With the San Francisco school board recall landslide still disturbing the sleep of progressives, and a recall election of San Francisco’s pro-crime DA Chesa Boudin coming in the spring, eyes are now looking south to Los Angeles, where a new recall drive against their pro-crime DA George Gascon is picking up steam.
But Los Angeles magazine has the scoop: the campaign, nearing $2 million in money raised, is being bankrolled by . . . Hollywood magnates and Democratic Party grandees:
Gascón Recall is Being Funded by Hollywood Power Players
The first attempt to recall Los Angeles district attorney George Gascón—a grassroots effort led by right-of-center law-enforcement boosters and MAGA activists—went down to resounding defeat last year, without fanfare.
But according to early returns from the fundraising effort obtained exclusively by Los Angeles, a new recall attempt against the controversial D.A.has been rapidly gaining steam—with help from some deep-pocketed Democratic donors and Hollywood grandees. . .
The list of early contributors to the campaign to oust Gascón, obtained exclusively by Los Angeles and not yet released to the public, includes Orion Pictures co-founder Mike Medavoy and his wife, socialite Irene Medavoy; supermarket magnate and President Clinton confidant Ron Burkle; President Biden’s pick for ambassador to Norway, Holmby Hills media-real-estate billionaire Marc Nathanson; Hillary Clinton bundler and Pacific Palisades real-estate baron Jordan Kaplan; and Malibu-based developer of malls and condos Richard Weintraub and his wife Liane.
Other prominent donors to the recall from the entertainment community include George Clooney’s long-time producing partner, Grant Heslov, and his wife Lysa; former 20th Century Fox exec and producer, Jonathan Sheinberg, son of film industry titan Sidney Sheinberg; Cynthia Sikes Yorkin, widow of All in the Family co-creator Bud Yorkin; and Lauren King, widow of the late Richard King of King World Productions, syndicator of The Oprah Winfrey Show, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!. . .
Celebrity supporters like boxing legend Sugar Ray Leonard and entertainment news host Carly Steele have donated to the recall, and last Wednesday, actress Rosanna Arquette posted to her Twitter page an Instagram post by former Beverly Hills mayor Lili Bosse that stated: “I am ALL IN. Recall DA George Gascón.”
Gascón donors and star supporters from Hollywood—such as actress Susan Sarandon, former Disney chief Michael Eisner, and Netflix founder Reed Hastings and his wife Patty Quinlan, and Queen of Calabasas-turned criminal-justice-reformer Kim Kardashian —have yet to publicly acknowledge their positions on the recall. “Nobody wants to be out front on this,” says a well-placed industry insider.
“The spin that Gascón has used effectively before, that it’s all Trump supporters, is not going to work this time,” says Irene Medavoy, who with her husband helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Obamas and other prominent Democrats. A major studio executive told Los Angeles, “People can be liberal in ideology but they don’t want crime in their city.”
Beyond another opportunity to go long on popcorn futures, this is a sign that traditional liberals in the Democratic Party may finally be rousing themselves to take back their party from the insane people in the faculty lounges and New York Times editorial page that have largely taken it over.
P.S. About Los Angeles “obtaining” this donor information not yet public—I wonder if it was leaked deliberately as a signal to other Hollywood people that it’s okay to oppose crime.
Notice: All comments are subject to moderation. Our comments are intended to be a forum for civil discourse bearing on the subject under discussion. Commenters who stray beyond the bounds of civility or employ what we deem gratuitous vulgarity in a comment — including, but not limited to, “s***,” “f***,” “a*******,” or one of their many variants — will be banned without further notice in the sole discretion of the site moderator.