SD26 Candidate Betsy Butler Misrepresents Endorsements From California's African American Caucus

In an effort to bolster her support amongst African American voters in California's Senate District 26, freshly-announced candidate Betsy Butler touted endorsements from an impressive number of SoCal's African American Caucus.

"She has a wide range of support from elected and community leaders," her February 12 press release touted. "including.... Assemblymembers Steve Bradford, Isadore Hall, Chris Holden, Reggie Jones-Sawyer and Shirley Weber."

The only problem? At least in the case of Chris Holden, and most likely Steve Bradford, those endorsements were either never given, or were pulled after Butler refused to recuse herself from the California Democratic Party's AD62 endorsement process when she withdrew from that race to run for Ted Lieu's state Senate seat.

By keeping her name in hat for the AD62 CADEM endorsement even though she was no longer running for that seat, Butler effectively blocked the front-running African-American candidate, Autumn Burke, from receiving the party's blessing.

According to my sources, it was a move seen as needlessly insensitive and divisive, and a number of African American electeds pulled their endorsements as a result.

I have written confirmation that Chris Holden's office will be issuing a correction to the Sacramento Bee's "Morning Report" tomorrow. Sources close to Bradford say he has also withdrawn his endorsement.