Capitol Weekly’s Top 100: David Pruitt

94. David Pruitt

Fundraiser David Pruitt is another person who could easily be overlooked in a crowd as small as two. But don’t sleep on him – Pruitt is the mad genius who had the idea to remake the Speaker’s Cup golf tournament, ditching AT&T’s longstanding sponsorship of the Pebble Beach event in favor of an entirely new fundraising mechanism, the Speaker’s Circle, which costs donors serious bucks to join. The switch has made the Speaker’s Cup, which was already a major fundraiser, into an even a bigger cash cow for the California Democratic Party. Every year now we hear stories about enormous sums raised at the event as well as about Pruitt’s central role in Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas’ political machine. Some folks argue – not without good reason – that this is exactly the kind of thing that turns regular people off to politics. But then we harken back again to Jess Unruh and money being “the mother’s milk of politics.” In this case, both perspectives can be true.

Updated Aug. 26, 2025