Adam Schiff recounts his luggage getting stolen and clerk telling him Dems are a—holes

Sen. Adam Schiff revealed that his luggage was stolen in South San Francisco two years ago, and that a clerk in a nearby Target afterwards “basically said in not so many words, yeah, Democrats are a—holes” when he went shopping for toiletries.

The Golden State senator used the anecdote to acknowledge that Democrats have a “major problem” and are fundamentally “going to have to change how we do business in California.”

“We’re going to have to address people’s legitimate concerns about crime,” Schiff (D-Calif.) reflected on “Real Time with Bill Maher” Friday.

“I thought, you know, if the cashier in San Francisco at 10:00 at night believes that Democrats are a—holes because that is shampoo is locked up and my stuff gets stolen out of the trunk, we’ve got a major problem that we have to address.”

Schiff, 64, who was a congressman at the time of the theft, said he had left his luggage in the trunk of a car, where it was later stolen in an “experience in the city that all too many people have” in California.

Other prominent California Dems have similarly been forced to reckon with their management of the Golden State.

Last year, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), who is term-limited, privately recounted in a since-leaked Zoom meeting with state officials, how he witnessed brazen theft in front of him at a Target.

“He picks it up and keeps walking out as we’re checking out,” Newsom recalled about the shoplifter before noting the clerk let him go. “The woman says, ‘Oh, he’s just walking out,’ ‘He didn’t pay for that.’ I said, ‘Well, why don’t you stop him?’ She goes, ‘Oh, the governor.'”

“‘The governor lowered the threshold and there is no accountability,'” the governor further recounted the clerk telling him. “And then she looks at me twice, and then she freaks out, calls everyone over. She wants to take a photo.”

“And I’m like, ‘No, I’m not taking a photo, we’re having a conversation. Where is your manager?'” 

Schiff’s blunt admission comes amid broader soul-searching within the Democratic Party over leadership issues and why Republicans had such a strong electoral performance last November.

“I don’t disagree that we’ve got to do a lot to improve governance in California,” Schiff admitted.

During the panel session on “Real Time,” Schiff also confronted concerns that the entertainment industry is fleeing California.

New York Times conservative opinion columnist Bret Stephens argued that “California has become Exhibit A in progressive misgovernance” and concluded that its high rate of taxation and regulation is turning the entertainment industry away.

“They’re leaving because they’re getting richer incentives in other states and other countries, and we haven’t kept pace with that,” Schiff countered about the entertainment industry. “If we want to keep the industry here, we’re going to have to compete with tax incentives. California has started to do that.”

“On a federal level, I think the United States is also going to have to offer incentives to keep this industry here and to compete around the world.”

Stephens argued that Schiff should apply that mindset towards businesses across the board that want to set up shop in California.

“We need to be competing for business with the rest of the country, and we need to not be complacent about whether people are going to locate here because of the business climate,” Schiff agreed.