If you recall last year, we had an election to fill the vacant U.S. Senate seat occupied by Democrat Diane Feinstein, who passed away in 2023. Gavin Newsom appointed, for the short term, Laphonza Butler to fill Feinstein’s remaining unexpired term for the interim. In March 2024 we had a top-two primary election between Steve Garvey, the former baseball player, two progressive congresswomen named Barbara Lee and Katie Porter and the bug-eyed liar of a congressman Adam Schiff to fill the seat. The race came down to Garvey and Schiff. Unfortunately Schiff won the general election.
Before it got to the general election, there was a debate that included the candidates and immediately there was something very unlikeable about Katie Porter.
Last week was a really bad week for Porter, who was the subject of a cascade of bad press.
Going viral last week was an interview in which she grew testy with CBS reporter correspondent Julie Watts who was trying to drill down into her feeling about the 40% of Californians who voted for Donald Trump. Porter dismissed them, saying she didn’t need them to win. It sounds like Katie Porter is just another divider and only cares about serving those in the Democrat Party.
Her fangs came out during the interview. Things got heated as Porter grew testy with Watts and immediately wanted to end the interview. She does not have the demeanor to be the governor of California. She began to take her microphone off and threatened to walk out and said she didn’t want the TV station airing any of it. Now if you’re Kamala Harris and this was 60 Minutes, that tactic might have worked since they edited her bumbling answers to make her sound intelligent. But good for Watts for pressing that a candidate for governor should be willing to answer tough questions.
The moment showed how very unlikable Porter is. Her overpowering alpha personality reminds me of other women who been accused of being abusive to staffers – Kamala Harris and Hillary Clinton.
Things only worsened for Porter. Stories began reappearing about her temper tantrums. Her 10-year marriage to Matthew Hoffman ended and he accused her of dumping boiling potatoes on his head in 2006 after she didn’t like the way he prepared them, burning his scalp. Hoffman also said she would call him a “f-----g idiot” and alleged she would not let him have a cell phone saying he was “too f-----g dumb to operate it.”
Then a video – not AI generated – resurfaced where an abusive Porter was caught berating a staffer who accidentally walked into the background of a selfie video she was shooting by nastily saying “get out of my f-----g shot.”
No wonder her relationships with men all sour including ex-partner Julian Willis. She abuses people like she abuses her body.
In December 2022, text messages surfaced in which Porter scolded a staffer for giving the congresswoman COVID. Dear White Staffers, a Twitter and Instagram account that shares anonymous first-person accounts and gossip from staffers on Capitol Hill, published that text exchange between Porter and the staffer, Sasha Georgiades, alleging that Porter had fired Georgiades due to the incident.
Other staff members say Porter is rage-prone, has a tendency to disparage staffers, holds wildly unrealistic expectations of them and making racist comments.
I can remember a time not that far in the past when we had respectable Democrats in the state of California like Pat Brown, Jerry Brown or LA Mayor Tom Bradley. They were likable and got along with members of the opposite party. This new crop of Democrats is angry and obsessed with destroying opponents.
It’s even amusing how this U.S. senator of ours, Alex Padilla decided to walk into a Kristi Noem press conference with the intent of disrupting it as a PR stunt in front of TV cameras. When detained by “Donald Trump’s agents,” Padilla – his is not exactly a familiar face to many – heralds himself as a Trump victim and uses footage of him being forced to the ground by security to sell to voters why Prop 50 is needed to reign in Donald Trump when he was clearly elected by a majority of Americans.
Dismiss Porter. She’s toxic. There are other candidates the Democrats can focus on, including Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, California State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former Comptroller Betty Yee. I met Villaraigosa when he came to South Modesto in 2015 and found him to be very likeable and moderate. But the Democrat Party is now about the crazies.
You can’t go wrong with the either of the two Republican candidates – Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco or political commentator Steve Hilton.
This column is the opinion of Jeff Benziger, and does not necessarily represent the opinion of The Ceres Courier or 209 Multimedia Corporation. How do you feel about this? Let Jeff know at jeffb@cerescourier.com
