The Independent Californian

Senate Bill 747, dubbed the No Kings Act, would create a first-in-the-nation legal pathway for residents to seek financial damages in state court for excessive force, false arrest and other violations of constitutional rights committed by federal officers.

No Kings Act passes California Senate
CA uses less water while Western U.S. guzzles
Billionaires stubbornly fail to flee California

CALIFORNIA AND ICE

California Senate Approves Bill Making It Easier to Sue ICE Agents

Guy Marzorati, KQED

A bill that would make it easier for Californians to sue immigration agents and other federal officials for civil rights violations sailed through the state Senate on Tuesday.

Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, wrote the bill. If state or local law enforcement officers had shot Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two people recently killed by federal agents in Minneapolis, they could be held financially liable, he said. “But under current law, it’s almost impossible to file that same lawsuit against a federal agent who does the same thing,” Wiener said. “If the federal government won’t hold these agents accountable for violating the Constitution, we will.”

The measure passed the state Senate on a 30-10 party-line vote, with Republicans arguing the bill could expose local police to more lawsuits.

ICE agents expected to be deployed for Super Bowl in California, officials say

Local officials confirmed that ICE will conduct immigration operations during 8 February game in Santa Clara

Dani Anguiano, The Guardian

US Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) agents are expected to conduct immigration enforcement operations during next month’s Super Bowl game in Santa Clara, California.

Local officials confirmed to media that ICE is expected to deploy for the game between the Seattle Seahawks and the New England Patriots. ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations team has long worked the Super Bowl and other major sporting events, largely focused on preventing human trafficking and stopping the sale of counterfeit goods, but immigration operations would be unusual.

“We have heard from the administration that they intend to have ICE at the Super Bowl. I don’t know how much of that is rhetoric,” Matt Mahan, the San Jose mayor, told KTVU.

California’s newest ICE center has 1,400 detainees. What Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla saw there

Democratic U.S. Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff today conducted an oversight visit at the state’s newest and largest immigrant detention center, located in California City, about 100 miles north of Los Angeles. In remarks to reporters, both highlighted what they described as inadequate medical care at the site

Wendy Fry, Source

“The most frequent feedback we got was the inadequacy of the medical care they are receiving,” said Schiff. He described meeting a diabetic detainee who he said has not received treatment for her condition in two months. “That’s frightening,” he said.

More than 1,400 people are currently held at the California City Detention Facility, run by the private for-profit prison company CoreCivic in the middle of the Mojave Desert. It opened in late August under a contract with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement with a capacity to hold 2,560 detainees.

CALIFORNIA AND THE ENVIRONMENT

Will Trump’s push to drill on California public lands be successful this time?

While President Donald Trump pursues Venezuelan oil reserves abroad, his administration continues to double down on efforts to expand drilling in the United States, most recently in California.

Blanca Begert, Inside Climate News

While President Donald Trump pursues Venezuelan oil reserves abroad, his administration continues to double down on efforts to expand drilling in the United States, most recently in California.

The Bureau of Land Management this month proposed plans to open nearly 2 million acres of land from Santa Barbara to the Bay Area for oil drilling and fracking, including land adjacent to national and state parks, along coastlines and waterways, and areas near schools and homes.

The last time Trump was in office, his efforts to open these areas to fossil fuel development were thwarted by lawsuits from environmental groups and the state alleging that environmental reviews for the plans did not adequately account for the impacts of fracking. While some experts and observers are waiving off the renewed push as a symbolic act that is again unlikely to amount to much, others are concerned about the new effort.

Halfway through winter, heat is melting the California snowpack

The snowpack in California’s Sierra Nevada is much smaller than usual, 59% of average for this time of year. While California is drought-free, the Rocky Mountains remain in severe drought. The poor snowpack is expected to worsen water shortages along the Colorado River.

Ian James, Los Angeles Times

An extraordinarily warm and mostly sunny January has left the snowpack across California’s Sierra Nevada far smaller than usual — 59% of average for this time of year, state water officials announced Friday as they held the season’s second snow survey.

“We are now about halfway through the typically wettest part of the year,” said Andy Reising, manager of snow surveys for the California Department of Water Resources. “We still have February and March, but each dry week we have will make it more difficult to catch up.”

The next two weeks aren’t expected to bring any significant storms. A late rebound is still possible before the season reaches its typical peak on April 1, Reising said, but “having two weeks ahead of us that we know is unlikely to produce any more snowpack and precipitation — that doesn’t look good.”

The Water Conflict a Century in the Making

Not for the first time, the seven Western states that rely on the Colorado River are fighting over how to keep these reservoirs from crashing — an event that could spur water shortages from Denver to Las Vegas to Los Angeles.

Sammy Roth, The New York Times

The tens of millions of people who rely on the Colorado River have weathered such crises before, even amid a stubborn quarter-century megadrought fueled by climate change. The states have always struck deals to use less water, overcoming their political differences to avert “dead pool” at Mead and Powell, meaning that water could no longer flow downstream.

This time, a deal may not be possible. And it’s clear who’s to blame.

Not the farmers who grow alfalfa and other feed for animals, despite the fact that they use one-third of all water in the Colorado River basin. Not California, even though the Golden State uses more river water than any of its neighbors. Not even the Trump administration, which has done a lousy job pressing the states to compromise.

No, the Upper Basin states of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming have emerged as the main obstacles to a fair deal. They’ve gummed up negotiations by refusing to accept mandatory cuts of any amount — unlike the Lower Basin states, which have spent years slashing water use.

GOOD NEWS IN CALIFORNIA

California cities just saw their lowest homicide rates in decades. It’s not clear why

What’s been clear for the last three years is that homicides are down in Los Angeles and San Francisco — but also in Fresno, Oakland, Richmond and Lodi.

Nigel Duara, CalMatters

After years of decline, the homicide rate in California surged by 31% in 2020 to 5.5 homicides per 100,000 people. In 2021, it rose again, to about 6 per 100,000 people.

But that trend began to turn in 2022, when the number of homicides dropped by 7%, then in 2023 by 14% and in 2024 by another 12%. By the end of 2024, the homicide rate in California was down to 4.3 per 100,000 people.

California’s population was about 20 million people the last time the state recorded such low homicide numbers, half of what it is today. The reason why is far less clear. To put it in the language of crime researchers, the answer is “multifactorial.”

California easily maintains its startup crown

Some of California’s most prominent venture capitalists are quick to slam their state, arguing that fiscal mismanagement and high taxes will cause startups to form elsewhere. So far that doesn’t seem to be happening.

Dan Primack, Axios

California startups raised a whopping 62% of all U.S. venture capital dollars in 2025, per the PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor. That’s above either 2024 (54.2%) or 2023 (46.9%), and even the decade-earlier mark of 47.2%.

The state is home to 31.5% of U.S. VC deals last year, compared to 31.7% in 2024 and 29.1% in 2023. In 2015, California’s market share was 32.5%. For context, the runner-up in 2025 was New York with 13.3%. Massachusetts was next, just ahead of Texas — both below 6%.

Californians have been using far less water than suppliers estimated — what does this mean for the state?

Flawed assumptions about water demand mean suppliers in California overestimated future demand by an average of 74% over 20 years — positive news for the drought-embattled state.

Chris Simm, Live Science

Water use in California was lower than officials estimated it would be between 2000 and 2020, according to a new report.

The findings raise questions about the accuracy of long-term water-demand projections, which could have knock-on effects on costs borne by consumers, but overall the news that water demand is lower than projected is positive for the state and its regular battles against drought, experts told Live Science.

“Overall, I think this is a good news story,” Heather Cooley, director of research at the Pacific Institute water think tank in California, told Live Science. “It shows that there are things we can do to ensure we have enough water for people and for nature.”

CALIFORNIA VS BILLIONAIRES

The Non-Exodus of California Billionaires

Nary a day has passed of late that hasn’t seen stories about the billionaires’ flight from California, lest they be subjected to a proposed wealth tax that hasn’t yet gathered the required signatures to qualify for the ballot. The fact that there is no billionaires’ flight from California hasn’t impeded the flow of such tales.

Harold Meyerson, The American Prospect

As the Prospect and a host of others have documented, raising taxes on the very rich has a negligible effect on billionaire residency. When New York raised its taxes on residents with annual incomes exceeding $2.16 million in 2021, a study from the Fiscal Policy Institute found that the top 1 percent of income owners moved out of state at a rate of 0.2 percent. If we apply that rate of out-migration to California’s estimated 200 billionaires, we’d find that the number actually leaving would be a little less than half of one person.

Is California’s proposed billionaire tax smart policy? History holds lessons

California’s proposed billionaire tax would impose a one-time 5% levy on residents worth $1 billion. Critics cite failed European wealth taxes as cautionary tales, while the measure’s architects argue they’ve designed a stronger version that addresses past pitfalls.

Kevin Rector, Los Angeles Times

In the roiling debate over California’s proposed billionaire tax, supporters and critics agree that such policies haven’t always worked in the past. But the lessons they’ve drawn from that history are wildly different.

The Billionaire Tax Act, which backers are pushing to get on the November ballot, would charge California’s 200-plus billionaires a one-time, 5% tax on their net worth in order to backfill billions of dollars in Republican-led cuts to federal healthcare funding for middle-class and low-income residents.

Critics of the proposal have argued that past failures of similar wealth taxes in Europe prove they don’t work and can cause more harm than good, including by driving the ultra-rich out.

To Avoid a Tax Hike, Billionaires Decide to Take Over California

Facing a proposed wealth tax that would restore health cuts, they’re pouring money into their own gubernatorial and legislative candidates.

Harold Meyerson, The American Prospect

Big money has long played a role in California politics, of course, as the cost of any statewide campaign in a state whose population is roughly the size of Canada is prohibitive. This commonly happens when a particular corporation or sector feels threatened by a measure directed specifically at them. The most recent tsunami of truly big money came when Uber and Lyft spent more than $200 million to overturn a new law that would have compelled them to treat their drivers as employees

Those periods of big-business dominance have been reduced to footnotes today, however, with the wholesale entry of California’s couple hundred billionaires into state politics to fend off the grim prospect of being subjected to progressive taxation.

CALIFORNIA AND PUBLIC HEALTH

As the U.S. bids adieu to the World Health Organization, California says hello

As the Trump administration says it has withdrawn from WHO over its handling of COVID, among other things, California is stepping in. It is the first state to join WHO’s Global Outbreak Alert & Response Network, also known as GOARN. Dr. Erica Pan, director of the California Department of Public Health, says she’s been in touch with other states hoping to follow suit. Illinois, in a press release, said it’s “making preparations” to join.

Gabrielle Emanuel, NPR

At 5 a.m. California time, when it is still dark outside, a member of the state’s Department of Public Health gets on a weekly call. The topic? Health emergencies all over the world.

For years, the U.S. federal government participated in these calls, which are organized by the World Health Organization. Now, as the Trump administration says it has withdrawn from WHO over its handling of COVID, among other things, California is stepping in.

It is the first state to join WHO’s Global Outbreak Alert & Response Network, also known as GOARN. Dr. Erica Pan, director of the California Department of Public Health, says she’s been in touch with other states hoping to follow suit. Illinois, in a press release, said it’s “making preparations” to join.

Newsom leads resistance to RFK Jr.’s public health upheaval

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) is making California the front line in the resistance to the Trump administration’s revamped health care policies under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., in what experts see as a politically savvy move that previews what a “Balkanized” public health landscape could look like as states lose faith in federal agencies.

by Joseph Choi, The Hill

Throughout 2025, California was at the center of state-level efforts to depart from new public health guidance coming from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under Kennedy, primarily those having to do with infectious diseases and vaccines.

After the Trump administration carried out layoffs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and alienated agency leadership — several senior officials left in protest of what they claimed was political interference — California joined with three other states to launch the West Coast Health Alliance in September. The West Coast governors blasted the administration for turning the agency into a political tool that “peddles ideology” and said their coalition would provide “evidence-based unified recommendations.”

In October, California joined another collective of more than a dozen other states in launching the Governors Public Health Alliance, which Newsom described as a “public health system that puts science before politics.” Weeks later, Newsom hired Susan Monarez, former CDC director, and Debra Houry, former CDC chief medical officer, to join the California Department of Public Health following their high-profile departures from the agency. They are tasked with helping to launch the Public Health Network Innovation Exchange, a California-led initiative that will “modernize public health infrastructure and maintain trust in science-driven decision-making.”

Healthcare experts warn ‘people will die’ unless state steps up amid federal cuts

Federal cuts could strip about 1.2 million Californians of Medi-Cal coverage, with health experts warning the consequences could be dire. New work requirements and eligibility checks every six months will block even qualified people from coverage, while private insurance costs are skyrocketing.

Katie King, Los Angeles Times

As massive federal cuts are upending the healthcare system in California, analysts and healthcare professionals are urging state lawmakers to soften the blow by creating new revenue streams and helping residents navigate through the newly-imposed red tape.

“It impacts not only uninsured but also Medicare and commercially insured patients who rely on the same system,” said Dolly Goel, a physician and chief officer for the Santa Clara Valley Healthcare Administration. “People will die.”

Non-paywall version

IN OTHER CALIFORNIA NEWS

A 100-foot tunnel, secret bunker and weapons stash found at MAGA activist’s California home

A secret underground bunker and a weapons stash with 13 firearms, body armor and 10,000 rounds of ammunition were discovered at a MAGA activist’s Shasta County home. Michael Kamfolt, a friend of far-right county Supervisor Kevin Crye, was arrested on suspicion of multiple felony weapons charges

Clara Harter, Los Angeles Times

Shasta County authorities started out investigating a suspected illegal marijuana farm but ended up making a far more unsettling discovery: a massive stash of illegal firearms and a secret underground bunker at the base of a 100-foot tunnel on a MAGA activist’s property.

Michael Jay Kamfolt, 40, was arrested Jan. 20 after members of the California Highway Patrol discovered the bunker and confiscated an array of illegally possessed weapons — including three AR-15-style assault rifles, a sawed-off shotgun and more than 10,000 rounds of ammunition — while serving a search warrant at his Anderson home. He was released the following day after posting $50,000 bail, according to the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office.

Non-paywall version

MAGA Tab in LA-LA Land! The California Post Launches

The expansion of the Murdoch tabloid from its New York roots to the West Coast is the latest sign of the outlet’s national ambitions.

Katie Robertson, The New York Times

The Post, once strictly a regional paper, has found an audience around the country. It has 100 million unique monthly visitors to its website and is the third-most-read newspaper in America by print circulation, according to figures from the Alliance for Audited Media.

Now, there’s a surprising new effort from the Murdochs to export the New York Post’s brand of screaming headlines to the West Coast.

Already, the new Post has picked its West Coast villains (Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass, whom it has labeled “Commiefornia’ Democrats”) and the issues it will slam them for (homelessness, the government’s response to the 2025 wildfires). A social media ad for The California Post alluded to Mr. Newsom’s signature coif with “Here to trim egos.”

These California Destinations Could Have a Superbloom This Year, Plus Where to Find Wildflowers in the State

From desert blooms in Death Valley to coastal florals in the Channel Islands and popular poppies in the Sierra foothills, here’s where to find California’s wildflowers.

Deb Hopewell and Bailey Berg, AFAR

California’s nickname is typically thought to allude to the rush of 49ers who traveled west to pan for gold. But some believe that “the Golden State” actually refers to the eye-catching blossoms of the California poppy, the delicate yellow-orange flower that blooms each spring, from Arcata in the north to San Diego in the south.

Peak wildflower season for any given area in California varies somewhat from year to year, based on factors like rainfall, altitude, and temperature. So, it pays to do a little research to find the most up-to-date information and predictions. Rainy years have resulted in spectacular super blooms in 2017, 2019, and 2023, and thanks to record rainfall across Southern California in 2025, exceptional blooms are expected this year.

Who’s Leaving California—and Who’s Moving In?

Hans Johnson and Eric McGhee, PPIC

Over the past 25 years California has had its slowest rates of population growth ever recorded. The primary driver of this slowdown has been California residents moving to other states—a trend that remains near record levels, despite having abated somewhat since the pandemic. It is a remarkable turnaround for California—once the epicenter of population growth in the United States. The affordability crisis, especially housing costs, has played a key role, with lower-income households much more likely to leave the state than higher-income households.

Cops have to treat marijuana in your car differently after new California Supreme Court ruling

If you can’t easily consume it, having marijuana in your car does not give California police the right to search the vehicle.

Nigel Duara, CalMatters

When it comes to impaired driving and the state’s open container law, a rolled and ready joint is more like a can of beer in giving police cause to search a car than a few crumbs of marijuana, according to the California Supreme Court.

The court’s reasoning: You can smoke a joint and drink a beer, but loose marijuana isn’t readily consumable.

In a ruling handed down today, the high court ruled that police must find marijuana in a condition that’s ready to be smoked if they are going to charge a driver with an open container violation.

Loose marijuana found on a car’s floorboards is like spilled beer, the court ruled. “In assessing whether the marijuana is imminently usable or readily accessible, courts should consider whether the marijuana could be consumed with minimal effort by an occupant of the vehicle,” the court found.

The ruling reversed a magistrate judge, trial court and the California Court of Appeal, which had all agreed that the loose marijuana constituted an open container violation and gave police cause to search a vehicle.

Issue #254: Can we bend the arc of history toward justice?

Mon, 19 Jan 2026 20:14:06 GMT

"Our universe is long, but it bends toward justice," King said to a crowd of about 7,000 people at Sacramento State.

Happy MLK day, California!
Scottish newspaper asks if CA could leave the U.S.
CA Drought-free for the first time in 25 years

HAPPY MLK DAY, CALIFORNIA!

Archives: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speaks in Sacramento about what ‘America has failed to hear’ in 1967

Daniel Macht, KCRA 3

Video from KCRA 3’s archives shows the civil rights leader giving a speech at what was known then as Sacramento State College at Campus Stadium.

“What I want to talk about, it is just as necessary for the concerned person and the person of goodwill to condemn the intolerable conditions which continue to exist in our society, which cause individuals to feel that they have no other alternative but to engage in violence in order to call attention to their problem,” he said. “But after all, a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it that America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the plight of the Negro poor has worsened over the last few years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and democracy have not been met, and it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice, humanity and equality.”

California defies Trump, makes admission free for over 200 parks on MLK Day

After President Donald Trump slashed free admission to national parks on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, California state parks will offer free admission at more than 200 state parks over the upcoming holiday.

Big Basin Redwoods State Park. By Anette Munthe, CC BY-SA-NC 2.0

In a new conference held in San Francisco on Friday, Gov. Gavin Newsom said the state was able to raise private funds to offset the cost of granting free vehicle entry to the parks. The money came from the California State Parks Foundation, an independent, nonprofit advocacy group for the parks, Newsom’s office said in a news release.

“While Trump works to erase Dr. King’s legacy, California will honor it,” Newsom’s office said in the release.

On Monday, vehicles with no more than nine passengers will be admitted to the participating parks for free. A list of these parks can be found on the California State Parks’ website.

SCOTS INTERVIEW ICI DIRECTOR

Could California leave the United States and become independent?

“I LOVE California, it’s the greatest country in the world,” Eric Swalwell – who is running to be the state’s next governor – said to chat show host Jimmy Kimmel last November. It was an interesting choice of words amid tensions between the US’s most populous and richest state and the Donald Trump administration.

From Lotsy. Buy the print here.

James Walker, The National

The YouGov survey in June 2025 found that 44% of Californian adults would vote for the state to leave the United States and become a fully independent nation, which the Independent California Institute (ICI) – who commissioned the poll – said is a “record high poll result for secession.”

Coyote Codornices Marin, the executive director of ICI – which is a think tank that researches and advocates for the idea of California independence – told the Sunday National that increased independence is already happening in many ways.

“We are seeing the start of building the groundwork that could be part of becoming a new country or could be part of becoming more autonomous within the United States,” they told the Sunday National.

“Like we’re already talking about backfilling money for federal programs that were cut by Republicans at the congressional level and money that’s been just straight up withheld by the Trump administration. We still want the same level of social services. We want government to work, and California’s getting the idea that that’s just not going to happen at the federal level, we have to do it ourselves.”

Marin added: “So California basically, if we just had all the tax dollars we paid to Washington, instead they went to the state government, for us, things would be exactly the same.

“We’d just be paying for whatever level of services we have now. There’s no added value in passing our tax dollars through the federal government.”

They went on: “The other thing is with the Trump administration, many of the things that have been good about the United States have gone away. We used to have a federal court system that made good decisions. We used to have free trade with other countries, for example.”

Marin also said that if the United States continues on its current course, they do believe that California will ultimately be a country “at some point”.

TRUMP TARGETS CALIFORNIA

Trump Administration Sues California to Allow Oil Wells Near Schools and Hospitals

The Trump administration is suing California over a law that prevents oil and gas drilling within 3,200 feet of homes, hospitals and schools — the latest in the power struggle between the state and federal government over energy rights.

Eliza Peppel, KQED

The complaint, filed Wednesday by the Department of Justice, argued that a law signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2022 — SB 1137 — violates longstanding federal law allowing the government to lease public lands for oil, gas, coal, and other minerals.

The law, which creates one-kilometer “health-buffer zones” around “sensitive spaces,” according to the California Department of Conservation website, will shut down one-third of all federally authorized oil and gas leases in the state.

The guidelines were developed based on recommendations from a 15-person expert panel to effectively protect residents from harmful emissions.

About 8% of California’s population lives within this distance to an oil or gas well. Low-income people are disproportionately affected by resulting health risks.

Trump administration proposes Colorado River options that could hit California hard

The Trump administration has released an outline of four new options for dealing with the Colorado River’s deepening water shortages, and they could dramatically cut the amount of water available for Southern California.

The Independent Californian is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Ian James, Los Angeles Times

Several of the alternatives are “alarming” because they could mean major water cutbacks for Southern California, said Shivaji Deshmukh, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District, which distributes water in the region.

The Trump administration apparently intends to “limit the pain” for the upper basin states, because the alternatives don’t clearly spell out significant cuts for those states, and instead would have California, Arizona and Nevada bear the brunt, said Kyle Roerink, executive director of the Great Basin Water Network.

The ‘People’s University’ of California is under siege by the Trump administration

While recent battles between the University of California and University of Southern California with the Trump administration have snagged most headlines, its campaign to demolish academic freedom in higher education has more quietly ensnared Cal State.

David Kirp, San Francisco Chronicle

The California State University system is the Rodney Dangerfield of higher education — it gets no respect. So, it perhaps shouldn’t be surprising that while recent battles between the University of California and University of Southern California with the Trump administration have snagged most headlines, its campaign to demolish academic freedom in higher education has more quietly ensnared Cal State.

Antisemitism is the ostensible rationale for an announced investigation of all 23 CSU campuses by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, in tandem with the Department of Justice. But combating antisemitism is a phony rationale for demanding that universities pledge fealty to the president’s political agenda. The Trump administration is claiming the right to decide what type of students can be admitted, what stripe of faculty can get hired and what can be taught — or else. Needless to say, these demands have nothing to do with antisemitism.

What Trump’s vow to withhold federal child-care funding means in California

Trump announced plans to freeze $10 billion in federal child-care, welfare and social services funding for California and four other Democrat-led states.

Melody Gutierrez, Los Angeles Times

The federal government has launched a broad attack on social services in California, raising the specter of fraud and threatening to withhold billions of dollars of funding in areas including child care, a jolt to tens of thousands of working families.

In a trio of Jan. 6 letters addressed to Gov. Gavin Newsom, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said it was concerned there had been “potential for extensive and systemic fraud” in child care and other social services programs that rely on federal funding, and had “reason to believe” that the state was “illicitly providing illegal aliens” with benefits.

The letters did not detail evidence to support the claims. State officials immediately said the suggestions of fraud are unsubstantiated.

Non Paywall Version

Trump administration escalates investigations into transgender athlete participation in California

The Trump administration is investigating more California colleges and schools, alleging that the participation of transgender athletes violates Title IX protections for women.

Christopher Buchanan, Los Angeles Times

Federal officials have launched an investigation into the California Community College Athletic Assn. and four other state colleges and school districts, alleging that their policies allowing sports participation based on gender identity violate the civil rights of female athletes, U.S. Education Department officials announced this week.

The investigations — which target 18 school districts and colleges nationwide — widen the Trump administration’s drive to end the participation of transgender athletes in women’s and girls’ sports.

The announcements came the same week that a majority of Supreme Court justices appeared ready to uphold the laws of two states that forbid transgender athletes from competition. But it wasn’t clear that they would stand in the way of states that chose instead to base participation on gender identity.

Non Paywall Version

OPINION OF THE WEEK

‘Brace for impact’: Trump turns fraud into new weapon against blue states

Donald Trump has found a new way to bludgeon blue states: accuse them of fraud, then move to cut off their money.

Blake Jones, Jeremy B. White and Nick Reisman, Politico

The Trump administration cited unproven fraud allegations last week as it put a hold on $10 billion in child care funding to five Democratic-run states. The Department of Justice announced it’s launching a new division of fraud enforcement, pointing to Minnesota’s “fraud epidemic.” And in California, acting U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said he’s pursuing additional charges of fraud involving state homelessness programs after railing for months against Gov. Gavin Newsom’s management of state spending.

The spending-focused line of attack from Trump marks an escalation in Trump’s already red-hot war on blue states. While hostilities between Trump and Democratic-led states on immigration intensify following shootings in Minnesota and Oregon, he is now moving more aggressively on a separate track to cut off states’ funding. And if “waste, fraud and abuse” is a familiar rallying cry for Republicans, it is now serving as fresh ammunition for Trump’s targeting of his political adversaries.

Trump’s offensive is already roiling politics in targeted states, where Democrats have largely chosen between two approaches to fending off the administration: casting the allegations as baseless or leaning into the risk of fraud and vowing to police it themselves.

CALIFORNIA COUNTERS TRUMP

Resistance state: Tracking California’s lawsuits against the new Trump administration

California is in the crosshairs of President Donald Trump’s efforts to expand the power of his office, touching on a vast array of issues that are core to the state’s ability to pay its bills and carry out programs backed by its Democratic leaders.

Mikhail Zinshteyn, CalMatters

The Newsom administration is fighting back, having filed dozens of lawsuits contesting the Trump administration’s executive orders, agency decisions and even laws that Trump himself signed.

The lawsuits include cases that contest Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to Los Angeles, seek to restore federal funding, protect civil liberties and uphold bedrock constitutional rights like birthright citizenship.

Nearly all of the lawsuits were filed in coordination with states led by Democrats. Generally, they argue that the Trump administration’s actions are unconstitutional. The arguments often say that Trump exceeded the powers Congress permitted under a specific law. Another common argument is that the Trump administration didn’t follow specific procedures for changing a policy in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act.

Trying to ‘Trump-proof’ California’s 2028 ballot

State lawmakers are already taking legislative steps to “Trump-proof” California’s elections, starting with a bill designed to keep President Donald Trump off of California’s ballot in 2028.

Maya C. Miller, CalMatters

The bill from Sen. Tom Umberg, a Santa Ana Democrat and chairperson of the Senate Judiciary Committee, would make it illegal for the California Secretary of State to place on the ballot any candidate for president or vice president who does not meet the constitutional requirements of those offices.

The Constitution’s 22nd Amendment already states that no individual can hold the presidency for more than two terms.

Senate Bill 46 would take that one step further and require any candidate to affirm under oath, and penalty of perjury, that they are indeed constitutionally qualified for the ballot. An elector could challenge the qualifications of a candidate by petitioning the Superior Court of Sacramento.

California Prosecutors Push Back on ICE Immunity Claims

California prosecutors are expressing alarm at the Trump administration’s response to the fatal shooting of a Minneapolis woman by an immigration agent, pointing to statements that the agent has absolute immunity from prosecution and to the decision to exclude Minnesota investigators from the inquiry into the incident.

Marisa Lagos, KQED

In interviews with KQED, state and local prosecutors vowed to investigate and, if necessary, prosecute federal agents who act illegally in California. But they acknowledged that those probes would be difficult to undertake without federal cooperation.

“Despite what Vice President Vance has irresponsibly and erroneously said …There’s no such thing as absolute immunity,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta, a Democrat, said. “Of course, there can be criminal liability for an ICE agent who commits a crime. ICE agents do not have carte blanche and license to kill and commit crimes and assaults and batter and rape and murder Americans. That’s what JD Vance is saying.”

