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Can a Red-Pilled Tree-Hugger Save California?
Can a Red-Pilled Tree-Hugger Save California?
Michael Shellenberger at his Berkeley home. (Michael Macor via Getty Images)
On the campaign trail with Michael Shellenberger, the Democrat turned independent who wants to unseat Gavin Newsom.
By Peter Savodnik
05.17.22 — U.S. Politics
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The Free Press
The Free Press
Can a Red-Pilled Tree-Hugger Save California?

Michael Shellenberger has no idea when life begins. Nor do any of the other wannabe governors on stage in Rancho Mirage, two hours east of Los Angeles. But that doesn’t stop them from blurting out “Conception!” like a sanctimonious flugelhorn when the moderator asks. Shellenberger can’t bring himself to do that. He’s at a loss.

The radical-turned-Democra…

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Peter Savodnik

Peter Savodnik is senior editor at The Free Press. Previously, he wrote for Vanity Fair, as well as GQ, Harper’s Magazine, The Atlantic, The Guardian, Wired, and other venues—reporting from the former Soviet Union, the Middle East, South Asia, and across the United States. His book, The Interloper: Lee Harvey Oswald Inside the Soviet Union, was published in 2013.

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