For weeks Interim District Attorney Summer Stephan’s campaign has been promoting the not-so-closely held rumor that billionaire financier and criminal justice reform advocate George Soros was planning sizable campaign funding for rival candidate Genevieve Jones-Wright.

Rumor became fact Monday when campaign finance records filed late Friday showed Soros contributing $1.5 million to the California Justice & Public Safety committee, which is supporting Jones-Wright.

The contribution may be the largest individual money drop ever in a county campaign, excluding candidates who self-financed. It is the largest made in a race for the District Attorney’s Office, which has had only three competitive races in nearly a quarter century — in 1994, 2002 and 2014.

It’s unclear if all of the money will be spent for Jones-Wright. Statewide campaign finance reports show Soros and the same PAC have supported district attorney candidates in Sacramento County and Contra Costa County this year.


The campaign finance report filed Friday in San Diego showed the PAC had spent $402,459 in support of Jones-Wright, buying television ads, digital ads, and campaign literature and mailings.

Soros is a liberal advocate for criminal justice reform policies ranging from charging decision to incarceration policies. Jones-Wright, a deputy public defender with the county who announced she was running last July, has built her campaign on similar calls for changes in the system.

She also picked up more support Monday from the founder of the Akonadi Foundation, a progressive group in Oakland that says it supports “powerful social change movements to eliminate structural racism and create a racially just society.” The group’s founder contributed $150,000 to another PAC formed by the San Diego progressive group Alliance San Diego that is supporting Jones-Wright.

The Stephan campaign reacted strongly to the Soros donation. Campaign consultant Jason Cable Roe said they expect Soros to spend at least $1 million on the San Diego race, and sounded the campaign’s theme that Soros is supporting Jones-Wright as an “anti-law enforcement candidate.”


“It is a shockingly large amount of money to dump into this race and will overwhelm the airwaves,” Roe said in an email. “Soros’s agenda is to expand the rights of criminals at the expense of victims. It is dangerous and scary for San Diego.“

Stephan has wrapped up every major endorsement from law enforcement and prosecution labor unions and organizations in the race, who are also raising money and spending it in support of her campaign. The PAC for prosecutors reported Friday it had plopped down $25,000 for a media buy, bringing its total support for Stephan to more than $227,526.

The campaign has also been bracing for Soros’s entrance, recently launching a website ThreatToSanDiego.com that blares “San Diego Public Safety Is Under Attack,” with photos of Soros superimposed over pictures of far-left Antifa demonstrators.

Stephan was appointed by the Board of Supervisors to fill the balance of the term left by predecessor Bonnie Dumanis when Dumanis in April 2017 said she was retiring, designating Stephan as her preferred successor.


Jones-Wright’s campaign has used that succession scenario to portray Stephan as an establishment figure unwilling to bring change to the office. She sounded those themes again on Monday in the wake of the Soros contribution.

In a statement from her campaign she said she was “thrilled” to have the support of Soros and said the money “will help level the playing field in a race that was rigged by my opponent from the beginning.”

“Criminal justice reform is getting the attention it deserves as a life and death issue for communities,” she said. “The people of San Diego county deserve an elected DA, not a selected DA and an honest conversation about the issues of criminal justice.”

The latest campaign reports showed Stephan had $241,627 on hand, far more than the $144,591 Jones-Wright had available. The Soros money will allow Jones-Wright, whose name recognition is far less than Stephan’s, to compete, said political consultant Tom Shepard.


San Diego County is bigger in size than 21 states, and limits under county rules for individuals contributing directly to campaigns — as opposed to PACs and independent expenditures not connected to the campaign — make it daunting to raise the funds necessary to compete, he said.

“The cost of introducing yourself to voters county-wide is simply enormous,” he said.

A spokeswoman for the California Justice & Public Safety PAC said in an email that because the group is involved in several different elections around the state not all of the money contributed by Soros will go to Jones-Wright.


Twitter: @gregmoran

greg.moran@sduniontribune.com