Immigration agents have been involved in at least two nonfatal shootings of drivers in Los Angeles in recent months, and a Wall Street Journal investigation identified 13 times since July when ICE agents fired into civilians’ vehicles, twice fatally.

Trump claims crime is rampant in California. Newsom counters with stats showing historic lows

Killings in Los Angeles plummeted in 2025, mirroring trends statewide.

Sonja Sharp and Libor Jany, Los Angeles Times

Trump hammered lawlessness in California’s streets during the 2024 presidential campaign and throughout his first year back in the White House. He rarely names Newsom without invoking crime and chaos, and regularly threatens to surge armed soldiers back into into the streets.

According to data published by the Major Cities Chiefs Assn., homicides were down in San Francisco, San José, Sacramento and Oakland. Other violent crimes, including rape, aggravated assault and robbery, also dropped, with a handful of exceptions.

At the same time, the Trump administration has slashed hundreds of millions in federal funding from school safety grants, youth mentoring programs and gang intervention networks that experts say have been instrumental in improving public safety. \

Street-level disorder and perceptions of widespread lawlessness helped topple progressive administrations across California in 2024 and earned Trump an unexpected windfall in some of the state’s bluest cities.

Gavin Newsom will attend Davos as counterweight to Trump

The California governor is slated to speak Thursday, one day after Trump’s scheduled speech, and will also attend private meetings with foreign leaders and business executives during his three-day trip.

Melanie Mason, Politico

Newsom aims to use the backdrop of the conference, a symbol of global capitalism, to blast the president’s economic stewardship as “an assault on the free market,” according to his office. He plans to rip into Trump as a “crony capitalist” pursuing personal enrichment while bullying private businesses and directing his administration to assume stakes in five U.S. companies.

But the ire will not only be aimed at the president. Newsom intends to call out the well-heeled audience for being “complicit” with Trump, continuing a confrontational streak he displayed toward the business community at the New York Times DealBook summit last month. Newsom has mockingly suggested that corporations, law firms and universities who have struck deals with the administration should wear kneepads for acquiescing to the president; his political website sells $100 red kneepads emblazoned with Trump’s signature.

CALIFORNIA EDUCATION

California schools now offer a preschool grade for 4-year-olds. Here’s how it’s changing education

With a new grade called transitional kindergarten, there are younger kids in elementary school this year than ever before in California — and with that comes its own set of challenges for schools who are trying to implement it.

Elly Yu, Julia Barajas and Mariana Dale, LAist

Expanding access statewide has required new infrastructure — with money that some districts don’t have. It’s required a new group of teachers with the right credentials. And while a year might not seem like much, 4-year-olds have different developmental needs than kindergartners.

The state has different requirements for new TK classrooms than for upper grades. They have to be larger, so kids have room to play. They need to have bathrooms inside the classroom or close by, and they have to be close to parent drop-off areas. But not all schools have built out these spaces.

UC sets new record in California student enrollment as it weathers Trump challenges

UC enrolled about 301,000 students in 2025, setting a record. More than 200,000 of them were California residents. New international students grew despite strict Trump administration visa policies.

Jaweed Kaleem, Los Angeles Times

The University of California enrolled a record number of Californians in fall 2025 and saw a surge in new international students, touting the vitality and popularity of a system under attack by the Trump administration and grappling with federal funding cuts and recent years of state budget belt-tightening.

More than 301,000 students attended one of UC’s 10 campuses over the fall — the largest number in its history — according to data released Thursday, with a year-over-year increase of 1,686 students. The total included more than 200,000 California resident undergraduates, an increase of 1,796 students. I

In recent years, UC has touted the racial and ethnic mix of its enrolled students as a growing reflection of California demographics. The point of pride has come despite attacks on diversity programs nationwide, and the Supreme Court ruled in 2023 that affirmative action in college admissions was unconstitutional.

Looking out for ICE, California parents, teachers help students get to school

School staff say patrols outside schools have boosted attendance and mental health

Zaidee Stavely, EdSources

A recent morning was abuzz outside the joint campus of Esperanza Elementary School and Korematsu Discovery Academy in East Oakland. A crossing guard walked parents and children across the street, cars pulled up to the curb to drop off students, and families lined up to buy tamales and champurrado, a hot drink made of corn and chocolate, sold from the trunk of a car.

Watching it all was a mom from another school, Larisa Casillas, wearing a neon green vest and a whistle around her neck. She walked up and down the block, scanning approaching vehicles, on the lookout for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, agents.

Casillas is part of a growing number of parents, teachers and neighbors who have banded together in districts across the state, including Oakland, Los Angeles and San Diego, to watch for ICE agents outside schools, walk students to school, and bring groceries for families who are afraid to leave their homes.

School leaders across the state said the efforts have helped improve students’ mental health and increase attendance, which in some cases had declined because of fears of immigration enforcement.

IN OTHER NEWS

California’s Trade Landscape Is Shifting, Not Shrinking—So Far

California’s trade landscape remains in flux. Tariffs can affect the broader economy, both in the short and long term. Amid ongoing uncertainty, investors, businesses, and consumers will continue to look for ways to acquire the goods they need and to seek new markets for California’s products.

Daniel Payares-Montoya, Source

US trade policy changed dramatically in 2025, with higher tariffs applied to trade with most countries, retaliation from trading partners, and a few new trade agreements. These changes have created uncertainty among investors, businesses, consumers, and workers and raised concerns about a significant shock to California’s economy. With ten months of 2025 data now available, a nuanced picture of international trade is now developing, highlighted by shifting partnerships and variable effects.

While imports and exports held steady, California’s trade partnerships are undergoing a notable realignment. Mexico has displaced China as the state’s top trade partner. Trade with China fell from a yearly average of 26% of California’s total commerce between 2010 and 2024 to just above 13% in the first ten months of 2025. Partially offsetting the decline in trade with China, Taiwan has become California’s third-largest trading partner. Canada has moved up to become California’s seventh-largest trade partner, behind South Korea.

However, the data does show a range of effects on exports across California’s trade sectors. For example, the state’s beverage industry—including brewery, winery, and distillery products—has been hit hard by tariff policies. In the first ten months of 2025, California’s beverage exports dropped over 32%, compared to the same period in 2024 (from over $1.3 billion to $880 million). Beverage exports to Canada, which averaged close to a third of California’s yearly total from 2010 to 2024, fell to 16% in 2025, amid a Canadian boycott.

California is completely drought-free for the first time in 25 years

Some wet years and recent winter storms have helped bring the state out of drought after years of insufficient rainfall

The Independent Californian is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Dani Anguiano, The Guardian

California is completely drought-free for the first time in a quarter of a century, a significant development in a state that endured grueling years with insufficient rainfall.

Over the last 25 years, drought conditions in California have intensified the state’s wildfire crisis and created challenges in its massive agricultural sector. But a few wet years, and a recent spate of winter storms, helped bring the state out of drought.

This news marks the first time since the year 2000 that not a single square mile of California is dry on the US Drought Monitor, Drew Tuma, an ABC7 meteorologist, said in a post on social media.

“If you’re 25 or younger you’ve always lived in a world where California has been entering or recovering from drought,” Tuma wrote.

California orders Elon Musk’s AI company to immediately stop sharing sexual deepfakes

California Attorney General Rob Bonta sent a cease and desist letter to xAI ordering the Elon Musk company to stop creating and distributing nonconsensual sexual images.

Khari Johnson, CalMatters

California Attorney General Rob Bonta sent a cease and desist letter to xAI ordering the Elon Musk company to stop creating and distributing nonconsensual sexual images.

In the letter, Bonta cited “numerous examples of xAI taking ordinary, clothed images of women and children” and allowing users “to depict the people in suggestive and sexually explicit scenarios and ‘undress’ them, all without the subjects’ knowledge or consent.”

Providing such imagery, Bonta wrote, violates state laws related to public decency and a “deepfake” pornography law that went into effect just two weeks ago. Bonta said he appreciates that xAI took steps to address the issue in recent days, such as blocking Grok use in places where generating images of people in bikinis is illegal, but he said the impact of those changes is unclear.

Bonta urged Californians who want to report depictions of them or their children undressed or committing sexual acts to visit oag.ca.gov/report. In a response emailed Wednesday, xAI did not address questions about the investigation.

Issue #253: California unmasks ICE

Thu, 08 Jan 2026 18:33:25 GMT

The No Secret Police Act would criminalize law enforcement officials’ use of face coverings while performing their duties. Exceptions are made for the California Highway Patrol, SWAT team members, undercover officers and those who must wear masks for health reasons.

No Secret Police Act takes effect
Pacific states secede from U.S. vaccine policy
New year, new California laws

CALIFORNIA VS U.S. ON MIGRANTS AND ICE

California pushes back against masked ICE raids with ‘No Secret Police Act’

Senna Ihab Omar, USC Annenberg Media

Authored by California Sen. Scott Wiener, SB 627 is the first law enacted in the nation to prohibit law enforcement officials from covering their faces while on duty.

“ICE’s secret police tactics, under Trump and Stephen Miller, are raining fear and aggression down on California and requiring us to adapt in real time,” Wiener wrote in a statement. “No one wants masked officers roaming their communities and kidnapping people with impunity.”

And yet, they are. Despite California’s attempts, the Trump administration has made it clear that it has no intention of complying with California’s new regulations regarding federal law enforcement agents. The administration filed suit against California in mid-November, alleging that the anti-mask law is unconstitutional, along with another new state law that requires federal agents who are not in uniform to display identification visibly.

State Releases New Guidelines for Immigration Enforcement on School Campuses

Santa Barbara County Schools View Updated Guidelines as Reinforcements for Existing Practices

Callie Fausey, Santa Barbara Independent

Federal agents raiding schools and abducting children sounds far-fetched. But considering the recent trends of immigration enforcement nationwide, California officials are treating this as a real possibility.

The California Attorney General’s office has released updated guidelines for school staff, students, and families on what to do should Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) try to step onto school grounds. It is intended to expand and standardize protections for students and families across the state, clarifying requirements for districts, county offices of education, charter schools, and even community colleges.

While the state cannot directly interfere with or control federal immigration enforcement, it does not have to assist in it. New state laws intend to make it as difficult as legally possible for ICE agents to conduct enforcement operations at schools and daycares. One law, Safe Haven Schools, limits campus access and protects student privacy. Another, the Family Preparedness Plan Act, clearly outlines caregiver processes so students can remain enrolled and supported if a parent is temporarily detained or deported.

California sets up a showdown with Washington by reissuing licenses to migrant truckers

California extended the deadline for 17,000 migrant truck drivers to reapply for commercial licenses, giving them until March 6 instead of Jan. 5.

Nilesh Christopher, Los Angeles Times

California has delayed its cancellation of thousands of commercial driver’s licenses held by migrants, setting it up for another showdown with Washington.

The Department of Motor Vehicles announced on Tuesday that the 17,000 migrant truck drivers whose licenses had been revoked can now keep them for 60 more days, which could enable the drivers to retake tests and do whatever is necessary to remain legal.

“Commercial drivers are an important part of our economy — our supply chains don’t move, and our communities don’t stay connected without them,” said DMV Director Steve Gordon in a statement after the extension.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy reacted by threatening to cut $160 million in federal funding to California if the state doesn’t meet the Jan. 5 deadline to revoke unvetted foreign trucker licenses.

The dispute disproportionately affects Punjabi Sikh truckers, a vital part of California’s Central Valley economy and the broader American trucking industry.

CALIFORNIA AND U.S. FOREIGN POLICY

Trump withdraws U.S. from 66 international organizations and treaties, including major climate groups

President Trump on Wednesday withdrew the United States from 66 international organizations and treaties, including the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Hayley Smith, Los Angeles Times

In a presidential memorandum, Trump said it is “contrary to the interests of the United States to remain a member of, participate in, or otherwise provide support to” the organizations, which also include groups geared toward education, economic development, cybersecurity and human rights issues, among others. He directed all executive departments and agencies to take steps to “effectuate the withdrawal” of the U.S. from the organizations as soon as possible.

While the president has already announced a withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement — an international treaty to limit global warming to under 2 degrees Celsius in order to prevent the worst effects of climate change — the latest move will further isolate the nation at a critical moment, experts said.

Maduro Ousted by U.S.: California Communities React as Legal and Policy Concerns Mount

Why Trump’s Removal of Maduro Is Sparking Celebration — and Controversy — Across California

Anne Howard, ScopeWeekly

Venezuelan communities across California, from Los Angeles to the Bay Area, reacted with a mix of celebration and skepticism this week after President Donald Trump announced the removal and capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. The administration said the operation targeted international drug cartels, but critics have pointed to Trump’s recent pardons of convicted drug traffickers, including former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, calling the move hypocritical and raising questions about motives, legality, and what comes next for Venezuela.

Danes offer to buy California to spite Trump’s Greenland aims: ‘We’ll bring hygge to Hollywood’ (from February 11, 2025)

Satirical petition from Denmark, which owns Greenland, racks up 200,000 signatures as Trump eyes Arctic island

Cecilia Nowell, The Guardian

Since returning to the presidency last month, Donald Trump has called for Canada to become the 51st US state, suggested he might take over the Panama Canal, floated US ownership of Gaza – and tried to buy Greenland. Now, Denmark – which owns Greenland – is clapping back. More than 200,000 Danes have signed a satirical petition to buy California from the US.

“Have you ever looked at a map and thought, ‘You know what Denmark needs? More sunshine, palm trees, and roller skates.’ Well, we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make that dream a reality,” the petition reads. “Let’s buy California from Donald Trump!”

Nearly half of Danes see US as threat and 78% oppose Greenland sale, poll shows.

OP-ED OF THE WEEK

California pioneering regional solutions to national problems

The federal government is no longer the primary arena where many of the nation’s most urgent problems are solved. Governing capacity is drifting downward — and outward — to states, cities and metropolitan regions that can still act with speed, competence and public trust.

John Eger, Times of San Diego

America — or more precisely, the country we still call the United States — is increasingly immobilized by zero-sum politics. Across healthcare, infrastructure, climate policy, housing and economic development, federal institutions that once set national direction are faltering. This dysfunction is no longer abstract.

In response, a quiet reorganization of governance is underway. Rather than sweeping national reform, authority is shifting incrementally toward states and metropolitan regions aligned by shared economic interests and policy goals.

Nowhere is this transformation more visible than in California. With an economy approaching $4 trillion — larger than that of most countries — the state would rank among the world’s largest economies if it were sovereign. But California’s significance today is not just economic scale. It is increasingly functioning as a governing laboratory, setting standards that ripple outward because national and global markets cannot afford to ignore them.

CALIFORNIA’S 2026 HEALTH CHALLENGES

California and its Western allies reject CDC’s scaled-back childhood vaccine guidance

Health officials in California and three other Western states continue to endorse the same childhood vaccines that have long been part of U.S. public health policy — despite a move by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to significantly reduce the number of vaccinations routinely recommended for children.

By Catherine Ho, San Francisco Chronicle

The CDC on Monday announced it is downgrading its recommendation that all children get vaccinated against the flu, hepatitis A, meningococcal disease, rotavirus and RSV. Instead, going forward, the agency recommends these vaccines only for only some high-risk children or after consulting with a doctor.

The decision was made without citing new scientific evidence and without undergoing the lengthy public review by infectious disease experts that the CDC — until the current administration — had historically done when considering changes to vaccine recommendations.

The West Coast Health Alliance — which includes California, Oregon, Washington and Hawaii — said in a statement late Monday that it will continue to recommend the childhood vaccination schedule endorsed by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the professional association that represents pediatricians. This vaccination schedule is what the CDC recommended for decades, before the current administration began its rollbacks.

Health Dept. Freezes $10 Billion in Funding to 5 Democratic States

The funding pause could jeopardize child care and other programs that serve hundreds of thousands of households in California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota and New York.

Minho Kim, The New York Times

The Trump administration on Tuesday froze $10 billion in funding for child care subsidies, social services and cash support for low-income families in five states controlled by Democrats, claiming without evidence widespread fraud throughout those states after a major welfare fraud scheme in one of them.

Minnesota, New York, California, Illinois and Colorado will be cut off from around $7.3 billion in funding for the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, which provides cash assistance to households with children, the Department of Health and Human Services announced. The five states will also lose access to nearly $2.4 billion for the Child Care and Development Fund, which supports child care for working parents, and around $870 million for social services grants that mostly benefit children at risk.

The funding pause could jeopardize programs that serve hundreds of thousands of low-income households in the five states.

Growing number of California sheriffs no longer respond to mental health calls

A shift away from police-led responses spreads, but gaps in crisis teams leave some communities exposed

Victoria Clayton, The Guardian

In the past year, a handful of sheriff’s departments in California have started refusing to respond to 911 calls that involve a mental health crisis, but where no crime has been reported.

In February, the Sacramento sheriff, Jim Cooper, announced that his deputies would only respond to mental health crises if a crime had been committed. Down in San Diego county, the police chief for the city of El Cajon, Jeremiah Larson, made a similar policy decision in May.

Several other law enforcement agencies in the state, including the Ventura county sheriff’s office and the Long Beach police department have said their officers will respond to every call, but they may not stay if no crime is happening and the person in crisis does not pose a threat to other people.

The trend comes as data shows the catastrophic results of police responding to mental health calls. But the removal of police from these situations, which civil rights advocates have long sought, has also raised questions about the real-world impact in communities where alternatives are incomplete.

NEW LAWS FOR CALIFORNIA

A new California law gives the state more power over workplaces. Trump is suing to block it

A new law backed by California unions gives a state board the right to regulate working conditions and labor rights as the federal labor board’s fate is in limbo.

Levi Sumagaysay, CalMatters

California under a law taking effect today seeks to uphold the labor and unionization rights of private-sector employees, as the federal agency that has held that power for decades is in limbo. But the new law’s future is unclear because the Trump administration is challenging it.

The law, which grants more powers to the California Public Employment Relations Board, is a response to the National Labor Relations Board lacking a quorum.

President Donald Trump fired the NLRB’s chairperson, Gwynne Wilcox, days after he began his second term in January. His two nominees to the board have yet to be confirmed, so the federal board has been without the three members it needs for a quorum for months.

10 new California laws you should know about in 2026

As of Jan. 1, hundreds of new state laws have the potential to shape the everyday lives of Californians.

Laura Fitzgerald, LAist

The new laws are meant to tackle the state’s housing affordability crisis, establish guardrails on the use of artificial intelligence and protect the sharing of personal information for those who could face federal immigration enforcement.

Most new laws won’t all bring change overnight. But some could stoke continued controversy and legal challenges. For example, if you live near public transit, one new state law will give developers the freedom to build taller, denser housing, overriding local zoning rules and potentially transforming some single-family neighborhoods. Some cities and counties remain vehemently opposed and are considering legal action.

New California tool can stop brokers from selling your personal online data. Here’s how

California launches DROP, an online platform enabling residents to request all registered data brokers delete personal information simultaneously.

Karen Garcia, Los Angeles Times

Starting this year, a single request form will allow Californians to demand that data brokers delete their personal information and refrain from collecting or selling it in the future.

Third parties are constantly lurking as you navigate the internet, collecting data they can later aggregate and sell, according to the Electronic Privacy Information Center. These data brokers can gather your email addresses, Social Security number, as well as details about your income, political preferences and martial status — often without your knowledge — and offer that information to everyone from advertisers to landlords to debt collectors.

You have the right to request a broker delete your information from their databases, but it’s an often-arduous task that entails identifying specific brokers who have your info, then reaching out to them individually with removal requests.

IN OTHER NEWS

California could impose a billionaire tax. Here’s how it would work and where the money would go.

A proposed billionaire wealth tax in California is sparking debate over whether the measure, if passed, would lead to more harm than good if ultrawealthy residents in the state flee to other locales.

Aimee Picchi, CBS News

Under the proposed ballot initiative, California would institute a one-time tax of 5% on the state’s estimated 255 billionaires. While wealth taxes aren’t new, the proposal has sparked pushback from some of America’s richest citizens and their allies, who claim it could drive the state’s billionaires to leave the state and discourage entrepreneurs from creating businesses.

By contrast, advocates of the tax emphasize that billionaires’ fortunes are growing much faster than the income of ordinary Americans.

Winter Storms Ease Drought in California, for Now

Experts say that it’s too early to tell what will happen during the rest of the state’s rainy season, but that extreme drought is unlikely.

Sonia A. Rao, The New York Times

Heavy rain and snow has pounded California in recent weeks, causing floods, power outages, mudslides and other disruptions. But the storms have also filled reservoirs and deepened the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada mountain range, easing drought concerns in a state that is perpetually worried about not having enough water.

The near-constant pace of storms so far this winter has brought the state above-average precipitation, driving the storage level in most of California’s water reservoirs to well above normal for this point in the rainy season. Measurements show virtually no drought in the state.

After devastating LA fires, California is drafting nation’s toughest rules for homes

The idea, called Zone Zero, is to prevent plants and flammable items from igniting during a wildfire, spreading flames to the house and the surrounding neighborhood. In high winds, most homes burn down due to embers, the tiny bits of burning debris carried by the wind.

Lauren Sommer, NPR

A typical single-family house is encircled by green, its shrubs and plants sitting just under windows and hugging exterior walls. It’s an image that California is trying to get homeowners to rethink as the state’s risk of extreme wildfires grows.

One year after the fast-moving Eaton and Palisades Fires destroyed more than 16,000 structures in Los Angeles, California is drafting the toughest statewide rules in the country for vegetation. In areas at risk of wildfires, homeowners would be required to clear some or all of the plants within five feet of their house, depending on what regulators decide. Well-maintained trees would still be allowed.

Still, the pushback has been strong, even in the Los Angeles area neighborhoods where so many lost homes.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, stop just short of secession

LA Times: Kidnappers or ICE agents? LAPD grapples with surge in calls from concerned citizens

Connecting California: How can California stop ICE overreach? The answer might lie in a 1972 case from Humboldt County

72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Issue #252: ICE, Rob Bonta would like a word with you

Sat, 13 Dec 2025 18:15:53 GMT

The highly politicized response to the fires has cast an unusual uncertainty over whether Los Angeles will receive more federal resources.

California AG prepares to take legal action against individual ICE agents
Trump schemes to get Californians’ sensitive data
A bad winter for California water

CALIFORNIA FACES FEDERAL FUNDING CUTS

Will California ever get more federal aid for L.A. County fires? It’s up to Trump

Alexei Koseff, San Francisco Chronicle

Despite the delay, there is still a path for Congress to provide supplemental support for the January fires, which killed at least 31 people and destroyed broad swaths of Pacific Palisades and Altadena. But it will likely require convincing President Donald Trump — whose support has been fickle and who continues to rail publicly against what he believes was a botched response by state and local officials — to make it a priority.

California could lose federal funds to administer food benefits next week

Just weeks after federal food benefits were restored following the government shutdown, some Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) funding is in limbo again. The program is known as CalFresh in California.

Jacob Aere, KPBS

The Trump administration said on Tuesday it may begin withholding money for administering federal food assistance in California and 21 other states starting next week unless the states start providing data about benefit recipients.

The action will not directly affect the benefits people receive, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture which oversees the federal food assistance program.

California lawmakers scramble to address looming Medicaid crisis

A significant part of Congress’ so-called Big Beautiful Bill’s takedown of Medicaid funding revolves around forcing people to show that they’re working 80 hours each month before they can receive benefits.

Mark Kreidler, Capital & Main

There isn’t a ton of research into the effectiveness of making people prove they have jobs in order to access social services. But what evidence there is points in one direction: Placing work requirements on programs like Medicaid does almost nothing to increase employment or hours worked, while actively hurting people in need.

With roughly 15 million Californians relying on Medi-Cal, the state’s version of Medicaid, for their health coverage, the Golden State is staring that grim truth in the face. And with about a year left until that requirement takes effect, California policymakers are scrambling to mitigate its most toxic effects — even if they are legally required to implement the broader law.

INTERIOR CALIFORNIA’S HEALTH CHALLENGES

Solutions Sought For Chronic Dust Pollution In Coachella Valley

The South Coast Air Quality Management District announced Tuesday that it is expanding its dust-monitoring capabilities to address dust pollution in the Coachella Valley.

Toni McAllister, Patch

Strong desert winds routinely generate and carry dust across the region, affecting air quality and public health. South Coast AQMD reports it has installed a high-resolution environmental camera in San Jacinto State Park that uses imagery and AI-supported analysis to track dust emissions. A second camera is located on Toro Peak overlooking the area from Indio to the north Salton Sea shore.

“I have been working with South Coast AQMD on increased airborne dust since Hurricane Hilary, and these two cameras are new steps in these efforts,” said V. Manuel Perez, Riverside County Supervisor and South Coast AQMD Governing Board member. “They will help us pinpoint where the dust is coming from and allow us to focus remediation efforts.”

‘Valley fever’ has spiked 1,200% in California — why more people are getting the disease that can spread to their bones and brain

California health officials are warning about a surge in a potentially deadly fungal infection. The state is reporting 6,761 cases of valley fever, also known as coccidioidomycosis, through July this year. That means California is on pace to top last year’s record of 12,595 cases.

Tracy Swartz), MSN

There were fewer than 1,000 cases logged in the year 2000. Valley fever now results in around 80 deaths and over 1,000 hospitalizations annually in California. Shaun Yang, the director for molecular microbiology and pathogen genomics at the UCLA Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, blames the increase on the mild and wet winters that have become more common in California.

Two Coccidioides fungi species cause valley fever — Coccidioides immitis and Coccidioides posadasii. Activities that disrupt the soil, such as wind, construction, farming, gardening or dust storms, can release the microscopic spores into the air. Breathing in these spores can lead to valley fever. If the initial infection doesn’t completely resolve, it may advance to pneumonia or disseminated coccidioidomycosis.

To protect underage farmworkers, California expands oversight of field conditions

California officials say they are enhancing coordination among state agencies to better protect underage farmworkers from toxic pesticides, dangerous heat and other workplace hazards.

Robert J. Lopez, Los Angeles Times

The actions follow an investigation by Capital & Main, produced in partnership with the Los Angeles Times and McGraw Center for Business Journalism, which found that the state is failing to protect underage farmworkers who labor in harsh and dangerous circumstances. Thousands of children and teenagers work in California fields to provide Americans with fresh fruit and vegetables. While laborers as young as 12 can legally work in agriculture, many described being exposed to toxic pesticides, dangerous heat and other hazards.

Worker advocates lauded the plans for increased enforcement as steps in the right direction. But they added that any long-term solutions need to address issues such as low wages and poverty, both of which drive minors to work in the fields to help their families pay rent and put food on the table.

CALIFORNIA’S UNPREDICTABLE WEATHER

Climate experts warn about a “historically dry” winter in California as La Niña refuses to disappear

For years, California has been known to experience more rainfall in December than in any other month. But now, a recent weather projection highlights the state to experience below-average rainfall. This wouldn’t be the first time experts have come up with such predictions. What makes this most peculiar is the presence of La Niña.

David A., The Diary24

La Niña is known to resist seasonal changes. When scientists observed the upcoming trend from the Pacific system, they observed it to contain a high-pressure system that could deflect moisture towards Canada, away from California. In simpler words, the events of this barrier could begin an extremely dry period, just after the mercury twilight farewell, flourishing ahead of winter shadow.

In fact, experts believe that even when rain falls later in the season, this drought will be difficult to get past. This prediction was carried out by a team of meteorologists who used a combination of atmospheric monitoring, analysis of ocean currents, and temperature readings.

‘A bit like poker’: California’s wet winter brings La Niña, El Niño confusion

Southern California has experienced a record-breaking wet start to the rainy season, contradicting typical La Niña patterns.

Rong-Gong Lin II, Los Angeles Times

Californians can be excused for being confused about the weather forecast. Scientists in October said La Niña had arrived, which many associate with dry conditions, particularly in the Southland.

But we have instead experienced a very wet season — at least so far — with rain bringing much-needed moisture to the brush, likely putting an end to the autumn fire season, and helping to keep the state’s reservoirs in good shape.

So what is going on?

Before-and-after images from space: Tule fog smothers a huge swath of California

California’s Central Valley has been enshrouded in mist for more than a week thanks to the area’s infamous tule fog.

