’ efforts to shrink the field. But he held on and apparently benefited from Swalwell’s downfall.
“I’m not the richest candidate, I’m not the slickest candidate, but I am the guy that’s got you,” Becerra said, rallying supporters in Los Angeles on Saturday.
The audience was filled with members of labor groups backing the longtime politician, and Becerra told them he’d serve as a “union man” in the governor’s office.
Pro- and anti-Becerra forces tussled outside the town hall after two people, who declined to identify whom they were working for, passed out fliers highlighting critical media investigations of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services during the migrant crisis when the agency was led by Becerra.
Pro-Becerra attendees grabbed the fliers and told the men to go away, prompting a security guard to intervene.
The question is whether Becerra, who also served as state attorney general, a member of Congress and a state Assembly member, can raise the funds necessary to compete in a state with some of the nation’s most expensive media markets. And he was tied in the state party poll with a billionaire who dumped an additional $12.1 million of his own money into his campaign last week.
Steyer’s total investment in his bid reached $133 million, according to the California secretary of state’s office. He also received the endorsement of Our Revolution, a progressive political organization founded by U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
“We’ve never endorsed a billionaire — but Tom Steyer is using his position to upset the system,” the group posted on X on Monday. “As Our Revolution executive director Joseph Geevarghese told @theintercept, ‘He’s been a partner in the movement. Most billionaires have used their wealth and privilege to lock in the status quo. Tom is doing the opposite.’”
San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, who is also running for governor, accused Steyer of hypocrisy for the hedge fund he founded profiting from investments in private prisons being used to house ICE detainees, and Steyer calling for the abolishment of ICE.
Steyer got “rich investing off the ICE infrastructure he now wants to abolish,” Mahan posted on Instagram.
Steyer, who sold his stake in the hedge fund in 2012, has said he ordered the company to divest from the private prison company and has repeatedly expressed remorse about his former firm’s ties with the detention company.
Mahan also appeared Monday at a Hollywood production lot to announce his proposal for a special fund to lure sporting events, concerts and other productions to California as part of his plan to help the struggling film and television industry.
An independent effort supporting Mahan has also raised roughly $11 million since Swalwell left the race.
Mehta reported from Los Angeles and Nixon from Sacramento. Times staff writer Dakota Smith contributed to this report.
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