Walmart is the biggest funder of California’s Proposition 36, which would reclassify certain misdemeanor theft and drug crimes as felonies. The megachain pumped $2.5 million into the early efforts to qualify the measure for the November ballot, and it recently donated $1 million more.
California voters, who have been inundated with news stories and social media videos of people running out of stores or shopping malls with stolen goods, overwhelmingly support Prop. 36, according to recent public polling. It would follow that Walmart also considers retail theft a major problem.
