Latest / The Orange Report with Kira Davis / Ep.23 California Governor's Race - Swalwell, Hilton, Bianco...Where now?
Transcript
- Kira Davis: you broadcasting to Facebook and YouTube. So find one of those places, get in the chat, listen up. We've got a big show today. We're going to talk about Eric Swalwell. We're going to talk about the California GOP convention, the governor's non endorsements, and a little bit about the process. I actually was going back and forth with some friends this morning. A lot of people don't understand the process very well. So ⁓ I'm just going to break that down a little bit for you. That's what we're going to be focusing on today. Let me pin this to my profile so everybody can see me and let's get in this. Let's get going. Well, ⁓ make sure that you follow me everywhere, of course. ⁓ Follow me on x at Kira Davis. ⁓ Facebook is just Kira Davis, J-O-S-T Kira Davis. That's meta, really. Instagram, just Kira Davis. And the Orange Report is available on YouTube and across other platforms, including Rumble. We're working on merging these brands. And so I'll be bringing Orange Report over to Substack soon as well. But go to JustCuraDatas.com to find out about my writing, because mainly I'm a writer. That's really what I do. I do radio. I do broadcasting. You'll see me on TV. I'm going to be on NewsNation with my friend Katie Pavlich next week to break down. the next debate in California. So I do that, but really I consider myself a writer above all. And so if you go over to just cura Davis, you'll see all kinds of stuff over there, given the archives dig in slots of fun. Okay. Well talking about digging in and fun, let's get right to it. Cause I know all of you are really curious about what happened at the California GOP convention this weekend in San Diego, where we had two strong Republican candidates, Chad Bianco versus Steve Hilton. Everybody knows what camp I'm in. So don't, uh, you know, this isn't an unbiased show. All right. Everybody understands that, right? Like I have a, I have a point of view. Steve Hilton is a long time friend. I just want to get that off the top. you, this is how you do media, right? I get this question all the time. Everyone says, Kira, how do I know who to trust? How do I know? How do I find like an unbiased, um, you know, reporting system or unbiased website or outlet and I always say there's no such thing there really isn't even the ones you think are unbiased are biased someone is giving you their point of view about what they think you should know about right what they think you're interested about and it means making a decision about a lot of other things they don't show you so there is no such thing as objective media it doesn't exist but the best you can do is to find somebody who is honest about where they stand up front So you go to CNN and they're going to tell you, we're just a regular media company. We're really on bias and we're, just professional journalists. But of course they're not. And so that's deception. That's deceptive. Then people think they're getting information from the middle of the road and they're not, they're getting very biased information. But if you go in understanding that you're getting bias information, you can then you're either making a choice to be okay with only having one side of the story. And that's a voluntary choice, or you're making the choice to go find. Other places where you might, you know, have a different point of view, which is what someone like me does. ⁓ in my business, you know, we have to, it's really, ⁓ it's really funny when people liberals accused me of, you're, just watch so much phone news. It's like, dude, you probably watch more Fox news than I do. I mean, my, my TV is on CNN, MSNBC. I'm streaming PBS. I'm streaming the liberal podcasters. Like I, I need to know what is going on in every corner. So. All that to say, I'm not an unbiased point of view, but now you know. However, there were a few things that I was looking for when I went in to the convention this weekend. I wanted to hear what the buzz was on the ground. ⁓ There was a, ⁓ shoot, Scott, I really wish I had given you these graphics, but maybe it's best. ⁓ There was a little controversy before we went in, right? Some mailers went out from Steve Hilton's camp. about Bianco ⁓ and Denise Bianco actually had an absolute fit about it on Instagram, which I went to look at and I thought, ⁓ my God, I didn't see the graphic. I just saw her video. was like, ⁓ my God, what did they do? This looks terrible. ⁓ And then I went to find the graphic, but being in media, I knew better than to just depend on one picture. So I went to find multiples of the picture again, I might do this. am sort of low to, you know, keep talking about it because at this point it's irrelevant that the convention is done. But, and it was totally doctored. You know, they had totally doctored the image. It really wasn't a target. It really was just some graphics behind the head. And so there were two different versions. The versions chats can't put out in the version that was in the mailers. So I was really interested to see. I wasn't gonna put my finger on the scale. I was just really interested to see if people were talking about it. A few people were talking about it on social media, but not much. And if it was affecting the way that people would vote. I spent a lot of my first day just lurking, just hanging out in the bar, just chatting with people, ⁓ and eavesdropping on conversations, really getting a feel for it. And I definitely... got the impression that the Bianco camp was not happy. And I don't mean just Chad and Denise, of course, but I just mean his supporters. And there were a lot there. He had a huge delegation there. There were a lot there. And people were talking about it. People absolutely were talking about it ⁓ where they were. ⁓ the main thing I heard from Bianco supporters were it was right, basically what you would think. ⁓ I didn't like that Steve went negative. Steve went negative first, so Chad had to go negative. ⁓ That's not true. I actually want to clear this record. And I am speaking as ⁓ somebody who was firmly in the Hilton camp. So again, take it with a grain of salt. Take it for what it's worth. Steve did not go negative first. He just went negative in public first. And I don't even think it's negative to just play the words of the other candidate. Now you can say, well, he played them out of context. I disagree. But he played them out of context here. Okay, fine. But they're his words, right? He's not like making up words. not doctoring images to make it seem like it's something different. So, okay. But I'm willing to play that game. A lot of my friends are Bianco supporters. I'm really not trying to make anyone mad. I'm willing to concede that. Okay, you think that Steve playing Chad's own words and own clips is going negative. That being said, what happened was And this has actually been a smart move. I'm going to say this, Bianco campaign has actually been very smart. I realized this at the convention this week. They've done all their campaigning internally. I wondered why Steve is doing five events to Chad's one, but Steve is campaigning to the people and Chad's been campaigning to the delegates, which was smart. And I'm going to tell you why, but, ⁓ but, and cause I'm going to tell you how the whole convention thing breaks out. A of people