If you’re in California and happen to be near a TV, you might have seen a terribly concerned woman peering into the camera and discussing her support for abortion rights. “You can call me Eleni,” she says. That would Eleni Kounalakis, the state’s lieutenant governor.
Kounalakis would very much like to be California’s next governor, and her fretful appearance in the 30-second spot is very much a part of her strategy to make that happen in November 2026. Legal abortion is not remotely at risk in California. A woman’s right to have an abortion is enshrined in the state’s Constitution and buttressed by the Democratic Party’s hegemonic hold on Sacramento.
But abortion is an uber-hot issue, Democrats’ hoped-for salvation against Republicans this November, and a topical way for someone like Kounalakis, with no particular role in the election, to wedge her way into the political conversation. The Democrat is emulating a tactic successfully used by Govs. Gavin Newsom and Arnold Schwarzenegger, who piggybacked their gubernatorial ambitions on a campaign issue as a means of boosting their electoral prospects.
Kounalakis is also the latest in a long line of wealthy women and men with a mountain of cash at the ready as they pursue California’s top political job. Most — Meg Whitman, Jane Harman, Al Checchi, to name a few — failed in grand fashion. Kounalakis’ stated mission this campaign season is straightforward enough.
She has formed a political action committee.
