Reparations-Backing California Candidate Run Out of Black LA Neighborhood Over His 'Devil Blue Eyes'
Near the front of the closely separated demolition derby field that is California’s gubernatorial jungle primary — where only the top two candidates advance — is Democrat Tom Steyer, a billionaire that billionaire-haters are supposed to love.
Steyer doesn’t have any real experience in governance or in enacting any of the policies he believes in — environmentalist austerity, tax hikes that might even give Michael Dukakis pause, and racial grievance-pandering of the highest order — but boy, will he ever tell you how much he believes in them and how he’s going to get it done.
He has to campaign hard on those to prove that diligence trumps experience, especially since a Republican is likely to end up in one of the top two spots in the jungle primary — meaning if he’s going to translate his chances into a ticket to the governor’s mansion in Sacramento, he’s got to work it.
In that vein, he decided to campaign to black voters, partially on reparations and other issues, Saturday. In a video that’s now going viral, we see how that ended: He got driven out of a historically African-American neighborhood due to, in part, his “devil blue eyes.”
According to a Substack account of the affair from former Washington Post campaign correspondent Maeve Reston, Steyer had pulled out all the stops, including enlisting R&B singer Howard Hewitt to get the crowd to clap in rhythm. (Not quite Jeb!’s “please clap,” but close enough to it.)
The neighborhood, Reston said, is “the cultural hub of Los Angeles’s Black community,” meaning that Steyer poured it on and thick.
The black community, for instance, was “the moral leader of the United States” for the entirety of his life, according to Steyer. He added there was a “gigantic debt owed to this community” due to “structural racism in our society for 500 years.”
In case you fail to realize where this is going, I point you to Steyer’s abortive 2020 presidential campaign (less successful than his run at the governorship, although surprisingly successful nonetheless, given how obvious a moneyed nonentity Steyer is), given how he feels regarding reparations:
I didn’t get to respond to the #DemDebate question on reparations last night. I support reparations and challenge other candidates to do the same. 400 years of legalized discrimination and unfairness. Deep, long-term injustice, and no apology. It’s time.
— Tom Steyer (@TomSteyer) December 20, 2019
And after he dropped his candidacy for the presidency, he still advocated for reparations when the now-deceased Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas introduced a bill to start the process of federal reparations.
“The moment we are in is 400 years in the making,” Steyer said in a July 2024 statement, The Hill reported. “The structural racism stemming from slavery that is baked into the founding and the foundation of our nation has permeated all aspects of American life.”
Of course, Jackson Lee’s bill dealt with reparations in the most Democrat way possible: by funding a committee to explore whether black Americans should get reparations and which ones should get them. I’m not sure whether I should be comforted by the fact that this approach means reparations will be permanently stuck in some committee, or discomfited by the fact that we’d waste more of our taxpayer dollars not on reparation grifters, but on committees and consultants.
Anyway, he didn’t talk about this in any specificity, and things began to go awry in that cultural hub of L.A.’s black community, as Reston notes:
But outside his event at the Ora Cafe, a small group of protesters were agitated. Rumors of a “security incident” spread inside the venue as towering members of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters — a union supporting Steyer — inexplicably paced in their orange vests from the front door to the back door. Instead of taking questions from the audience, the event’s moderator announced they’d have to cut the dialogue short (even though Steyer insisted he wanted to stay).
As voters grabbed final selfies with the candidate, union workers and several plainclothes security guards formed a tight circle around Steyer and escorted him out through the kitchen to the alley where his black SUV was waiting. But protesters, who numbered less than a dozen, had already surrounded the vehicle — putting themselves directly in its path once the candidate was inside.
Two security guards in sunglasses motioned for them to step back and tried to inch the vehicle down the alley. But they quickly came chest to chest with demonstrators who refused. “Don’t you put your motherf***ing hands on me,” one protester said, shoving the security guard back. Others gave Steyer the middle finger through the tinted windows.
“You’ve got to let him go,” one security guard pleaded. Scuffles ensued as more event staff came outside to try to help clear the alley.
Because there’s nothing that indicates your pandering to the woke black community has gone awry than being on the wrong side of policing fiery but mostly peaceful constituents.
“What’s your position on reparations, Tom Steyer?” one of the protesters yelled, at one point. “How are you going to cut the check?”
He didn’t answer: “It wasn’t until a California Highway Patrol officer showed up on a motorcycle that Steyer’s driver was able to peel out of the alley and the South LA neighborhood,” Reston wrote.
Reston’s report is both thorough and admirable in its own way, coming from someone who still harbors WaPo sympathies, if not a WaPo position. She’s significantly underselling the video of Steyer getting chased out of Leimart Park, which includes more f-bombs and racial slurs than a whole Tarantino flick and also includes a man warning the gubernatorial candidate, “I better not catch you over here with those devil blue eyes!”
WARNING: The following video contains vulgar language that some viewers will find offensive.
“I betta not catch you over here with those devil blue eyes!”
L.A. (May 22) — CA Democrat governor candidate @TomSteyer was surrounded by militant blacks in the Leimert Park neighborhood. They demanded reparations, shouted racial slurs and threatened him. pic.twitter.com/xtWv3IAuiY
— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) May 23, 2026
The picture Reston paints is definitely a bit more genteel than what actually occurred, especially since the California Post reported that a knife was pulled in the fracas.
“Tom attended an event in Leimert Park last Saturday to meet voters,” a Steyer spokesperson told the publication.
“After the event was over, staff escorted him to a vehicle in the alleyway because protesters were present, including one individual who had pulled a knife on campaign staff. The campaign did not contact CHP or request a security escort.”
I’m not sure who wins here. The woke black activist contingent has made it clear that reparations aren’t enough, but you have to say it louder and louder each time you mention it. And it proves these are people who see things only through the eyes of race, insisting that Steyer was worse for them because of “devil blue eyes.”
Steyer, meanwhile, ought to realize the only people who think he’s good are the crazy progressive white-collar professionals — mostly white in skin tone, as well — who don’t mind paying taxes if it makes them feel better. (Results, on the other hand: Who needs those?) He’s certainly not doing a good job of expanding that base in advance of the primary.
As for current California Democrat politicians looking at higher office or to keep the one they have — I’m speaking generally of oleaginous governors and ineffectual mayors — what does it say about their ability to run a state that they can’t even keep a top gubernatorial candidate safe from encountering a violent mob that wanted to knife him?
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