Terry Castleman, Los Angeles Times

Technically known as radiation fog, the weather phenomenon is the result of a combination of “a cool, moist layer of air from the Pacific close to the surface, clear skies above and light winds,” according to the National Weather Service. Most persistent in valleys where the wind can’t sweep it away, the tule fog has been a main character in California for decades. It causes pileups, traps airborne pollutants and has even inspired poetry about its haunting beauty.

The NWS forecast shows most of the Central Valley — including Merced, Fresno, Visalia and Bakersfield — should be spared from the most hazardous conditions Monday evening, then the fog is expected to again thicken overnight and reach Level 3 of the weather service’s five-level fog severity index, indicating moderate risk and half a mile of visibility.

ICE NEWS IN CALIFORNIA

California leaders launch online portal where ‘federal agent misconduct’ can be reported

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and Gov. Gavin Newsom launched a new online portal Wednesday allowing residents to report what they believe to be excessive force, misconduct or other potentially illegal activity by federal agents or members of the military working in the state.

Kevin Rector, Los Angeles Times

Videos, photos and other information submitted through the portal will be treated confidentially and will help members of Bonta’s team “create a record of potential unlawful conduct by federal agents” that could be used in future legal actions, Bonta’s office said.

The announcement comes as state leaders have clashed fiercely with Trump administration officials over the deployment of federal immigration agents in California. For months, local residents have filmed and documented those agents during immigration raids and enforcement actions. Claims of abuses have mounted and local leaders have started putting forward their own measures to restrict federal agents operating in their jurisdictions — including a Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors vote on Tuesday to ban federal agents from wearing masks.

High school bullying is up, attendance down as ICE raids sow ‘climate of distress,’ study says

A UCLA/UC Riverside study finds a widespread “climate of distress” in public high schools because of immigration enforcement.

Iris Kwok and Howard Blume, Los Angeles Times

High school principals across California and nationwide say raids by Immigration, Customs and Enforcement have provoked a “climate of distress” among immigrant students who have been bullied on campus and whose attendance has dropped, according to a study released Tuesday.

Seventy percent of public high school principals surveyed said students from immigrant families expressed fears for themselves or their families because of ICE crackdowns or political rhetoric related to immigrants, according to the report by researchers at UCLA and UC Riverside.

The findings echo the narrative of what schools and districts have reported across Southern California since President Trump took office in January and began aggressive immigration raids.

48% of people ICE arrested in Northern California have no criminal record

Almost half of the people being arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Northern California have no criminal record, recent data shows. Data also reveals that ICE arrests across Northern California more than tripled this year.

Kelly Waldron, Mission Local

A Mission Local analysis of data released from the Deportation Data Project, a group of researchers based at the University of California, Berkeley, shows that 48 percent of the people arrested by ICE across Northern California in September had no criminal background, while 39 percent had a criminal conviction. The remaining 14 percent had pending criminal charges.

That is a large spike from earlier months, when immigrants with either a criminal conviction or charges made up the majority of arrests in Northern California. September was the most recent full month for which data was available.

Earlier this year, President Donald Trump pledged to deport the “worst of the worst,” but the latest numbers confirm that the administration’s crackdown continues to target an increasing share of people who have committed no crimes.

MORE CALIFORNIA VS. TRUMP NEWS

What you should know about the Trump administration’s push to get California voters’ private data

A federal judge heard arguments in a case to decide whether California should have to give the federal government sensitive data about its more than 23 million voters.

Jill Replogle, LAist

California is one of 14 states the U.S. Department of Justice has sued in recent months in a nearly nationwide effort to collect voter data, including sensitive information that typically is under state control and kept private.

The California case is further along than any other, so it serves as a kind of test that’s being closely watched by election officials, voting rights advocates and election integrity hawks. The U.S. Department of Justice has requested complete voter registration data from at least 40 states.

Here’s a closer look at the legal showdown — and why it ultimately might be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court:

S.F. judge spars with DOJ lawyers arguing ‘a danger of rebellion’ in California

The federal government says President Donald Trump’s continued deployment of 100 National Guard troops in Los Angeles is lawful because of the “danger of a rebellion” there, attorneys argued during sharp back-and-forth with a judge in San Francisco Friday.

Sara DiNatale, San Francisco Chronicle

The California National Guard has been in Los Angeles since June, when Trump first federalized about 4,000 troops to thwart protests over deportation raids. But those protests are long over and in the meantime, some of the troops have been sent to Oregon and Illinois. Though a trial over the L.A. deployment concluded in September — the same judge found troops had illegally conducted law enforcement activities — California is now challenging an extension of the deployment for the remaining troops.

The consequences of the administration’s legal argument would mean the president could keep troops in place long after the original situation that prompted their deployment passed, the judge said.

How do Californians, US feel about Trump? Approval ratings drop

Polls show that 26% of California adults approved of Trump’s handling of his presidency, several percentage points lower than in June and February.

Paris Barraza, Desert Sun

President Donald Trump is ending the year with the lowest approval rating in his second term so far at 36%, according to a Gallup poll conducted from Nov. 3-25. Gallup has been tracking the president’s approval rating through his first and second terms, with his second-term approval rating averaging 41%. For some context, Trump’s November approval rating is the lowest among recent presidents for the same month during the same period — the first year of their second term. That includes former Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, according to Gallup.

Among Californians, Trump’s approval rating has remained low throughout the year, at least according to the Desert Sun’s previous reporting on polls such as Civiqs and the Public Policy Institute of California. This figure makes sense when you think about the state’s makeup. Approximately 45% of registered California voters in the weeks leading up to last year’s presidential election were Democrats, nearly double that of Republicans, according to the California Secretary of State.

IN OTHER CALIFORNIA NEWS

California water wars reignite as Trump administration plans to send more to farms

The Trump administration is pressing forward with its pledge to send more Northern California water south to farms, even as state officials warn that the move could cut vital supplies for cities and fish.

Kurtis Alexander, San Francisco Chronicle

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation announced its plan Thursday in an update to operations at the Central Valley Project, calling for increased pumping from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to points south.

The delta, where California’s biggest rivers converge, is the crux of the state’s water supply and a lifeline for fish and wildlife. How it’s managed is a perennial source of tension, and the Bureau of Reclamation’s change in operations is already stoking a fresh round of fighting between the federal government and California.

California leaders, however, including the governor’s office, were quick to challenge the move, saying there would be inevitable harm to endangered fish, including salmon, as well as reduced water supplies for other parts of the state.

California residents are moving less than average

America saw fewer moves than ever in 2024, and California is one state where people are particularly staying put, according to an analysis of census data published this fall.

Sami Sparber and Kate Murphy, Axios San Diego

Roughly 1 in 9 people (11%) changed residences last year — a record low in data going back to 1948. That’s down from around 14% a decade ago and 20% in the 1960s, per the analysis by rental listing site Point2Homes. Only 9.6% of California residents moved in 2024.

A sharp nationwide “decline in geographic mobility is the single most important social change of the past half century,” The Atlantic’s Yoni Appelbaum wrote this year. In any decade, “the people who have moved have done better economically than the people who stayed behind,” Appelbaum said on a podcast in August, discussing his book “Stuck.”

“The last 50 years, as we’ve stopped moving, have also seen [a] sudden atrophy and decay of our social and civic life.”

Data centers for AI could nearly triple San Jose’s energy use. Who foots the bill?

Artificial intelligence and its growing demand for data centers are putting new pressure on California’s electric grid. In San Jose, supporters see jobs and investment, while a key ratepayer advocate worries customers could end up paying for upgrades.

Alejandro Lazo, CalMatters

The surge in AI is complicating efforts by regulators and utilities to forecast how quickly data centers will grow and how much power they’ll need. Companies can propose large facilities without committing to build them, the computing demands behind AI are changing quickly and cooling needs vary across the state. These factors make long-term energy needs hard to pin down.

The Public Advocates Office, an independent consumer watchdog within the California Public Utilities Commission, recently warned that rapid data-center growth could leave Californians paying for billions of dollars in grid upgrades if projects never materialize or use far less power than promised.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, stop just short of secession

LA Times: Kidnappers or ICE agents? LAPD grapples with surge in calls from concerned citizens

Connecting California: How can California stop ICE overreach? The answer might lie in a 1972 case from Humboldt County

72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Issue #251: Who gets to regulate AI?

Wed, 03 Dec 2025 18:10:36 GMT

California and the White House are once again at odds — this time over who should control safety regulations for artificial intelligence, as federal officials push for a national standard while state leaders move ahead with their own rules.

California fiscal stability lauded, but Trump poses risk
Has California lost its dominance as the wellspring of crazy?
California climate regulations still set the standard

WHITHER GOETH AI REGULATION?

California, White House clash over who should regulate artificial intelligence

Jenny Hu, abc10

The debate underscores a growing national fight over state versus federal authority as lawmakers try to rein in rapidly advancing AI systems. especially when protecting children online.

This year, California passed a sweeping package of online safety laws, including SB 53, authored by Sen. Scott Wiener. Gov. Gavin Newsom has said the state is filling a void left by Congress and that California’s approach could serve as a model for the nation.

President Donald Trump is pushing for a single federal framework. He is considering an executive order that would create a task force to challenge or invalidate state-level AI laws and could penalize states by withholding federal funds. He also supports a Republican-led effort in Congress to impose a moratorium on state and local AI regulations. A similar 10-year moratorium proposed earlier this year under the “One Big Beautiful” Bill ultimately failed in the Senate.

But California lawmakers argue federal efforts aren’t moving fast enough.

Trump’s AI power play: Crushing state regulations to forge a “woke-free” future

In a move that could redefine the balance of power between Washington and the states, President Donald Trump is poised to sign an executive order that effectively neuters local governments’ ability to regulate artificial intelligence.

QUASA

Drafted in the wake of failed congressional efforts to impose a nationwide moratorium on state AI laws, the order - titled “Promoting American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence” - would centralize oversight under federal control, branding any state-level rules as threats to “innovation and interstate commerce.”

Targets already in the crosshairs include Colorado’s pioneering AI safety bill (passed in May 2025, mandating bias audits for high-risk systems) and California’s AB 2013 (the “Deepfake Accountability Act,” effective January 2026, requiring watermarking on AI-generated media).

Non-compliant states could see grants frozen or clawed back - up to $1.5 billion for California alone, per preliminary estimates from the Commerce Department.

Can California protect its AI regulations from Trump’s executive order?

Republican members of Congress are considering a provision in the National Defense Authorization Act, the annual legislation to fund the military, that would preempt state authority to regulate AI.

Lynn La, CalMatters

California Attorney General Rob Bonta urged congressional leaders to reject the proposed language, arguing that preemption would undermine states’ abilities to respond “swiftly and effectively to emerging technologies” and allow AI companies to “evade commonsense state law protections.” Thirty-two of the world’s top 50 AI companies reside in California, according to Bonta’s office.

THE GOLDEN STATE

California: A State Like No Other

The Golden State has taken a remarkable turn in terms of its financial health in the past decade. Balanced budgets and improved cash flows have led to credit rating upgrades and stable outlooks.

Patrick Haskell, Seeking Alpha

The state’s $228 billion fiscal year budget, passed June 27, is based on roughly $215 billion in revenues and a $7 billion draw from the budget stabilization account, with reserves expected to drop to $16 billion (6.9% of general fund expenditures). The state budget passage coincides with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), which introduces risks to budget stability as the state tackles changes to Medicaid and other programs.

Our proprietary economic heat map highlights regional disparities. For example, Southern California continues to see healthy economic trends, while benefiting from robust tourism and uptick in the return to office trend.

[However], urban areas, such as San Francisco, have large exposures to troubled commercial real estate struggling with post pandemic recovery combined with growing budgetary expenditures threaten the city’s ability to provide services for residents.

America has become too crazy for California

We Californians have our self-destructive tendencies, but never would we jump off the cliff into national suicide. Like you’re doing now.

Joe Mathews, Zócalo Public Square, in VC Star

America, you’re a world hegemon that is abandoning that leadership role and all the economic benefits that come with it. Our planet is burning up, and you’ve decided to abandon smart climate investments to burn it up faster.

Our Golden State is no model of effective government, but you’ve turned the federal government into a combination of criminal enterprise and oligarchic concierge service. In California, we’ve elected our share of crooks, but you put a convicted criminal in the Oval Office after he sought to steal an election and promised to rule as a dictator..

It’s even weirder to see a former mayor of a famously insane city, San Francisco, emerge as our national voice of reason. When Gov. Gavin Newsom — who spins out crazy ideas at the pace of a maître d’ reciting a menu — is mocking you for going overboard, it should feel like a splash of ice water in the face.

CALIFORNIA REGULATIONS SETTING THE STANDARD

California law regulating web browsers could have national data privacy impact, experts say

Privacy changes required by a newly-enacted California law could mean web browsers will soon offer all Americans a mechanism to easily opt out of all data sharing and sales when surfing the web.

Suzanne Smalley, The Record

In October, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law which amends the state’s trailblazing Consumer Privacy Act to mandate that web browsers create a turnkey tool for residents to opt out from data sharing once instead of having to do so each time they visit a website.

Crucially, the law applies to Californians even when they are traveling out of state or using a virtual private network, a fact which a California data privacy regulator and the legislator behind the law say likely means browsing companies will make the tool available nationally.

Twelve states, including California, now require businesses to stop sharing data from consumers who opt out. But because most web browsers have not offered mechanisms for residents to easily exercise their rights, most do not do so. That means that once browsing companies set up a universal opt out tool, tens of millions of consumers — including those outside of California — could begin refusing to share their web browsing data.

The California law goes into effect on January 1, 2027.

The growing power of the California Consumer Privacy Act

The CCPA’s power has not been manifested by issuing massive fines against violators. Instead, it is the continuing oversight the state exercises once it identifies a violation and reaches a settlement with a regulated entity.

Phil Favro, JDSupra

The Agency and attorney general have collectively obtained several settlements with companies over CCPA violations. For example, the attorney general announced on October 30, 2025 that Sling TV agreed to “implement changes to ensure the CCPA opt-out is easy for consumers to execute, requires minimal steps, and considers the way the business interacts with consumers.” Sling TV also agreed to pay a $530,000 fine. The pace of enforcement shows no signs of slowing.

Beyond the regulatory realm of CCPA compliance lies private party litigation. Lawsuits typically to seek to address enterprises’ alleged CCPA violations, particularly for data breach violations, often through proposed class actions. Those actions have significantly multiplied since the CCPA went into effect, with legal search engines reporting dozens of federal court decisions this year alone addressing CCPA-related issues; most frequently ruling on motions to dismiss CCPA claims. Significantly, CCPA claims are not limited to California federal and state courts. A brief review of 2025 cases reveals CCPA claims in pending lawsuits throughout the country, including federal courts based in the following U.S. cities beyond California: Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Dallas, Detroit, Jacksonville, Las Vegas, New York, Orlando, Philadelphia, and Salt Lake City. Both the growth of CCPA-related litigation and its widespread proliferation suggest the number of private CCPA lawsuits will not decrease any time soon.

LOOKING FOR PROTECTION FROM FEDERAL ATTACKS

How California can protect students from Washington’s uncertainty

Districts across California face a looming crisis as funding freezes, proposed cuts and a government shutdown jeopardize critical resources for millions of students and threaten to disrupt classrooms, staffing and services.

Ana F. Ponce, EdSource

California is far from immune to federal turbulence, receiving about $8 billion annually in federal K-12 education funding. This summer, with more than $800 million at stake, state leaders joined legal challenges to safeguard funding for core services, including those for low-income students, special education, English learners, and foster and homeless youth.

But California has also built its own framework to direct resources where they are most needed, progress that matters even more when federal dollars are unstable. Through the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), state dollars flow to local education agencies in the form of base grants for all students, along with supplemental and concentration grants for specific student populations. This targeted approach ensures that significantly more funding follows higher-need students, and research links LCFF to improvements in test scores, graduation rates and college readiness.

How California (and other states) can bring back the money that Trump takes away

We don’t have to be broke: Study shows states have many progressive revenue options—if the governors and legislators will take advantage of them

Tim Redmond, 48 Hills

The outlook for California’s budget is, of course, bleak. I say “of course” because most states are in serious trouble: Federal support makes up close to a third of most state budgets, sometimes more—and as the Trump Administration has set about destroying state funding to give tax cuts to billionaires, the situation has left governors and legislators looking for ways to cut programs.

But a new report from the Action Center on Race and the Economy offers another alternative: State governments have plenty of ways to raise new revenue from taxes on the rich and on big corporations. There’s enough money out there to come close to replacing what Trump has taken away.

State officials, the report says, need to stop just blaming Washington and start demanding that the very rich in their own states “pay us what you owe us.”

FOCUS ON CALIFORNIA’S ENVIRONMENT

As federal support withers, California invests in cheap heat pumps

The California Public Utilities Commission has allocated $115 million over six years to generate business for makers of small heat pumps and battery-equipped induction stoves that can be plugged into standard outlets without requiring expensive electrical upgrades.

Todd Woody, LA Times

The project is part of a program approved in 2019 to lower barriers to the adoption of new energy-efficient technologies, which are often more expensive than their less-efficient counterparts. The program is particularly focused on improving accessibility for lower-income residents.

Window heat pumps can be installed in minutes and warm and cool about 500 square feet of space without requiring the expensive and disruptive renovations that accompany the installation of a centralized heat pump system. But the technology is new and not yet widely available.

Current small heat pump models can only be installed in windows that slide open vertically. California, though, wants to encourage the development of devices for windows that open horizontally to accommodate the state’s housing stock.

California endures whipsaw climate extremes as federal support withers

As humans continue burning fossil fuels, global temperatures are rising in startlingly unpredictable ways. The trend is increasing instances of so-called compound dangers, such as landslides hurling millions of tons of mud, boulders and trees down hillsides charred by wildfires.

Aaron Cantú, Capital and Main, Santa Barbara News-Press

Such a catastrophic event killed 23 people in California’s Santa Barbara County in 2018, when unusually hard rains pounded the Santa Ynez Mountains for just 30 minutes while the Thomas Fire — among the largest in state history — still smoldered.

Los Angeles was spared from similar devastation after a mass of moisture from the Pacific drenched the county this month — making November among the wettest on record.

The county recorded no major property damage, but evacuation warnings before the storms were a reminder of how dangerous debris flows can be following major fires.

Since 2021, the U.S. government has recognized risks from landslides and created an advisory committee to address such threats. But as scientists draw clearer links between climate extremes, and sound the alarm over rising greenhouse gas emissions, the government under President Donald Trump is increasingly unable and often unwilling to help residents prepare for and survive such events. The state is stepping in to fill the void, but lacks funding and resources that proved crucial in the past.

Trump’s new drilling plan is an old California nightmare

The Interior Department released plans last Thursday to open new offshore drilling leases in federal waters off the coast of California for the first time in four decades.

Miranda Green, Atmos

As to be expected, this latest offshore drilling proposal—which would open six oil and gas auctions off California’s coast between 2026 and 2031—was not received well by California’s leaders.

“It’s never going to happen. Over our dead body. Dead on arrival. Period. Full stop,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom told reporters after a draft version of the plan leaked during COP30 earlier this month.

Newsom said of Trump: “He’s trying to re-create the 19th century.”

California Attorney General Rob Bonta—who some say might be jockeying to replace Newsom as governor when his term runs out in 2027—wrote in a statement following last week’s proposal that California is “not a rich man’s playground, and the president cannot come and extract resources as he pleases.”

A stratospheric disruption is occurring — and the impact on California is becoming clearer

California weather is likely to be cool and dry as December arrives, owing to a high-pressure ridge over Alaska and Canada.

Greg Porter, SF Chronicle

The researchers found that these jet stream responses to the Canadian warming event typically arrive in short, distinct phases. A “first phase” pattern often settles in for 3-7 days, followed by a slightly longer 2-10 day period where the ridge shifts or weakens. That gives California a window where the jet could wobble just enough to let a few interior-track systems slip through.

For California, that blended pattern sets the stage for the first few weeks of December. By the last day of November, a strong ridge of high pressure is likely to develop in the Gulf of Alaska and close to the U.S. West Coast, keeping California quiet and dry. But about a week after that, a slightly weaker or east-shifted ridge opens the door for colder systems to slide down the interior West. But those kinds of storm systems, which come from inland, tend to arrive as moisture-starved and modest at best — and lack the ingredients that typically drive California’s biggest winter storms. Atmospheric rivers, which come from the ocean, are generally blocked.

And there’s a final wrinkle. This pattern is brittle and potentially just the first act.

Tule fog: The hazards and benefits the phenomenon brings to Northern California

Tule fog is a common feature of winter weather in the Central Valley.

Heather Waldman, KCRA 3

Tule fog can lead to dangerously poor visibility for drivers, especially on freeways where traffic flows much faster. In December of 1997, Tule Fog was blamed for a quarter-mile-long fiery crash on Interstate 5 in Sacramento County.

But those who have lived in the Central Valley for at least a couple of decades may have noticed that fog events aren’t as intense as they used to be.

Scientists say that’s not just an anecdote. Stricter pollution policies like burn bans and emissions requirements have dramatically reduced the amount of pollution in the Valley during the winter months.

Fewer pollution particles means there’s less for water vapor to condense onto. That leads to either less fog or fog that’s not as thick. The reduction in fog is a plus for road safety, but some sectors of the state’s agriculture industry rely on fog during winter to produce a good crop. UC Davis says that cherry trees, almond and walnut trees, as well as pistachio trees, are some of the most reliant on Tule fog.

A Wildlife Success Story

The San Gabriel River is a thriving turtle habitat .

Samantha Helou Hernandez, LAist

Jacob Margolis, LAist

Once nearly extinct, Southern California’s population of green sea turtles is exploding, and many of them are making their home in the San Gabriel River. It’s one of the most remarkable animal recovery stories in decades.

Here’s this animal that we most often see in photos of people snorkeling during a tropical vacation. It’s munching on algae in fetid suburban runoff, with cars zipping by on the 605 Freeway a few hundred yards away.

Gliding through just a few feet of murky water, a green sea turtle dodges beer cans, plastic bags and shopping carts in the concrete-lined San Gabriel River.

A scene that feels very turtle out of water.

Exxon has sued the state of California over its new emissions rules.

Giant corporations like ExxonMobil are calling on the Supreme Court to block a California law that would require them to release their emissions and climate records. The argument? It would violate businesses’ free speech.

Veronica Riccobene/Katherine Li, Jacobin

California’s new laws, set to go into effect January 1, 2026, will require larger companies operating in the state to publicly state their “climate-related financial risk,” as well as issue emissions records and public assessments of their environmental impacts.

An emergency appeal filed in recent weeks by the US and California Chambers of Commerce, as well as the American Farm Bureau Federation, the Los Angeles County Business Federation, the Central Valley Business Federation, and the Western Growers Association, accuses the Golden State of waging an “open campaign to force companies into the public debate on climate issues” and “pressure [firms] to alter their behavior.”

The letter’s authors complain that lawmakers are attempting to “make sure that the public actually knows who’s green and who isn’t.”

IN OTHER NEWS

Californians sharply divided along partisan lines about immigration raids, poll finds

California voters sharply divided on ICE raids along partisan lines; 90% of Democrats oppose deporting all undocumented immigrants, versus only 10% of Republicans.

Seema Mehta and Brittney Mejia, LA Times

“The big thing that we find, not surprisingly, is that Democrats and Republicans look really different,” said political scientist Amy Lerman, director of UC Berkeley’s Possibility Lab, who studies race, public opinion and political behavior. “On these perspectives, they fall pretty clearly along party lines. While there’s some variation within the parties by things like age and race, really, the big divide is between Democrats and Republicans.”

One remarkable finding was that nearly a quarter of survey respondents personally knew or were acquainted with someone in their family or friend groups directly affected by the deportation efforts, Lerman said.recovering from years of drought and dangerously low water levels. The wet season is off to a promising start, but the balancing act between storing water and preventing floods is only beginning.

Spirit of Walt but no Mickey Mouse in Disney’s planned desert community

The entertainment giant is building almost 2,000 homes in California’s Palm Springs area so beloved by its founder

Sara Braun, The Guardian

In 2022, Disney announced plans to build a first-of-its-kind branded residential community, which they have named “Storyliving by Disney”. The first of the Storyliving communities, Cotino, is officially welcoming residents into model homes in Rancho Mirage, a city nestled in Coachella valley. When all plans are finished, the 618-acre community will feature almost 2,000 residential units, including single-family homes and condos.

Residents are already moving into their very own Disney castles, which went on sale at the beginning of 2024. The model homes range in sizes, with the smallest two-bedroom, two-bathroom “Cottage Collection” homes starting at prices in the mid-$1m range and totaling about 2,200 square feet.

More California students than ever are heading out of state for college. Here’s why

The share of California high school graduates heading out of state for college has nearly doubled in two decades. Arizona, Oregon and New York are the top destinations.

Iris Kwok, LA Times

In 2022, nearly 40,000 California high school grads enrolled in out-of-state colleges, roughly a third of whom flocked to Arizona, Oregon or New York, the researchers found in their analysis of enrollment data from the National Center for Education Statistics. In 2002, the number was closer to 15,000.

Under the right conditions, and after taking into account financial aid or merit-based scholarships, private colleges can sometimes end up costing less than a California public university, said Erica Rosales, executive director of College Match, a mentoring program for low-income students in Los Angeles.

Tourist mispronounces Willamette, immediately deported back to California

A Southern California tourist was escorted to the Oregon–California border Tuesday after loudly referring to the Willamette River as the “Will-Uh-Mah-Tee,” a pronunciation so catastrophically off-base that officials classified it as an “Immediate Deportation Scenario.”

State Troopers performing their civic duty: returning a ‘Will-Uh-Mah-Tee’ offender to his natural habitat.

Tyler James, That Oregon Life

The incident occurred inside a downtown Portland food hall, where the tourist — identified only as “Brad from Huntington Beach” — pointed at a mural and confidently said, “Hey babe, look, it’s the Will-Uh-Mah-Tee River!”

Witnesses described the moment as “chilling.”

“He said it like he was naming an exotic smoothie,” one local recalled, still visibly shaken. “I dropped my kombucha. It shattered everywhere. The trauma’s real.”

Within seconds, Oregon’s Linguistic Enforcement Task Force (LETF) descended on the scene wearing flannel uniforms, Tevas, and expressions of exhausted disappointment. According to official protocol, any Californian who mispronounces Willamette by more than two syllables must be “returned to point of origin for community safety.”

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, stop just short of secession

LA Times: Kidnappers or ICE agents? LAPD grapples with surge in calls from concerned citizens

Connecting California: How can California stop ICE overreach? The answer might lie in a 1972 case from Humboldt County

72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Issue #250: The Post-Shutdown Mandate

Tue, 25 Nov 2025 18:53:49 GMT

Research shows student absenteeism rose 22% among some 113,000 children living in California’s rural Central Valley in wake of the early 2025 raids.

More California vs. ICE News
Focus on California Education and Housing
Does “California Sober” work?

ICE IN CALIFORNIA’S SCHOOLS

As ICE Actions Ramp Up, Study Cites 81K Lost School Days After California Raids

Jo Napolitano, The 74

Daily student absences rose 22% among more than 100,000 children living in California’s rural Central Valley in the weeks following January 2025 immigration raids, according to a newly peer reviewed Stanford University study.

The findings span the early weeks of the second Trump administration. Since that time, immigration enforcement has escalated dramatically, particularly in Democratic cities targeted by the president, including Chicago and Los Angeles.

Schools became fair game days into the new administration when it revoked longstanding protections against enforcement actions near or on-site. Hospitals and churches, too, are no longer exempt from raids.

After ICE took students’ parents, these teachers began rising at dawn to keep watch: ‘We said, hell no’

With students terrified and arrests rising, educators in San Diego are scanning streets, sharing alerts and defending the right to feel safe

Amanda Ulrich, The Guardian

In the US, children have the right to a free public education from kindergarten to 12th grade, regardless of their citizenship or immigration status. Although immigration officers were previously limited in their ability to make arrests in or near “sensitive locations”, like schools and churches, the Department of Homeland Security rescinded those Obama and Biden-era guidelines earlier this year. School districts like San Diego unified have passed resolutions that require ICE agents to obtain a warrant before entering school property, but that has not stopped a spate of arrests from happening just off school grounds.

Fear among students and parents across southern California is at an all-time high, particularly after the supreme court ruled earlier this fall that federal agents can stop and detain residents in Los Angeles simply for speaking Spanish, appearing Latino or working certain types of jobs.

