Jennifer Campbell

The Money Machine: How a Lincoln Club-Founded PAC Buys Democratic Votes on San Diego's City Council Published

**A MathPolitics Investigation -- The Council Files, Part 1**

The Cheapest Yes Published

Sempra Energy distributed $75K across four intermediary PACs before the 2021 SDG&E franchise vote. Those PACs channeled $392K+ to the mayor and five of six YES-voting council members. All three NO voters received $0.

The $247K Primary Published

How Two PACs Spent a Quarter Million Dollars to Choose San Diego's District 2 Representative — and Why the Same Donor Network Is Already Back for 2026

The Seat Money Published

Traces a single donor network across three San Diego District 2 election cycles (2018, 2022, 2026) showing how lobbyists, developers, and political operatives adapted tactics — from direct donations to IE committee spending to candidate selection — to maintain influence over one council seat.

The Council Published

Your one vote is also four votes you didn't cast. The 6-of-9 override almost never comes.

The Gloria Machine Published

The machine changes party but not behavior: the same lobbyists and developers, now operating through Democratic officeholders.

Southwest Strategies: Manufacturing Consent for Hire Published

Southwest Strategies (CEO Chris Wahl; rebranded Bodewell Group Feb 2026): 1,001 evidence-backed connections — 428 lobbying contacts across 27 city and county elected officials of both parties (2012-2025), 88 consulting clients, and $193,686.81 in disclosed political giving topped by $69,313.81 to the county Republican Party and $18,000 to the county Democratic Party. The public-affairs firm behind the Sports Arena, 101 Ash, and SoccerCity public-land deals.

The Madaffer Axis: Two Firms, One City Hall Published

The Revolving Door: Regulators for Hire Published

Three San Diego officials — Marcela Escobar-Eck (Development Services Director then Atlantis Group), Gil Cabrera (Ethics Commission Chair then Airport Authority Chair and New San Diego PAC), and Frank Urtasun (Sempra VP then Housing Commission Chair then Port Commissioner) — who ran a city regulatory, ethics, or housing body and later lobbied or consulted the same arena, two of them rotating back into appointed office. A bipartisan revolving door, documented evidence-first.

The Permanent Money: Who Funds Every Side Published

Five unelected institutions — Sempra and its monopoly utility SDG&E, the Sycuan gaming tribe, the Building Industry Association, and the San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council AFL-CIO — supply the money behind San Diego politics, funding both parties through party-committee conduits and sponsored independent-expenditure committees. SDG&E's signature outcome: the 2021 6-3 renewal of the gas-and-electric franchise it has held since 1920. The labor left wing is as structurally unelected as the utility/developer/gaming right wing.

The Price of No Published

Raul Campillo took $14,779 in post-election donations from lobbyists and developers — then voted against their interests on the biggest deals in San Diego. Three weeks after his dissenting votes, the Council President removed him from the committee where those votes were cast.