Up until a month ago, former Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) had been dominating gubernatorial election polls.
A series of videos showing her becoming unhinged for a variety of reasons has since been published on social media, and it would appear that they have had a rather dramatic impact on her campaign.
Porter went from a six-point lead in September to a one-point deficit in October.
The video that got all this started was a video of Porter nearly walking out during an interview over a question about winning over Trump voters.
She wound up staying for the remainder of that, but it started a flurry of videos on Porter’s unhinged behavior, including a video of a team member who had walked into her shot while Porter was filming a video for social media.
The worker could be seen in the background of the video when Porter yelled out, “Get out of my fu**ing shot!”
It turns out, Porter was offering up some bad information, and her staffer was only getting her the correct information. Porter never apologized, but instead continued to tell the worker to stay out of her shots when she was filming.
It did not help Porter’s case that the videos brought up previous incidents that took place with her ex-husband, who then got his 15 minutes of fame.
Having allegedly had a bowl of food dumped on his head by Porter, Matthew Hoffman, 50, Porter’s ex, stated that it was “about time” that the videos of her behavior came out.
He further stated, “The amount of staff she goes through. The horrible things that she says [about others] … those aren’t fabrications.”
When Porter was asked to comment about her ex’s comments, her office replied, “Katie and her ex-husband divorced more than a decade ago and have a positive and productive relationship as they continue to co-parent their three children.”
California has an open primary system, so this is not a party-driven primary, and right now, it is a big problem for Democrats and Porter.
When everyone thought Harris was running, there were more than a few projections that would have had this a Harris v. Porter general election, but that just got flipped on its head, to the point this could be an all-Republican general election.
Not only had Republican Steve Hilton taken the lead in polling, but now Republican Chad Bianco is up to 11% and in third place. If Porter’s slide continues, the GOP could wind up squeezing Democrats right out of this race.
The key to look at in this race will be in how many Democrats leave the race before the primary, as they significantly outnumber the GOP in this race. There are seven Democrats listed in the poll, with only two Republicans. But, no Democrat other than Porter is above 5% (there are still more than 30% undecided), so the GOP has a real shot here.
