Friday night, April 16th, 2010 Jessica Yellin got a chance to sit in for Campbell Brown on CNN’s show “Campbell Brown.” Yellin wasted no time in bringing her partisan political views front and center for the CNN audience to witness firsthand. Yellin brought on for a one-on-one interview the man running for Governor of California – Jerry Brown. In a live performance from the California Democratic Convention in Yellin’s hometown of Los Angeles, Yellin shockingly interviewed Brown and never told the viewers that Jerry Brown is running for Governor of her home state or that he was sitting at the California Democratic Convention in the town where she grew up.

In a cozy conversation, Yellin introduced Brown to CNN as “California’s top law enforcement official” – immediately positioning him as someone more interested in issues than politics even though Brown is in the middle of a hot campaign for Governor. Yellin threw Brown multiple softball questions throughout the interview with not a single follow-up question to Brown’s long diatribes and no interruptions to Brown’s soliloquies. Yellin, who is known for her liberal political views, even trumpeted the Brown campaign’s messages about the assumed Republican opponent, Meg Whitman.

Starting off the interview, Yellin warms up with asking Brown what he thought about the Goldman Sachs’ scandal. Brown quickly proclaimed “regulators let people get away with murder….this is a massive meltdown, the biggest around the world….we are being stymied by federal laws and rules that often block the Attorney Generals from enforcing anti-fraud statues based on state law…this was, you could say fairly, the biggest bank robbery in the history of America.” Yellin just smiled approvingly but didn’t ask a follow-up nor question Brown’s pandering answers. While unbiased journalists may think to question a man running for Governor about why he hasn’t done more to combat the Goldman Sachs type of problem in his current position as Attorney General, or why, as a Democrat, he thinks the Obama Administration has allowed this to happen, Yellin had nothing to say. She had no follow-up question nor did she bother to push back on anything Brown said.

Yellin’s next question was on Sarah Palin. And Yellin didn’t miss the chance to declare the Democrats talking point in her question: “You are investigating a California school that invited her to speak but then wouldn’t disclose the terms of her contract….why does this merit the attention of the AG?” As Brown went on and on about how “we want to make sure that charitable foundations do what the rules require” and wondered “is the foundation connected with this state college following the rules of charitable trusts?”, Yellin once again let Brown talk without interruption or a single follow-up question. While an unbiased journalist, interviewing a man running for Governor of California, may have wanted to ask Brown WHY he suddenly started his new campaign to rid charitable foundations of financial abuse just this week with a Republican star like Sarah Palin, Yellin just smiled and moved on to the next topic – Meg Whitman.

In a casual and flippant comment, Yellin referred to the man she first introduced as “the top law enforcement official in California” as having an interest in the Governor’s race when she oddly said, “Let me turn to another focus of your attention these days – the Governor’s race. Your likely Republican opponent…has already pumped a remarkable $59 million of her own money into this race, she’s vowing to spend so much more….How do you build momentum against her at this point?”

It was a moment that the Brown campaign couldn’t have orchestrated better. Yellin positioned Brown as the non-politician, asked him questions on easy topics, allowed him to speak without challenge, messaged Meg Whitman as a wealthy politician whose spending “so much” of her own money and characterized Brown as an underdog. Yellin went on to hammer home the Brown message that Whitman is “pumping” millions of dollars of her own money into the race and is “attacking” her opponents. It was a television moment that made all of Jessica Yellin’s friends at the Democratic State Convention in her home state of California cheer as they watched the interview from the Convention in LA.

Yellin gave Brown free air time to talk about…the importance of going to the people, and that the race is really dead-even, and how 1.9 million jobs were created the last time he was Governor, how strongly committed he is to getting our economy better, to protecting the environment and fixing our schools. Brown continued with a claim that Whitman is a billionaire trying to buy the race and that she’s never even voted. And Yellin sat quietly, pleased with her Governor’s answers. Not surprisingly, no follow up questions from Yellin.

Yellin wasn’t done yet. After playing some of the Whitman commercials which Yellin labeled “attack ads”, she asked, “how do you plan to go up against attacks like that when they come your way?” It was a question the Brown campaign had hoped she would ask by labeling Whitman an attacker and positioning Brown as the David to the oncoming Goliath. Brown said, “Making stuff up about the opponent is silly….” And there was no response from Yellin.

As they wrapped up their comfy chat and said good-bye, Yellin couldn’t help herself and blurted out, “Thanks Mr. Attorney General, I always enjoy talking with you….” Mr. Attorney General? For heaven’s sake, Jessica, he’s running for Governor and you are a journalist – can’t you even fake it?

It was an interview that the Whitman campaign should complain to CNN about and ask CNN to report to the FEC as an in-kind contribution to the Brown campaign. It was outrageous and Yellin should be barred from conducting her style of journalism on California political races ever again.