Two years ago, Jesus Cardenas, a leading San Diego County Democratic political operative, abruptly vanished from public life.
He pleaded guilty to two felony counts of fraudulently obtaining Covid relief money by massively overstating the size of his political consulting firm’s workforce.
Forced to step away from his role as a go-to political consultant to a generation of Democratic power brokers, he became a political pariah.
The same politicians who once courted him suddenly acted as if they had never known him. His exile was swift and seemingly absolute.
It also may have been short-lived.
Starting late last year, a
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