Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom has used his office to solicit millions of dollars in behested payments for his wife’s charity and various left-wing organizations over the past 12 years, according to a California government website designed to track political donations.
California’s behested payments system allows public officials and lawmakers to solicit payments from individuals or organizations to another individual or organization “for a legislative, governmental or charitable purpose,” according to California’s Fair Political Practices Commission. In total, since 2011 Newsom solicited more than $300 million in donations for various causes while governor and lieutenant governor, including his wife’s California Partners Project, the left-leaning Tides Foundation, consulting fees to the former mayor of Los Angeles, and climate activist organization the Aileen Getty Foundation.
“California law permits what amounts to explicitly a shakedown of donors and corporations, for money for their own pet projects,” Scott Walker, president of the investigative think tank Capital Research Center, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
