Salas calls on Valadao to retract 'shameless attack' in campaign ad

Sep. 28—The race for the 22nd Congressional District heated up Wednesday when accusations were levied after a recent campaign ad by an incumbent congressman rankled the assemblyman running to try and replace him.

Assemblyman Rudy Salas, D-Bakersfield, who's running for the 22nd Congressional District, was joined by California Attorney General Rob Bonta during a virtual press conference that called upon Rep. David Valadao, R-Hanford, to retract statements made in a campaign ad attacking Salas' vote on a bill aiming to hold opioid companies accountable for overdose deaths.

Valadao released an advertisement that begins by asking "Why are we paying Rudy Salas?" claiming he has missed almost 450 votes while serving in the Assembly and that he is not doing his job. Salas did show up to increase the cost of groceries, diapers and housing, the advertisement alleges.

Salas took umbrage at the ad, which also states his vote for Assembly Bill 2486 led to a price hike for medication needed by cancer patients. The ad is paid for by Valadao for Congress, according to an announcement at the end of the ad.

"It's a shameless attack," Salas said in the Zoom press conference. "It's a complete farce and a false lie to say that this is actually increasing drug costs when it's holding opioid manufacturers responsible for all the death and destruction and addiction that we see in our communities."

AB 2486, called the Opioid Prevention and Rehabilitation Act, would have required companies selling opioids to provide the state public health department a report detailing drugs it distributed throughout California. Based on this amount, those companies must distribute money to counties to offset costs from deaths, emergency department visits and hospitalizations from opioid overdoses. It died in the state Senate in November 2018, according to information about the bill listed at the state Legislature's website.

Andrew Renteria, spokesman for the Valadao campaign, sent a written statement in response to The Californian's questions about the advertisement and Salas' statements.

"Most of the time, Rudy Salas doesn't even bother to show up to vote, but when he does, he takes every opportunity to raise costs on Central Valley families' drugs, gas and groceries," Renteria wrote. "Voters will continue to hear more in this campaign about the ways Rudy (Salas) puts himself and special interests ahead of voters."

Bonta added that AB 2486 was a bipartisan bill, authored by Assemblyman Kevin McCarty, D-Sacramento, and James Gallagher, R-Yuba City, and that it passed the Assembly with almost no opposition. Nothing in the bill raises the price of prescription drugs, Bonta noted. An Assembly floor vote tallied 65 lawmakers in favor of it and one against, with 12 legislators listed as "no vote recorded."

"It's a really sad day when helping to solve the opioid crisis is used in an attack ad," Bonta added.

Salas called upon Valadao to retract his advertisement and apologize to the Republican and Democrat legislators who voted for the bill; families who lost someone to addiction; and those enduring addiction.

Abby Olmstead, the campaign manager for Salas, wrote in an email the assemblyman has voted on more than 19,155 pieces of legislation throughout his career and said his missed votes were a nonissue.

"We're asking him to do the right thing," Salas said, while adding that opioid addiction is a prevalent problem in Kern County as seen in recent incidents at North High School.

You can reach Ishani Desai at 661-395-7417. You can also follow her at @_ishanidesai on Twitter.