don't even know, but Just go back to my original point, have been in ⁓ Chad's private events. Sometimes I'm on the roster as well as a speaker. Not a lot, but sometimes. ⁓ I sat in a meeting in March. It was a private meeting. And I sat in a meeting and I watched Chad go negative from the pulpit, from the microphone, about Hilton and he said some pretty mean thing. He said some pretty bigoted things. I think about Steve's immigrant immigrant past, you know, he's an American but said that, you know, I think that's a very odd thing to be saying about particularly a California candidate, especially a Republican candidate because in the Republican Party, we nominate foreigners all the time. We have a huge Asian contingent who are foreign born, especially here in Orange County. They speak with accents. English is not their first language, but they're great patriots. We love them. don't trash them for being born in another country. So I heard him go negative and I remember going like, ⁓ my gosh, okay, we're not being nice anymore. Got it. ⁓ So he's been doing it behind closed doors. Smart, but I just wanted to set the record straight about that. However, ⁓ What is really smart is that Chad went after the delegates and that's what he's been campaigning on. So let me explain a little bit to those of you who don't understand the California Republican Party nomination process. And I want you to know I'm new to it all too. I actually had the great pleasure of sitting next to a couple of women from Northern counties when we were in the general session on Sunday, which is where the endorsement process happens. And they were fantastic. They were older women. One was running for office. One was the head of her ⁓ Republican club up north. they really, when I had questions, they really filled me in. They really helped me with information. I want to thank those ladies. One was Angela. I can't remember the other one's name, but I hope to see you again soon, ladies. They were so helpful. And so I want to share some of this with you because I was going back and forth with some friends this morning and I realized, people don't understand how this nomination process works. And they might feel like ⁓ why can't the party just pick one? Well, I don't know how it works in other states. But here in California, we have what is called the jungle primary. This is a top two primary. We don't have party primaries. The two parties don't get to run to weed down, to pare down their ⁓ field, and then push a strong candidate forward. The jungle primaries are a backdoor ⁓ attempt at communism. And it works and they're trying to push it in Idaho, Ohio, Kentucky. You guys should keep an eye out for it. It'll give you, ⁓ a permanent Democrat super majority if you do that. So don't do it. They try to make it sound good. They try to make it sound like, this will make it nonpartisan. Ask yourself who's pushing it before you get excited about it. Okay. So we have this jungle primary. means that in June, there will be an election and it is a state election. We run for June in California. We don't run for November. You run for June. Because you have to get through June as a candidate and only two people are going to get through and regardless of party, it's going to be the two candidates who are polling or who secure the most votes in June. Okay. We have two Republican candidates and 10 Democrat candidates and seven of those 10 are contenders. Contenders. depending on how you view that. Now we know it just happened this weekend with Eric Swalwell, we're gonna talk about that. But what the convention does is it gathers all the delegates. So every county has delegates, right? You sign up to be a delegate, pay your membership fee, you pay your dues, I guess you pay your dues, and then you have a voting interest in the party. then think about, the national conventions that you see the RNC, the DNC, and you have all of the delegations from California delegation from ⁓ New Mexico and they have their signs and they go up and they tell you who they voted for for the primaries, who they voted for to go through as a presidential candidate. You've seen it. It's basically like that, except on the state level, you have your county delegations. They all come in. Now they all have not made choices. Some of the county party central committees have endorsed, others haven't, but there is no one uniform process for every Republican committee in every county. Excuse me, so the delegates, it goes to the delegates. There's 1,100 about delegates, I think that's what I got, 1,100 delegates that show up and they go to a general session meeting. am not a delegate, I went as a guest, so I got to sit. and watched the process, but I did not vote. And they are presented with the statewide candidates. And then they have a remote, they have a voting device. It records the votes in real time. And so when each office comes up for nomination, all of the delegates have two minutes to press their, type in their choice. And then the candidate who gets 60 % Okay, 60%, the threshold is 60%. It's not the candidate who gets the most votes. It's a candidate who gets 60 % of the votes of the delegates that will move on to get the endorsement. They will secure the endorsement. So for instance, we had a little competition with the treasurer, with the office of treasurer. Two candidates were running, a gentleman named David Serpa. And a woman named Jennifer Hawks, Jennifer Hawks had the experience. David Serpa had the pizzazz. He was, he was running all over, pizzazzing it up all over the, all over the convention. And then he had a lot of supporters there. People weren't sure Jennifer's a little more low key. know, she's a little more dry. Treasurer isn't the most exciting office, but she gave her speech and encouraged people to vote for her. And the delegates took the vote and Jennifer was at 50. Jennifer won 58 % of the delegate vote. I think were some no preferences and then Serpa was down there in the 30s. It wasn't a competition. But 58 % is not 60%. And some people abstained from the vote because they couldn't really make the choice between the two. But our chairwoman, Corinne Rankin, and I think this is very good of her, said, we're not going to send candidates away. with no endorsement if we have an opportunity to endorse people. So the threshold for a revote is 58%. You get 58, 59, they will take a revote. So she called for an immediate revote to see if they could get Jennifer or even David, but really Jennifer over the 60 % threshold so she could leave with a party endorsement. Took the vote again, an extra two minutes, got her the 60%. Some of those undecideds were like, okay, we're not gonna do that either. Do you see what I mean? Now she could have left there with the confidence of knowing that most of the delegates support her campaign and she could, you know, take that with her. But why would she do that when she could get 60 %? Why would the party leave her hanging like that? So that was a good thing that they did. That was a good thing that Corinne did. That was a good thing that the party did. know a lot of people have a lot of complaints for our party chair and our party apparatus. I do too. Like I'm, I'm not, but credit where credit is due. I, Corinne said, we're not going to send someone away without an endorsement when we have the opportunity to do so. So there's a case of that happening. So some