Over the past three decades, Katie Porter hasn’t changed much. She was always a high achiever, as a protégé Harvard Law student studying under then-professor, now-Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, and as a first-time congresswoman who flipped an Orange County seat blue in the House of Representatives. During that campaign and her other House campaigns, and when she launched a later bid for California senator, she always billed herself the same way: a single mother, a lawyer and professor, and and unafraid to speak passionately on issues.

Porter, 52, is also now the only woman out of eight main candidates running for California governor, a defining characteristic that is being used against her.

She came to Congress as an experienced consumer advocacy lawyer and managed to flip a red district in 2018 as part of the blue midterm wave during the first Trump administration. She ran a campaign that specifically tested Donald Trump’s policies, calling out his weakening of health care protections and his tax cuts that largely benefited corporations. Once in Washington, she gained a reputation as a person with sharp elbows and an outspoken, but measured, approach. She would grill executives during hearings, her trusted accessory a white board she’d scribble across as she interrogated Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan, about poverty-level wages at his company or pharmaceutical company bosses for putting profits ahead of patient care. She was willing to break away from fellow Democrats, including then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi, if it meant defending her beliefs. 

Article continues below this ad

FILE: Sen. Elizabeth Warren, right, speaks with Rep. Katie Porter before Israeli President Isaac Herzog addresses a Joint Meeting of Congress in the House Chamber of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on July 19, 2023.

FILE: Rep. Katie Porter, D-Calif., points to a chart as she speaks during a House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing in the Rayburn House Office Building on Feb. 1, 2023, in Washington, D.C.

“The white board moments were about doing oversight. They were about holding someone to account to try to get answers,” Porter told SFGATE in an exclusive interview just hours before the May 14 gubernatorial debate in San Francisco.

But as the years went on, the very things that helped elect Porter — her bold, no-nonsense persona, and her comfort with doing things her way — would soon be the things that weakened her image. Once the front-runner to succeed Gavin Newsom, she is now flailing in the final weeks of an unpredictable governor’s race.

Article continues below this ad

Porter was famous for her attitude. Then it came to haunt her. 

Porter is proud of her white board gotcha moments, but “as a governor that is not the role,” Porter told SFGATE. She said there is an assumption that her tone toward people in power “translates how I relate to my team for example ... and that is not correct.”

One of the first public accusations about the mistreatment of her staff came up in 2022, when leaked texts showed Porter reprimanding a member of her team for not following COVID-19 protocol, accusing the staffer of getting her sick. The texts painted Porter as a boss with a no-mercy approach, but safety protocols during that time were still in effect in most workplaces. Then she got heat again in 2023, after announcing a run against Sen. Dianne Feinstein, which sparked its own drama because it was seen as disrespectful to run against the tenured Democrat. Politico wrote that year about how Porter had a “bad boss” problem, with unverified rumors swirling about her harsh treatment of staffers and high turnover on her team. At the time, she responded to the........

© SFGate