Feinstein-de León race low on spending
California may be the most important state when it comes to national political fundraising, but this year’s U.S. Senate contest between incumbent Dianne Feinstein and fellow Democrat Kevin de León didn’t even crack the top 10 Senate races nationwide in political spending, according to tracking by OpenSecrets.org.
Feinstein raised a healthy $16.5 million for her race, compared with the paltry $1.6 million former state Senate President Pro Tem de León put together.
In contrast, the key U.S. Senate fight in Florida between incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson and Republican Gov. Rick Scott has generated $180.6 million in spending — with half coming from outside political action committees.
But with two Democrats running in California, neither party has spent big here.
And while de León managed to win the Democratic party’s official endorsement — it came with little or no support — his campaign all but fizzled in the homestretch with no money for TV advertising.
On the other hand, California is very much in play in the battle for control of the House — with four of the congressional races in the top 10 when it comes to spending. The most expensive is District 25, featuring incumbent Republican
Steve Knight and Democratic challenger Katie Hill. Spending among the two candidates has hit $25.7 million.
All told, according to OpenSecrets, federal spending has hit an all time record this midterm, with more than $5.2 billion in spending — an increase of 35 percent over four years ago.
Then again, Americans spent an estimated $9 billion on Halloween candy this year.
“I did not know that,” said Brendan Quinn, spokesman for the Center for Responsive Politics, which runs the OpenSecrets website. “We don’t track candy spending here.”
Too big to fail: The fallout from a deal gone bad to turn BART stations into mini-malls could send the entire Bay Area into a tailspin, according to the transit system’s lawyers.
BART is fighting a breach-ofcontract suit filed by TransMart Inc. and its founder, Alexis Wong, a politically connected San Francisco housing developer. In 2008, Wong came to BART with the idea of filling its 43 stations with businesses and, in the process, create boatloads of cash for the agency.
BART bit, and Wong wound up with an exclusive deal.
The deal fell apart in 2016, with BART saying that Wong had failed to deliver.
Wong and her attorneys, however, say the district acted in bad faith, and cost the enterprising company $95 million in lost business.
In court filings BART’s lawyers are claiming TransMart’s lawsuit is “an attack on an indispensable component of public transportation infrastructure,” and that a verdict against BART will have “repercussions and consequences that will reverberate throughout the region, affecting BART’s ability to maintain, repair and improve the BART system.”
Which prompted this retort from Pete Hillan, a spokesman for TransMart: “BART’s dillydallying on legal responses for more than a year only to hide behind a claim of indispensability right before trial suggests the agency’s mismanagement runs deep.”
The trial has been set for May 20.
Sales job: Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff looks to be breaking new ground in pressing for passage of Proposition C on Tuesday’s ballot in San Francisco.
Not only has Benioff committed $7.9 million in personal and corporate money to the Yes on C drive, but he’s also loaned the campaign Salesforce billboard space alongside Interstate 80.
If approved by voters, the measure would add some $300 million to homeless spending by taxing the city’s biggest corporations — including Salesforce.
Now comes word that Salesforce Tower has been hosting a phone bank for Yes on C as well, with about 30 to 40 volunteers pitching calls every day.
“Salesforce has donated office space, phones and laptops to the Prop. C campaign, and they have set up a phone bank in Salesforce Tower,” confirmed Gina Sheibley, the company’s senior vice president for communications.
Sheibley said the callers staffing the bank are volunteers, not Salesforce employees. At least not employees working on company time.
But try as Benioff & Co. might to get the measure over the two-thirds threshold needed to withstand a possible legal challenge, No on C campaign spokesman Jess Montejano said they are “not moving the needle.”
Montejano said voters know that doubling the homelessness budget overnight “is a poor return on investment.”