ICE chased down Oakland parent at school drop-off in attempted arrest, city council member says

A parent dropping their child off at a West Oakland elementary school was apparently targeted by federal immigration officers Wednesday morning, resulting in a car chase that ended in a crash, according to Oakland City Council Member Carroll Fife.

Jessica Flores, The San Francisco Chronicle

Oakland school district officials alerted parents of the ICE presence near Hoover Elementary, saying ICE officers were last seen near the intersection of 31st and Market streets. Hoover Elementary went into “secure school protocol” because of the nearby ICE activity. The nearby Harriet Tubman preschool also went into “secure school protocol” before classes were dismissed for the day, district officials said.

CALIFORNIA’S TIME TO LEAD

The Post-Shutdown Mandate—It’s Time for California to Lead | Opinion

Once again, political stunts in Washington have treated people as bargaining chips—a stark reminder that we cannot rely on federal leaders to protect everyday families but when the federal government flounders, California can step up and demonstrate how government should work.

Ash Kalra and Lola Smallwood-Cuevas, Newsweek

The government shutdown may be over, but for millions of families across the country, the damage is done. Food assistance was delayed for over 40 million people, health care access has become uncertain for the tens of millions who rely on Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies, lines at food pantries have doubled and veterans and active-duty members are waiting for benefits they rely on.

Through all this, Californians have sent a clear and resounding message: We reject this type of governance. Voters want leaders who protect working families, strengthen public systems and take bold action when Washington fails. November’s elections were more than just a vote—they were a mandate, showing that voters are ready to back measures and candidates who reflect these values.

California has a responsibility to lead. While Washington spirals from crisis to crisis, our state can model a government that works for the people.

MORE ICE IN CALIFORNIA NEWS

Proposed California legislation would allow lawsuits if ICE agents violate constitutional rights

State Sen. Scott Wiener proposed new legislation Tuesday that would give those who have had their Constitutional rights violated by immigration agents a new pathway to hold them accountable in court.

Sara DiNatale and Bob Egelko, San Francisco Chronicle

Wiener’s SB 747 - or “the No Kings Act” - aims to close a legal loophole that has made it difficult for those who claim immigration agents violated their constitutional rights to sue government officials and federal officers. Allegations could include freedom of speech violations, unlawful searches or racial profiling. cross the U.S.

Wiener says there is virtually no accountability, for example, when Immigration Customs and Enforcement officers take U.S. citizens into custody to later face consequences in court. He pointed to the struggles of Los Angeles resident George Retes, a 25-year-old Army veteran, who was arrested by ICE despite being a citizen. He was held in custody overnight after he was doused in pepper spray and tear gas.

Similar scenes have played out with ICE agents across the country, according to a recent Propublica investigation. The investigation found 170 cases where citizens were detained and more than 20 cases where the citizens in custody – like Retes – were held for over a day without being able to call an attorney.

ICE raids may stunt economies of states with large Latino populations

A UCLA study documents that Latino immigrants comprise 16% of California’s workforce and 14% in Texas, dominating construction, agriculture and service-sector jobs nationwide.

Carlos De Loera, De Los

The ongoing Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids could have major economic effects on the U.S. economy as Latino workers have gone into hiding across the country, according to a data brief released Wednesday by the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute.

Using data from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey 2023, researchers found that there are 5.7 million Latino immigrants in the workforce of politically blue states and more than 5 million in politically red states.

ICE raids are forcing Latino immigrant workers into hiding across the country, threatening economies in both red and blue states that depend heavily on their labor. Data show 1.2 million immigrants have left the labor force since January, prompting the Congressional Budget Office to downgrade its economic growth forecast.

How fear of Trump’s immigration blitz is changing life in California farm towns

Tax receipts are down almost 30% in one California farm town, where immigrants are afraid to go out and some longtime workers are weighing self-deportation.

Nigel Duara, CalMatters

As this year’s harvest ends, the small Central Valley towns that rely on migrant or undocumented labor to survive are themselves forced to imagine the end of a way of life.

The worry here is the workers might not return next year, at least not in the numbers that sustain local economies and power the state’s $60 billion agricultural industry, which grows three-fourths of the fruits and nuts consumed in the U.S.

The second Trump administration has pledged to carry out the largest deportation program in American history. They have, so far, mostly left the agricultural industry alone. But Trump and his advisers have wavered on whether to protect farms from immigration raids, so the seasonal workers and their employers will have to wait and see.

In the meantime, what connects tiny truck stop towns and big cities of this part of the valley is fear: of tightened water allocations, of market turbulence and, this year, of immigration agents.

MORE CALIFORNIA EDUCATION NEWS

The college dreams of 80,000 undocumented California students threatened by Trump suit

Trump sued California alleging in-state tuition and financial aid programs for undocumented students are illegal, raising concerns among the 80,000 such students. Students worry the lawsuit, if successful, will make college unaffordable.

Jaweed Kaleem, Los Angeles Times

The Department of Justice on Thursday sued California and its three public higher education systems, seeking to overturn a decades-old state law that provides lower in-state tuition to undocumented students who have attended the state’s high schools. The Trump administration also sued to put an end to the California Dream Act, which it alleges gives illegal preference for financial aid to people who are not citizens.

The moves are the latest in a series of similar legal actions the federal government has taken this year against states including Texas, Kentucky, Illinois, Oklahoma and Minnesota. Thursday’s complaint was filed in the Eastern District of California. In June, after the Trump administration sued over the law in Texas, the state agreed to stop giving in-state tuition to undocumented immigrant students. Kentucky and Oklahoma also said they would not defend their tuition laws.

How a new California curriculum brings Native American knowledge into everyday learning

Developed with tribal voices and community stories, the curriculum helps teachers connect Native American knowledge beyond history class to science, art and other subjects.

Roman Battaglia, Jefferson Public Radio

California recently released a model curriculum to help teachers incorporate Native American history, culture and experiences into their lessons.

The Humboldt and San Diego County departments of education jointly developed the model curriculum over three years. Cutcha Risling Baldy, a professor at Cal Poly Humboldt, was one of the lead scholars behind the curriculum.

“The state of California had said that they wanted a full Native American studies model curriculum, and they needed people to lead what that would look like,” she said. “There wasn’t really an exact vision of what that could be.”

How California’s new ultra-processed foods law will transform school lunches

A new California law, kicking in next January, requires the phaseout of certain ultra-processed foods from school meals throughout the state. Some characteristics the law considers when targeting foods to remove or replace include high levels of saturated fat, sugar and sodium, alongside a host of other ingredients like non-nutritive sweeteners, color additives and thickeners.

Manola Secaira , KPBS

The law requires schools to phase out ultraprocessed foods of concern no later than July 2029. It also bans vendors from offering these foods to schools starting in July 2032. Gabriel says he’s expecting to see concrete progress at schools toward phasing these foods out within the next couple of years.

But a menu makeover requires investment. At Lincoln Crossing Elementary, that included new equipment for the kitchen and more staff training.

Those efforts brought the school to where it is today, with more than half the meals served being freshly prepared. It’s a big jump from where the school started in the 2022-2023 school year, when only around 5% were freshly prepared with the rest of the meals being primarily heat and serve.

FOCUS ON CALIFORNIA’S ENVIRONMENT

California adopts tougher methane rule for landfills to curb planetary warming

Your trash, or the place where it ends up, is also one of the most serious contributors to global warming.

Ezra David Romero, KQED

After livestock, landfills are the second-largest source of methane emissions in California, responsible for more than 20% of the state’s output. That’s why the California Air Resources Board took action on Thursday to monitor and capture the landfill’s gases.

Methane is a potent greenhouse gas that is generated from the breakdown of waste. Even though it’s a short-lived climate pollutant compared to long-lasting carbon dioxide, it severely exacerbates human-caused climate change.

The new rules will eventually require landfill operators to take action when a satellite or airplane detects a methane leak, improve routine leak monitoring and reporting and mandate stronger action on recurring issues.

The protections will add to a suite of regulations the state passed in 2010, which made California the first state to develop stricter standards than the federal government.

Data centers are putting new strain on California’s grid. A new report estimates the impacts.

California is a major hub for data centers — the facilities that store and transmit much of the internet. But just how much these power-hungry operations affect the state’s energy use, climate and public health remains an open question.

Alejandro Lazo, CalMatters

A new report released this week by the environmental think tank Next 10 and a UC Riverside researcher attempts to quantify that impact — but its authors say the report is only an estimate without harder data from the centers themselves.

“We are just making these reports pretty much in the dark — since there’s almost zero information,” said Shaolei Ren, an AI researcher at UC Riverside and co-author of the report. “We have extremely little information about data centers in California.”

Ren and his coauthors conclude that between 2019 and 2023, electricity use and carbon emissions by California data centers nearly doubled, while on-site water consumption slightly more than doubled. Much of the increases were attributable to the electricity required to run artificial intelligence computations. But many of the report’s estimates, including its health impacts, are based on limited data — a key issue researchers said they encountered repeatedly when crafting the report.

Appeals court pauses California requirement for companies to report climate-related financial risk

A federal appeals court has paused a California law that requires companies that do business in the state and make more than $500 million a year to report how climate change could hurt them financially

Sophie Austin, A.P.

A U.S. appeals court on Tuesday paused a California law set to take effect in January requiring large companies to report every two years on how climate change could hurt them financially. Another new law requiring major companies to annually disclose their carbon emissions can stay in place for now, the court ruled.

The policies Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom signed in 2023 would be the most sweeping of their kind in the nation, and proponents say they would increase transparency and encourage companies to assess how they can cut their emissions.

The financial risk disclosure law applies to companies making more than $500 million a year that do business in California. The Air Resources Board estimates more than 4,100 businesses will have to comply with the legislation.

The emissions reporting law applies to businesses that make more than $1 billion a year and do business in the state — which covers roughly 2,600 companies. They will have to report planet-warming pollution from burning fossil fuels directly, as well as releases from activities such as delivering products from warehouses to stores and employee business travel.

FOCUS ON CALIFORNIA HOUSING

Huge cuts to homelessness funding are coming just as California has started to make progress

Just when years of effort and investment in the Bay Area and across California to address homelessness have begun to yield measurable results, the Trump administration is poised to erase our progress and drive many more people back out onto the streets.

Brett Andrews, San Francisco Chronicle

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has announced sweeping changes to the federal government’s largest homelessness program. New rules will dramatically reduce how much federal funding can be spent on housing and support for hundreds of thousands of formerly homeless Americans, all of whom are disabled and many of whom are older.

This wrench in the gears of government — imposing a new paradigm in the middle of what was supposed to be a two-year funding cycle — will delay the delivery of all program funding for months.

If local homelessness response systems become ineligible for Department of Housing and Urban Development funding, the Bay Area would lose at least $190 million. This funding represents a tiny fraction of the overall federal budget, but a huge share of the resources available to solve homelessness in communities around the country.

Making matters worse, the state government pulled back on funding effective homelessness solutions this year, eliminating the state’s largest source of homelessness funding from this year’s budget. The irony of these federal and state funding cuts is that they come at a time when real progress is finally being made to address the homeless crisis in our state.

The Housing Strategy That Has California NIMBYs in a Corner

For years, the state has been nudging its cities to build housing to address a severe shortage. Maybe what they needed was a shove.

Conor Dougherty, The New York Times

The gap between the abstract agreement that more housing is needed and the construction of a specific project on a specific block makes it difficult to build what is required.

Interest groups are reluctant to curb regulations, such as environmental rules, that can add years even to small projects. And the desire to keep a neighborhood from changing is deeply ingrained in local politics and the human psyche. There are just too many things to object to: Traffic. Not enough parking. Complaints that the building is poorly designed or blots out sunlight, or should be a park instead.

To address this, Sacramento legislators have spent the past decade writing a slew of laws that aim to create more housing. The laws vary from tiny coding changes that ease the way for backyard “granny flats” to a tectonic rewrite of the state’s landmark environmental law. The net effect is to nudge neighborhoods to become taller and denser by eroding local control over land use.

More housing on the California coast? Changes at this agency signal a pro-building shift

In a push to address the state’s gripping housing crisis, the California Coastal Commission last week approved a rule change to make it easier to build affordable housing in Monterey and elsewhere along the hundreds of miles of the Pacific coast.

Nadia Lathan, CalMatters

It was the latest effort by the powerful state agency to combat its poor reputation among housing advocates and Democratic leaders who see it as an obstacle to drastic housing reform in California’s coveted coastal regions. While minor and uncontroversial, the amendment was one of a few shifts the commission has made in recent months in an effort to be viewed as playing a part in addressing the state’s crippling housing crisis.

IN OTHER NEWS

California Reservoirs Surge Above Average After First Big Winter Storm

California’s first major winter storm has already made a dent in the state’s water supply, pushing nearly every major reservoir above its historical average for this time of year.

Active NorCal

Shasta Lake, the state’s largest reservoir, sits at 58% of total capacity and 109% of its historical average. Its current surface elevation is 991 feet, well below its full pool of 1,067 feet, but a strong start considering the long dry stretch leading into the season.

Lake Oroville, the second-largest reservoir, is 52% full and right at 100% of its historical average, with a measured elevation of 769 feet.

Across the board, California’s reservoirs are looking healthy for November. Trinity Lake is at 127% of average, Folsom Lake at 110%, Lake Sonoma at 114% and New Melones Lake at 126%. Most of the state’s major reservoirs are currently sitting between 50% and 70% of total capacity.

For now, the above-average conditions are a welcome sign as California continues recovering from years of drought and dangerously low water levels. The wet season is off to a promising start, but the balancing act between storing water and preventing floods is only beginning.

California Just Legalized Waymo in Some of the Nation’s Most Populous Areas

The new map includes much of California wine country, and fills in the remainder of the Bay Area. It also adds a great deal of coverage to densely populated parts of southern California.

Mike Pearl, GIzmodo

The areas where “testing and deployment” of Waymo driverless taxis will now be legally tolerated by the state include two massive, apparently continuous swaths of geography full of interconnected urban population centers, suburbs, exurbs, and the rural land in between them. This includes chunks of (in alphabetical order): Alameda, Contra Costa, Los Angeles, Marin, Napa, Orange, Riverside, Sacramento, San Bernardino, San Diego, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, Sonoma, Ventura, and Yolo Counties.

Famous expanses of California highways—and freeways—could potentially open up to driverless taxi traffic. You could take the scenic route up Pacific Coast Highway from San Diego to Malibu, or driverlessly reenact the first episode of The O.C. by hailing a ride from Chino to Newport Beach

As ‘California sober’ catches on, study suggests cannabis use reduces short-term alcohol consumption

A new study led by researchers at Brown University suggests that while other risks remain, smoking marijuana can temporarily cut down how much people drink.

Juan Siliezar, Brown University News

The “California sober” trend, which involves ditching alcohol in favor of cannabis, is gaining momentum, spreading from Hollywood to health influencers to homes across America. Among the motivations for many adopters is to reduce alcohol use, and a new study on the causal effect of cannabis on alcohol consumption suggests that smoking marijuana may lead people to drink less — in the short term.

Published in the American Journal of Psychiatry, the study by researchers at Brown University is the first randomized, placebo-controlled trial to test whether cannabis use directly changes alcohol consumption. Unlike previous research that relied on surveys or self-reported associations, this trial allowed scientists to measure cause and effect under controlled laboratory conditions.

he “California sober” trend, which involves ditching alcohol in favor of cannabis, is gaining momentum, spreading from Hollywood to health influencers to homes across America. Among the motivations for many adopters is to reduce alcohol use, and a new study on the causal effect of cannabis on alcohol consumption suggests that smoking marijuana may lead people to drink less — in the short term.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, stop just short of secession

LA Times: Kidnappers or ICE agents? LAPD grapples with surge in calls from concerned citizens

Connecting California: How can California stop ICE overreach? The answer might lie in a 1972 case from Humboldt County

72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Issue #249: Does the world need America?

Tue, 18 Nov 2025 17:03:04 GMT

With the Trump administration absent from the U.N. climate summit, Gov. Gavin Newsom is positioning California as America’s climate leader on the world stage.

In This Issue:

California goes global in confronting the climate crisis
Challenging ICE in California
California storms: what to know about debris flows

CALIFORNIA EMERGES AS A GREEN SUPERPOWER

At Brazilian climate summit, Newsom positions California as a stand-in for the U.S.

Melody Gutierrez, Los Angeles Times

The expansive halls of the Amazon’s newly built climate summit hub echoed with the hum of air conditioners and the footsteps of delegates from around the world — scientists, diplomats, Indigenous leaders and energy executives, all converging for two frenetic weeks of negotiations.

Then Gov. Gavin Newsom rounded the corner, flanked by staff and security. They moved in tandem through the corridors on Tuesday as media swarmed and cellphone cameras rose into the air.

California’s carbon market and zero-emission mandates have given the state outsize influence at summits such as COP30, where its policies are seen as both durable and exportable. The state has invested billions in renewables, battery storage and electrifying buildings and vehicles and has cut greenhouse gas emissions by 21% since 2000 — even as its economy grew 81%.

If Trump’s EPA abandons climate policy, could California take over on greenhouse gases?

Legal experts, including a former federal official and UCLA professor, say California could go it alone if the federal government stops regulating greenhouse gases. One reason to try is to protect the state’s clean-car economy.

Alejandro Lazo, CalMatters

California has long cast itself as the nation’s climate conscience — and its policy lab.

Now, as the Environmental Protection Agency moves to revoke the backbone of federal climate rules — the scientific finding that greenhouse gases threaten human health — one of the state’s top climate officials is weighing a provocative idea put forward by environmental law experts: If Washington retreats, California could lead on carbon-controlling regulation.

Absent what’s known as the endangerment finding, the EPA may soon consider abandoning the legal authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gases from vehicles, power plants and other sources, furthering the Trump Administration’s stated aim to dismantle U.S. climate policy.

While decrying the prospect of such a move, climate advocates say a repeal would yield a silver lining: California and other states could in theory set their own greenhouse gas rules for cars and trucks, regulations previously superseded by federal authority.

Trump Is Said to Propose Opening California Coast to Oil Drilling

Gov. Gavin Newsom, a chief critic of the president and an opponent of oil exploration in the Pacific, called the proposal “dead on arrival.”

Maxine Joselow and Lisa Friedman, The New York Times

The Trump administration plans to allow new oil and gas drilling off the California coast for the first time in roughly four decades, according to three people briefed on the matter.

The move would set up a confrontation with Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who has fought offshore drilling and who has emerged as one of President Trump’s chief political antagonists.

The Interior Department could announce the proposal as soon as this week, according to the three people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

When asked about the proposal on Tuesday, Mr. Newsom rolled his eyes and said it would be “dead on arrival in California.” He said that the state would “absolutely” challenge the plan in court once it was finalized.

Business groups ask Supreme Court to pause California climate reporting laws in emergency appeal

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce asked the Supreme Court on Friday to pause new California laws expected to require thousands of companies to report emissions and climate-risk information.

Lindsay Whitehurst and Sophie Austin, A.P.

The laws are the most sweeping of their kind in the nation, and a collection of business groups argued in an emergency appeal that they violate free-speech rights.

The measures were signed by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2023, and reporting requirements are expected to start early next year.

One requires businesses that make more than $1 billion a year and operate in California to annually report their direct and indirect carbon emissions, beginning in 2026 and 2027, respectively. The other law requires companies that make more than $500,000 a year to biennially disclose how climate change could hurt them financially. The state Air Resources Board estimates more than 4,100 companies will have to comply.

Lower courts have so far refused to block the laws, which the state says will increase transparency and encourage companies to assess how they can cut their emissions.

GLOBAL CALIFORNIA

Make California a G7 Member

The Golden State is poised to join vital international organizations as the Trump administration retreats from them.

Markos Kounalakis, Washington Monthly

Donald Trump may have personally run exclusive clubs, but America, under his presidency, is dropping its membership in global clubs left and right.

His administration recently severed our ties to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), as well as other organizations. In this moment, as America retrenches from global leadership, cities and states need to step up and join as many multinational organizations as will have them. California’s Governor Gavin Newsom is actively and assertively testing the case by seeking to expand strategic international trade relationships in light of the Trump tariffs. As Newsom puts it, “California is not Washington, D.C.”

In this light, the global economic powerhouse of California should be admitted into the G7, given that the state’s $4.1 trillion GDP and throw-weight are greater than those of five of the current members. California’s participation would be good for the state, the G7, and America. It would allow America’s foremost economic entity to represent the nation’s interests and explain economic trends, from AI and biotechnology to fintech and quantum computing. All from a state that is on the bleeding edge of technological and cultural development. California would be able to help shape policy and bring back to Washington early warnings about G7 plans in the offing

There is some good news for California—a state that makes up around 20 percent of America’s GDP and would now be the world’s fourth-largest economy if it were a sovereign nation-state. The G7, made up of democracies that are economic powerhouses, already allows for “non-enumerated members”.

Subnationals, whether sovereign or not, have a voice and enough independence to make a difference in the new, revised, and revisionist world order.

ICE IN CALIFORNIA

California police intervene as ICE agent in plain clothes points gun at woman

Agent said woman was following and filming him, but officer said he couldn’t assist if no crime was committed

Dani Anguiano, The Guardian

A US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent briefly held at gunpoint a woman whom he claimed was following him, prompting a southern California police officer to intervene, authorities said.

The police department in Fullerton, a city in Orange county almost 30 miles (48km) from Los Angeles, said that on Sunday one of its officers had just finished taking an incarcerated person to a county jail when he saw two vehicles stopped in an intersection in Santa Ana.

The officer stopped when he saw a man exit one of the vehicles and point a firearm at the other driver, the agency said in a statement. He did not initially know the identity of the armed man, who was dressed in plain clothes and soon provided credentials showing he was an ICE agent.

People held in ‘decrepit’ California ICE facility sue over ‘inhumane’ conditions

Lawsuit against US government alleges ‘life-threatening’ medical neglect and says residents frequently go hungry

Sam Levin, The Guardian

Seven people detained at California’s largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center have sued the US government, alleging they have been denied essential medications, frequently go hungry and are housed in a “decrepit” facility.

The federal class-action complaint filed against ICE on Wednesday challenges the “inhumane conditions” at the California City detention center, which opened in late August inside a shuttered state prison. The suit alleges “life-threatening” medical neglect, with the plaintiffs saying they have been denied cancer treatment, basic disability accommodations and regular insulin for diabetes.

The facility is run by CoreCivic, a private prison corporation, which is not a named defendant. Residents have raised alarms about the facility for two months, with some describing it as a “torture chamber” and “hell on earth” in interviews.

Unreported World: Inside California’s fight against ICE crackdowns

Families in the US are living in fear of immigration raids and President Trump’s immigration crackdown.

Ria Chatterjee, Channel 4 News

Los Angeles is a self-declared sanctuary city – a supposed haven for migrants. Nearly half of its residents are Latino, and the city’s economy depends on migration.

But, it’s become a target in one of the largest deportation drives in US history.

Officers from US Immigration and Customs – also known as ICE – say they’re targeting eleven million undocumented immigrants. The administration’s plan is to deport three thousand people a day.

CALIFORNIA EDUCATION

‘Unlawful coercion’: Trump can’t withhold funds or demand payment from UC, federal judge rules

The judge has previously sided with UC scholars several times since June in halting Trump’s termination of science and health research funding. The latest ruling is arguably the most sweeping yet.

Mikhail Zinshteyn, CalMatters

A California federal judge ruled today that Donald Trump cannot demand that UCLA pay a $1.2 billion settlement that would have imposed severe limits on the campus’s academic freedoms and efforts to enroll an economically and culturally diverse student body or risk continued funding freezes on grants the system relies on for research

The decision by Judge Rita Lin is a preliminary injunction and represents a significant victory for University of California scientists, professors, graduate students and other researchers. They and a national professors association sued Trump in September, claiming that his settlement demand — the most sweeping to date in his war on exclusive universities — represents an “unlawful threat” of funding cuts to coerce the university system into “suppressing free speech and academic freedom rights.”

Lin agreed with that assessment, calling Trump’s actions toward the university “coercive and retaliatory.” Her ruling doesn’t just apply to UCLA. It largely ties the hands of the Trump administration to target the rest of the UC system for current and future research grants.

California schools now offer free preschool for 4-year-olds. Here’s what kids really learn in it

Julia Barajas, Mariana Dale and Elly Yu, LAist

Every 4-year-old in California can now go to school for free in their local districts. The new grade is called transitional kindergarten — or TK — and it’s part of the state’s effort to expand universal preschool. While it’s not mandatory for students to attend, districts must offer them as an alternative to private preschool. One big question we’ve heard: What do kids actually do and learn in a TK classroom? Educators say it’s intended to emphasize play, but what does that mean?

IN OTHER NEWS

‘A flood on steroids’: What to know as storm, debris flows threaten LA

An unusually strong storm system has reached Southern California, raising fears that the rain could unleash a threat that has been lingering in the burn scars of wildfires that ravaged Los Angeles communities in recent years.

Rachel Becker, CalMatters

Called debris flows, fast-moving slurries of floodwater and sediment can hurtle down slopes carrying cars, trees and even boulders with them.

Burn scars — slicked by fire and stripped of plants — are especially vulnerable. A storm after the Thomas Fire in 2018 spurred debris flows in Montecito that killed 23 people. And in February, a debris flow in the Palisades Fire burn zone swept a Los Angeles Fire Department member and his SUV into the Pacific Ocean.

We spoke with the U.S. Geological Survey’s Kean, an expert on debris flows after wildfires, about what to expect. This conversation has been edited and condensed

They’re like “a flood on steroids,” said Jason Kean, a research hydrologist with the U.S. Geological Survey’s landslide hazards program. “It’s really hard to stop these things.The best thing to do is get out of the way.”

US justice department joins lawsuit to block California’s new electoral map

Move escalates legal battle over a redistricting effort designed to help Democrats flip House seats in 2026

Lauren Gambino, The Guardian

The justice department on Thursday joined a lawsuit brought by California Republicans to block the state’s new congressional map, escalating a legal battle over a redistricting effort designed to give Democrats a better chance of retaking the House of Representatives next year.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in California, challenges the congressional map championed by Gavin Newsom, the state’s Democratic governor, in response to a Republican gerrymander in Texas, sought by Donald Trump. The justice department’s intervention in the case sets up a high-profile showdown between the Trump administration and Newsom, one of the president’s chief antagonists and a possible 2028 contender.

“California’s redistricting scheme is a brazen power grab that tramples on civil rights and mocks the democratic process,” said Pam Bondi, the US attorney general. “Governor Newsom’s attempt to entrench one-party rule and silence millions of Californians will not stand.”

Key Takeaways from the Proposition 50 Election

The results point to relatively high voter engagement and may signal the revival of Democratic fortunes, but they do not necessarily indicate a change in voter attitudes toward the redistricting reform they set aside.

Eric McGhee and Mark Baldassare, Public Policy Institute of California

Voter engagement with Prop 50 was quite high. In the early-October PPIC Statewide Survey, 68% of likely voters said they considered the outcome of the measure to be very important, and 56% were planning to vote yes.

The Prop 50 outcome suggests that the coalition Democrats rode to victory in the 2020 presidential election might be reemerging. Between 2020 and 2024, Democrats lost significant amounts of support among 18-to-29-year-old (75% to 58%) and Latino (75% to 59%) voters. If a yes vote on Prop 50 is treated as a vote for Democrats, Democratic support among each of these groups returned to something much closer to 2020.

Strong support for Prop 50 did not necessarily reflect negative views of the redistricting commission. In our October survey, 72% of California voters and a higher share of yes (77%) than no (67%) voters said that the redistricting commission had mostly been a good thing.

Likewise, 92% of voters in the exit polls felt districts should be drawn by an independent commission, even though most of them (63%) voted to suspend the map California’s independent commission had drawn. If Prop 50 had involved a permanent end to the commission—instead of a temporary pause in response to the partisan redistricting in Texas—it might have had a much harder road to victory.

California Supreme Court rejects free-speech challenge to LGBT protections in nursing homes

The California Supreme Court rejected a 1st Amendment challenge to a state law that protects the rights of gay and transgender people in nursing homes and forbids employees of those sites from using the wrong pronouns to address a resident or co-worker.

Nigel Duara, Los Angeles Times

The ruling, handed down Friday, holds that violations of the LGBT Long-Term Care Residents’ Bill of Rights are not protected by the 1st Amendment because they relate to codes of conduct in what is in effect a workplace and a home.

