Adam Schiff to take on Republican former LA Dodgers star Steve Garvey in crucial California race to replace Dianne Feinstein: Trump nemesis beats fellow Democrats Katie Porter and Barbara Lee in crucial Senate contest
- California's Senate race in November will come down to Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff and Republican Steve Garvey, a former professional baseball player
- Schiff ran ads to elevate Garvey with California Republicans as a way to kneecap rivals, fellow Democratic Reps. Katie Porter and Barbara Lee
- Progressives shamed Schiff's efforts, suggesting Garvey on the ballot could endanger Democrats' ability to gain back a House majority
Democratic Senate hopeful, Rep. Adam Schiff, will face off against Republican Steve Garvey in California's Senate race this November, beating out two other Democrats to make the ballot.
Schiff's campaign ran ads ahead of Tuesday's Golden State primary calling out the sole Republican in the race, former Major League Baseball star Garvey, for being a strong supporter of former President Donald Trump.
Schiff also characterized Garvey as being 'too conservative for California,' hoping the ads would work as cat nip for Republican voters, and thus knee-capping his two Democratic rivals, Reps. Katie Porter and Barbara Lee.
California is such a blue state - especially in a presidential election year - that Garvey as a rival practically guarantees that it will be Schiff to replace the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein and fill the rest of her current term.
The state has a 'jungle' style primary with the two top voter-getters, regardless of party, moving on to the November ballot.
Former House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff was the first candidate in California's four-way Senate race to advance to the general election
He will be on the ballot against Republican Steve Garvey, a former Major League Baseball star. Schiff's campaign elevated Garvey's profile in California, attaching him to former President Donald Trump to entice GOP voters to come out and vote for him
On Tuesday night, within 30 minutes of polls closing, Schiff officially advanced to the general election, and at 9:01 the Associated Press said Garvey would be the former House Intelligence Committee chairman's opponent.
The results were bad news for Porter, a nationally known progressive, as well as longtime California lawmaker Lee.
Porter was receiving about 15 percent of the vote and Lee was only netting around 7 percent.
The quick race announcement went practically unnoticed at Porter's Long Beach watch party, where a deejay blasted Katy Perry's Firework, a favorite at Democratic Party events, and, oddly, YMCA, a known fixture of former President Donald Trump's rally playlist.
National progressives hammered the result.
'Adam Schiff put his own selfishness above democracy by lifting up Republican Steve Garvey, who will now turn out Trump voters in key House races that could determine control of Congress,' said Adam Green, the co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, whose group had endorsed Porter.
In the end, Schiff's ads seemingly had an impact.
'The ads that have been running in opposition of Steve Garvey, for me, I watched them and I'm finding myself kind of laughing, thinking those are the exact reasons why I do want to vote for him,' 32-year-old Michael Mesbah told DailyMail.com at his polling place in downtown Huntington Beach Monday.
Mesbah, who works in advertising, went to the polls Monday alongside his wife Allyssa, 29, a dancer, where they both cast votes for Trump and Garvey.
He wasn't surprised when informed those ads were paid for by Schiff.
'That would make sense because they're flattering ads if you're looking at them from that viewpoint,' Mesbah saiid.
Other voters interviewed by DailyMail.com didn't know much about Garvey, though 34-year-old Nick Mao, a general contractor in Huntington Beach, mentioned he wasn't thrilled about the ex-baseball player's women woes.
'I mean he doesn't have my respect in entirety with just the way ... he treats women ... I think if we can get a Republican in there, it's better than what we've had, in my opinion,' said Mao, an independent, who reluctantly voted for the baseball great.
Garvey played for the Los Angeles Dodgers between 1969 and 1982 and has now waded into politics as a Republicans in the deep-blue California
Long before his political career, in the mid-1980s, Garvey was involved in a spate of scandals, lawsuits and ended up in astounding debt.
Before divorcing his wife Cynthia Truhan he became romantically involved with his secretary Judy Ross.
While dating Ross, Garvey started seeing CNN assignment Rebecka Mendenhall, not telling the women about each other.
As this was going on, he impregnated medical products sales representative Cheryl Ann Moulton.
He eventually proposed and had a child with Mendenhall, though broke off the engagement.
Through all of this he was involved in litigation involving child support and custody.
Garvey told Sports Illustrated at the time: 'Some people have a mid-life crisis. I had a mid-life disaster.'
More recent stories from the Los Angeles Times raised questions about his behavior as a father.
'These experiences have equipped me to better understand the adversities others face in their lives and to serve the public with empathy and integrity, something that has been lacking in Washington, D.C.,' the candidate said in a statement to The Times, when asked to respond to claims of child abandonment.