people sail through Sonya Shaw, I'm running for superintendent of public instruction sail through. She was really the rock star of the weekend. Everyone loves Sonya Shaw. I really think she's got a great chance to win handily, but she's got a chance to win in June. So here's the other thing that the primary does. If one of the candidates wins 50 % plus one of the vote in the primaries in June, that person automatically wins. They don't have to go to November. They just win. Tonya Shaw actually has a possibility to do that. It's hard to get polling out of this race, but Sacramento seems to be panicking a little bit. Newsom has said he wants to strip the office of its power now that it looks like a mama bear is going to be in there. He's like, we're going to strip the office. We don't really need it. So they're going to try to strip the office, but that tells me that she's really a threat. It's really hard to get polling in this type of race. And when you're running for that type of position, you don't have the juice in your campaign to, to do polling. It's very expensive. So a lot of it is just going off vibes, but if the vibes are anything, ⁓ to talk about, yeah, she's going to win. She's going to win. I think that they, she's, she could, she has a great chance to win in June. And then she doesn't have to worry. about ⁓ November. So she was easy. Herb Morgan, the golden ticket all went through Herb Morgan for state controller. Now the golden ticket is just Steve's brainchild. It's not like these people have to go with Steve, right? You can vote for them even if you're voting for Bianco, you'll be doing Bianco a favor if he wins and he gets to go in with a golden ticket that Steve helped publicize and helped win. That's a win-win for everyone. So the golden ticket, they're not, of course they can't hang with Steve. But they're not out there telling Chad, like, we don't like you, you're our enemy. They're not doing that. They're hanging out with Chad. They're going, because any, they can go through no matter what. They're their own campaigns. The golden ticket is a PR concept ⁓ to help simplify it for California voters. I think it's brilliant. think you should vote the whole golden ticket, but regardless, all of those people can go through with or without Steve. So her Morgan sailed through. Gloria Romero sailed through I want to say a couple of things about Gloria There are some people who say well, I don't want Gloria. She's suspicious. She's a former Democrat I do not understand this position just like I don't understand that sees a foreigner position I really don't because y'all are the same people who are who will defend Melania Trump to the hilt against those same accusations y'all are the same people who vote for foreign-born Asian candidates every year and happily we have them at our clubs we have them at our meetings like We don't say, ⁓ graphics. I don't know why this thing does these graphics. It's so weird. These are not my graphics. These are the program graphics. you vote for those people. So I do not understand the position of, Steve's a foreigner or Gloria is a former Democrat because isn't this what we're always asking Democrats to do, to come over? It's just so odd. You know, when Trump was running, Again, this is just like, is where the derangement syndrome starts to come in. I think it's perfectly fine to be passionate for your candidate, but don't be deranged. You know, don't forget our values. This is where I feel a little weird about all of this. When we drop our values for a candidate, like I'm a conservative, not cause of Steve Hilton. If Steve Hilton comes out tomorrow, he's like, ⁓ just kidding. ⁓ I don't want to do this. And I'm really not like you. That's not gonna, that's not gonna, ⁓ crush my world. I'm a conservative. I'm a conservative. was a conservative before Donald Trump ran. I'll be a conservative after Donald Trump is dead and gone. You know, it's not the person, it's the values. And so we have these, these values of being a big tent, opening the doors to people who want to come over. But because it's Steve Hilton that brings on one of these people who's going to be instrumental in getting the middle in the left. Cause Gloria Romero is an absolute legend in California politics. She's going to be instrumental in going to get those people, particularly ⁓ the Latino community as well. She's got big inroads there. ⁓ I don't understand. I think the only explanation for complaining about her, especially since she has Trump's stamp of approval, Trump is the reason why she's a Republican, ⁓ I just think it's cope to complain about Gloria. I actually think it's kind of rude. You can be against her. I have no problem with you saying like we don't like Gloria's positions on the lieutenant governor position. We don't like it. By the way, she won overwhelmingly. She won the vote overwhelmingly, but a lot of Bianco's crowd were there. I think being very rude to her, very rude, because she was very gracious. ⁓ and she talked a lot about how Donald Trump embraced her and said, look, come over. We've got room for you over here. We need rock stars like you. And she said, yeah, this guy is the man with the plan. And Donald Trump also endorsed Steve Hilton. But somehow we throw those things aside because we have personal preferences. Again, I do not mind. I think that is perfectly acceptable. Just don't pretend that it's about, you're completely loyal to Trump or to Charlie. Charlie endorsed Steve as well. Just don't pretend that. Be like, no, this is my guy. This is my guy. I don't care what Trump says. I don't think Trump knows a lot. I don't think Charlie Kirk knew a lot. I don't trust them. I trust Bianco over them. Say that. That is perfectly fine. And it really, really is. Everybody needs to be honest about where they stand so we can move forward and make our choices with honesty. But I don't think we need to be denigrating ⁓ people for where they're born. or for making the choice to come over because you know how many Republicans in our party here in California, you know, have that story. I'm one of them. lot of your major donors are actually, they're people who, who made their money, ⁓ in blue state, California voted the right way forever and then got burned by the liberals and realized, ⁓ I'm in the wrong party. And they came over and now they fund our biggest candidates. I was a Democrat until the second Bush administration, you know, Even still even even when I was ⁓ Even up until just a few years ago when I would get mad at the California GOP I would just change my registration so they could see me leaving right I wanted to see that them to see ⁓ I'm pissed at you. I'm leaving a lot of people do that, too So we can't I I just find it a really disingenuous argument and strange strange actually Gloria is actually a fantastic woman. She is a she is a spitfire I cannot believe, I think she's 80 or almost 80. is, she has more energy than I do. I do not know how she's doing it, but she makes a really great case for Lieutenant Governor. Did you know that the Lieutenant Governor is a Regent for ⁓ California, the UC system for the California college system. That's a big deal. Cause you can imagine all the craziness that goes on in our UC system. So to have a Republican and a woman, with experience fighting the morons who are now running her old party. Yeah, I think she made a great case. Love her, her