“The pronouns provision constitutes a regulation of discriminatory conduct that incidentally affects speech,” the court ruled.

The opinion reversed an appeals court ruling that held provisions in the 2017 law relating to patient pronouns and names could impede an employee’s freedom of speech. Five justices signed on to the main opinion; two signed on to a concurrence. There were no dissents.

Trump admin to ban book from Yosemite National Park, says author

A prominent Bay Area author said one of his books has been quietly flagged at Yosemite National Park as part of a March 2025 federal directive aiming to remove and revise “negative” information relating to American history.

Olivia Hebert, SF Gate

Naturalist and illustrator Obi Kaufmann wrote in a Facebook post this week that his 2019 book, “The State of Water: Understanding California’s Most Precious Resource,” was identified by park officials as restricted under President Donald Trump’s executive order “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” Kaufmann said the flagging means that while Yosemite bookstores will not pull copies from the shelves, they will no longer purchase new copies of his book.

“The State of Water” explores what has led to California’s current water crisis, “exposing a history of unlimited growth in spite of finite natural resources,” according to its publisher, Heyday Books. In the book, Kaufmann cautions against further developing California’s waterways, highlighting that conserving and restoring the ecosystem is not only a moral issue but a matter of survival.

Kaufmann’s focus on ecological decline and water exploitation may explain why the book’s been targeted,Jonathan Rosenfield, science director at San Francisco Baykeeper, told SFGATE.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

Poll: 72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative

Do California cities have to fly the American flag?

The not-so-subtle connection between ICI and ‘Uncle Patrick’s Secessionist Breakfast’

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Texas v What? Debunking 5 big myths about secession

The High Price of Fear: California could defend itself for a fraction of the cost

Fire and Flood: Why California should control our own water system

Just 9 states make up more than half the U.S. population

Issue #248: Prop 50 wins big

Thu, 06 Nov 2025 15:59:31 GMT

UCLA School of Law professor Rick Hasen — a leading authority in election law and the founding director of the Safeguarding Democracy Project at the law school — dives into the nitty-gritty to explain what Proposition 50 does and what’s at stake.

Republicans sue to block Proposition 50
Proportional representation could make gerrymandering obsolete
Court rules California cities cannot require voter ID

PROPOSITION 50 REVERBERATES

How big a deal is California’s Proposition 50?

Rick Hasen, UCLA Law and UCLA Newsroom

It comes down to two kinds of arguments. Supporters say that the fairness of congressional districting should be judged on a national basis, and if Republicans are engaging in partisan gerrymandering in states they control, Democrats need to fight back. Opponents of Proposition 50 argue that two wrongs don’t make a right and that there is not a strong enough reason to set aside the maps drawn by a commission that voters charged with taking politics out of the process.

Interactive maps: See California’s new proposed districts with Proposition 50

There are the 52 new districts contained within Prop 50, which is on the ballot for the 2025 midterms. Democrats hope to gain five seats in Congress.

Daniel Macht, Katrina Ventura, Nicki Camberg, KCRA 3

See interactive maps here for details of the five targeted districts.

California Republicans retreat as anti-Prop 50 campaign collapses

Opponents of the Democratic gerrymander start casting blame for defeat at the ballot.

Will McCarthy, Politico

“It’s as full-throated a campaign for Democrats in California as if we were in the middle of a presidential election,” said Jon Fleischman, a former executive director of the California Republican Party. “But you can go to the house next door, occupied by Republicans, and it’s crickets — other than receiving their ballot in the mail.”

That imbalance represents a turnabout from August, when Newsom first moved his proposed map redraw towards the November ballot. At the time polls showed support for the measure, which became known as Prop 50, hovering precariously just over 50 percent. That appeared beatable by a campaign able to mobilize the Republican base while raising enough money to sway the relatively small slice of persuadable centrists. Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy vowed to raise $100 million for the enterprise.

Instead Prop 50 opponents have been greatly outmatched in resources and are now bracing for an embarrassing loss.

Proposition 50: Will it enhance or hinder representation in California?

Many Republicans, including Vice President J.D. Vance, already complain that under California’s current map, Democrats control over 80% of congressional seats even though the party got just under 60% of statewide votes in the 2024 presidential election.

Jeanne Kuang, CalMatters/San Jose Mercury News

Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly two-to-one. The citizen commission that drew the maps, composed of equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans as well as four independents, were specifically forbidden from considering party registration in deciding how to draw the lines. They did have to consider geography, and Democrats and Republicans don’t live in an even distribution across the state. Plus, several of the current blue districts are highly competitive, with the incumbent Democrats winning them last year with razor-thin margins.

Two academic institutions that rate states’ redistricting plans say California’s current map is mostly fair. PlanScore found the map is tilted toward Democrats by two measures and balanced by two other measures. Princeton University’s Gerrymandering Project gave California’s map a “B” score on partisan fairness, docking it only for giving incumbent politicians an advantage. (The proposed new map got an “F” from the organization.)

California fights Trump’s attempt to steal the midterms

The state strikes the first blow against the president’s plan to subvert democracy.

Ari Berman, Mother Jones

When Sara Sadhwani, a Democratic member of California’s independent redistricting commission and a political science professor at Pomona College, first heard of California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s vow to enact a new congressional district map in response to Texas passing a mid-decade gerrymander inspired by President Donald Trump, she was skeptical.

“My initial response was, you don’t have that power,” Sadhwani told me. “The Constitution is very clear that neither the governor nor the legislature has that power, and so I just didn’t see how he thought he would do it.”

Sadhwani didn’t want to see the work of the independent commission put aside, but she says she believes that passing a new map, on a temporary basis, is the only way for Democrats to restore fairness to the race for the US House as Trump presses state after state to gerrymander their maps in advance of the 2026 midterms to give his party as many new seats as possible. “There is a bit of a moral dilemma here,” she says. “It’s because I support democracy, it’s because I support good governance, that I support Prop. 50.”

As Californians decide fate of Prop. 50, GOP states push their own redistricting plans

Redistricting efforts in Texas and California have triggered intense partisan redistricting battles across the country to redraw congressional maps. Experts tracking the moves so far see an uphill battle for Democrats.

Ana Ceballos and Seema Mehta, LA Times

GOP leaders in North Carolina and Missouri approved new maps that likely will yield one new GOP seat in each, Ohio Republicans could pick up two more seats in a newly redrawn map approved Friday, and GOP leaders in Indiana, Louisiana, Kansas and Florida are considering or taking steps to redraw their maps. In all, those moves could lead to at least 10 new Republican seats, according to experts tracking the redistricting efforts.

To counter that, Democrats in Virginia passed a constitutional amendment that, if approved by voters, would give lawmakers the power and option to redraw a new map ahead of next year’s election. Illinois leaders are weighing their redistricting options and New York has filed a lawsuit that seeks to redraw a GOP-held district. But concerns over legal challenges already tanked the party’s efforts in Maryland and the potential dilution of the Black vote has slowed moves in Illinois.

So far, the partisan maneuvers appear to favor Republicans.

Republicans file lawsuit to block Prop. 50 districts; 4 takeaways from Democrats’ big night

Proposition 50’s big win Tuesday night is a political earthquake that is being felt nationally.

Hannah Fry, Alex Wigglesworth, Connor Sheets and Jessica Garrison, LA Times

1. Trump’s toxicity in California

2. End of an independent era?

3. Big win for Newsom

4. More polarization

Republicans file lawsuit challenging California’s redistricting measure

Republicans in California on Wednesday filed a federal lawsuit challenging a high-stakes redistricting measure that could help flip up to five congressional seats for Democrats.

Lauren Gambino, The Guardian

The plan is a direct response to gerrymandering in Texas, where Republicans, at the US president’s behest, have carved out several new safe Republican districts in an effort led by Donald Trump to keep the House under Republican control during the last two years of his second term.

Mike Columbo, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said that California Democrats drew the maps to increase the power of Latino voters.

While the supreme court allows states to use race as a factor in drawing political maps, Columbo argued that the intent was to help minority voters elect the candidates of their choice. In California, he noted, Hispanic voters represent the largest ethnic group.

“There is no majority race in California more than Hispanics,” Columbo said at a press conference on Wednesday morning. “Hispanics have had fantastic success in electing candidates of their choice. Accordingly, California cannot meet this exception.”

Democrats have expressed confidence that the maps would withstand a legal challenge.

“We haven’t reviewed the lawsuit, but if it’s from the California Republican Party and Harmeet Dhillon’s law firm, it’s going to fail,” Newsom’s office responded on X as it retweeted a video of the moment when the mics fell into the podium at the start of the Republicans’ press conference. “Good luck, losers.”

MORE ON ELECTIONS

It’s time for proportional representation

By gerrymandering as a defensive measure, Democrats are asking Californians to sacrifice fair elections in the name of protecting national democracy.

Caledon Myers, Capitol Weekly

When Republicans stop playing by the rules, what other option do Democrats have but to do the same?

Instead of either breaking or playing by the rules, they can change them. The path to defeating Trump and pulling the country back from the brink of authoritarianism won’t come from copying the Republican’s playbook. To address gerrymandering — and the toxic two-party culture driving it — California needs structural democracy reform.

Most advanced democracies around the world don’t need to deal with gerrymandering – not because they’ve also adopted independent redistricting committees, but because they use an electoral system designed to prevent zero-sum politics. That system is called proportional representation (PR), and it’s the most commonly used form of election for national legislatures in the world.

The key difference between PR and America’s system is how representatives are elected. The U.S. uses single-member districts, where one representative “wins it all.” PR uses multi-member districts, where seats are allocated to parties in proportion to the votes they receive. If a party earns 20% of the vote, it earns 20% of the seats. Every vote counts, and elections become reflections of voter preferences rather than all-or-nothing contests for domination.

Appeals court strikes down Huntington Beach voter ID law in blow to GOP agenda

Cities in California can’t require voters to show proof of their identity at the polls, a state appeals court ruled Monday, striking down a law approved by voters in Huntington Beach (Orange County)

Bob Egelko, SF Chronicle

The ruling reverses a judge’s decision upholding the ballot measure and, unless overturned on appeal, establishes a precedent binding on trial courts statewide.

Trump has sought to require voters to present proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections. But a federal judge in Washington D.C., ruled Friday, in a case separate from the Huntington Beach dispute, that the president lacked authority to restrict voter eligibility and that registration is regulated by Congress and the states, not the president. Federal legislation to impose such a requirement passed the House last year but has not won approval in the Senate.

Earlier this year, as Los Angeles County reeled from devastating wildfires, Trump threatened to withhold federal disaster aid unless the state imposed a voter ID requirement, but has not won enough Republican support in Congress to carry out his threat.

CALIFORNIA GOVERNMENT(S)

PPIC Statewide Survey: Californians and Their Government

Views are mixed regarding the direction of the state, with nearly half of adults (47%) and likely voters (49%) saying it is headed in the right direction (wrong direction: 51% adults, 50% likely voters). Still, the share of adults saying the state is headed in the right direction has increased since June, when 39 percent said this. A majority has said wrong direction since June 2023.

Mark Baldassare, Dean Bonner, Lauren Mora, and Deja Thomas, Public Policy Institute of California

When it comes to the state legislature, 49 percent of adults and 52 percent of likely voters approve. The share of adults who approve has stayed below half since September 2023. Today, an overwhelming majority of Democrats (77%) approve, while most independents (54%) and Republicans (91%) disapprove. The share who approves varies across demographic and regional groups.

Three in four adults (75%) and likely voters (76%) expect that over the next 12 months, California will have bad times financially. This share has increased from a year ago (62% October 2024). Today, about two in three or more across partisan, demographic, and regional groups hold this pessimistic view.

When it comes to immigrants in the state, strong majorities of adults and likely voters say they are a benefit to California because of their hard work and job skills; three in ten or fewer say they are a burden because they use public services. The share of adults who say immigrants are a benefit is similar to findings from February. Today, partisans are divided on this issue, with overwhelming shares of Democrats and independents saying immigrants are a benefit to the state, while just three in ten Republicans say this. Six in ten or more across regions and demographic groups say this; these shares decline with increasing income and age.

A majority of Californians distrust the state government

Despite majority support for Prop 50, a majority of adults and likely voters say they trust the state government in Sacramento only some of the time. Majorities of Californians have expressed this low level of trust since early 2023.

Deja Thomas, Public Policy Institute of California

Many Californians still question whether the state government is run by a few big interests looking out for themselves, or for the benefit of all the people. Today, solid majorities of adults and likely voters say a few big interests while about one in three say for the benefit of all. However, Californians’ views on this issue have shifted: the share of adults saying a few big interests has declined slightly since last September (71% to 65% today).

Partisans are divided: most Republicans and independents see the government as run by a few big interests compared to a slim majority of Democrats who see it as run for the benefit of all. Six in ten or more across demographic and regional groups say a few big interests. This share is highest among Californians who are white, younger, have incomes under $100,000, do not have a college education, or are residing in the Central Valley or Inland Empire.

Opinion: Mayors like me can’t fix what the state is breaking. We need to demand better

San Jose’s Matt Mahan issues a call for a “Back to Basics Agenda” built on collaboration and accountability.

Matt Mahan, SF Standard

Thousands of local governments are struggling to address the staggering cost of housing, homelessness, unemployment, and public safety — without the close partnerships they need with one another or, most of all, with Sacramento.

It’s time for that to change — and for Sacramento and local governments to stop working at cross purposes and start working better together.

Without a doubt, California is still the most innovative state. But we won’t stay that way unless we face facts. And they are grim.

We have the nation’s highest poverty rate (opens in new tab) and highest unemployment rate (opens in new tab). Our energy costs are the highest in the continental United States.

The most pressing example is homelessness. Last year, when 68% of Californians voted yes on Proposition 36, they agreed that those suffering from severe addiction should be required to go to treatment if they steal to buy drugs. This policy would save thousands of lives, billions of dollars, and help people get the treatment they need to escape the streets. Where is it? Sacramento refuses to implement it.

Polarizing political events are leading Americans to increasingly call for a national divorce

A recent poll found that 64% of Americans think the country is too politically divided to solve the nation’s problems.

Ryan D. Griffiths, The Conversation

The trend toward heightened polarization in America is not irreversible, but there are limits to how much the country can take before secession becomes a serious project. Some of the limits can be identified in advance.

First, it’s important that the country’s leaders take the pulse of America. If 20% of Americans favored national divorce in early 2023, what is the percentage now? That kind of sentiment can increase surprisingly fast.

Between 2006 and 2014, for example, Catalonian support for independence from Spain increased from 14% to 45%. If something like 50% of Americans concluded that America didn’t work and was better off broken up into smaller parts, then the country could tip rapidly into a secessionist crisis.

Second, high levels of secessionist support make the country vulnerable to trigger events that convince Americans that secession is the answer. The polarization-inspired assassination of prominent leaders can lead to a cycle of recrimination. Upcoming elections are also a concern. If they are closely contested and the losing side is unwilling to admit defeat, then the bedrock of democracy is broken. Both triggers can accelerate polarization and the turn to secessionism.

A third threshold moment is when a prominent leader decides to champion the cause of a national divorce.

Should someone like California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott or the sore loser of a 2028 election conclude that the system is rigged, and secession is the only solution, then the entire project gains legitimacy.

It was that kind of elite conversion to the secessionist cause that energized the movement in places like Scotland and Catalonia.

The U.S. is a robust country and the longest-running democracy in the world. Americans have more in common than they realize, and the country can be a positive force in the world.

But without decisive action by political leaders to reduce the polarization that threatens to tear the country apart, the United States is at risk of turning from one country into two.

FEDERAL SHUTDOWN AND CALIFORNIA

Analysis shows government shutdown could lead to at least 330,000 college students not receiving their November CalFresh benefits

A data point by the nonpartisan California Policy Lab shows how many low-income students in California Community Colleges and in the University of California system would lose access to CalFresh benefits if they are cut off in November due to the ongoing government shutdown.

California Policy Lab, University of California

According to the data point, which was published previously, 276,000 California Community College (CCC) students, 50,000 University of California (UC) undergraduate students, and 8,400 UC graduate students received CalFresh benefits in Academic Year 2022-23. The data point does not include students from the California State University, though future analyses by the Lab will include these students.

“CalFresh benefits help students pay for food while they’re in school, and about one in five UC undergraduate students receive CalFresh,” explains co-author Jesse Rothstein, Carmel P. Friesen Professor of Public Policy, David P. Gardner Professor of Higher Education, and Professor of Economics at UC Berkeley and the faculty director of the California Policy Lab’s UC Berkeley site. “Students use these benefits to afford their groceries, so if they don’t receive the benefits next month, then they will face some painful decisions about where to pull from their already limited budgets.”

SNAP benefits: California among states that will partially fund food stamps amid shutdown

The California Department of Social Services said the state is expected to fund CalWorks in November, but CalFresh will be delayed. Gov. Newsom released $80 million, but that money will be used up in a few days.

Heather Miller, KTVU Fox 2

In California, for instance, there will be a one-day delay in benefits available for every day after Oct. 23 that the process of putting money on cards hasn’t begun. That means that if a judge orders the program to continue on Thursday, the first cards would likely not be ready until around Nov. 10.

CALIFORNIA ENVIRONMENT

Why a small change in paperwork is generating a big fight over hazardous waste in California

Just as consumers can track a package from a warehouse to their doorstep, California regulators keep tabs on the movement of hazardous waste, even on a short journey. Now the Department of Toxic Substances Control is considering whether to lift some of those tracking requirements in situations where companies transport hazardous waste within their own properties and along some public roads.

Alejandra Reyes-Velarde, CalMatters

The University of California system and large corporations say this change in what’s called the manifest rule would make hazardous waste disposal processes safer and more efficient. It could benefit car manufacturer Tesla, giant agribusiness in the San Joaquin Valley or industrial chemical manufacturers in the Los Angeles Basin.

But environmental advocates say state regulators have no good reason to weaken California’s regulations, which are more stringent than federal rules. They fear the department’s proposal signals regulators’ intent to weaken regulations as a strategy to manage some of the state’s growing waste problem.

“Certainly you don’t have to assume that everybody’s a bad actor, but you probably also shouldn’t assume that nobody’s a bad actor,” said Angela Johnson Meszaros an attorney for the environmental group Earthjustice.

Opinion: Large scale desalination could transform California

Two or three 1,200 acre seawater desalination complexes, built at Texas prices instead of California’s hyper-regulated, punitively elevated prices, could contribute millions (plural) of fresh water to our water supply every year, while consuming a negligible fraction of our state’s total electrical consumption.

Edward Ring, California Policy Center

Even if the electricity needed for desalination were excessive (it’s not), there is a fundamental premise regarding electricity that needs wider circulation: electricity is going to be cheap and abundant within the next 20 years. We may confidently predict this based on likely advances in PV/battery technology, SMR nuclear technology, and even ultra-efficient modern natural gas power generation, impelled by the political and financial power of California’s tech sector abruptly developing a voracious appetite for electricity.

Environmentalist objections to desalination often point to problems with intakes, despite them being successfully mitigated around the world by using very large, low-velocity, fine-screened open-ocean filters. As for brine, the seawater that remains after fresh water has been extracted, its concentration of salt is only twice that of the ocean. This brine can be discharged under pressure into the California Current, where it will be naturally and immediately disbursed.

What also stops desalination projects is the exorbitant cost, but even at California prices the cost competes with other solutions.

ICE IS STILL AROUND

Berkeley to ICE: Stay off city property

The City Council ordered staff to inventory all the property Berkeley owns, then figure out how to keep federal agents off of it

AP/Noah Berger

Alex N. Gecan, Berkeleyside

The City Council Tuesday ordered the city administration to tighten its grip on who can use city property, like parks and parking lots, and how. The objective is to keep federal agencies like Immigration and Customs Enforcement from co-opting city-owned locations in pursuing the Trump administration’s deportation agenda.

There is a potentially major hiccup. The city’s recent track record on property management is so poor it completely lost track of a building it owned. As such, the council ordered the city administration to put together an inventory of “all city-owned and city-controlled properties.”

It is unclear whether any such centralized inventory already exists. Spokespeople for the city did not immediately respond to an inquiry from Berkeleyside.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

Poll: 72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative

Do California cities have to fly the American flag?

The not-so-subtle connection between ICI and ‘Uncle Patrick’s Secessionist Breakfast’

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Texas v What? Debunking 5 big myths about secession

The High Price of Fear: California could defend itself for a fraction of the cost

Fire and Flood: Why California should control our own water system

Just 9 states make up more than half the U.S. population

Issue #247: Federal invasion of San Francisco called off

Thu, 30 Oct 2025 05:09:35 GMT

Protesters flood streets in show of resistance, as president calls off deployment after speaking with city’s mayor and Silicon Valley leaders

California bans heavy plastic bags for lying about recycling
Trump election “monitors” to observe next week’s California election
As federal food assistance ends, California national guard will help distribute food

WHAT’S UP WITH THE NATIONAL GUARD?

Trump backs down on sending federal troops to San Francisco for immigration crackdown

Maanvi Singh and Dani Anguiano, The Guardian

The Bay Area region had been on edge after reports emerged on Wednesday that the Trump administration was poised to send more than 100 Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and other federal agents to the US Coast Guard base in Alameda, a city in the East Bay, as part of a large-scale immigration-enforcement plan. By early Thursday morning, hundreds of protesters had gathered outside the Coast Guard base, holding signs with slogans such as “No ICE or Troops in the Bay!”

But just hours later, the president said he would not move forward with a “surge” of federal forces in the area after speaking with the mayor, Daniel Lurie, and Silicon Valley leaders including Marc Benioff, the Salesforce CEO who recently apologized for saying Trump should send national guard troops, and Jensen Huang, the chief executive of Nvidia.

Can Trump send the National Guard to S.F.? What California’s AG says about the legal issues

Attorney General Rob Bonta’s team was the first to challenge Trump on taking over control of the California National Guard under a rarely used law that allows the president to do this in times of invasion, internal rebellion or when U.S. laws cannot be executed with “regular forces” — a contested term.

Mikjail Zinshteyn, CalMatters

Before news broke of federal agents arriving in San Francisco, California Attorney General Rob Bonta sat down with CalMatters today to talk about Trump’s use of the National Guard.

“It would be dangerous and wrongly decided to allow the president to do what he’s trying to do now, which is to act as if he’s above the law, act as if he’s a king, treat the National Guard as his royal guard,” he said. “He will deploy only to blue cities. He will use it to punish enemies. He will use it to target those people who didn’t support him.”

Bonta is a key player in that Blue State resistance. His team was the first to challenge Trump on taking over control of the state National Guard under a law that allows the president to do this in times of invasion, internal rebellion or when U.S. laws cannot be executed with “regular forces” — a contested term.

California is ground zero for this novel dispute. This is where Trump mobilized 4,000 of the state’s National Guard troops in June in response to two days of occasionally violent protests against federal immigration raids in the Los Angeles region.

Attorneys for the federal government have been consistent in maintaining that judges cannot even review the president’s decisions to federalize a state’s National Guard troops. However, California state attorneys wrote to the Supreme Court that “every court to consider the question has rejected that argument.”

Trump’s DOJ is sending election monitors to California with voting on Prop. 50 underway

It’s common to see election observers at voting stations, but generally less so for them to come from the federal government. Some from the Trump administration will be on the ground in several California counties next month.

Maya C. Miller, CalMatters

The Trump administration’s Department of Justice will deploy election monitors to five California counties on Election Day, the department announced Friday, in what it describes as an effort to “ensure transparency, ballot security, and compliance with federal law.”

The news comes as voters are already casting ballots on Proposition 50, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposal to redraw the state’s congressional districts to favor Democrats. Early in-person voting is set to begin this weekend in many counties.

Federal personnel from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division will be sent to Fresno, Kern, Los Angeles, Orange and Riverside counties. Harmeet Dhillon, the former vice chair of the California Republican Party and a Republican National Committee chairwoman, leads the division.

It’s unclear whether the federal monitors will be onsite during early in-person voting or just on Nov. 4. The Justice Department has not said whether monitors will be stationed at polling places in addition to county elections offices.

Newsom to deploy CA National Guard after millions at risk of delayed food assistance in shutdown

Now in its third week, the ongoing federal government shutdown will likely delay food benefits for millions of Californians — prompting Gov. Gavin Newsom to set aside $80 million in state support and deploy the California National Guard to assist food banks.

Lynn La, CalMatters

The governor unveiled the move today, days after the California Department of Social Services began notifying counties to prepare for the possibility that federally-funded food benefits, known as CalFresh in California, could be disrupted. Without federal intervention or the shutdown ending by Thursday, about 5.5 million low-income Californians enrolled in the program would likely not receive assistance for November — including nearly 3.5 million children and senior citizens.

California issues about $1.1 billion in CalFresh benefits every month. Though benefits for October have already been distributed, those who applied to the program between Oct. 16 through Oct. 31 would not receive assistance for the second-half of the month, as well as November.

Recipients of California’s separate food benefits program for eligible noncitizens who can’t receive federal aid, known as the California Food Assistance Program, should also expect delays.

SUFFERING CALIFORNIA

When it comes to Trump’s energy cuts, California is the biggest loser

The numbers are in: The dust has settled on the Trump administration’s axing of $8 billion in energy funding, and California is the biggest loser.

Noah Baustin and Jessie Blaeser, with help from Alex Nieves and Camille Kaenel, Politico

Total hit to the Golden State: $3.3 billion in anticipated funding. (That’s $2.1 billion DOE had committed to recipients and $1.2 billion in expected funding for the ARCHES hydrogen hub.)

California’s Democratic congressional delegation has noticed the apparent target on the state’s back, and is calling foul.

“These unjustified terminations call into question whether DOE followed appropriations law and raise serious doubts about the Department’s ability to meet its contractual and grant obligations,” 30 Democrats, led by Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff and Rep. Zoe Lofgren, wrote in a pair of letters to the agency on Monday, obtained exclusively by POLITICO. “Terminating grants based on partisan criteria suggests significant unlawful bias at the highest levels of the Department.”

DOE didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the letters. But in its Oct. 2 statement on the cuts, the agency said that the projects it canceled “did not adequately advance the nation’s energy needs, were not economically viable, and would not provide a positive return on investment of taxpayer dollars.”

Trump plan would allow oil drilling all along California coast

If the Trump administration has its way, oil rigs could soon start drilling along the entire California coast, according to documents obtained by the Houston Chronicle.

Tara Duggan, SF Chronicle

Drilling could take place in the pristine waters off of Sonoma County and Big Sur, and theoretically even near the Golden Gate, if the administration were to find a way to bypass national marine sanctuary protections.

California elected officials, environmental organizations, and tourism and fishing industries expressed opposition to the plan, which they’d been expecting and dreading for months. The documents confirmed that the administration plans to open federal waters, which run 3 miles to 200 miles from shore in California, to oil and gas leasing as soon as 2027, according to the Houston Chronicle.

Such a move would override federal protections in place for decades and would have to overcome state and local environmental regulations. Many coastal counties have ordinances restricting or prohibiting onshore infrastructure for oil drilling, which would make it all but impossible to bring oil collected in federal waters to shore, experts say. Oil companies would also have to obtain permission from the state Coastal Commission.

Trump official warns California against arresting federal agents

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche on Thursday threatened to prosecute California officials who support arresting federal immigration agents, sharpening the standoff between the Trump administration and local leaders.

John Yoon, NY Times News Service, Hawaii Tribune-Herald

Blanche conveyed the warning in a letter a day after several officials in San Francisco, including Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker, and Brooke Jenkins, the city’s district attorney, said that they might seek to arrest federal agents who break California law during immigration raids.

The suggestion, Jenkins said, came from seeing agents confronting people in Los Angeles and Chicago. While she did not envision police officers handcuffing federal agents on city streets, she said she would use video footage to identify agents using excessive force and ask a judge for arrest warrants.

Their idea would be to prosecute immigration agents who overstep their authority, for example by using excessive force, state officials said. But the ability of states to arrest federal officers is without much legal precedent.

Blanche said in the letter that arresting federal agents performing their duties would violate federal laws against impeding enforcement operations. He posted the letter on social media, addressing it to Gov. Gavin Newsom of California and the California attorney general, Rob Bonta, as well as Pelosi and Jenkins.

He also said that the Constitution’s supremacy clause prevents federal officers from being held on a state criminal charge if the alleged crime occurred while the officer was performing federal duties.

