Those Who Disparage The Democratic Base By Referring To Them As "Hyper Bernie Activists" Move In To Kill Kevin De León's Campaign

KDL knows exactly who's trying to undermine his campaign

It's no secret here in California that the Democratic establishment has moved ruthlessly to choke off money and support from Kevin de León's challenge to doddering conservative Democrat Dianne Feinstein. But no one's supposed to write about it. BuzzFeed reporter Ruby Cramer just did: Two Aides With California Democratic Connections Leave Feinstein Challenger's Team. The main culprits, she wrote, are California Secretary of State Alex Padilla, unaccomplished former Attorney general/unaccomplished current U.S. Senator Kamala Harris and L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti.

De León, president of the state Senate has made centrist politicians uncomfortable because he pushed a cutting edge agenda of progressive legislation through the Senate instead of playing dead like Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, who knows how to take orders. De León is way too independent-minded for the establishment. Everyone knows no one is supposed to challenge the 84 year old conservative, Republican-friendly Feinstein. But that's exactly what de León is doing, infuriating a usually very complacent Democratic establishment.

The two aides pressured to not work for de León lost are election lawyer Stephen Kaufman and Stephanie Daily Smith.

In California Democratic politics, where a regular cast of elected officials share an overlapping network of in-state consultants and political consulting firms, conflicts and allegiances often tangle statewide elections. But with de León’s decision to challenge Feinstein, a state party mainstay and one of the longest-serving US senators, that complicated web runs deep, if not directly.

Kaufman and Daily Smith both work for Padilla, Harris, and Garcetti, who are supporters of Feinstein. Garcetti shares the same longtime chief strategist, veteran operative Bill Carrick, as Feinstein. And Padilla and Harris both use SCN Strategies, the same leading consulting firm that is now running a pro-Feinstein super PAC, Fight for California, which launched within hours of a competing pro–de León super PAC.

“It doesn’t surprise us that there are powerful people who don’t want Kevin de León to succeed in this race,” said [Roger] Salazar, the de León spokesman. “He’s been told to wait his turn. It’s part of that mentality of folks who like things the way they are.”

Spokespeople for Garcetti, Harris, and Padilla declined to comment.

The shuffle did come as something of a surprise to the de León campaign, particularly in the case of Kaufman, who had done yearly work for the 50-year-old State Senate leader on campaigns and ballot initiatives since he served in the state assembly, de León aides said.

It’s “not unusual” for consultants or vendors to be “conflicted out,” said Salazar. Here, though, with no direct conflict to Feinstein, “the tone of it is a little unusual,” he said. “But like I said, it's something we were expected based on whenever you challenge an institution of power.”

De León, who is still assembling his campaign team two weeks after jumping in the race, has already brought on a number of national, Washington-based operatives. In California, where left-leaning activists reportedly encouraged him to challenge Feinstein, he may find it more difficult to hire tied up in-state operatives.

The race has already been cast, in part through the de León campaign's own statements, as a fight between antiestablishment and party forces. Feinstein, who guided the city of San Francisco through the 1978 assassination of Mayor George Moscone and supervisor and LGBT activist Harvey Milk, is seen by some Democrats as a legendary but complex figure in the national party, with positions on foreign policy, privacy, and security that may be generationally out of step with the new influx of progressives. Both de León and Feinstein supported Clinton in the 2016 campaign.

Garcetti, the Los Angeles mayor, dismissed the idea that a Feinstein–de León race reflects an intraparty division. "People will overanalyze it that way," he said in an interview during the Democratic National Committee meeting last week. "But for the average voter, even the average supporter, that isn’t the prism we use."

"They were both Clinton supporters. She’s the NRA’s number one enemy, helped repeal DOMA, helped write the torture report. So did she take a vote that also is different from my perspective 20 years ago? I’m sure," Garcetti said. "Does he take corporate dollars? Of course he does. He was the head of the Senate in California."

"So to that hyper Bernie activist, he or she can probably find something to hate about both of them."

KDL has no wealth to speak of. He's a regular struggling middle class Californian. The establishment characters lining up against him are from another world. Feinstein herself, infamous for having consistently sold her office for private gain, has a net worth of at least $79 million. To people like Feinstein and her crooked husband, de León will always be a working stiff to be, at best, tolerated and, more likely, looked down their patrician noses at.