The governor’s race in Oregon is tight. Democrat Tina Kotek is facing off against Republican Christine Drazan, as well as former conservative Democratic State Sen. Betsy Johnson, who announced her plans to run in the Beaver State’s gubernatorial race last year—as an independent.
Three-way races are often messy affairs, but the situation in Oregon is especially grim. The people of an entire United State are hanging their hopes on Kotek, the lone contender campaigning for equity and progress; meanwhile, Kotek’s campaign must fight back against the GOP-lite Johnson, as well as the seemingly bottomless purse of the state’s QAnon “patriot” contingency, which is funding Drazan.
Recent polling has shown that Johnson’s pro-gun, pro-big-business version of centrist politics has taken a toll on Kotek’s polling numbers. The most recent polling has Drazan edging out Kotek 32-31 (with Johnson receiving 18%) among Oregonians.
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Drazan is the former Oregon House minority leader, and her politics are exactly in line with what the GOP has to offer Americans: nothing. Unfortunately, Ms. Johnson stands to give the GOP a victory, as she does the dirty work of pulling Democrat Tina Kotek closer to the right—especially with regard to big business interests.
But what this really means is that Drazan must court the rightest of right wings in her state, as the center and the left of the state are already in line with the other candidates. You know what that means: Big money is coming into her campaign from shady extremist sources, notably from Oregon libertarian far-right Tea Party funder, David Gore.
David Gore and his wife have reportedly spent at least $70,000 on Drazan’s campaign this year. The mega-donor has spent almost a half-million dollars of his money on supporting the far-right Tea Party Patriots crew that helped organize the Jan. 6 insurrection. HuffPo reports that one week after Jan. 6, Gore gave “$150,000 to the Tea Party Patriots Citizens Fund.”
This is Drazan’s support network. And now, The Oregonian seems to be engaged in damage control for Drazan, arguing that Kotek’s calling Drazan out for being tied to right-wing extremists is “misleading.”
That’s not exactly what happened. In June 2021, Republican State Rep. Mike Nearman was expelled from the chambers on a 59-1 vote after loads of video and audio evidence showed he had illegally coordinated and physically helped protesters breach the Oregon state Capitol building on Dec. 21, 2020—an action that resulted in “thousands of dollars in damage and six injured Salem and Oregon State police officers.” Giving Drazan credit for “standing up,” in this case, is like giving her credit for brushing her teeth at least once a week. The lone dissenting vote was from Mike Nearman himself.
The Oregonian, after saying that Drazan’s link to right-wing extremists is “misleading,” proceeds to show how it isn’t misleading at all. For example, Drazan has been asked about—and has unequivocally stayed mum about—Republican Senate candidate Jo Rae Perkins, who is a QAnon adherent with the kinds of problems of logic that QAnon conspiracists suffer from. Drazan’s silence is complicity, but The Oregonian doesn’t point that out.
At the bottom of the story is a note that, yes, Drazan “did speak at a campaign event for multiple Republican candidates on Sept. 1 in Terrebonne where B.J. Soper also spoke.” That’s Bruce “B.J.” Soper, who leads the Central Oregon Constitutional Guard and is connected to all kinds of Oregon-based militia groups. He’s one of those militia types that shows up to speak at Ammon Buddy rallies and the like—“the like” being campaign events for Christine Drazan.
A perfect encapsulation of the three candidates' politics can be summed up in their stated approaches to dealing with homelessness in Oregon. This is from a debate held at the end of July:
One person, Kotek, wants to figure out how to create more housing, and the other two want to convert a jail while also putting more unhoused Oregonians … in jail. This is enough to tell you who each candidate is. But it is more than that. In a more recent debate, Johnson explained that the “legislature needs to get out of the house-building business. We need to let developers to do their job.” The point, of course, is that she wants to deregulate the housing market in Oregon. It isn’t much different than what Gov. Gavin Newsom is trying, and succeeding, to get away with in California right now.
There are problems with treating housing insecurity as a crime, of course. For one, it’s inhumane. But there’s a precedent from recent history that shows it just doesn’t work. A couple of months ago, big donors funded the nationally covered recall of progressive San Francisco district attorney Chesa Boudin. The success was predicated on pointing out how San Francisco continued to have homeless people and crime. This recall was enacted on the same excuses going on in Oregon now: We need tougher-on-crime law enforcement to lower rates of crime and homelessness. This argument doesn’t hold water; evidence has shown that by not defunding the police over the last two years, crime has gone up slightly in areas where income inequality continues to widen its gap. San Francisco very quickly put in Brooke Jenkins, who coincidentally had ties to groups funding Chesa Boudin’s recall.
Guess what.
Donald Trump and his MAGA allies came close to overthrowing our democracy on January 6, and they will try again if they win in 2022. The best thing you can do is to help get out the Democratic vote for the midterms, and we need everyone to do what they can. Click here to find all the volunteer opportunities available.