‘I have no regrets’: Ex-federal officials flock to California

California officials are using the government shutdown to recruit more federal workers.

Camille Von Kaenel, Politico

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s campaign to recruit former federal workers has yielded a steady stream of job applications since its launch in March, at the peak of the Elon Musk-led job cuts that saw tens of thousands leave the federal workforce. Applications peaked in May at 314 but have largely kept up, numbering 239 in September, according to state data provided to POLITICO.

The result is at least dozens of hires, from entry-level staff to high-profile scientists and regulators with decades of federal experience who moved West to preserve their life’s work and lead California departments at the front lines of backfilling federal rollbacks.

Now, the state is hoping to further capitalize on that insider experience as this spring’s deferred resignations start running out and the White House drafts further layoff plans (which a judge paused last week, for now.) The state currently has about 3,000 job postings across all agencies and counties.

POLITICAL CALIFORNIA

Five Fast Facts on California Voters

As a special Election Day approaches, here’s a look at the numbers that define California voters along with a glimpse of their views on government.

Stephanie Barton, Public Policy Institute of California

Voter registration is very high. In 2025, more than eight in ten eligible Californians were registered to vote—or over 23 million of California’s 27 million eligible adults as of September. Adults age 66+ make up the largest share of registered voters (23%) followed by adults 26–35 (18%) and 35–45 (17%); younger adults are the smallest registered share (12%).
Close to a third of registered voters are neither blue nor red. Forty-five percent of eligible Californians have registered as Democrats, 25% as Republicans, and 23% as independents. The registered share who now align with a minor political party has ticked up from 6% in 2021 to 7% today.
Many likely voters are displeased with the major political parties. Of the registered voters who vote regularly and engage with politics, also known as likely voters, about six in ten hold unfavorable views of the Democratic Party while seven in ten hold unfavorable views of the Republican Party.
Few Californians trust the state and federal government. Although Californians profess more trust in their state government than in the federal government, the numbers still reflect a dim view of both: 44% of likely voters say they trust the state government in Sacramento to do what is right, while 29% say the same of the federal government in Washington. Likely voters are also dissatisfied with the California Legislature (53% disapproval).
Likely voters represent a small slice of the population. Californians who are most likely to vote also tend to be white, affluent, college educated, and homeowners. Today, white adults make up 50% of likely voters but 36% of the California population. In contrast, Latino adults are 29% of likely voters and 38% of the population, Asian-American residents are 12% of likely voters and 16% of the population, and Black residents are 4% of likely voters and 5% of the population. PPIC’s population sample includes naturalized immigrants.

California secession? It’s already happening

Joe Mathews on the state of the nation-state and his new book.

Paul Thornton, Golden State Report

But that breakup might not simply be California declaring independence. In an interview with Golden State Report co-founder Paul Thornton, Mathews discusses “soft secession” -- where California still maintains its place in the union but acts more like its own country -- and envisions a future where his children and grandchildren travel the world on passports issued by Los Angeles County.

‘The 2026 Billionaire Tax Act’: Emergency proposal aims to fight back against Trump attack on Medicaid

A coalition of frontline healthcare workers, unions, and economists launched an effort Thursday to build support for a proposed ballot measure in California that would impose a one-time tax on the state’s billionaires to avert a looming crisis spurred by national Republicans‘ unprecedented Medicaid cuts.

Jake Johnson, Common Dreams

The proposed ballot initiative, titled “The 2026 Billionaire Tax Act,” would levy a single 5% tax on the wealth of California’s roughly 200 billionaires to offset healthcare funding shortfalls caused by the roughly $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts that US President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans approved over the summer.

Service Employees International Union–United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW), one of the largest healthcare worker unions in the country, is spearheading the organizing push to get the proposal on the California ballot in November 2026. The union expects support for the measure to grow quickly in the coming weeks, and organizers said they hope the effort can serve as a “playbook” for other states working to mitigate the increasingly devastating impacts of the GOP assault on Medicaid.

Dave Regan, the president of SEIU-UHW, said during a press call Thursday that “it is a 100% certainty that we have the ability to put this on the ballot in 2026, and we intend to do so.”

Experts estimate that the one-time tax would raise $100 billion—a fraction of the staggering $2 trillion in combined wealth controlled by the 200 wealthiest Californians. Billionaires impacted by the tax would include Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang, two of the richest men in the world.

Unveiled today: The first politically viable wealth tax

A proposed 2026 California ballot measure would tax billionaires’ fortunes to fund imperiled health access for 15 million state Medicaid recipients.

Harold Meyerson, American Prospect

The ballot measure they unveiled is an emergency billionaires’ tax aimed at making up the $100 billion hit to California’s Medicaid program over the next five years that the Republican Congress and President Trump delivered by enacting their One Big Beautiful Bill that disproportionately cut taxes on the wealthy and reduced federal allotments for Medicaid. If it qualifies for the November 2026 ballot and is enacted by state voters, the initiative would levy a 5 percent tax on the wealth of the state’s roughly 200 billionaires and direct 90 percent of those funds to California’s Medicaid recipients and the institutions that serve them, with the remaining 10 percent going to the state’s K-12 schools. (This latter provision likely ensures the support, or at least the neutrality, of the state’s teachers unions, which are accustomed to seeing schools getting 40 percent of any state tax increases.)

The stated purpose of this measure is to address what will surely be a crisis for many Medicaid recipients and the hospitals and clinics that treat them, where many of SEIU UHW’s members work. But its implications, at a time when the fortunes of the very wealthy are reaching stratospheric levels even as median incomes are largely stagnant and public funding is under attack, may have even greater significance. It comes at a time when proposals to hike taxes on the very rich (something that polls have long shown to be popular) are beginning to bubble up.

Governor Newsom long-form interview on KQED

Newsom on Prop. 50, the Democratic Party, DOJ election monitors, and more

Marisa Lagos, Scott Shafer, Political Breakdown, KQED

Watch on Youtube here

CULTURAL CALIFORNIA

John Freeman sees California as America’s literary center

John Freeman, author of “California Rewritten: A Journey Through the Golden State’s New Literature,” talks about how California has become America’s new literary center, challenging New York’s dominance.

California Sun Podcast

He discusses the pandemic book club that sparked his journey, the state’s evolving mythology, and how diverse voices are redefining what it means to imagine America’s future.

Transitional kindergarten in California, explained

California has expanded its transitional kindergarten (TK) program to all four-year-olds this fall—making it one of the largest programs in the nation. What is transitional kindergarten, and what does it look like in California?

Laura Hill, PPIC Explainer on Youtube

CALIFORNIA ECONOMY

Food Costs and Household Impacts

Inflation has been top of mind recently. In PPIC’s June 2025 Statewide Survey the top choice for the most important issue facing Californians today was cost of living, economy, and inflation, at 37% of adults.

Caroline Danielson, Public Policy Institute of California

Among all families, housing is the largest expenditure (38%), but spending on transportation (15%) and food (13%) come next in family budgets, followed by health care (8%). Spending on groceries (“food at home”) is $6,900 per family annually on average in California, or $2,500 per person. Food away from home totals $5,300 ($1,950 per person). Compared to those in western states, people in the Midwest spend 3% less per person on groceries, those in the South spend 12% less, and those in the Northeast spend 11% more.

The result is pressure on family budgets that can extend to concerns about affording enough food or cutting back on the variety or quantity of food—collectively known as “food insecurity”. About 1.8 million California households experienced food insecurity in 2023, according to the most recent USDA data, translating to a rate lower than the national rate (11.4% vs. 12.2%). It can also mean cutting back on other expenditures to afford food.

The largest programs in California’s nutrition safety net are CalFresh, WIC, and school meals, making up about $18 billion in state and federal expenditures. Funding for emergency food, including food banks, totals another $160 millionand in 2025–26, includes a one-time state appropriation of $72 million to support food banks. All told, 4.2 million California households access one or more of the three largest programs to help them afford the cost of food. These programs help with rising food costs because they serve meals or they increase benefits when food costs rise.

California says 4 plastic bag makers will stop sales in state in recycling settlement

Four major plastic bag producers will no longer sell their grocery bags in California and will pay fines in a settlement. The companies had labeled the bags as recyclable when they actually are not.

Tara Duggan, SF Chronicle

State law requires plastic grocery bags be recyclable in the state. [California Attorney General Rob] Bonta also announced Friday that he had filed a lawsuit against three additional bag producers for the same reason. Consumers may continue to see plastic bags from those additional producers in stores until January, when a new state ban of all plastic bags from grocery stores goes into effect.

“Even when consumers follow the instructions printed on these plastic bags and return the bags to designated recycling bins at stores or other locations, these bags generally end up in landfills or incinerators rather than getting recycled,” Bonta said. “And inevitably some of them end up in our state’s waterways and other ecosystems.”

Exxon sues California over new laws requiring corporate climate disclosures

Exxon Mobil has filed suit in federal court challenging two California laws that would require the oil giant to report the greenhouse emissions resulting from the use of its products globally.

Doug Smith and Susanne Rust, LA Times

The 30-page complaint, filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California, argues that the laws violate the company’s free speech rights by requiring it to “trumpet California’s preferred message even though ExxonMobil believes the speech is misleading and misguided.”

Senate Bill 253, the 2023 legislation known as the Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act, requires the California Air Resources Board to adopt regulations by this year to mandate public and private companies with more than $1 billion in annual revenue to begin publicly disclosing their emissions across three “scopes.”

Scope 1 emissions are defined as direct greenhouse gas emissions from a company and its branches. Scope 2 includes indirect emissions, such as electricity bought by the company. Scope 3 are emissions from the company’s supply chain, including waste, water usage, business travel and employee commutes, which account for about 75% of a company’s greenhouse emissions for many industries. Reporting begins in 2026 on scopes 1 and 2 and in 2027 on scope 3.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

Poll: 72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative

Do California cities have to fly the American flag?

The not-so-subtle connection between ICI and ‘Uncle Patrick’s Secessionist Breakfast’

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Texas v What? Debunking 5 big myths about secession

The High Price of Fear: California could defend itself for a fraction of the cost

Fire and Flood: Why California should control our own water system

Just 9 states make up more than half the U.S. population

Issue #246: Hundreds of thousands of Californians turn out for democracy

Mon, 20 Oct 2025 15:23:02 GMT

Local protesters rallied in Alameda, Albany, Berkeley, Calistoga, Cotati, Corte Madera, El Cerrito, Fremont, Half Moon Bay, Hayward, Healdsburg, Hercules, Mill Valley, Milpitas, Napa, Novato, Oakland, Pacifica, Palo Alto, Petaluma Redwood City, San Francisco, San Jose, San Leandro, San Rafael, Sausalito, Sunnyvale, Union City, Walnut Creek, Pleasant Hill, and Vallejo.

Huge crowds say, ”We don’t want no stinkin’ king”
Number of arrests in Los Angeles: zero
California takes the lead in regulating artificial intelligence

NO KINGS, REDUX

Thousands turn out for ‘No Kings’ protests around the Bay Area

Human banner at Ocean Beach

John Ross Ferrara, Tor Smith, KRON4

Two large events were San Francisco, including a demonstration at Ocean Beach’s Sunset Dunes Park and a march from the Embarcadero to the Civic Center along Market Street.

Across the Bay, thousands of protesters streamed into Oakland’s Wilma Chen Plaza just before noon where many held signs, wore colorful costumes, and gleefully chanted a unified message about their dissatisfaction with the Trump Administration.

Attendees laughed at the decorations that poked fun at the administration, but through smiles, people reiterated their concerns that their civil rights were in peril, and said it was their patriotic duty to push back.

Rachael Grail arrived to the march with her friends in inflatable costumes in an effort to spread joy to others.

“The reason we decided to wear these (outfits) is for strategic frivolity,” said Grail. “We want to stand for joy and kindness. By wearing these we show that we aren’t playing by the same tactics as this administration with hate and fear.”

Several organizations were involved in planning the Oakland event, including the ACLU of Alameda, Alameda Labor Council, SEIU 1021 and the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Walnut Creek

No Kings protests: S.F. march surpasses June’s as tens of thousands rally in Bay Area

About 50,000 marched in San Francisco, surpassing the June protest’s crowd. Nationwide, more than 2,700 protests took place.

Anna Bauman, St. John Barned-Smith, Sarah Ravani, Lucy Hodgman, Brooke Park, SF Chronicle

Although the demonstrations were framed as a broad repudiation of Trump, organizers especially focused on immigration and the deployment of the National Guard in cities from Los Angeles to Chicago. Trump, on Wednesday, indicated that he wanted to send federal troops to San Francisco, hours after Mayor Daniel Lurie and local law enforcement leaders pushed back on calls for the president to do just that. The protests also came amid a government shutdown that appears to have no resolution in sight.

Marin County’s No Kings protest at the San Rafael Civic Center attracted a “well-vetted count” of 5,843 people, according to Susan Morgan, founder of Indivisible Marin.

Several other cities throughout Marin also held No Kings rallies, for a combined total of about 5,000, she said.

“This puts up well above the off-cited number of 3.5% of citizens needed to be actively engaged in a movement to overcome an authoritarian regime,” Morgan said. The protests drew more than 4% of the total of Marin County’s population of about 256,000.

Sarah Ravani/SF Chronicle

Dozens of Los Angeles “No Kings” protests draw crowds across city

In Southern California, protesters gathered in areas across Los Angeles, San Diego, Orange County and the Inland Empire. The largest was expected to be in downtown LA, with protesters meeting at the Gloria Molina Grand Park.

Frederick J. Brown, AFP

Austin Turner, CBS News

In a statement following the conclusion of most of the demonstrations, No Kings said that approximately seven million people participated in the nationwide marches.

As of 5 p.m., Los Angeles Police Department officials say that no arrests were made in connection with the downtown L.A. demonstration, where thousands of people gathered outside of the Metropolitan Detention Center and City Hall.

Police declare ‘unlawful assembly’ at downtown L.A. protest, use tear gas to disperse crowds

Tense standoffs took place between police and the crowd in the area of Alameda Street and Aliso Street Saturday evening, with demonstrators accusing law enforcement of escalating tensions amid the carryover from peaceful daytime rallies.

Carlin Stiehl/For the Times

Jaweed Kaleem, Christopher Buchanan, Yahoo! News (LA Times)

The day’s protests, which drew throngs of crowds in Southern California and across the nation, made pointed critiques of President Trump’s actions on transgender rights, foreign policy, the federal government shutdown, university funding and other matters. Protesters also took on the White House’s push to deport immigrants without legal authorization to be in the U.S. by undertaking raids in U.S. cities including Los Angeles. The Metropolitan Detention Center, a federal facility, has become a focal point over anti-ICE sentiment.

On Saturday, tensions grew around 7 p.m., after LAPD declared the unlawful assembly and began to press a line of protesters outside the facility. Police shot multiple nonlethal rounds, used tear gas and brought in a fleet of horses in an attempt to push back crowds.

By 8:30 p.m., protesters had largely abandoned their stand near the detention center while police tried to reestablish a line on the street in front of federal building.

As of 9 p.m., LAPD had reported no arrests.

No Kings protests across the US: in pictures

From New York to San Francisco, millions of Americans hit the streets to voice their anger over Trump’s policies

Pejman Faratin, The Guardian

MEANWHILE IN TRUMP VS. CALIFORNIA

Interstate 5 closure brings gridlock, new battle between Trump, California

Gridlock reigned Saturday on one of California’s most vital freeways after state officials closed a 17-mile stretch of Interstate 5 in response to a pre-planned event in which live-fire artillery rounds were shot over the freeway at Camp Pendleton.

Johnathan Alcorn/For the Times

Andrew J. Campa, Melody Gutierrez, Karen Garcia and Malia Mendez, LA Times

The full closure of the main route between Los Angeles and San Diego was brief, but it caused massive traffic jams across San Diego and Orange counties. Exits from the freeway onto surface streets were clogged. Many motorists were forced to take a jammed Interstate 15. The inland detour swelled drive times from L.A. to San Diego to well over three hours as of Saturday afternoon. That was an hourlong delay over typical conditions. By 5 p.m., traffic was finally getting back to normal and much of Interstate 5 was moving at normal speeds.

Newsom criticized the White House for failing to coordinate or share safety information ahead of the Marine Corps 250th anniversary celebration, which featured Vice President JD Vance.

“It is not safe for people to drive on a major freeway at high speeds directly under LIVE MUNITIONS,” his office wrote on X. “White House not communicating, endangering the public, and then trying to blame the Governor for doing the right thing — keeping people out of harm’s way — yet another day living in Trump’s authoritarian America,” the post said.

Administration officials said the Camp Pendleton event was perfectly safe and that a freeway closure was not needed.

It would be good for California too. America’s authoritarianism has scrambled our calculations.

California AG vows to sue if Trump sends troops to San Francisco

Trump raised the possibility of deploying the National Guard in San Francisco after Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said he was “all for” the move.

Noah Baustin, Politico

California’s attorney general said Thursday that he plans to take the Trump administration to court if the president follows through on threats to send the National Guard to San Francisco.

Rob Bonta, a Democrat, said at a news conference that “it’s currently our plan” to challenge in court a National Guard deployment to San Francisco, as the conflict between the Trump administration and California Democrats intensifies.

Brooke Jenkins ‘won’t hesitate’ to charge federal agents

San Francisco’s top cop suggested she’d consider bringing excessive force or other charges against troops deployed by President Donald Trump to her city

Dustin Gardiner, Melanie Mason, and Blake Jones, Politico

Brooke Jenkins, the city’s district attorney and a moderate Democrat, told Playbook, “If I believe, and have conviction, that we can meet our burden and charges are appropriate, that I won’t hesitate to do so.”

Jenkins’ remarks come as officials in San Francisco brace for the possibility that Trump could send National Guard troops into the city after the president re-upped his threat for the umpteenth time.

But this time is different. His warning Wednesday was singularly focused on the City by the Bay, and it came on the heels of Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff saying he would support Trump sending in the Guard. (Benioff later walked it back; Salesforce did not respond to a request for comment.)

Jenkins is at the center of the crisis. She has publicly disavowed Benioff and implored the Trump administration not to intervene, a move she said would sow chaos. Noting that a mobilized National Guard is often coupled with a ramp-up of immigration enforcement, she has signaled openness to pursuing charges if federal agents use excessive force or break other local laws — a move that would be unprecedented among the nation’s district attorneys and would face major legal hurdles. (A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment.)

CALIFORNIA PUSHES AHEAD, NOT BACK

California just passed the first U.S. frontier AI law.

SB-53 offers a blueprint for evidence-generating transparency measures that could shape the next few years of frontier AI governance.

Scott Singer and Alastair Phillips-Robins, Carnegie Endowment

Late last month, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a historic law focused on increasing transparency among the companies building the world’s most advanced AI models. The law, formally titled the Transparency in Frontier AI Act and more commonly known as SB-53, fills a void Congress has left open.

Many AI policy bills have emerged at the state level, but only a few are designed to address potentially catastrophic risks from advanced AI systems. SB-53 is the first to make it into law. The law introduces protections for whistleblowers inside AI labs, mandatory reporting of certain safety incidents, and requirements that large developers publish so-called frontier AI frameworks to explain how they plan to mitigate catastrophic risks.

As the home of many of the world’s largest and most important AI companies, California has a unique role in AI policy. It is one of two jurisdictions with the greatest capacity to enact legally binding policies that affect frontier AI developers. The other, of course, is the U.S. federal government. But Washington, so far, has largely declined to act. That gives California huge influence over national, and even global, AI policy. SB-53 could provide a blueprint for other states and governments to follow—including, perhaps, a future Congress.

The successful passage of SB-53 represents the culmination of a yearlong rethink of California’s frontier AI policy, following Newsom’s September 2024 veto of a previous AI regulation known as SB-1047. That bill would have imposed broader rules on AI development and was criticized for creating new liability for AI-induced harms, requiring that developers build in “shutdown” capabilities to their models, and imposing know-your-customer rules on cloud computing services. SB-53 takes a lighter touch, offering a more flexible framework with requirements that companies can fill in as they establish best practices.

California is getting its ‘AI Act’ together

While Washington remains gridlocked on technology policy, California is charting its own course.

Drew Liebert and David Evan Harris, Tech Policy Press

California’s intervention isn’t defiance; it’s necessity. Our state’s residents and our democracy cannot wait for a federal standard that may never come. When inaction leaves people – especially kids – vulnerable to deepfakes, data exploitation, scams, and algorithmic discrimination, state leadership must fill the void.

This year, Sacramento took a number of important steps toward doing just that. While none of these laws are a panacea, together they demonstrate that democratic institutions can still reasonably govern technology in the public interest without impeding the nation’s innovation leadership.

Tired of explaining to your relatives that the Facebook video they shared or the scandalous image they saw on X is AI-generated? One new law, the California AI Transparency Act of 2025, which we at the California Initiative for Technology and Democracy proudly sponsored, brings much needed transparency to fake content online. This measure, through the tenacious stewardship of Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D), will require large social media platforms, messaging apps, and search engines to identify AI-generated content and require smartphone and camera manufacturers to let users embed digital provenance data into images and videos. This will give people critically important tools to better determine their authenticity and nature of content in an era of AI-created deception and deepfakes.

New laws also target more immediate harms, like regulating the use of AI chatbots that have encouraged self-harm among minors and mandating mental-health warnings on social media platforms. Others clarify that companies can’t escape responsibility for harmful algorithms or harassment that their systems amplify, and create easier ways for users to opt out of the sale of their data.

California invests big in battery energy storage — and leaves rolling blackouts behind

Experts and officials say the Golden State has reached a turning point, reflecting years of investment in making its electrical grid stronger, cleaner and more dependable. Much of that is new battery energy storage, which captures and stores electricity for later use.

California hasn’t issued an emergency plea for the public to conserve energy, known as a Flex Alert, since 2022.
Experts credit much of the progress to a surge in battery energy storage systems in recent years.
Battery storage in California has grown more than 3,000% since 2020.

“There is no question that the battery fleet that has grown rapidly since 2020, along with the state’s expanding portfolio of other supply and demand-side resources, has been a real game changer for reliability during summer periods of peak demand,” said Elliot Mainzer, CAISO’s president and chief executive.

ON HEALTH

Newsom unveils $11 state insulin for Californians: ‘We took matters into our own hands’

Starting next year, Californians with diabetes will be able to purchase state-branded insulin at steeply reduced prices

Kristen Hwang and Ana B. Ibarra, CalMatters

Long-acting insulin pens will be available at pharmacies for $11 per pen — or $55 for a five-pack — beginning Jan. 1. The pens are interchangeable with glargine, the generic alternative for Lantus, a once-a-day injection that regulates blood sugar. An equivalent amount of Lantus sells to pharmacies for more than $92, according to data compiled by the governor’s office, but consumers may pay a different price based on their insurance.

“California didn’t wait for the pharmaceutical industry to do the right thing — we took matters into our own hands,” Newsom said in a statement released at 3 a.m. Pacific time. “No Californian should ever have to ration insulin or go into debt to stay alive.”

The sale of insulin is part of the state’s CalRx initiative aimed at lowering prescription drug prices for Californians. Today’s announcement comes three years after Newsom announced the state would tackle the cost of insulin. The first vials of insulin will be for sale two years after the governor’s promised delivery date of 2024.

California joins breakaway public health alliance in rebuke of ‘extremists’ at CDC

California is joining 13 other states to create an alliance aimed at coordinating public health, in a direct rebuke of the Trump administration and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s dramatic overhaul of the nation’s public health systems.

Marissa Lagos, KQED

The move comes as public health experts grow increasingly concerned about Kennedy’s transformation of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where he’s fired top officials, slashed research funding, changed vaccine recommendations and gutted the leadership of a key federal immunization committee and replaced them with novices.

The new partnership is meant to coordinate public health leadership to improve communication, share information and position states to respond quickly to new threats. It includes the governors of Washington, Oregon, Hawaii, Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, Maryland and North Carolina, plus the U.S. territory of Guam.

It comes just weeks after Gov. Gavin Newsom also announced California would band together with Oregon and Washington to issue vaccine recommendations separate from the federal government’s. That move came in response to the Trump administration’s inconsistent guidance on vaccines.

SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT

Commentary: Blue states have the power to change liberalism and block conservatism. They just have to use it.

Abundance strategy advocates say blue states’ crippling attachment to process is undermining their ability to achieve the things they say they care about - and California is the poster child.

Arkadi Gerney, Sarah Knight, Democracy: A Journal of Ideas

he California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) may be the most powerful source of state capacity across the 50 states, employing over 1,400 people and overseeing the electricity, natural gas, water, telecommunications, and transportation of the world’s fourth-largest economy. The CPUC has used its power to deliver novel services for California: developing the country’s most ambitious renewable energy portfolio standards in 2002 and fueling a boom in rooftop solar; modeling comprehensive data privacy protections that allow Californians to reap the benefits of bold technological innovation without sacrificing their own security; and unlocking major advancements in battery storage to help California transition to a 100 percent clean electricity grid by 2045.

But the CPUC is also one of the primary reasons California struggles to build and innovate. Too often, the CPUC has been at the center of California’s most vexing policy challenges—and responsible, in part, for some of the state’s most cataclysmic policy failures. The CPUC embodies both the promise of creative state capacity and the paralysis of regulatory excess and malaise. And that’s to say nothing of the California Coastal Commission, the California Air Resources Board, the California Energy Commission, the California Department of Water Resources, the California State Water Resources Control Board, and the state’s many other regulatory agencies. All told, California, once a beacon of the future, has become a growing tangle of red tape, too often serving as a cautionary tale of what happens when government prioritizes process over outcomes.

What’s there, here: on Golden State writers in ‘California Rewritten’

John Freeman, author of just-released California Rewritten: A Journey Through the Golden State’s New Literature, has an ask for his East Coast friends. “Picture the entire length of the East Coast as one state,” he says. That might give them an idea of the multi-habitat, multicultural, multi-political jigsaw puzzle that is California.

Janis Hashe, East Bay Express

This concept is reflected in the 51 essays that make up California Rewritten, covering work from living California writers from Deborah A. Miranda (Bad Indians) to Amy Tan (The Backyard Bird Chronicles). Multiple Bay Area authors are part of the mix, including Rebecca Solnit (A Paradise Built in Hell), Elaine Castillo (America Is Not the Heart), Karen Tei Yamashita (I Hotel), Tommy Orange (There There) and Maxine Hong Kingston (The Woman Warrior) among others.

The idea for the book first came up in 2019, while Freeman dined in Berkeley with a group of people associated with his magazine, Freeman’s. The concept evolved as he hosted Zoom conversations with Alta Journal’s California Book Club. One of the first discussions kickstarting the idea revolved around C Pam Zhang’s How Much of These Hills Is Gold, Freeman said in a phone interview. The story about a Chinese family moving to California during the Gold Rush is “a story distorted by time,” he said.

ENVIRONMENT

Study: California has greenest U.S. cities; Arizona at bottom

No city in the U.S. is greener than San Jose, and four other California cities join it in the top 10.

Dave Mason, The Center Square

That’s according to a recent WalletHub study of the nation’s 100 most populated cities and their progress on environmental and climate issues.

WalletHub said San Jose stood out for having the fifth highest number of solar panel installations per capita, a bicycle-sharing program, a ban on plastic bags and initiatives promoting green energy.

“There’s a lot of environmentally conscious legislation,” WalletHub analyst and writer Chip Lupo told The Center Square about the Golden State. “In the case of San Jose and a number of cities, they have a high percentage of renewable energy sources.”

The least green city in America? That’s Glendale, Ariz., according to WalletHub. The Phoenix suburb, which ranked No. 100 overall, was near the bottom in environment, transportation and lifestyle and policy. It ranked a bit better, at No. 68, for energy.

How grand plans to restart oil drilling off Santa Barbara’s coast hit California’s green wall

When a Texas oil company first announced controversial plans to reactivate three drilling rigs off the coast of Santa Barbara County, investor presentations boasted that the venture had “massive resource potential” and was “primed for cash flow generation.”

Grace Toohey, LA Times

But now, less than two years later, mounting legal setbacks and regulatory issues are casting increasing doubt on the project’s future.

Most recently, the California attorney general filed suit against Houston-based Sable Offshore Corp., accusing it of repeatedly putting “profits over environmental protections.” The lawsuit, filed last week in Santa Barbara County Superor Court, accuses Sable of continually failing to follow state laws and regulations intended to protect water resources.

