Representative Adam B. Schiff, who grew to become the Democratic nominee for an open Senate seat in California final week, denied on Sunday the suggestion that his main had been rigged.
Mr. Schiff mentioned that Democrats had swiftly rebuked an assertion from considered one of his main opponents, Representative Katie Porter, that rich donors had spent hundreds of thousands of {dollars} for Mr. Schiff to “rig” the race, contrasting his party and former President Donald J. Trump’s false claims across the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election.
“That time period ‘rigged’ is a really loaded time period within the 12 months of Trump,” Mr. Schiff mentioned in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “It connotes fraud, poll stuffing and false claims like these of Donald Trump. I feel what’s exceptional is Democrats in a short time rallied to say, ‘No, we don’t use that language.’”
Ms. Porter, considered one of Mr. Schiff’s two progressive main opponents for the seat, thanked her supporters on social media final week and went on to explain “an onslaught of billionaires spending hundreds of thousands to rig” the first.
Her remarks drew quick criticism from Democratic colleagues, together with Senator Alex Padilla of California, who dismissed Ms. Porter’s suggestion as “ridiculous” in an interview with Politico.
“That is a pointy distinction to how the Republican Party treats allegations of rigged elections,” Mr. Schiff added on Sunday, referring to Republicans who’ve characterised the prosecutions after the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol as political retribution. “Indeed, they’re urging President Trump to pardon the Jan. 6 insurrectionists if he ever received an opportunity.”
Ms. Porter did not advance within the Senate main final week after Mr. Schiff and his allies spent tens of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} airing tv advertisements that described Steve Garvey, the Republican opponent, as “too conservative for California.”
Mr. Schiff’s advertisements have been broadly understood to be a part of his marketing campaign technique to attract extra Republican voters to the polls to field out his Democratic rivals in California’s “jungle” main, the place the 2 prime finishers advance to the final election no matter their party affiliation.
The advertisements drew sharp criticism from Ms. Porter, who characterised them as “openly cynical.”
Mr. Schiff defended his marketing campaign technique through the Sunday interview, saying he merely went after his Republican opponent as his Democratic colleagues did.