Shady billionaire-backed Ro Khanna primarying Mike HondaBlue America has endorsed only 2 House incumbents facing reelection difficulty. And one, Mike Honda, represents Silicon Valley-- CA-17, a heavily Democratic area-- D+20 which Obama took with 72% last year. Honda even did better than that, beating his Republican opponent 74-26%, more than 100,000 votes separating them. The plutocratic interests in the district-- and across the country-- know they can't beat Honda, a lifelong staunch advocate for working families, with an outright Republican, so now they're trying to a stealth Republican, conservative fake Democrat Ro Khanna. He's pro-choice and pro-gay and all that but when it really counts, on matters of economic justice, he's as bad as any Republican and has already been out calling for reducing Social Security and Medicare benefits for retirees. (After that blew up in his face, he's trying to say whatever it takes to win.)Khanna is the sleaziest kind of opportunistic careerist running this cycle-- regardless of party. Tuesday, Josh Richman at the San Jose Mercury News gave us a little peek into the millions of dollars Khanna has been raising from Republicans who want to oust Honda.
So far, challenger Ro Khanna has enormously outraised incumbent Rep. Mike Honda, D-San Jose. Khanna had a bit over $1.9 millon cash on hand with about $36,000 in outstanding debts as of Sept. 30, while Honda had about $560,000 banked with $4,700 in outstanding debts… [A] few donors to Khanna’s campaign seem to be Republicans taking an “anybody-but-Honda” stance.Marc Leder-- the Florida hedge-fund executive who hosted the fundraiser at which Mitt Romney made his infamous “47 percent” comment, and who gave Romney and affiliated groups more than half a million dollars-- contributed $5,200 to Khanna’s campaign. Khanna isn’t the only Democrat to whom Leder has contributed… but his money skews heavily toward the GOP.Khanna also received $2,500 from billionaire PayPal cofounder, hedge fund manager and venture capitalist Peter Thiel, a libertarian-leaning GOP funder who has given $2.6 million to the Endorse Liberty PAC and $2 million to Club for Growth Action in recent years.And Khanna received $5,100 from Bay Area venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya, whose only other contribution in recent years was $5,000 to U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas. Palihapitiya made waves during October’s government shutdown by saying “stasis in the government is actually good for all of us. It means they can neither do anything semi-useful nor anything really stupid.”
Honda is one one the most solid progressives in Congress. It would be tragic to see him taken out by a bucket of slime like Khanna, backed by some of the worst predatory billionaires in America. If you'd like to help Honda win, you can do that here.