Los Angeles, CA — Following the results of the CA-41 and CA-27 congressional primaries on Tuesday, Executive Director/Founder of the Progress Action Fund Joe Jacobson issued the following statement:
“Congratulations to Democrats Will Rollins and Christy Smith for their victories in two contentious primaries. Rollins and Smith understand that American democracy is in grave danger from a Republican Party that no longer believes in our country’s founding principle.
“As California’s next congress members, Rollins and Smith will work to protect our democracy from traitors like their Republican opponents Ken Calvert and Mike Garcia.
“We’ve been running ads against Garcia and Calvert for months because voters need to be told the truth consistently: Calvert and Garcia helped Donald Trump incite a violent coup to overturn the 2020 election and they’ll do it again unless they are defeated in November.’
PAF and its affiliate, Defeat Seditionists, have been running ads against Calvert since March 2022. Calvert represents California’s 41st congressional district, which includes Palm Springs and other areas of Riverside County in Southern California. Calvert hasn’t faced a well-financed challenger in decades, but redistricting turned his seat into a district that Trump only won by 1 point in 2020. Calvert is facing Democrat Will Rollins, a former federal prosecutor who focused on counterterrorism and counterintelligence cases in Southern California. The race was recently covered by The New York Times, given Calvert’s vote to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
PAF and Defeat Seditionists have been running ads against Mike Garcia since February 2021, and received coverage from the Antelope Valley Press for doing so. Garcia is in California’s 27th district outside of Los Angeles in Santa Clarita, Lancaster, and Palmdale. CA-27 (formerly CA-25) was flipped by Katie Hill in 2018 with a 9-point victory. Garcia won by .1 points (333 votes) in 2020, despite his campaign and Republican groups outspending his opponent and Democratic groups by over $5 million. CA-27 is now 2 points more Democratic thanks to redistricting, as Trump would have lost in 2020 in the newly drawn boundaries by 12 points (as opposed to by 10 points in the old district).
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Progress Action Fund (PAF) is a Democratic Super PAC best known for its viral ad in 2020 exposing Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue for investing in body bags. Last week, PAF gained coverage from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution & Roll Call for its new ad highlighting Herschel Walker’s history of domestic abuse.
Defeat Seditionists is an affiliate of PAF that holds Republicans accountable for their actions leading up to and on January 6 and has been covered by outlets such as The Hill, Rachel Maddow, and Politico.
To learn more, visit www.progressactionfund.com