Morgan for state controller guys. If we don't elect a guy named herb for state controller, what are we even doing? What are we even doing? Like we have the greatest chance to elect this really, he's going to be the coolest accountant, accountant, ⁓ in America. I think, I think herb has a chance to be a rock star. I love them. Can't wait to have him. He's gonna come on this show But I know you want to hear about the Bianco and Chad a Situation listen, it wasn't friendly. It's not friendly I'm just trying I genuinely am trying to be honest and objective here and again you take everything that I say with a grain of salt I found the most of the Steve Hilton supporters are the ones that I was hanging out with and saw to Just kind of be minding their own business at that point. Just like a lot of joy a lot of fun going on Just kind of really minding their own business, I thought the Bianco people were kind of mean there. That's really what I they were kind of mean They really were. I just being honest, I'm just being, I'm just telling you what I saw and everybody looked really tense over there. However, I did see, ⁓ I did see, ⁓ her Morgan went to Chad's party as well. And, ⁓ he posted some pictures from it. He posted something. Hello to got flavor. Hello. Thank you for checking in. ⁓ he poses the pictures, looked like it was really good. Actually looked like it was a blast. So I'm not saying that the Bianco people did not have fun. They were having fun, but it was a little Ted's out there in the hallway. He's, I like to think we're, all on the same team. Let's talk about this for a minute too. I do want to talk about this, the split in the Republican party before I move on. A lot of people said they weren't surprised to see the delegation basically split. I think it came out to Chad 49 and Steve 46, something around there. mean, they were not far apart at all, at all. And again, this is not the vote of the people, this is the vote of the delegates, that's different. ⁓ like I said, Chad had a great strategy to campaign among the delegates. Cause he really needs, especially after that Trump endorsement, he really needed to get, ⁓ a party endorsement that would have been. That really, but it would have been wind in his sales. So he, he, to his credit was campaigning very heavily among the delegates and it showed it did good for him. Like that was the right move. Just putting my objective hat on and they did have fun. I watched them all in their parties having fun. I did not attend. I don't think I would be invited. But I don't know that I would be run out of the place. So it was a little tense. ⁓ I don't think people need to take this as personally as they are because this is politics. And this is what I want to say. talked to one of the wonderful ladies that I met, Angela, ⁓ who really was so helpful to me while we were watching that delegate process and explained so much to me. She said, you know, One of the reasons why I don't like Hilton is because he went negative. And I just don't think there's a reason to bang up other Republicans. And of course I said, well, is it negative to show what another person has said? Is that negative? Like, shouldn't you at least want to be informing people about the different things your opponent is saying and doing? And isn't Chad going negative? Like it's. you know, if I'm being honest with you, some of these people are being really insulting and mean here. Like I'm talking about foreigners and accents and she's, and she said, yeah, I agree. I do see that. I think those people are on the fringe though. And they're mad because Steve went negative first. I already explained my feelings on that. I'm not going to belabor the point because to me it really doesn't matter. My point is this, and this is what I was trying to tell her, but she, she really was like, I don't think Republicans should go negative ever. There's no reason for it. Two points about this one what we call negative and what is negative are two different things. I noticed that a lot of people who just see ads talking about what they're what the opponent is saying and doing feel that that's negative that you should never mention your opponent and you should only mention what you're doing. But that's a very naive point of view and that's not how polling works. That's not how voting works. The reason why politicians run negative ads is because they work. Otherwise they wouldn't do it. It's a lot of money. It's a lot of money to put into mailers and and things ⁓ And and all of the stuff so you wouldn't do negative but you can do less negative ⁓ Ads right like when I was running for school board I ran a couple of negative mailers on my opponent, but really it was just like hey I stand for kids. He doesn't he's he said he hates Mary Barkie. I think I put that on one of my flyers Mary Barkley is an education rock star and he hated her and he had some Facebook posts about her. So I like printed that up. Look, we love parents love Mary. He does it. You know, there's ways to do it to where you're not being personally insulting. ⁓ so that that's fair enough, but I, I, it's a very naive point of view to believe that candidates for major office don't have to go negative. We all love Michael Gates. He's out there talking about Rob Bonta every day. It's not good stuff. But there's nothing good to say about Rob Bonta. And he has to talk about Rob Bonta, because Rob Bonta has name recognition. And he's going to be on the ballot. And Michael's trying to make inroads in a space where a lot of people don't even realize a Republican is running. He has to. It's the same kind of thing that Chad and Steve are engaging in. We don't think about it, because Rob's a Democrat, and we all love Michael Gates. ⁓ I think it's naive and I just wish people would understand like the process is a lot different than what you think it is sitting at home in front of your computer or the living room. It's a lot different on the back end. The numbers look different. The internals look different. There's a lot to consider. I think as if you as a supporter are going to say, hey, no, I'm not going negative and not sharing negative ads. I am not participating in anything negative. I will ignore everything negative. Any candidate says, Fair enough, fair enough. But you know, protect your peace. But the candidates don't have that luxury. They really don't. And I want to point out that Chad and Steve are running against each other. They are not running on the same ticket. They cannot run on the same ticket. I need everybody to let that go. Okay. Filing has already passed. This is the other thing that a lot of people don't understand. You can't just get in a race whenever you feel like it and you can't switch races. All right. So Chad and Steve both had to file last month, right? Or it's still April this month. to run for governor. So if one or the other drops out, it's not like the other one can say, you know what, okay, I'm gonna come over to your ticket and I'm gonna run as lieutenant governor. It doesn't work that way. Lieutenant governor spots are full. Registration is closed, filing is closed. The field you have now is the field you get. There is no such thing as one of these guys dropping out. to officially join the other team. could do a like, I'm going to support you thing. Give me a spot in your administration kind of thing. Like the big players do on the national