The action comes less than a month after the Santa Barbara County district attorney’s office filed criminal charges against the company, accusing it of knowingly violating state environmental laws while working on repairs to oil pipelines that have sat idle since a major spill in 2015.

The company also faces legal challenges from the California Coastal Commission, environmental groups and even its own investors.

Dazzling satellite photos show California mountains before and after snowstorms

Satellite photos show California mountains transformed from brown to snow-capped just four days after the season’s first major atmospheric river.

NASA EOSDIS

Terry Castleman, LA Times

The deluge of moisture left all but a few of the state’s biggest reservoirs at or above historical levels for this time of year and may have pushed back fire season in Los Angeles significantly, experts said.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

Poll: 72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative

Do California cities have to fly the American flag?

The not-so-subtle connection between ICI and ‘Uncle Patrick’s Secessionist Breakfast’

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Texas v What? Debunking 5 big myths about secession

The High Price of Fear: California could defend itself for a fraction of the cost

Fire and Flood: Why California should control our own water system

Just 9 states make up more than half the U.S. population

Issue #245: Would we get along better after a national divorce?

Sun, 05 Oct 2025 16:29:56 GMT

The White House is asking nine major universities to commit to President Donald Trump’s political priorities in exchange for more favorable access to federal money.

Trump and Newsom spar over academic freedom
Shutdown impacts on California
Glacier-denuded Sierra Nevada coming way too soon

FIGHT OVER UNIVERSITY EDUCATION

Trump asks 9 colleges to commit to his political agenda for better access to federal money

Aamer Madhani, AP/PBS

The 10-page proposed agreement was sent Wednesday to some of the most selective public and private universities: Vanderbilt, the University of Pennsylvania, Dartmouth College, the University of Southern California, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Texas, the University of Arizona, Brown University and the University of Virginia. It was not clear how these schools were selected or why.

A document sent to the universities encourages them to adopt the White House’s vision for America’s campuses, with commitments to accept the government’s priorities on admissions, women’s sports, free speech, student discipline and college affordability, among other topics.

Signing on would give universities “multiple positive benefits,” including “substantial and meaningful federal grants” and “increased overhead payments where feasible,” according to a letter sent to universities alongside the compact. The letter calls it a proactive effort as the administration continues to investigate alleged civil rights violations at U.S. campuses.

Newsom threatens state funding for California universities that agree to Trump demands

Gov. Gavin Newsom threatened Thursday to withhold state funding from California universities that agree to new policies proposed by President Donald Trump on transgender students, free speech, student discipline and other political issues.

Sophia Bollag, SF Chronicle

In an all caps statement designed to mimic Trump’s social media posts, Newsom said California universities that sign what he called the “RADICAL AGREEMENT” will lose state funds, including those for scholarships.

Schools that sign on to the pact would agree not to “punish” or “belittle” conservative ideas — a vague requirement that might violate the First Amendment. In exchange, they would receive federal funding.

Colleges and universities have become key targets of Trump’s second-term agenda. Prominent conservatives often criticize higher education institutions in the U.S. as too liberal and say they are hostile to conservative ideas.

The letters represent the latest push by Trump to reshape higher education. His administration has launched investigations into alleged antisemitism at universities across the United States, including schools in the University of California and California State University systems. As part of those investigations, his administration has sought settlements with universities over findings by the administration of antisemitism, which include agreements that schools pay hundreds of millions of dollars and submit to more oversight and control by the federal government.

DEMOCRACY UNDER THREAT

Mathews: California is already gone as America abandons state

We should stop talking about secession. Trump dismantled the government and ended the democratic republic. He dumped us. We’re already gone.

Joe Mathews, Zócalo Public Square in USA Today

I’ve written about the idea of California breaking up with the U.S. for a decade. I’ve embraced independence at times, in frustration. But I’ve also expressed doubts.

There were simply too many reasons to stay.

But now those reasons are evaporated.

For me, the most compelling reason to stay came from David French. In his 2020 book “Divided We Fall.” French argued that a California departure would damage the world because it would weaken America. The democratic world needed a mighty America to keep the peace and protect against authoritarians.

But that’s no longer true. The U.S. government has switched sides on democracy, allying itself with right-wing authoritarians, from Jair Bolsonaro to Benjamin Netanyahu, and strengthening regimes in Russia and China.

In this new context, California’s departure would be good for the world — precisely because it would weaken a dangerously autocratic America.

It would be good for California too. America’s authoritarianism has scrambled our calculations.

The choice of whether California’s future is inside or outside the U.S. is no longer difficult.

To stay in the U.S. is to choose to fight for a marriage the other party has abandoned. It is a choice to live under a tyranny that could forever destroy California.

Outside the U.S., California has a better chance of survival. Moving on from this bad marriage also offers hope for a new beginning that we’ll never find under fascism.

If we, California’s people, seize this moment to build our own new republic, we might soon live again in freedom — and sing that victory song.

More than half of Americans say the country’s best days are already behind it

For the first time in nearly a decade of polling, more than half of Americans say the country’s best days are already behind it.

CNN/SSRS polling; Graphic by Ariel Edwards-Levy

Ariel Edwards-Levy, CNN

Three-quarters think the country’s political system needs major reforms or a complete overhaul, according to CNN polling conducted by SSRS this summer.

The Democratic Party has rebounded slightly from the record-low favorability marks it hit earlier this year. The widespread feeling among Democrats that their own party needs to make major changes is outweighed by their anger toward President Donald Trump and the GOP.

That level of negativity hasn’t always been a part of politics, but in recent years it’s become fundamental to understanding where we are today. CNN’s poll finds that more than half of political independents are either dissatisfied with or indifferent to both political parties – but different blocs of independents hold notably different attitudes.

And within the parties, people are more vehement in their dislike of the opposition than in their enthusiasm for their own party. The Democratic Party last saw positive ratings from a solid majority of the country in February 2009, while the Republican Party last saw a favorability rating of 55% or higher in February 2005.

Is this the beginning of the end for US democracy?

First come the words: “war,” “domestic terrorists,” “full-force.” Then the decrees: control, discipline, submission. Authoritarianism is not improvised; it is scripted.

Amy La Porte, Common Dreams

History reminds us that totalitarianism seldom arrives as a cataclysm, and instead as a creeping normalization of rhetoric that softens us for what’s to come. Scholars call it “democratic backsliding”: slow, at first, mundane and almost imperceptible. Death by a hundred incremental erosions. When state legislatures in the US criminalize gender-affirming care, they echo morality laws of the junta-run nation of Mali, where both same-sex couples and their tacit neighbors will now be persecuted. Women’s autonomy shrinks here under abortion bans; in Afghanistan, the rollback began with veils and movement restrictions. When late-night show hosts vanish from screens here, recall Bassem Youssef’s forced exile in Egypt.

It often starts with “us-versus-them,” and a chorus of dehumanizing labels like “invaders,” “illegals,” and “animals”; in Nazi Germany, Jewish immigrants were called “rats” and “parasites.” For those there, who went about their lives, choosing not to react to each stroke of a pen and press release, each edict alone no doubt felt survivable. But together, when left unchallenged, they would go on to suffocate and extinguish all aspects of democratic freedom, with consequences for the entire populace, not just those initially marked.

The question now is not whether Americans can hear the warning bell of authoritarianism, but whether they will heed it before it is too late. The only sustainable reply is peaceful defiance: citizens assembling in public forums, online and off, and insisting on their rights. History shows that authoritarian rule falters when met with unified resistance, and even the most persistent forces struggle to withstand a people’s refusal to kneel.

Violence, redistricting, and democratic norms in Trump’s America

We have asked expert and public respondents to rate the overall performance of U.S. democracy on a 0–100 scale since May 2017 and September 2017, respectively. Our September 2025 survey also asked expert respondents what rating they would expect to give the U.S. on the same scale in 2027.

Bright Line Watch September 2025 survey

Expert ratings of U.S. performance at upholding specific democratic principles are mostly stable since April, but we observe significant declines on toleration of peaceful protest, not using government agencies to punish political opponents, and fair electoral district boundaries. Among the public, Republican ratings were largely stable, whereas Democrats perceived declines in a number of areas.

However, as the next figure shows, the partisan gap in democracy ratings has reached an all-time high. The average difference across all previous surveys was 8 points, and the previous maximum difference was 12 points, in July 2018, when the average rating among Republicans was 63 versus 51 among Democrats. In our September 2025 survey, the gap reached 15 points (58.5 among Republicans versus 43.6 among Democrats). When our respondents are asked to project a democracy rating for 2027 on the same scale, their expectations diverge by 18 points.

The current expert rating of 54 continues to place the United States between the scores that experts gave in April 2025 to Israel (49) and Mexico (60) and well below our nominal democratic peers of Great Britain (83) and Canada (88).

TRUMP VS CALIFORNIA

White House points the finger at immigrants - and California - for government shutdown

Among the White House’s objections to the Democratic proposal to reopen the federal government is a provision that would “allow California to continue exploiting a loophole to fund Medicaid for illegal aliens.”

Alexei Koseff, Sara DiNatale, Yahoo! News, SF Chronicle

The claim refers to efforts to roll back new restrictions - adopted by Republicans this summer in their tax and domestic policy megabill - on provider taxes that states use to draw down matching federal health care funds. California has taxed insurers for years to bring in billions of additional dollars for Medi-Cal, its free health insurance program for the poor.

At the same time, under Newsom, California has gradually expanded Medi-Cal access to adults regardless of their immigration status - an initiative the governor fully implemented in 2024 to much fanfare. The state must use its own tax dollars to pay for the coverage, because undocumented immigrants are ineligible for federally funded health programs.

Though the expansion was not paid for directly by the provider tax, White House officials contend that California could not afford to put resources toward benefits for undocumented immigrants if it had not received the extra federal money.

But the program has begun to cause a political headache for Newsom this year. More undocumented adults signed up for coverage than expected, leading to billions of dollars in cost overruns and an emergency funding measure to keep Medi-Cal solvent. The governor ultimately pushed through a state budget deal this summer that will freeze enrollment for immigrants 19 and older starting in January and eventually require those that maintain their coverage to pay monthly premiums.

Trump uses repeated funding cuts to pressure California, complicating state’s legal fight

When the Trump administration has faced pushback over attempted cuts to California’s federal funding, it has shifted strategy and gone after the funding again.

Allen J. Schaben/LA Times

Kevin Rector, LA Times

The strategy has both complicated and expanded the scope of California’s legal fight against the administration, which now includes more than 40 lawsuits.

The repeated lawsuits reflect an increasingly familiar pattern in the growing mountain of litigation between the Trump administration, California and other blue states.

[Attorney General Rob] Bonta said such shifting strategies were the work of a “consistently and brazenly lawless and lawbreaking federal administration,” and that his office was “duty-bound” to fight back and will — as many times as it takes.

California vs. Texas: How ICE enforcement differs, according to new UCLA report

While California has a larger immigrant population, Texas experienced arrest rates three to four times higher, reflecting differences in state cooperation with ICE and broader political climates.

UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs

The report notes significant variation in the profiles of those detained. In California, fewer individuals had pending criminal charges, and there were fewer transfers from jails and prisons compared with Texas. California also experienced a higher proportion of arrests among immigrants without prior criminal records, suggesting that state-level policies and political orientations heavily shape ICE enforcement outcomes.

These findings highlight the differences in federal immigration enforcement across states and underscores the importance of considering local policy environments when assessing the human and social consequences of ICE operations.

Commentary: California’s most glaring issues have little to do with Trump

While resisting Trumpism may play well for Newsom within California and perhaps in other blue states, it also may be indirectly bolstering Trump’s standing in the nation as a whole, since he often portrays California as an example of failed progressive governance.

Dan Walters, CalMatters

He had nothing to do with California’s high rates of homelessness, poverty, and unemployment, its very high living costs, its shortage of housing, its long-standing water supply conundrum, the shortcomings of its public school system or the multi-billion dollar deficits in its state budget.

While Newsom inherited most of them upon being elected governor in 2018, in the main, California’s unresolved issues have stagnated or worsened in the nearly seven years since. And they are likely to still be there when he leaves in 2027, possibly to pursue the presidency himself.

What a government shutdown means for Californians, from Social Security to national parks

Social Security and Medicare benefits will keep flowing in a government shutdown, but federal employees will be working without pay and delays likely will occur across many services.

Rachel Becker, Kristen Hwang, Alejandro Lazo, Cayla Mihalovich,and Jeanne Kuang, CalMatters

Most Californians shouldn’t worry about a federal shutdown impacting their Social Security benefits or their health care access in the near term. About 6.5 million Californians receive benefits through the Social Security Administration and those checks are expected to continue going out during a shutdown. But, customer service could suffer depending on how many employees are told to stay home, according to the National Committee to Preserve Social Security & Medicare.

Medicaid and Medicare, which pay for health care for low-income individuals, people with disabilities and seniors, are mandatory programs that are exempt from the annual appropriations process.

You’ll be able to fly and take trains during a government shutdown, but you might experience more delays. That’s because air traffic controllers and Transportation Security Administration agents are among the government employees who would be expected to show up for work without getting paid. The longer a shutdown drags out, the more likely it is that the system will strain and workers will call in sick.

A federal shutdown won’t ground firefighters, but could slow the money that pays for future disaster prep.

National parks are open, but you won’t be able to access the full range of services they provide. The Interior Department is planning to keep the gates open and retain enough parks employees to clean bathrooms and dispose of garbage through the shutdown. Visitors centers are expected to close, however, and the National Park Service may restrict access if safety becomes an issue.

San Francisco Officials Respond to Trump Telling US Generals: ‘We’re Under Invasion From Within’

California elected officials reacted with concern on Tuesday to President Donald Trump’s threat to send troops to Democratic strongholds like San Francisco and other major cities to fight what the commander-in-chief called a “war from within.”

Sydney Johnson, KQED

Speaking to a highly unusual gathering of top U.S. military officials in Virginia, Trump called on generals to defend the country against an internal invasion. He suggested using Democratic-led cities as “training grounds” for the National Guard.

The president’s comments quickly drew condemnation from Democratic leaders, including Gov. Gavin Newsom and state Sen. Scott Wiener, as well as immigration advocates across California.

In August, Trump called out San Francisco as one of the cities he’d like to “clean up” by sending in the National Guard. The president’s speech on Tuesday, however, was the first time Trump publicly alluded to cities such as San Francisco, Chicago, New York and Los Angeles as war zones, according to the Washington Post, and directed military officials to be “a major part” in fighting on the ground.

ENVIRONMENT

For the first time in human history, Calif.’s glaciers will soon disappear

Scientists recently discovered that California’s glaciers are thousands of years older than previously thought, but the glaciers are projected to disappear between 2050 and 2100.

Julie Brown Davis, SF Chronicle

California may be known as the Golden State, with its shimmering beaches and warm Mediterranean climate. But clinging to the rooftop of the High Sierra are the last remnants of glaciers that have existed for thousands of years, since the end of the last Ice Age. The Sierra Nevada was carved by glaciers, but scientists previously thought glaciers largely went away as the ice receded. A new study published this week, however, found that glaciers have existed in the Sierra Nevada since the Ice Age and for thousands of years before humans set foot in North America.

Humans have never before experienced an ice-free Sierra Nevada, the study states. But that day is coming soon.

Study finds Berkeley ordinance leads to healthier foods at checkout

Berkeley’s new ordinance has led to significant reductions in the sugar, sodium and saturated fat contents of food checkout products, according to a study.

Emily Wong, Daily Cal

A recent study was conducted on the impact of the Healthy Checkout Ordinance, a Berkeley policy prohibiting checkout products containing more than 5 grams of added sugar and 200 milligrams of sodium that took effect in 2021. This study found a 70% reduction in added sugars, 53% drop in sodium and 41% decrease in saturated fats in checkout products within a year of the policy’s implementation.

The study — conducted by researchers from UC Davis, UC Berkeley and the University of Illinois, Chicago — also found a 47% increase in fiber within checkout products.

The ordinance is having its “intended effect” of “improving the healthfulness of foods at checkout,” according to Alexandria Reimold, one of the study’s researchers and a UC Davis Department of Human Ecology postdoctoral scholar.She added that due to the policy, shoppers now have healthier options that may make it easier for them to “make healthy choices.”

Contra Costa County first U.S. county to ban junk food at checkout

The Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted Tuesday to approve a first-in-the-nation countywide policy requiring large retail stores to stock only healthier foods and beverages in checkout areas.

The Richmond Standard

The law applies to retailers over 2,000 square feet in unincorporated areas of the county. Currently, about 40 retail food stores in unincorporated Contra Costa exceed that threshold and are subject to the ordinance. Affected stores will need to ensure that foods within three feet of registers or in checkout queues meet basic nutrition standards. No more than five grams of added sugar and 200 milligrams of sodium per serving are allowed. Gum and mints must contain no added sugars. Beverages must have no added sugar or artificial sweeteners.

Newsom signs legislation to bolster fusion, quantum technologies

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday signed into law legislation that is aimed at advancing the state’s position in fusion and quantum technologies, a move lawmakers see as a key in keeping California at the forefront of global innovation.

Rick Hurd, San Jose Mercury News

The announcement came just three days after Fremont-based energy startup company Pacific Fusion announced that it will build its new $1 billion nuclear fusion site in Albuquerque, N.M., spurning Bay Area bids from both Livermore and Alameda.

Under one of the pieces of legislation Newsom signed — Assembly Bill 940, authored by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, D-Oakland — the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development will publish a strategy that aligns with the state’s economic blueprint to grow the quantum economy in regions throughout the state.

Senate Bill 80 creates an initiative that will distribute $5 million toward advancing research and development into fusion energy. Newsom said his goal is to deliver the world’s first fusion energy pilot project in the state by the 2040s and have 100% clean energy in the state by 2045. State Senator Anna M. Caballero (D-Merced) authored the bill.

AND IN FILM

‘One Battle After Another’ Revives Pynchon’s ‘Vineland’

Paul Thomas Anderson’s new action film draws from the California novel.

Tom Zito, Alta

This new film, which the director says was “inspired by” Pynchon’s Vineland, is a different animal altogether: If the novel, published in 1990, was a glance back at Nixon’s War on Drugs and the ensuing Reagan-era clampdown on dissidents, Anderson has turned it into a frightening, snatched-from-the-headlines look at the contemporary American police state, with local cops and federal forces working together everywhere, focused almost exclusively on rounding up and shipping off immigrants. It’s all the more amazing because shooting was finished well before the elections and this year’s commencement of Trump Term Two.

Although there are diversions to surfer-rich Southern California and flashbacks to seamy bits of Japan, most of Vineland’s telling takes place in its mythical eponymous town, set among the ancient redwoods near Humboldt County.

In Anderson’s telling—and he changes all the names—One Battle After Another becomes a very sweet father-daughter...rom-com is not quite the right word, but it’s clear they love each other, and there are constant laughs. Leonardo DiCaprio is Bob Ferguson—a retired revolutionary, to the extent you can ever retire from that life—who’s had greatness thrust upon him in the form of a daughter, Willa, played by newcomer Chase Infiniti.

INSURANCE

California FAIR Plan seeks huge rate hike. Map shows which ZIPs hit hardest

The FAIR Plan, a last resort insurance option being used by an increasing number of California homeowners, is requesting a 35% rate increase.

California FAIR Plan’s requested rate increase

Megan Fan Munce, SF Chronicle

Individual homeowners could see a range of impacts, above or below the average. About half of all customers would see an increase of 40% to 55%. Rates for some would decrease as much as 78%, while four policyholders’ rates would increase more than 300%. If approved, the new rates would go into effect at customers’ next renewal date after April 1.

A spokesperson for the FAIR Plan said the biggest factor influencing how consumers’ rates will change is their wildfire risk. Rates would generally go down in low-risk areas such as the Central Valley, but those in high-risk areas including Sonoma County and the Sierra Nevada foothills would be hit by large increases. Discounts are available for homeowners who perform work to reduce wildfire risk on their properties.

The FAIR Plan was created by the Legislature but is a privately run insurer offering coverage to those who cannot get it on the regular market. A FAIR Plan policy covers damage from fire, but nothing else — requiring policyholders to get a second policy elsewhere to cover liability payments, water damage and other typically covered damages. Between the cost of these two policies, many homeowners who switch to the FAIR Plan report paying double or more compared with what they used to on the private market, even with no recent rate hikes.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

Poll: 72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative

Do California cities have to fly the American flag?

The not-so-subtle connection between ICI and ‘Uncle Patrick’s Secessionist Breakfast’

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Texas v What? Debunking 5 big myths about secession

The High Price of Fear: California could defend itself for a fraction of the cost

Fire and Flood: Why California should control our own water system

Just 9 states make up more than half the U.S. population

Issue #244: Election fever underway

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 20:02:53 GMT

How exceptional do we want California to be?

Will the future of the golden state be golden?
UC needs state support to stand up to Trump
Beware of the (Pacific heat) Blob!

A LOOK TO CALIFORNIA’S FUTURE

Will California’s future be exceptional?

Panel discussion hosted by Zócalo Public Square, moderated by Joe Mathews

This program kicks off our series, “California 175 — What Connects California?” On September 9, 1850, California was hastily admitted into the Union—just two years after the U.S. seized the former Mexican province in war. Since then, the Golden State has kept moving fast—and defined itself by being different from the rest of the world. So much so that a seminal 1949 book dubbed California “the great exception.”

Being exceptional cuts both ways. California is the most economically productive state in the Union—and the state with the largest unhoused population. It’s a leader in protest and progress, violence and healing, catastrophe and natural beauty, innovation and inequality. Its contradictions create instability and raise questions about the future. What do Californians want California to be? Zócalo Public Square presents a suite of free public programs across the state, bringing together leaders and thinkers from all walks of life to envision California’s next 175 years.

Imagining California 25 years from now: What will Golden State life look like in 2050?

Per ICI poll, quite a few Californians are ‘dreaming’ of grabbing the state out of the Union.

D.J. Waldie, CalMatters

What California will be in its bicentennial year of 2050 is subject to unpredictable conditions. The nation becomes ungovernable; the San Andreas rips; drought worsens in the Colorado River watershed; AI-driven technologies deliver worst-case scenarios: social isolation, broken economies, accidental war.

Absent these shocks, continuities will dominate California’s tomorrows. Demographic trends underway since 1990 will persist. Californians will be older, with a median age of nearly 42, up from a median age of 38 in 2025. Nearly one-quarter of us will be over 65, troubling the state’s image of youthful hedonism as well as the job market. Ethnic and political sorting will continue to send more Californians to red states and bring immigrants — in fewer numbers — to change the makeup of the political and civic organizations through which power is channeled. By 2050, nearly 50% of us will have Latino roots. The percentage of white non-Latinos will drift down to 25%. This realignment will likely bring a California-style Latino populism that disrupts conventional blue/red political binaries.

POLITICS: ELECTIONS ON THE RADAR

2025 special election voter guide

Proposition 50 is the sole measure on the statewide Nov. 4 special election ballot. If approved, California would temporarily set aside its nonpartisan citizen redistricting commission and adopt new congressional lines that favor Democrats for the next three election cycles.

CalMatters

All eyes are on California this fall as voters decide whether to approve Proposition 50, a partisan gerrymandering plan with significant stakes far beyond California’s borders — for control of the federal government, for President Donald Trump’s agenda and for Gov. Gavin Newsom’s national ambitions.

Will Gov. Newsom and Sen. Padilla swap jobs next year?

History has a warning as California’s top two politicians consider a risky switcheroo

Photo: AP, Marcio Jose Sanchez

Joe Mathews, Zócalo Pubic Square

Are Gavin Newsom and Alex Padilla going to swap jobs next year?

It’s a live political possibility. It’s also the big, undiscussed storyline behind all the media leaks that Padilla, California’s senior U.S. senator, is considering a run for governor next year.

If Padilla were to join the gubernatorial race, he’d become a favorite in a weak field of seven Democrats (currently led by former congresswoman Katie Porter, of Orange County) and two Republicans (a scandal-plagued county sheriff and a former Fox News host from England).

If Padilla were to win the governorship, he’d succeed the term-limited Newsom at the end of 2026.

This is when the swap would come in. As the new governor, Padilla would get to fill the open Senate seat—to appoint his own successor, who could serve for two years, until the 2028 election.

California 2025 Poll: Majority support proposition 50 in November special election

Governor Race 2026: Porter Maintains Support while Padilla May Struggle to Gain Traction

Emerson College Polling

A new Emerson College Polling survey of California voters finds 51% plan to vote in favor of Proposition 50 in the November special election, which would authorize temporary changes to congressional district maps. Thirty-four percent plan to vote no, and 15% are undecided. Support for Prop. 50 is higher among those “very likely” to vote in the November special election, 55% of whom plan to vote yes and 35% no.

In the 2026 Primary for Governor, former Representative Katie Porter leads with 16% support, followed by Republican Steve Hilton at 10%, Republican Sheriff Chad Bianco at 8%, and former U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra at 5%. A plurality of voters, 38%, remain undecided. Since August, support for Porter and Hilton has decreased by two points, respectively, while support for Bianco increased one point, and support for Becerra increased two points.

With Democratic U.S. Senator Alex Padilla added to the hypothetical ballot, Porter, Hilton, and Bianco each maintain their support, while Padilla receives 7%.

RESISTING TRUMP

Tom Elias: Less overt, Trump’s war on California continues

It’s not exactly the Hundred Years’ War, but Donald Trump’s undeclared “War on California” carries on this fall just as intently as ever.

Tom Elias, Davis Enterprise

No, it’s not as obvious as when he defied the governor and several judges to send National Guard and Marine troops by the thousands to quell a riot that wasn’t.

It isn’t merely that the count of California lawsuits against him is higher today than at the same point in his first presidential term. In some cases, Trump lets other Republicans carry his water and in others he is harming California more than other states with his nationwide moves, including the tariffs he has (possibly illegally) imposed on California’s largest trade partners.

These things will not likely knock California off its pedestal as the world’s No. 4 economy, just ahead of India and just behind Germany. For one thing, the large amount of rebuilding construction that will soon follow last January’s Los Angeles County firestorms will keep the cost of goods created here higher than before, suggesting a potential move up in the worldwide economic rankings.

But make no mistake, through a wide series of moves, Trump is doing what he can to make life less pleasant, more expensive and even less truthful for Californians than others.

Volunteer initiative launched to monitor ICE operations in L.A.

The Save America Movement is putting together ‘Liberty vans’ outfitted with trained camera crews to hold ICE operations accountable in Los Angeles.

Tara Nguyen, Los Angeles Magazine

Over the weekend, the Save America Movement (SAM) launched an initiative called “Operation Liberty” to have trained camera crews and volunteers keep an eye on ICE operations in Los Angeles.

The group unveiled three specialty vans, Liberty vans one, two, and three. All of which are outfitted with camera crews and staffed by trained volunteers, like lawyers, clergy, veterans, and videographers.

“Los Angeles will always stand with families under threat,” Mayor Karen Bass said at MacArthur Park for the Operation Liberty Rally on Saturday. “Angelenos are showing the country that when our communities are targeted, we respond with solidarity, with resources, and with an unbreakable commitment to justice.”

Teachers and unions fight back as UC campuses prepare to fuel Trump’s witch hunt

A coalition of University of California faculty, students, staff, and labor unions is suing the Trump administration.

Majorie Cohn, TRUTHOUT

Outrage flared last week about the University of California’s capitulation to this era’s resurgent McCarthyism, as news spread that the university has provided the names of at least 160 students, faculty members, and staff at the University of California, Berkeley, to federal officials who — under the guise of investigating “alleged antisemitic incidents” — are scrutinizing people who have expressed opposition to Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

A Truthout analysis of a voluntary agreement signed by the University of California and the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights nine months ago reveals that more such disclosures from other schools may be yet to come. In December 2024, after the election of Donald Trump but under the auspices of the outgoing Biden administration, the University of California promised to also hand over names of people who either reported or were the subject of allegations of discrimination at five other University of California campuses — UCLA, UC Santa Barbara, UC San Diego, UC Davis, and UC Santa Cruz.

As small farms face federal cuts, local food banks will take a big hit

Local food banks are about to lose a key source of fresh, local produce after the Department of Agriculture ended the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program or LFPA.

