Overview
- Federal campaign filings made public in mid-April show Campaign for Democracy spent $1,561,875 to buy and mail roughly 67,000 copies of Gavin Newsom’s memoir to donors who gave any amount.
- Those PAC-distributed copies account for about two-thirds of the book’s roughly 97,000 print sales tracked by Circana BookScan since its February release.
- The payments went to Porchlight Book Company and were recorded as “books at cost,” making it the PAC’s largest expense in the first quarter of 2026.
- Newsom’s team says donations tied to the offer exceeded what the PAC paid for the books and says he did not receive royalties on the copies bought through the committee.
- The promotion began after voters approved Proposition 50 as a way to refill the PAC’s funds, and the unusually large scale compared with similar offers by other politicians has spurred scrutiny of bestseller claims, with no enforcement action reported.