stage. But otherwise that's not going to happen. The field is what it is now and it cannot change except for people dropping out. All right. Let me take a sip of water before I get into this next thing, because I need every Republican in California to understand this. I need you to hear me. The Republican party is not split. The California Republican party is not split. Was there a division at the California convention this weekend? Mm For sure. Is there a division between the grassroots and the establishment in the California Republican party? Yes. And that was on display per usual at the convention this weekend. And I say per usual because now I'm almost 20 years a California resident, almost 20 years involved in politics, nationally speaking, and in California politics, but especially the last five years been really involved. So I've been covering this beat for a long time. And I can tell you there is nothing different, nothing different about this version of the California GOP. And the version that I came into in 2000 in the eight, like 2000s, 2009 around there, 2010, like nothing is different. When I came into the party, then I came in as grassroots. still consider myself grassroots, although I'm trying to move up in into more areas of media, you know, so can cover a full spread. ⁓ But as far as activism is concerned, like, I consider myself grassroots is how I got into politics is why I got in. It's why I'm a writer. It's literally why I'm a writer is citizen journalism. And, and, but when I got in, it was the same thing of the grassroots versus the establishment. All of y'all are going to remember our battles during the tea party days, right? And some of our tea party candidates, this is hilarious. This is why you guys. If you play it right, if we play it right, both sides can have influence and some people can move back and forth, okay? I'm old enough to remember the Tea Party era. And you know who the big grassroots Tea Party candidates were that we put up and supported as a Republican unit? Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, two of our biggest Tea Party candidates. And now their establishment, now we think of them as establishment. Marco Rubio has a very good chance of being the president of the United States one day. Tea party candidate, grassroots. That's where they came from. And now, and I just saw Ted Cruz speak at the convention this weekend. Nice to see you again, Senator. ⁓ Now we think of them as part of the establishment class, but they have grassroots values, grassroots backing. And this is kind of how it works. So I think everyone needs to like all of this idea that California GOP is ever going to be one big happy family. We're always going to have this division, but this is where the fighting, the vetting, the information, the slings and arrows, this is where it all happens inside the party. It's supposed to happen in there. If we had normal primaries, we would be doing this in a more official way. So there's fewer feelings hurt, but we have not been given that. So what we have to do is battle it out within our confines so that we lead, we emerge confident to support a platform and a message against the Democrats moving forward. This is where we fight. We don't do that fight on a general election stage. This is where we have to have it. This is where we're supposed to have it. and we're supposed to have it at the convention. And people are supposed to go there and be mad. People are supposed to go there and be annoyed. People are supposed to go there and talk bad about each other and talk behind each other's back. It's not all kumbaya. It can't be kumbaya. People in the northern part of the state think differently about the people in the southern part of the state and vice versa. We're not all one big happy family. We all live very different lives. Someone living in Orange County is living an extremely different type of life than someone living in the Central Valley or inland. different needs, different people, different values, different candidates, all Republicans. I'm going to prove it to you that the party is not split. Are you still with me? I approve it to you. California GOP holler. If you're watching and you're California GOP, how long have you been in the GOP? How long have you been complaining about the division? My point is y'all are still Republicans. Y'all are still here. All those people at the convention this weekend. who are like the party's so split. ⁓ my gosh, we're never gonna get together. Like we're in fighting and this is so childish. Y'all are still Republicans. You still been Republicans. You still gonna be Republicans. Do you know what I'm saying? Does everybody understand it? No, the party is not split. You're still in the party. We're all still here. So the party is not split. The party is arguing. The party is vetting. The party is trying to go through the process of figuring out who they want to support. And we haven't been given the gift of good leadership, right, on this issue. So we have the jungle primaries that works against those in the California GOP who do want to provide leadership. And there are people there who do want to. They're not all flakes. There are people in on the board who really do want to provide leadership for California and cannot because they feel hamstrung by the state process. But also we need leaders who are going to take the initiative to help clarify our party and help unite our voters. And so that's kind of what the convention is for too. The convention is for all of us to be in the same space. We've got the same general goals. Win back California. Okay. We don't support the same candidates. Some people are even running in local districts against other people. All that to say that the California Republican party is not split. This is the party. This is what it looks like. You have establishment, you have grassroots, you have all kinds of people moving up and down the food chain in between. And then we're always battling out for who's going to move forward out of our conventions. But the party is not split. All y'all are going to be at the next one. Right. or all y'all are gonna be complaining about the next one, right? But you're voting Republican. You're in the Republican party. And if you think the Republican party is split and you think that's a problem, then why are you still here? Either you're here because you think this is the best party to represent your values, not the perfect party. That's how I feel, right? I'm a conservative. I caucus with the Republican party and I'm registered as a Republican because they have the best. I have the best chance of having my conservative values represented there. I'm a conservative, right? So a lot of you are going to have to make the choice. And if you think the party is split and it can't serve your interests, then where are you going to go? The truth is you're a Republican because you feel your interests have the best opportunity to be represented there. Not because they're perfect, not because they're great people, not because you love Chad or you love Steve. because you think this is the place that's going to best represent your values and gonna give you the greatest chance to vote for those things. The California GOP is not split. This is the California GOP. This is what we look like. This is what we look like. If you wanna be more unified, if you wanna walk in lockstep, if