“When he was asked about hate, the elephant in the room was the president,” said Modesto resident Ken Schroeder after Congressman Jeff Denham’s appearance at the Red Event Center in downtown Modesto on Tuesday. The event was sponsored by the Latino Community Roundtable. And even though the president’s name rarely came up during Denham’s question-and- answer session, Donald Trump’s policies hovered like a dark shadow over the entire program. In […]
Congressman Jeff Denham
Denham and Zinke: Crimes against Nature
There was a time when Ryan Zinke’s claim to be a Teddy Roosevelt Republican would have elicited laughter heard from Don Pedro Dam to Mount Rushmore. Teddy Roosevelt was one of the first and strongest ever defenders of public lands and wildlife; Donald Trump’s Secretary of the Interior might go down in history as the worst-ever enemy of those same public lands and wildlife. Consider this: Ryan Zinke has already […]
The Denham Dossier, Part III: Water for Tunnels
Jeff Denham has a lot of explaining to do. Once again on his biennial campaign tour, Denham’s latest reelection gambit features Secretary of Interior Ryan Zinke. Secretary Zinke is supposedly helping Congressman Denham work against state requirements for increased flows along our rivers, the so-called, “water grab.” Denham obviously wants to show he has tremendous clout in Washington D.C., but some of his work with fellow Republicans back east isn’t […]
Bruce Frohman on Jeff Denham: Propaganda over Service
Former Modesto City Councilman Bruce Frohman followed Jeff Denham’s long political career well before he won at the federal level and ever since. Although Jeff Denham has not been a good Congressman, he’s a masterful propagandist. He’s even got a billboard praising his failed effort to help promote DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals); that’s real chutzpah. He did not express support for DACA until the law expired and his […]
The Denham Dossier, Part I: the Immigration Shell Game
Every two years, Congressman Jeff Denham leaves his Virginia home and shows up in California to run his immigration shell and pea game. In the shell and pea game, the object is to follow the pea while it’s supposedly concealed under a shell. The scam is that the operator of the game hides the pea in his hand and only places it under a shell after a player has pointed […]
At the March: Names and Stories
“This is about a profound contrast in moral vision for what America should be.” Josh Harder America is names, names and stories. The names—Madueno and Kolasinski, Nou and Tanaka, Harder and Hughes and Hernandez, Lakestani and Dashputre, Ricci and Costello and Talbott, Pallios and Nelson and Scribner—all have stories, and some of those stories were told at Saturday’s March for Families in downtown Modesto. Julissa Ruiz Ramirez told the story of […]
Denham and Friends: Is Dirty Money the New Norm?
“Rep. Denham may have found a new low in despicable campaign tactics.” Headlines about the latest Trump scandal—this time about a phony charitable foundation used to launder money—have become ho-hum moments. It’s pretty hard to top payoffs to porn stars and Russian bagmen. But dirty money in politics isn’t anything new; in fact, it’s now a political norm. Maybe because it happened three years ago, recent news that former Oakdale […]
Harder Impresses at Town Hall
Congressional candidate Josh Harder impressed an audience of mostly senior citizens at an informal town hall in Modesto yesterday. He fielded tough questions about everything from bombing Syria to California’s proposed bullet train and twin tunnels for water. Probably the most remarkable aspect of his appearance was the lack of equivocation and vague response typical of too many politicians. When asked whether he supported bombing Syria, Harder replied that, “Without […]
Did “Plastic” Jeff Denham Fail to Disclose Loans from JP Morgan?
Steve Ringhoff’s careers as a journalist and attorney led him to a love of investigation and publication. His “Modesto Explained” website features detailed analysis of how our government does, and, more often, does not, serve the people. We hope to be publishing more of Steve’s fine work soon. Would it be important to know a congressman’s relationship with the country’s largest bank, especially with banking regulation legislation pending? Well, two […]
Registrar’s Office Gags Harder (and everyone else)
Political speech, “should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open.” Justice William Brennan Last Friday, a clerk in the Stanislaus County Registrar’s Office rejected Josh Harder’s official campaign statement on the grounds it used President Donald Trump’s name. The clerk claimed Harder would need written permission from Trump himself if he were to use the president’s name. Harder and some of his staff members were stunned. While it makes sense to obtain […]