{"id":153020,"date":"2021-02-20T13:06:18","date_gmt":"2021-02-20T18:06:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=153020"},"modified":"2021-02-20T13:13:30","modified_gmt":"2021-02-20T18:13:30","slug":"companies-that-donated-to-gov-gavin-newsom-to-help-with-coronavirus-were-rewarded-with-no-bid-state-contracts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/companies-that-donated-to-gov-gavin-newsom-to-help-with-coronavirus-were-rewarded-with-no-bid-state-contracts\/","title":{"rendered":"Companies That Donated To Gov. Gavin Newsom To Help With Coronavirus Were Rewarded With No-Bid State Contracts"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">34<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fcompanies-that-donated-to-gov-gavin-newsom-to-help-with-coronavirus-were-rewarded-with-no-bid-state-contracts%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=153020&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/GettyImages-1301832135.jpg?w=1200&amp;h=800&amp;ixlib=react-9.0.3\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p>Individuals and businesses who made donations at Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s (D-CA) request were rewarded with state contracts.<\/p>\n<p>The requests are known as \u201cbehested payments,\u201d donations made to organizations at the request of a politician. In California, Newsom rewarded those who made donations at his request with lucrative state contracts. Reason <a href=\"https:\/\/reason.com\/2021\/02\/18\/donations-requested-by-newsom-exploded-as-his-emergency-powers-ballooned\/\">reported<\/a> this week that the behested payments \u201cwere a record-setting haul eclipsing all prior donations on record by nearly $100 million.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhile most donations supported COVID-19 relief efforts, a closer look suggests Newsom\u2019s fundraising was supercharged not just by the pandemic, but also by the broad emergency powers the Democratic governor has assumed because of it,\u201d the outlet continued.<\/p>\n<p>For example, Newsom raised $45 million last year from insurance companies Blue Shield of California and Kaiser Permanente toward his housing initiative, Project Homekey. Newsom appointed Paul Markovich, Blue Shield\u2019s CEO, to co-chair the governor\u2019s COVID-19 testing task force. In addition, Blue Shield, with some help from Kaiser Permanente, were awarded state contracts to manage vaccine distribution.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat decision has raised eyebrows as the governor\u2019s office&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/politics\/article\/Why-Blue-Shield-for-California-s-COVID-vaccine-15909689.php\">has remained silent<\/a>&nbsp;about the particulars of the deal, including why his administration selected Blue Shield and how much the company would be paid,\u201d Reason reported. More from the outlet:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><em>But Blue Shield and Kaiser Permanente aren\u2019t alone. Newsom has&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/california\/story\/2020-05-07\/coronavirus-california-contracts-billions-accountability\">committed<\/a>&nbsp;to spending nearly $4 billion on no-bid contracts to fight the pandemic. A number of companies who lined up for these contracts ended up donating, at Newsom\u2019s request, to his various relief efforts.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Since March, Verily Life Sciences has received up to&nbsp;$44 million in&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/files.covid19.ca.gov\/pdf\/Verily-life-sciences-LLC-OES-6140.pdf\">three<\/a>&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/files.covid19.ca.gov\/pdf\/Verily-life-sciences-LLC-OES-6141-amendment.pdf\">different<\/a>&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/files.covid19.ca.gov\/pdf\/Verily-life-sciences-LLC-OES-6155.pdf\">contracts<\/a>&nbsp;to help operate COVID-19 testing sites. Verily falls under the same parent company as Google, and in April, Google donated&nbsp;$7 million in ad credits to the governor\u2019s COVID-19 ad campaign. That same month, Verily&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/cal-access.sos.ca.gov\/PDFGen\/pdfgen.prg?filingid=2469363&amp;amendid=0\">registered<\/a>&nbsp;to lobby the governor\u2019s office. Similarly, AT&amp;T received over $40 million in contracts from the Office of Emergency Services. They donated $310,000 to the governor\u2019s office and spent millions more lobbying the state last year. Other donor-contractors&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/states\/california\/story\/2020\/05\/19\/newsom-raises-record-26m-in-donations-for-covid-19-some-from-companies-lobbying-state-1284526\">include<\/a>&nbsp;McKinsey &amp; Company and advertising firm Runyon Saltzman.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Behest payments have come under fire in California before, with the Los Angeles City Council debating a measure to ban them, The Los Angeles Times editorial board endorsed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe growth in behested payments has tracked closely with the centralization of political power during the pandemic. While Newsom raised $226 million in 2020, he only raised $12 million the year before. That spike is unique to Newsom. Behested payments to state legislators and other officials were down in 2020. Even if you exclude payments that explicitly mention COVID-19 and related programs, such as Project Homekey, Newsom still raised $8 million more than he did in 2019, a nearly 70 percent increase,\u201d Reason reported.<\/p>\n<p>Much of the anger regarding perceived preference centers around California\u2019s TV and movie industry, which was allowed to operate while small businesses were shut down. The entertainment industry appears to have received preferential treatment after aggressively lobbying Newsom, something individual small businesses couldn\u2019t do.<\/p>\n<p><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/subscribe\">The Daily Wire is one of America\u2019s fastest-growing conservative media companies and counter-cultural outlets for news, opinion, and entertainment. Get inside access to The Daily Wire by becoming a<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/subscribe\">member<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Individuals and businesses who made donations at Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s (D-CA) request were rewarded with state contracts. The requests are known as \u201cbehested payments,\u201d donations made to organizations at the &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2181582,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/GettyImages-1301832135.jpg?w=1200&h=800&ixlib=react-9.0.3","fifu_image_alt":"Companies That Donated To Gov. Gavin Newsom To Help With Coronavirus Were Rewarded With No-Bid State Contracts","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-153020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/GettyImages-1301832135.jpg?w=1200&h=800&ixlib=react-9.0.3","fifu_image_alt":"Companies That Donated To Gov. Gavin Newsom To Help With Coronavirus Were Rewarded With No-Bid State Contracts","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153020\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2181582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}