you want to be a zombie delegation, the go along to get along. If you just want to be the NPCs, the non-player characters for those millennials out there in Gen Z years, then go be a Democrat. Cause that's what they do. There is no dissension in the Democrat party. There is no arguing in the Democrat party. Actually, this is why they're, they're falling apart over there right now. Cause now there is arguing, right? Now they haven't been able to lock down the robots. It's a revolt over there, you know, and that's their problem. mean, you know, don't don't threaten me with a good time. That's their problem. We have our own problems over here. But if you want to be, if you want a party that is going to force you to think one way, only choose, you know, one way of thinking one person, one group of people, that's the Democrats. If you want a party who are open thinkers, who are free thinkers, who aren't narrow minded, who aren't afraid to stand up for what they believe in, because that's what you're going to need to move forward to win elections. I don't care what your values are. If you're not passionate, if you're not ⁓ unafraid to stand up and talk and yell about what you believe, you're not going to make it in politics. That's the party we have. We have a party full of people who are unafraid, not afraid to stand up, to speak harshly to each other, to get their point across. to be rude when it matters to them. I don't like rudeness, but you know. I know who's in my foxhole is what I'm saying. If you want a robot army, go caucus with the Democrats, go to their convention. If you want to be a Republican, then pull up your pants, you know, get yourself together, grow some thick skin, grow up a little bit and understand that when good adults have good ideas, they argue about them because they believe in them. We're a party of people who believe in something. And I know a lot of people on Chad's side, they believe he is the man who can and should be the governor of California. And a lot of people on Steve's side, they believe the same thing. And what you are seeing are two groups of passionate people coming together and making their case passionately, wildly, and yes, sometimes rudely. But the idea that Steve and Chad were never going to ding each other up, this is why the open primaries. are such a detriment to us. Democrats have unlimited money. They're cheating. They're using your tax dollars to have unlimited spending accounts. We have limited spending accounts and we have to use them to bang each other up in the primaries to get through to November. And then we waste our whole war chest. This is another reason why I think Steve is the best person to go through in November. He has the donor war chest. He can do it. He can do it. He can get the deep pockets we're going to need to I think it's going to be Steyer coming through. I think Steyer is who we're getting and maybe Katie Porter if we don't tighten the belts here folks, maybe Katie Porter. I happen to think Steve's going to go through. That's my suspicion. like my friend, Jennifer van Lahr, managing editor at red state was saying the other day, she was like, I don't know. I'm not the one to be asking about predictions. I keep being wrong. And I was like, girl, after 2016, you know, I don't want to make any more predictions. I had 2016 all wrong. Can only go off the vibe folks. I'm a vibe lady. I'm not the numbers lady. I'm not the political process lady. You know, I'm never going to be the chair of the Republican party. Nothing. I'm never going to be Corinne. You know, I'm not smart enough for that. I'm just I'm the vibe tech girl. I tell you, just I got a feeling. I got a feeling about this. And I will before I want to move on to swallow out before we run out of time. But one more thing about the California Convention, I want to say or just the Chad Bianco and Steve breakdown. I found it. And this is an objective breakdown. This part that I'm giving to you right now. So I take off my Hilton hat and I'll try to put on my somewhat objective. I'd, if I was on Chad's campaign team, I would be nervous about the numbers ⁓ from the delegation, from the delegates, because they did give him now, if we were voting majority, he would have gone through with that nomination, right? His plan to go get the delegates was a good plan. Instead of wasting his time with people who don't know his name, Steve's got an easier job with that, right? He had Fox News gig, he's been campaigning for two years already. with his ⁓ foundation, Golden Together. And instead of competing on a level he can't compete at, he went to where Steve wasn't, which was the delegates. And he got them. But when you spend all your time campaigning for the delegates, that's the people who have your message. They look like a strong contingent at the GOP convention. But you take that out of Riverside County and it's a different story. You take it out of ranch country and it's a different story. And I think those numbers weren't high enough to indicate that he's got ⁓ a good base to go out there into the generals. think, and you couple that, I talked about this last week, you couple that with how Chad's polling is stalled out. Even the fake polls he shows, they are fake, they are Democrat, they come out of Swalwell's camp. Eric Fuala, they come out of the Democrat camp. The Democrats do want a split like this. So they're going to keep making sure that their polls look like we're pulling both at the top. But even the polls that Chad puts out, even if you think I'm lying and being biased here, let's just concede that you're right, that Chad is pulling at the top and that his polls are correct. He stalled out. His polls are 13, 14, 12, 13, 14, 12, 13, 14. You look at Steve's polling and it's increasing, right? It's going up. He even has Chad sometimes going up in his polling. But why is the polling that Chad is bragging on, it's because his campaign is stalled out. That's what I'm concerned about. The campaign is stalled out. So you get the delegates, but how do you go out then? You're not increasing in the polls. Now the Swalwell thing might help. So let's see. Let's see if that ⁓ makes. Bianco voters may be more excited, ⁓ maybe feeling like happier. I know that the Hilton camp was happy. That's while all dropped out. I'll close with this. ⁓ I talked to the Hilton camp afterwards. They were very happy with the results. They wanted an endorsement from the, from the GOP cause that could have just put all this to rest and we wouldn't have to be wasting each other's money campaigning against each other in the primaries, but it wasn't to be so that for them, this was the second best outcome. for their opponent to not get the nomination. So they were actually quite pleased. And as Steve said, he's got the endorsement that matters, which is president Trump. And it will matter because June is a base election and, and November is a midterm. It's going to be base. It's a base election. I know you're like, there's not going to be able to go get the left. He doesn't need to. He doesn't need to. He will be able to go get them because he's got an amazing team and a platform and everyone is sick of Democrat bullshit. So yeah, he will be able to go get them, but he doesn't need to. It's gonna be a midterm turnout election. We're gonna have voter ID on the ballot. Republicans are coming out. So they were very happy. I did not talk