RELATED STORIES:
Far-right QAnon conspiracy theorist wins GOP Senate nomination in Oregon, and goes into erratic mode
As ‘Ammon’s Army’ assembles at site of Oregon water dispute, local farmers grow concerned
Three-way races are often messy affairs, but the situation in Oregon is especially grim. The people of an entire United State are hanging their hopes on Kotek, the lone contender campaigning for equity and progress; meanwhile, Kotek’s campaign must fight back against the GOP-lite Johnson, as well as the seemingly bottomless purse of the state’s QAnon “patriot” contingency, which is funding Drazan.
Recent polling has shown that Johnson’s pro-gun, pro-big-business version of centrist politics has taken a toll on Kotek’s polling numbers. The most recent polling has Drazan edging out Kotek 32-31 (with Johnson receiving 18%) among Oregonians.
Campaign Action
Drazan is the former Oregon House minority leader, and her politics are exactly in line with what the GOP has to offer Americans: nothing. Unfortunately, Ms. Johnson stands to give the GOP a victory, as she does the dirty work of pulling Democrat Tina Kotek closer to the right—especially with regard to big business interests.
But what this really means is that Drazan must court the rightest of right wings in her state, as the center and the left of the state are already in line with the other candidates. You know what that means: Big money is coming into her campaign from shady extremist sources, notably from Oregon libertarian far-right Tea Party funder, David Gore.
David Gore and his wife have reportedly spent at least $70,000 on Drazan’s campaign this year. The mega-donor has spent almost a half-million dollars of his money on supporting the far-right Tea Party Patriots crew that helped organize the Jan. 6 insurrection. HuffPo reports that one week after Jan. 6, Gore gave “$150,000 to the Tea Party Patriots Citizens Fund.”
This is Drazan’s support network. And now, The Oregonian seems to be engaged in damage control for Drazan, arguing that Kotek’s calling Drazan out for being tied to right-wing extremists is “misleading.”
That’s not exactly what happened. In June 2021, Republican State Rep. Mike Nearman was expelled from the chambers on a 59-1 vote after loads of video and audio evidence showed he had illegally coordinated and physically helped protesters breach the Oregon state Capitol building on Dec. 21, 2020—an action that resulted in “thousands of dollars in damage and six injured Salem and Oregon State police officers.” Giving Drazan credit for “standing up,” in this case, is like giving her credit for brushing her teeth at least once a week. The lone dissenting vote was from Mike Nearman himself.
The Oregonian, after saying that Drazan’s link to right-wing extremists is “misleading,” proceeds to show how it isn’t misleading at all. For example, Drazan has been asked about—and has unequivocally stayed mum about—Republican Senate candidate Jo Rae Perkins, who is a QAnon adherent with the kinds of problems of logic that QAnon conspiracists suffer from. Drazan’s silence is complicity, but The Oregonian doesn’t point that out.
At the bottom of the story is a note that, yes, Drazan “did speak at a campaign event for multiple Republican candidates on Sept. 1 in Terrebonne where B.J. Soper also spoke.” That’s Bruce “B.J.” Soper, who leads the Central Oregon Constitutional Guard and is connected to all kinds of Oregon-based militia groups. He’s one of those militia types that shows up to speak at Ammon Buddy rallies and the like—“the like” being campaign events for Christine Drazan.
A perfect encapsulation of the three candidates' politics can be summed up in their stated approaches to dealing with homelessness in Oregon. This is from a debate held at the end of July:
One person, Kotek, wants to figure out how to create more housing, and the other two want to convert a jail while also putting more unhoused Oregonians … in jail. This is enough to tell you who each candidate is. But it is more than that. In a more recent debate, Johnson explained that the “legislature needs to get out of the house-building business. We need to let developers to do their job.” The point, of course, is that she wants to deregulate the housing market in Oregon. It isn’t much different than what Gov. Gavin Newsom is trying, and succeeding, to get away with in California right now.
There are problems with treating housing insecurity as a crime, of course. For one, it’s inhumane. But there’s a precedent from recent history that shows it just doesn’t work. A couple of months ago, big donors funded the nationally covered recall of progressive San Francisco district attorney Chesa Boudin. The success was predicated on pointing out how San Francisco continued to have homeless people and crime. This recall was enacted on the same excuses going on in Oregon now: We need tougher-on-crime law enforcement to lower rates of crime and homelessness. This argument doesn’t hold water; evidence has shown that by not defunding the police over the last two years, crime has gone up slightly in areas where income inequality continues to widen its gap. San Francisco very quickly put in Brooke Jenkins, who coincidentally had ties to groups funding Chesa Boudin’s recall.
Guess what.
Donald Trump and his MAGA allies came close to overthrowing our democracy on January 6, and they will try again if they win in 2022. The best thing you can do is to help get out the Democratic vote for the midterms, and we need everyone to do what they can. Click here to find all the volunteer opportunities available.
RELATED STORIES:
Far-right QAnon conspiracy theorist wins GOP Senate nomination in Oregon, and goes into erratic mode
As ‘Ammon’s Army’ assembles at site of Oregon water dispute, local farmers grow concerned