Democrat Christy Smith, who is challenging incumbent Republican Mike Garcia in California’s 27th congressional district, said he shares the blame for Friday’s attack on Paul Pelosi, husband of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), in San Francisco.

Paul Pelosi, 82, suffered injuries and was taken to surgery after 42-year-old David DePape allegedly hit him with a hammer during an altercation inside the Pelosi residence. DePape was said to be a disturbed man from Berkeley who shared conspiracy theories online.

Smith was among the first Democrats to attempt to politicize the attack, saying that Garcia was culpable and owed the Pelosis an apology because he had used the word “evil” to describe Speaker Pelosi.

Smith and Garcia are facing off for the third time, after Garcia won a special election to replace Rep. Katie Hill (D-CA) in 2020, and won again that November in the 25th district, north of Los Angeles.

California’s supposedly non-partisan, independent redistricting process — which has been gamed by Democrats in the past — redrew the district boundaries to make Garcia’s district, now labeled as the 27th, more Democratic by excluding Simi Valley, which includes the Ronald Reagan presidential library. President Joe Biden carried the district by 12 points in 2020.

Nevertheless, Smith had been struggling to gain traction against Garcia in recent months. Last week, the House Majority PAC, the super PAC aligned with Speaker Pelosi, announced that it was pulling millions of dollars out of the district to spend on more competitive races.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.