to anybody official on the Bianco team. I did talk to some Bianco supporters and they were very happy that Steve did not get the endorsement and they felt that Chad was a winner because he got that majority and they felt like, well, in our book, he's the winner. So that's what I saw and heard at the convention. It is the party split. Absolutely not. The California Republican party is exactly what it has been my entire time in this party. I mean, you can call that good or you can call that bad. It is not split. Nobody's going anywhere, everybody. All the people that were at this convention this year are going to come back to the next one as Republicans the next year. Right? We've been arguing over this for 20 years. If we're not split yet, we're not going to be split. This is how it works. And if you want to change it, we have to change the jungle primary system. And if you want to change the jungle primary system, You need a governor who's going to be able to help facilitate that process, who's going to lead us into that, or who at least is going to be a party leader to help us. ⁓ to help us pare down and focus our internal process. If we can't get the externals right, we've got to come up with our own party internal process, okay, for this to work properly. Let's talk about Eric's wall in the last few minutes. I know I've spent a long time. This is a California, particularly a California podcast today. I'll try to get some people in this week to get you some more interesting commentary on the event. And maybe we'll get to Michael Gates. I was chatting with him this weekend. He said he's ready to come back on the show. So we'll have him on there. And I want to have the golden ticket on on here as well. I'm getting Herb Morgan on this show, everybody. You guys are going to love Herb Morgan. If you don't follow him, please follow him. He is the coolest accountant in America. He's so fun. So I'm going to have him on the show for sure. But now we see that Swalwell is on the ropes. He's compromised. Right. I got most this weekend was who leaked it who leaked us and I want to say this doesn't matter. It wasn't a secret. It's always been out there. There is all of the, almost all of this stuff, except that really one weird video where he's allegedly, ⁓ making out with a prostitute in his house. ⁓ Conservative media has been reporting on this for 10 years. If you follow Susan Crabtree, Katie Abrams, Jennifer Van Laar, me, if you follow any of the California writers over at redstate.com, mild job, ⁓ if you follow any of, if you follow anybody from the California Globe, they have been reporting on Eric Swalwell for years. Eric's been next in line to the Pelosi throne. Once Gavin moved on, Scott Weiner is going to take her seat, but nobody likes Scott Weiner, right? But he wasn't in line. And that's why Eric surged so much. It's not because he's a good candidate. It's not because he's a good guy. It's not because he's a good politician. It's because he did whatever he had to do on the back end to ingratiate himself to the Pelosi dynasty. so he was the pick. And in the past, that's all you need. But it's 2026 and the whole world has changed and it's still changing. And in this state, everyone is about sick of this shit. Eric picked the wrong time to be the next crowned governor because no one's in the mood to overlook BS anymore. Frauds getting called out. This is the era of accountability. We are in an era of accountability. Eric Swallow should probably go to jail. That's actually what is going to happen, I believe. I think he is going to get a sentence of some kind. And that's why he dropped out of the race today. And that is why he will resign from Congress. California politics. Yes, Scott flavor says California politics are very interesting They're way more interesting than people give us credit for people just think we're a bunch of loonies and nut jobs here But it's way more interesting here than people think and there are strategy involved. I spent so much time at the grassroots level I really I really never learned strategy and it's only in the last two or three years that I've Beginning began to ask people to teach me ask people to teach me about the the Market of strategy the concept of strategy because California is a different beast and that's why that Trump endorsement was like hmm Some people are like I don't know California is different But I think I made my case for why it doesn't matter like Trump is different also So I don't think there's a poll. Yeah, I I don't think it's a problem, but go back and listen to that Very interesting. So swalwell is tanked, but I do think it was probably Porter's people Katie Porter's people ⁓ I do think so. He's a thorn in their side and it was just an easy target. What I'm blown away by is that he even got in the race. This is how arrogant they are. Do you know what mean? This is the chance. This is why we all got to be big boys and girls and try to make the uncomfortable decisions to really coalesce around one candidate this cycle. Cause we actually do have a chance to win. The Democrats have never been this weak. They've never been in this type of disarray. They've never been this leaderless. I've never said they've always had a strategy, but this is what happens when you only win, you get weak. When you only win, you get lazy. I talked to Marley, is it Marley or Mari Hornick? from United for Freedom, they do voter integrity stuff. I had her on last year. I should recycle some of those clips, because we weren't yet really talking about voter integrity, but she just blew my mind with some of this stuff. They're auditing ⁓ registrar's office across the nation. ⁓ I can't remember where I was going with the story. Scott, what did I just say? My producer wasn't even listening. Somebody help me. ⁓ I know what she's telling me. I got it. Thanks for nothing, Scott. I, you should be listening. You should be learning. Okay. I was like, you're over time. I'm off the clock. All right. Let me say this really quick. ⁓ Marley does a lot of work. Auditing like teachers unions as well and she was she's on the East Coast so she's telling the story about how she's working with an accountant in New Jersey to audit the teachers unions and the school boards there and She's talking to one gentleman who was saying Marley. I'm not even I don't even have to look there's no Nothing is hidden. They have they make up they text message each other. They email their bribes they do Recorded phone calls they do meetings in public. He's like all this stuff is public Their corruption has been so, ⁓ they've been like so unaccountable for everything that they're so used to it. They just assume nobody's gonna care. Nobody's gonna do anything. And she said, Kira, it's blatant. You would be shocked to see the things they email over Gmail, which is public email, over Gmail, using words like bribe, using words like extortion. She's like, it's just incredible. And I said, yeah, but they're right, right? Because you're telling me this, they're not being prosecuted in New Jersey, are they? She's like, yeah, well, we have to change that. That's kind of what we're doing. We want to hold people accountable. But that's our advantage. Does everybody understand? That's our advantage here in California. Like, we're in a good spot. It's a good time to be a Republican here in California. Because Democrats have been winning for so long, they