Eric Swalwell — the same congressman who spent four years screaming about Russian collusion on every cable news show that would have him — is the current frontrunner for Democrats in California’s governor race. And as of this weekend, he’s facing what a left-wing activist is calling a “shocking” number of sexual harassment allegations from former staffers, interns, and young women who say he used his position to prey on them.

This isn’t so shocking to Republicans who spent years when Democrats were in charge telling them to get their dude off high-level intelligence committees after being caught in a years-long relationship with a literal Chinese spy named Fang Fang. Instead of crawling under a rock and staying there after falling for a classic honeypot scheme by the Chinese, he decided the logical next step was running the largest state in the country. And now women are coming out of the woodwork saying he was sliding into their DMs on Snapchat like a 40-year-old creep at a college bar. You truly cannot write fiction this good.

Here’s what happened. On Sunday, Cheyenne Hunt — a lawyer and the executive director of Gen-Z for Change, which is not exactly a MAGA outfit, folks — dropped a bomb on social media. She announced that she’s been working with multiple women who are preparing to go public with allegations against Swalwell ranging from “uncomfortable comments to potentially criminal conduct.” She said the number of women willing to share their stories was “pretty shocking.”

Pretty shocking. That’s the phrase a progressive Democratic activist used to describe what Eric Swalwell has allegedly been doing. Not a Republican. Not a Trump supporter. One of his own.

Hunt posted a text message from one of the women that read: “You know Eric Swalwell has slept with many of his interns and makes them all sign NDAs so they don’t speak up, right? And when I was 19 he tried hitting on me and sliding into my DMs.”

NDAs. For interns. In a congressional office.

Now I’m old enough to remember when Democrats told us they were the party that “believes all women.” They put it on signs. They screamed it during the Kavanaugh hearings until their vocal cords gave out. They built entire campaigns around it. But apparently that sacred principle has an asterisk at the bottom that reads: *unless the accused is a Democratic frontrunner 27 days before mail-in ballots go out in the most important governor’s race in the country.*

And how did Swalwell respond to these allegations? Did he express concern for the women? Did he call for an independent investigation to clear his name? Of course not. His campaign spokesman Micah Beasley released a statement calling it a “false, outrageous rumor” being spread by “flailing opponents who have sadly teamed up with MAGA conspiracy theorists.”

There it is. The MAGA card. The man’s go-to move.

Swalwell has been playing this card since 2020, when Axios broke the story about his cozy relationship with Christine Fang, a Chinese Ministry of State Security operative who helped fundraise for his campaigns, planted an intern in his office, and cultivated what intelligence officials described as a suspiciously close personal relationship with him. When that story broke, what did Swalwell do? Blamed Republicans. When the FBI started looking at the files again this year under Director Patel? Blamed MAGA. When progressive women from his own party say he was targeting teenage fans and staffers on Snapchat? You guessed it — MAGA conspiracy theorists.

At some point, brother, you have to wonder if maybe the problem isn’t a vast right-wing conspiracy. Maybe the problem is the guy looking back at you in the mirror who can’t stop sending DMs to 19-year-olds.

Here’s the political reality that makes this absolutely delicious. California’s top-two primary is June 2nd. Mail-in ballots start landing in every registered voter’s mailbox on May 4th — less than four weeks from now. The latest Emerson College poll had Swalwell leading the field at 17 percent, four points ahead of Republican commentator Steve Hilton. Katie Porter, Chad Bianco, and Tom Steyer are all way down the list.

So the Democrats’ best horse in this race — the guy they were counting on to keep the governor’s mansion blue in a state they’ve owned for decades — is now radioactive. And the allegations aren’t coming from the right. They’re coming from inside the house. A progressive activist group is doing this. Left-wing women are the ones coming forward.

This is the part where the Democrats have to make a choice: Do they stand by their “believe all women” platform and throw Swalwell overboard? Or do they do what they always do — circle the wagons, smear the accusers, and pretend this is all a Republican dirty trick?

If recent history is any guide, I think we all know where this is headed.

But let’s not lose the forest for the trees here. Eric Swalwell is a man who had a romantic entanglement with a Chinese intelligence operative, spent years accusing the sitting president of being a foreign agent while he himself was literally sleeping with one, and is now accused by women in his own party of using his congressional office like a dating app for teenagers.

And he wants us to hand him the keys to California.

The state is already on fire — sometimes literally. The last thing it needs is a governor whose idea of mentorship involves Snapchat messages and NDAs.

Mail-in ballots go out May 4th, California. Choose wisely. Because Eric Swalwell has spent his entire career telling you who the villains are. Turns out he might want to check a mirror.