Elder campaign replaces campaign manager in California recall race

By Kyung Lah, CNN

Under fire with 3 weeks to go and ballots in the mail, California Republican Larry Elder has installed Jeff Corless as his campaign manager in the recall race for governor, a spokeswoman for the campaign told CNN.

Cordless replaces the campaign’s previous manager Louis Barnett, said Ying Ma, Elder’s communications director. Cordless is a familiar figure in California GOP politics and is well-versed in state and national politics. He is also the former political director for Carly Fiorina, former 2016 Republican presidential candidate.

The move was first reported by Politico.

The campaign shake-up comes as Elder, a leading Republican candidate, faces heightened scrutiny of some of his past comments as a longtime talk radio host, including derogatory comments about women reported by CNN’s KFILE.

A CNN KFile review of his comments going back to 1996, show a lengthy history of disparaging comments about women, including recently in 2017 when he mocked women attending the Women’s March as “obese.” He also deleted a 2017 tweet in which he implied women attending the march were too unattractive to be sexually assaulted, according to the Los Angeles Times.

California voters have already begun receiving mail-in ballots for the recall election to replace Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, set for September 14. Elder, who jumped into the race in July, joins other Republicans looking to unseat the governor, including reality TV star and former Olympian Caitlyn Jenner, former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, businessman John Cox (who lost to Newsom by a wide margin in 2018), and state Assemblyman Kevin Kiley.

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CNN’s Chandelis Duster contributed to this report.