don't know how to fight. and they don't know how to lose and they don't know what to do when they are losing they just assume they're going to walk into every win and now that that's not the case because people have had they pushed way too fast way too far way too far way too fast either way too much of both And it just has all, and then with the election of Donald Trump, and this is why, again, you can't be scared of a Trump endorsement, because he changed California too on the day he was elected. Yes, he did, my friends. And the day he walked into Los Angeles and said, you guys aren't doing anything for the people, and we're going to make sure you're held accountable. He's done his best, but if you're a state's rights person, then you agree you can only do so much. He changed the state and he changed people's estimation of him. You're never gonna win the hard left. You're never gonna win the true believers. Forget about them. But there's a lot of Californians that want something different and they know they've had the same for the last 20 years. And what we're offering is something different. So don't be afraid of all the fighting, the infighting. Swellwell's gone, but here's what's gonna happen. The Democrat party is gonna coalesce around one or two candidates. It's probably gonna be Tom Steyer because he's got the most money. And we don't have to worry about Tom Steyer's intellectual prowess. Okay? He's as fake as he sounds. He's as fake as he looks. He's one of the reasons California is so terrible. And there's a lot of oppo on Tom, believe me. There is a lot of people hate. We're over the billionaire class and we're over the, ⁓ was saved for Trump, which is funny. I've always thought that was funny, but he's like the working man's billionaire. We're over the billionaire class. ⁓ We're over the fake. We're over fakes. We want authenticity. And Tom Steyer sitting in front of an AI forest background with his sleeves rolled up, a chair going, I'm going to go after the billionaires. It's fake. It looks fake. Everybody thinks it's fake. The only reason he's pulling so high is because he spent a hundred million dollars. And we're not even to June. He spent a hundred million dollars for name recognition. So my, my thought is it's going to be Steyer or this guy, Matt Mahon might make a search cause he's He sounds pretty centrist, he's not. But he sounds centric centrist. He might make a surge, but I just don't think the Democrats are smart enough to let that happen. I think they're going to go with the guy with the money. That means we're going to need money because we can beat them in the arena of ideas. We could beat them in the arena of ideas, but we can't beat the Democrats when they're using our own money against us. That means we have to make hard, hard decisions, hard choices. We got to make the hard good choices. And, ⁓ And yeah, it does. And I just, again, I just want to end by making the case for why I think it's just logical to support Steve. know all of you have your other. I don't want to call them pet issues. That sounds insulting, but your core issues that you might feel like Steve doesn't line up with exactly 100 percent. But Steve is pulling high. I mean, he's pulling the highest. So you would you we should go with the person who's pulling the highest. Now, if you want to wait a little bit. and see how this shakes out after the swall well drop out. All right, fine. But it's logical to go with the person who's polling the highest. Logic dictates that. And with the person who also has the biggest endorsements, because endorsements are going to help. And in general, it's going to be name recognition in California. We don't have the most informed electorate. All right, I'm running out of time here. have to go. Sorry for my national listeners if this wasn't really your cup of tea. ⁓ I'll be dropping the gossip on all the other things that are going on in the nation. And I know Trump's out there with the memes. Trump's always hurting people's feelings with the memes. Guys, I don't think God cares about memes. I'm just saying, I could be wrong, but I don't think he cares about memes. I think we're fine. think the California GOP is doing fine. Can they do better? Yes. Do we have too many stuffy suit and ties at the top running stuff? Yeah. People who don't get it, who want the status quo? Yeah. We got too many of them. Sure. But grassroots people, you're never going to beat them if you don't learn how they work. Kira Davis, can follow me on here on x at Kira Davis, or the police do go follow the Orange Report OC Orange Report OC everywhere. That's just helpful for our algorithms. I of course broadcast through both so that you know my established brand can ⁓ help you find the Orange Report brand. ⁓ Send us an email if you have a news tip. I've got a couple local stories I'm going to be covering that are that are very interesting on a national level as well. I take those stories as well. And I'm to be having some of your candidates in to talk now that we've been through this to help you make a decision. And tell me if you disagree. Please do disagree. I'll be tuned in. This is good. Thank you for tuning in. Really appreciate you. Really appreciate the chat there. ⁓ And yeah, stay tuned. And it's OK if you want to be mad. And it's OK if you want to be mad at me. I want to say that it really is OK, because guess what's going to happen? At the end of the day, we're going to be one big happy family because at one point or another, we're all going to have to get behind one guy at one point or another. We're going to get behind one guy or no guy. And if we don't get behind or if we get behind no guy, then we're all going to have to go back to our parties and start from scratch and start and get back to the drawing board. and figure out how to win the next election and we'll all be working together again. Because we're Republicans and we've always been Republicans. So we're gonna be fine. Everybody try not to take it too personally. Again, I just wanna say, keep saying put on your big boy underwear, really like toughen up a little. This is how it is, this is the game. I realize from my position, I've been in media a long time covering this stuff a long time and I've worked on campaigns and run my own campaign. So I do know the distasteful part of it. And I think that's just as much a part of politics as the tasteful part of it. And I think it's naive to think other, well, I know it's naive to think otherwise, actually. You don't win campaigns ⁓ on 1000 % sunshine and rainbows. Don't work that way. Might be nice if it did. Maybe it worked that way in heaven. I don't know if we'll need campaigns or elections in heaven. I don't know. We'll see. We need them now. And I need you to go follow me. Like, subscribe. Click send your friends go to just cura Davis comm sign up for that and If you're of politics, and you just want a little break follow my Christmas broadcast Christmas all year round journey to Christmas land with my BFF Amelia Hamilton We review cheesy Hallmark movies all year round zero politics zero Zero politics just good old cheesy Hallmark fun. We have a good time talking about it You don't even have to watch the movies to have a good time follow that I will see you tomorrow right here on the Orange Report until we see each other again. Remember that sunlight is the best disinfectant. So bring on the sunshine.