Erika Cruz Guevarra, Sarah Mohamad, Alan Montecillo, Jessica Kariisa, KQED

The program was a key source of revenue for small, local farms that played a major role in keeping people fed during the pandemic.

Small farms are absolutely vital and they are deeply embedded in their communities. During the pandemic when industrial supply chains broke down, when communities couldn’t rely on produce shipping from halfway around the world, many small farms stepped in to keep fresh food flowing to families and especially to families who are in low income communities.

Trump cuts threaten futures of 250,000 children of migrant farm workers: ‘We felt like crying’

The Migrant Education Program (MEP) is a federal initiative that supports children whose families move from place to place for seasonal agricultural work.

Isabeau Doucet, The Guardian

But the future of this safe haven for the more than 250,000 eligible migratory children and youth is now in jeopardy and could be slashed under the Trump administration. Trump’s 2026 budget, which is set to be debated by Congress this fall, proposes eliminating all funding for the MEP, a program that has been in place for nearly 60 years. (This budget is separate from the Republican budget bill passed this summer, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.)

The MEP was also thrown into chaos this summer, when the Trump administration abruptly froze nearly $7bn in congressionally approved education funds from the 2025 budget. The funds were eventually released in late July after a coalition of 24 states, including California, sued the Trump administration, and 10 Senate Republicans signed a public letter urging the White House to release them.

Nowhere would the impact of these proposed cuts be felt more than in California, where one out of three migrant students in the US lives. In California, the MEP serves nearly 80,000 youth ages three to 21, most of whom live in rural areas. In Monterey county, an agricultural region about two hours south of San Francisco, there are more than 10,000 students who are eligible for this support.

California’s anti-Trumpism will outlast Newsom

Many of the Democrats jockeying to replace Newsom are making Trump resistance a throughline of their campaigns, as a forum featuring five of the leading candidates showed Sunday.

Blake Jones and Dustin Gardiner, plus Melanie Mason, Politico

Xavier Becerra promised that, under his leadership, “we will not bend a knee” to Trump. Katie Porter emphasized that she first ran for Congress to “stop Donald Trump’s attacks on health care.” All five attendees, including Antonio Villaraigosa, Betty Yee and Tony Thurmond urged their Democratic colleagues on the Hill to force a government shutdown this week if they can’t draw health care concessions from Trump and Hill Republicans.

ENVIRONMENT

More California drivers are buying electric trucks

Electric vehicles comprised nearly a quarter of all new trucks sold in California last year, with manufacturers saying they offloaded 30,026 zero-emission haulers

Rachel Swan, SF Chronicle

The number signaled a fervor for everything from electric buses to Rivian’s wagon-style SUVs, to the recognizable Cybertrucks whose hard geometric design resembles a battleship from a 1980s video game.

“We’re rapidly replacing dirty diesel big rigs and buses with cleaner alternatives,” Newsom said in a triumphant statement, noting that California has outpaced its already aggressive goals for fuel conversion in the medium- and heavy-duty market. Sales figures for 2024 models were double the minimum target, marking an uptick for the fourth consecutive year. Since 2021, motorists have purchased more than 57,000 clean trucks.

“Sorry, President Trump,” Newsom jeered, “the future is here no matter how hard you bend the knee to China and sell out American workers.”

Drivers’ enthusiasm for plug-in trucks and buses marks a hopeful sign for the EV market in general, after it flatlined in the first quarter of 2025 — largely because people were shunning Tesla.

In New York, Newsom tries ‘filling the void’ left by Trump on climate leadership

Newsom lacks formal power over international relations. But as the governor of the country’s most populous state, he has used his influence to build climate partnerships across the globe.

Andres Kudacki/ AP

Sophia Bollag, SF Chronicle

The same day Trump insulted international leaders in his U.N. address, Newsom signed a nonbinding but symbolic agreement with Brazil promising collaboration between California and the South American nation to reduce carbon emissions.

It’s one of several similar agreements Newsom has signed with other countries since Trump took office and began dismantling the country’s policies aimed at fighting climate change. In recent months, Newsom has also inked agreements with Canada and Denmark.

In 2023, Newsom traveled to China for a trip focused on climate. He signed agreements with multiple local leaders and met with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Newsom, who has laid the groundwork for a presidential run in 2028, was treated in many ways like a president while on the trip.

Pacific ‘blob’ heat wave now spans an area the size of the US

From seabirds to sea lions, wildlife along the California coast are now facing “the Blob,” a massive marine heat wave that’s become a recurring anomaly since the early 2010s.

Sea temperatures, as measured in this NOAA image of the northern Pacific Ocean from September 22, 2025, are currently running up to 10° F above normal.

Olivia Hebert, SFGate

The oceanic phenomenon returned this past May, and it can have far-reaching impacts on marine life, leading to harmful algae blooms and massive animal die-offs.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s California Current Marine Heatwave Tracker, also known as the “Blobtracker,” the latest Pacific marine heat wave or blob — its official name is NEP25A — first formed in early May. By late July, it had grown to cover almost 8 million kilometers and around 3.1 million square miles.

Rachel Hager, a spokesperson for NOAA Fisheries, told SFGATE via email that the anomalous heat wave has grown “approximately the same size as the contiguous U.S.” She added it now ranks among the top three largest marine heat waves ever recorded in the northeast Pacific Ocean since monitoring began in 1982.

Californians support transitioning to clean energy, but - not paying more for it

Most Californians support the state’s goals for reducing greenhouse gases and the transition to renewable energy sources. But economic and political headwinds are limiting their endorsement of state policies and their participation in the changes needed to achieve these goals.

Mark Baldassare and Tani Cantil-Sakauye, Public Policy Institute of California

Over the past 20 years, the PPIC Statewide Survey has been tracking Californians’ attitudes toward climate change policies. Today, while we see continued support for issues related to the state’s energy transition, we also see growing concern.

Majorities of California adults (62%) and likely voters (69%) believe that the effects of climate change have already begun to happen. →
Two-thirds of adults (67%) and likely voters (66%) favor reducing greenhouse gas emissions to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030; slightly fewer favor all the state’s electricity to come from renewable energy sources by the year 2045 (62% adults; 60% likely voters). →
However, 59 percent of Californians are not willing to pay more for electricity generated by renewable energy sources. Half or more say that the current price of gasoline (52% adults) and the rising cost of natural gas and electric utility bills (55% adults) is a major problem personally for them. →
Today, fewer Californians believe that actions to reduce climate change will result in more jobs (35%; 45% July 2010) and more think they will result in fewer jobs (32%; 23% in July 2010) in the future. →

State leaders will need to factor in the economic realities faced by Californians today or they may confront dwindling support for a comprehensive energy transition in the state. Going forward, meeting the state’s goals of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and transitioning to renewable energy sources will require Californians to lend their voices to the decision-making process and participate in addressing the critical environmental issues facing their state.

HOMELESSNESS

Homelessness is dropping in California counties. But funding cuts could derail that progress

Experts worry liberal California will be blacklisted from federal homelessness dollars, effectively counteracting recent progress.

Marissa Kendall, CalMatters

California counties are reporting decreases in homelessness, suggesting the state is finally making progress in solving one of its most difficult and persistent problems.

But even as Gov. Gavin Newsom and local officials are celebrating, the money that made those wins possible is at risk of evaporating.

President Donald Trump’s administration this month tried to block organizations that don’t support its social agenda from accessing federal homeless housing funds — causing experts in the field to worry that politically liberal California could find itself blacklisted from crucial dollars.

Cuts to state homelessness funding are also on the horizon, and some local jurisdictions are pulling back funds as they struggle with their own budget deficits. That has counties, nonprofits and industry experts worried California’s homeless counts will soon go right back up.

EDUCATION

Making gains in gateway English and ESL through dual enrollment

Taking college courses while in high school—known as dual enrollment (DE)—gives students greater access to core subjects like English and math.

Rachel Yang Zhou, Hoyun Kim, Olga Rodriguez, Laura Hill, Eric Assan, and Daniel Payares-Montoya, public Policy Institute of California

Along with legislation, in the past few years California has invested nearly $700 million to support K–12 and community college districts to expand and support dual enrollment—and to help accelerate gains among historically underserved student populations such as Latino, Black, and first-generation students.

In this descriptive study, we explore the challenges and opportunities of using dual enrollment English and English as a Second Language (ESL) as a strategy to improve access to and success in college. It is important to note that our results show associations between participating in DE and improving student outcomes—not causal relationships. We find:

Each year, greater numbers of students take dual enrollment English.
The vast majority of dual enrollment English is at the transfer level. The vast majority (94%) of those students enroll in college composition courses that satisfy lower-division general education requirements for the University of California (UC) and California State University (CSU).
CCAP improved dual enrollment English among underserved student groups. The growth in CCAP English dual enrollees has powered the overall increase. Latino, Black, and first-generation students represent a larger share of CCAP than non-CCAP English participants.
English dual enrollees have better college outcomes than students who do not participate in dual enrollment at all. Among those who enroll in a community college after high school, students who took English courses through dual enrollment are more likely to fulfill the college composition requirement, earn higher college GPAs, and accumulate enough credits to be almost a year ahead of their peers who did not participate in dual enrollment by the end of the first year of college enrollment. They also complete associate degrees or transfer to four-year institutions at higher rates than their non-dual enrollment peers.
CCAP English dual enrollees have shown slightly greater improvements in college outcomes over time compared to non-CCAP English dual enrollees.
Dual enrollment ESL course offerings are much less common than dual enrollment English courses and are emerging in a variety of forms according to the needs and interests of the local community. Dual enrollment ESL participation has decreased in recent years, likely resulting from the fall-off in international immigration into California and decline in high school English Learner population.

Commentary: California needs to take a bolder stand for universities targeted by the White House

This a moment to stand up and fight. The University of California Regents must challenge the Trump administration in federal court. At the same time, Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state legislature must provide the UC system with the financial support it needs to stand for the rule of law and academic freedom.

Blake Emerson, CalMatters

The university has the law on its side. My colleagues and I drafted an open letter to the UC Regents explaining why the funding terminations were unlawful. Over 170 professors at UC law schools have signed it. The Trump administration has ignored the clear procedural requirements of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 — such as the requirement that it provide for a hearing before an impartial decisionmaker before terminating funds, report to Congress and offer substantial evidence for its charges.

These days the law is not always enough. Since the government has failed to provide due process, universities reasonably fear that failure to comply will only bring on more deadly funding cut-offs, and perhaps other forms punishment, such as loss of nonprofit status.

Given this climate of fear, the university and the state will need to partner to challenge the government’s illegal persecution. Newsom has already urged the regents to fight back against the Trump administration, asking, “How could you possibly accept this fine. Fine for what?”

He’s right. But the university receives over $17 billion a year in federal funding, including $5.7 billion for research and program support. It would struggle to survive, much less maintain its status as a world-class research and educational institution, if all of those funds were withdrawn.

Newsom and the state can help. Democratic lawmakers in California have proposed a ballot measure that would provide for $23 billion in funding for state grants for research. The proposal would leverage California’s unparalleled economic strength to check the Trump administration’s lawlessness.

Let’s sing along: Down West performing The Land of California

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

Poll: 72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative

Do California cities have to fly the American flag?

The not-so-subtle connection between ICI and ‘Uncle Patrick’s Secessionist Breakfast’

The Drain (podcast): California Independence, with Coyote Marin of the Independent California Institute

Texas v What? Debunking 5 big myths about secession

The High Price of Fear: California could defend itself for a fraction of the cost

Fire and Flood: Why California should control our own water system

Just 9 states make up more than half the U.S. population

Issue #243: The Trump effect on education & health

Mon, 22 Sep 2025 21:04:40 GMT

ICI Executive Director Coyote Marin discusses the results of our most recent poll and its implication for federalism. Click here or listen on your favorite podcast player

COW: Joining hands with our neighbors to resist
Check out discussion of California’s options on the Pacific Time podcast
Diversity: We’re #1!

SECESSION ON THE MARCH

Pacific Time Podcast episode 26: Do Californians want autonomy?

A recent survey shows that Californians want autonomy—what does this mean?

In this episode, Greg talks with Coyote Marin, co-founder and executive director of the Independent California Institute, a nonprofit think tank focused on educating Californians about their relationship with the federal government. Unlike advocacy groups, Coyote’s organization doesn’t push a single path forward—it lays out facts, options, and tradeoffs so Californians can decide for themselves.

We explore new survey data showing strong support for California gaining special autonomous status within the U.S.—and a surprising amount of openness to peaceful secession. They discuss why autonomy polls higher than full independence, what it means to be a “donor state,” and how Californians might rethink the federal government as a costly (and morally compromised) middleman between taxpayers and the services they depend on.

This is a conversation about sovereignty, pragmatism, and possibility—not about destroying America, but about building a California that works better for Californians.

California secession now?

Casey Coss, Local News Pasadena

Per ICI poll, quite a few Californians are ‘dreaming’ of grabbing the state out of the Union.

The state’s independence sentiment is evident in a recent poll by the San Diego-based and ironically named Independent California Institute, stating more than 60 percent of Californians agree that they “would be better off if California peacefully seceded from the U.S. at some point in the next 10 years.” The controversial poll found substantial majorities “want California to form a commission dedicated to secession; to use its border stations to check incoming autos for drugs, guns and other contraband; to seek ownership of federally owned land, and use hardball tactics in Congress, such as withholding votes on the federal budget to press for independence.”

So far, secession has been a bad bet, but perhaps the time has finally come.

Although we have good relations with all our land neighbors (Oregon, Nevada, Arizona and Mexico), militarily, California has the infrastructure for land, sea and air bases if necessary for our defense. However, all of these powerful resources that could serve as a foundation to launch a nation, are also powerful reasons that the United States would never give us our independence.

Mathews: California's new country is COW

COW stands for the alliance of three states — California, Oregon, and Washington — that is restoring institutions the Trump administration is dismantling.

Joe Mathews, Zócalo Public Square in VC Star

Earlier this month, COW announced the West Coast Health Alliance, through which the three states will create their own expert panel to govern vaccines and public health — since Trump’s Health and Human Services department is now run by anti-vax cranks.

And, with Trump gutting the U.S. Fire Service, California recently signed on to the Northwest Wildland Fire Fighting Compact, of which Oregon and Washington are pillars.

These new collaborations build on years of COW alliances. California, Oregon, and Washington have jointly protected reproductive rights and abortion access, collaborated in the COVID pandemic, and made pacts on trade, ocean health, climate change, and opioids.

Looking at all this collaboration, it’s natural to dream of California, Oregon, and Washington forming their own republic. Except that it’s too late to dream.

Californians need COW country now.

We need a new, free, and democratic republic because we are no longer part of one. The United States government has abandoned its constitution and morphed from a republic into what political scientists call “competitive authoritarianism” — autocracy with competitive elections. This dictatorial shift is the product of what the world’s leading democracy and electoral assistance organization, International IDEA, recently referred to as a “presidential coup.”

To be clear, California hasn’t seceded from the union. Rather, by canceling the republic, the U.S. regime — Trump and a compliant Supreme Court — have, for all practical purposes, kicked the Golden State out. Military occupation of peaceful cities, bankrupting of public universities, abducting our neighbors, and denying our fundamental rights effectively nullify the constitution upon which the republic once stood. The United States now treats California as a foreign land.

Without a country, California could fight to get back into the union, but why? That would mean living under an American tyranny that could last decades.

Conference: Will California’s future be exceptional?

Wednesday, September 24, 2025 6:30pm PDT, live or streaming on YouTube

This program is presented with generous support from Latino Community Foundation, the Karsh Family Foundation, and Snap Foundation

California is the world’s most exceptional province. It has the economy of a superpower nation (only China, Germany, and the U.S. have greater GDP). The state is home to the most powerful tech companies in the universe, the Earth’s top exporter of entertainment, and a fountain of new trends, new foods, new business, and new culture. From the Big Mac to the smartphone, our innovations have been so widely embraced that the Golden State faces a quandary: By remaking the world in its image and with its images, California has made its exceptionalism everyone’s new norm.

This raises questions about its future. How can California and its institutions remain exceptional in the face of the leveling forces of climate change, rising authoritarianism, and AI? And even if California could stay exceptional, should it? Being such a uniquely dynamic and appealing place makes living in California expensive—and makes the state a political and economic target. Might surviving present and future dangers require California to curb its contrarianism and fit in?

Zócalo Public Square will convene two back-to-back panels moderated by Zócalo’s California columnist Joe Mathews to ask: How exceptional do we want California to be?

The first panel will start at 6:30 p.m. and feature expert voices in fields shaping California’s identity: business advocate and public affairs specialist Brooke Armour Spiegel, Caltech astrophysicist Konstantin Batygin, and immigrant rights advocate Yliana Johansen-Méndez.

The second panel will start at 7:15 p.m. and feature youth leaders who are inheriting the state: trans rights organizer, budget advocacy and policy expert Michaé De La Cuadra, community organizer and housing justice advocate Aidan Lin-Tostado, and Tongva, Chumash, and Xicano artist and environmental advocate Isaac Michael Ybarra.

CALIFORNIA AND IMMIGRATION

Newsom signs laws to resist Trump’s immigration crackdown, including ban on masks for ICE agents

Gov. Gavin Newsom today signed a set of bills meant to check the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown in California, including a first-in-the nation measure to prohibit officers from wearing masks and others that limit their access to schools and hospitals.

Cayla Mihalovich and Jeanne Kuang, CalMatters

Gov. Newsom signed laws meant to protect immigrants during President Trump’s extensive deportation program. Some of the measures raise constitutional questions and likely will be challenged.

Among Democrats, 91% felt enraged or sad. Conversely, 65% of Republicans felt hopeful, “like justice is finally being served.”

The new laws echo the “resistance” measures California adopted during the first administration, when it passed a so-called sanctuary law to limit local law enforcement from cooperating with immigration agents, among other policies.

“Immigrants have rights and we have the right to stand up and push back,” Newsom said at an event in Los Angeles where he signed the legislation.

President Trump promised a historic deportation effort and assault on sanctuary-style policies when he took office for the second time. His administration criticized the state’s new immigration laws even before Newsom signed them.

HEALTH ON THE LINE

California bill protects vaccine regulation from federal interference

California lawmakers in 2025 have taken a decisive step to protect the state’s vaccine regulations and public health policies from potential federal interference, particularly in response to shifting federal vaccine guidance and rising misinformation campaigns.

Josh Friedman, CalCoast Times

California faces challenges from federal attempts to weaken vaccine mandates, promote personal or religious exemptions, and politicize vaccine safety conversations. This environment has created confusion among healthcare providers, patients, and insurers, risking the rollback of progress on diseases once considered controlled.

To counter these threats, California enacted a robust bill—referred to as SB 144—that enshrines state authority over vaccine regulations, aligns policies with scientific consensus, and protects providers offering vaccines under California law. The bill’s objectives crystallize into several core components:

State Sovereignty on Vaccine Policy: It affirms California’s right to set vaccine schedules and mandates without federal override.
Evidence-Based Standards: The bill mandates that vaccine recommendations follow guidance from respected scientific and medical bodies, like the American Academy of Pediatrics and the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), protecting against politically motivated changes.
Protection for Healthcare Providers: Physicians and clinics adhering to California’s vaccine policies are shielded from liability or administrative penalties resulting from conflicts with federal policy or misinformation campaigns.
Continued Vaccine Access: SB 144 guarantees Medi-Cal recipients retain unimpeded vaccine access consistent with state mandates, ensuring vulnerable groups remain protected.
Information Transparency: The bill encourages clear communication to Californians about vaccine safety, efficacy, and the importance of immunization, combating misinformation and restoring trust.

States can protect public health when the Feds do nothing

Governors in California, Oregon, Washington, and Hawaii plan to work together to create their own vaccine guidelines.

Suzanne Gordon, American Prospect

According to their initial press release, “President Trump’s mass firing of CDC doctors and scientists—and his blatant politicization of the agency—is a direct assault on the health and safety of the American people … California, Oregon, and Washington will not allow the people of our states to be put at risk.”

To mitigate this risk, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek, Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson, and Hawaii Gov. Josh Green have formed the West Coast Health Alliance, which will give residents of the four states “accurate information and evidence-based public health recommendations about vaccines and public health.”

While this new alliance is an important and much-needed first step as the nation confronts federal policies that could jeopardize the health and well-being of millions of Americans, this kind of state action is not unique—at least not for California.

In the 1980s, when the world faced the emerging AIDS epidemic, the federal government, led by President Ronald Reagan, promoted public-health policies that seemed to be guided by ideology and prejudice rather than scientific evidence. In the face of government resistance and inaction, California launched novel and wide-ranging public-health programs designed not only to gather and distribute accurate information about AIDS, but also to find treatments and a cure. More than 40 years later, California’s initiatives of the 1980s to combat HIV/AIDS offer useful lessons—that some California leaders of today may have forgotten—about how states can counter dangerous federal policies and take the lead in protecting public health.

COVID vaccine now universally available in California

A recommendation by Western states allows anyone over 6 months old to get a COVID-19 shot. California insurance providers will have to cover the cost.

Esther Kaplan, The Oaklandside

California and four other Western states announced new recommendations today guiding who should be vaccinated for COVID-19, saying they sought to counter a “vacuum left by the Trump Administration’s chaos and politicization of science.”

The new recommendations, issued by the West Coast Health Alliance, encourage all residents, except those under six months, to receive the COVID vaccine, especially toddlers up to 23 months old; adults over 65; anyone who’s pregnant or trying to get pregnant; and anyone else who has a risk factor, such as asthma or diabetes.

The recommendations, announced by Governor Gavin Newsom along with governors Tina Kotek of Oregon, Bob Ferguson of Washington, and Josh Green of Hawaii, follow those of major medical organizations including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the American Academy of Family Physicians. They were issued a day before a panel of CDC advisers were due to begin meeting to review recommendations for vaccines, including COVID.

How Federal funding cuts threaten the health of Californians

Overview of H.R. 1 Impacts on Medi-Cal Health Coverage

Adriana Ramos-Yamamoto

California has a strict vaccine mandate. Will it survive the Trump administration?

A federal effort is building to give parents the right to opt out of school vaccinations for religious or personal beliefs. California is one of just five states with statutes that do not allow families to request any kind of non-medical exemption.

Jenny Gold, LA Times

California is one of just five states that bans any non-medical exemptions, the result of a landmark 2015 law passed in the wake of the Disneyland measles outbreak. Connecticut, New York, Maine, and West Virginia have similar statutes.

The law is credited with bringing California’s rate of kindergartners vaccinated against the measles to 96.1% in the 2024-25 school year, up from 92.6% in 2014-15, even as the national rate declined. California is one of just 10 states with a kindergarten measles vaccination rate that exceeds the 95% threshold experts say is needed to achieve herd immunity.

Key actions to allow for vaccine exemptions include:

Legislation introduced in Congress last month would withhold federal education funding from states without religious exemptions.
A letter from the Department of Health and Human Services threatened to withhold federal vaccine funding from states that have any form of religious freedom or personal conscience laws but do not allow exemptions to vaccines. The move is “part of a larger effort by HHS to strengthen enforcement of laws protecting conscience and religious exercise.”
Several lawsuits winding their way through the courts from parents — including in California — seek the right to a religious exemption, which may eventually come before the Supreme Court.

Legal experts say that taken together, these moves reveal a concerted effort to chip away at limits states like California have placed on parents’ ability to send their unvaccinated children to school.

Threats are also mounting from Washington, D.C. The GRACE Act, which was introduced in Congress last month by Rep. Greg Steube (R-FL), would withhold federal education funding from any state that does not offer parents the right to opt out of vaccines for religious reasons.

The bill, if eventually approved and signed into law by President Trump, would also explicitly prevent states, including California, from requiring any documentation from parents to prove a sincere religious conviction against vaccines.

Inoculating California’s vaccine laws against RFK Jr.

Anyone who was worried that RFK Jr. was going to bring his past anti-vaccine rhetoric to the administration is sweating right now. And no, it’s not just Covid.

Lindsey Holden, Politico

The Legislature has been pursuing different ideas to remove RFK Jr.’s influence from state vaccine laws. Right now, lawmakers are jamming through a bill that would freeze vaccine recommendations and insurance coverage requirements at what they were on Jan. 1 of this year.

They’re also trying to update state laws to remove all references to the vaccine committee, ACIP, and move that authority to the State Department of Public Health. Recommendations for which shots kids get at school and which ones seniors are offered at inpatient facilities will now flow through state public health authorities, not federal ones.

COVID rising fast in California, fueled by new ‘Stratus’ variant tied to Omicron

COVID-19 is once again climbing to troubling levels in California — a worrying trend as health officials attempt to navigate a vaccine landscape thrown into uncertainty by delays and decisions from the Trump administration.

Rong-Gong Lin II, Los Angeles Times

Public health departments in Los Angeles and Santa Clara counties have reported jumps in the coronavirus concentrations detected in wastewater in recent weeks. L.A. County also has reported a small increase in patients hospitalized with COVID.

The rise in COVID comes as the Trump administration has delayed the rollout of the updated vaccine for the fall. Last year, the federal government had fully green-lighted the annual reformulation of the vaccine by June, in time for a rollout that began in September.

This year, however, the Department of Health and Human Services led by vaccine skeptic Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has in effect delayed the rollout of this fall’s COVID shot.

The California Department of Public Health also warned that because the federal government hasn’t made decisions on licensure approvals and recommendations, “availability and timing of specific COVID-19 vaccine products may be more limited and occur on a later schedule.”

“We’re in an unfortunate limbo, created by an administration that’s uncommitted to vaccines, between the slow shutting down of ’24–’25 vaccine availability and access to the ’25–’26 version,” Willis wrote in the Your Local Epidemiologist in California blog.

THE BATTLE OVER EDUCATION

UC faculty escalate court battle against Trump efforts to reshape higher education

University of California faculty groups are escalating their pushback against the federal government’s efforts to reshape higher education, demanding access this week to a settlement proposed by the Trump administration that they say is part of an effort to exert control over universities.

Kate DeBenedetti, KQED

In August, the Trump administration moved to freeze hundreds of UCLA research grants totaling roughly $500 million over allegations that the school ignored antisemitism on campus. Federal officials said universities, including UCLA, Columbia and Harvard, have fallen into a “decades-long woke-capture” spearheaded by Democrats.

The administration’s proposed settlement agreement in exchange for releasing those funds includes a $1.2 billion fine — the largest the Trump administration has requested from a university so far. According to reports from the Los Angeles Times and others, it was also accompanied by nonmonetary demands that would radically remake the university “in a conservative image.”

While national news outlets say they have viewed the administration’s lengthy list of demands and reported on their broad strokes, faculty members say the UC Board of Regents is refusing to share the document, hampering their ability to fight the proposed changes.

This week, in addition to suing the Trump administration over the proposed settlement, UCLA’s faculty association and the Council of University of California Faculty Associations sued the regents for declining a public records request for Trump’s demand letter.

It’s not just UCLA. UC president warns of Trump push into all campuses and hospitals

The University of California’s top leader warned Monday that the federal government’s $1.2-billion fine and sweeping proposals to remake UCLA are “minor in comparison” to what could hit the entirety of the nation’s premier university system of campuses, hospitals and clinics.

Jaweed Kaleem, LA Times

“As we consider the unprecedented action against UCLA, it is important to keep in mind that the federal government is also pursuing investigations and actions in various stages against all 10 UC campuses,” UC President James B. Milliken said in a Monday letter. “So, while we are first focused on the direct action involving UCLA, we must also consider the implications of expanded federal action.”

The “investigations and actions” range from Trump administration allegations of the illegal use of race in admissions — at Irvine, Berkeley and San Francisco campuses — to civil rights complaints lodged with the Department of Education by Jewish and other community members at UCLA, Davis, San Diego and Santa Barbara campuses. There is also a UC-wide investigation alleging the system discriminates against Jews in hiring, retention and promotion.

Milliken said “the threat that looms” could lead to further layoffs, budget reductions, federal grant suspensions and cuts to the university, California’s second largest employer.

He released his message after The Times on Monday published in an article detailing a wide-ranging 28-page settlement proposal the government sent to UCLA last month. In addition to the fine, the Department of Justice seeks to drastically overhaul campus practices on hiring, admissions, sports, scholarships, discrimination and gender identity.

UC has not agreed to the proposal, which represents the government’s first volley as it seeks to overhaul many of UCLA’s policies and culture to adhere to President Trump’s conservative higher education agenda.

‘Bipartisan, common sense, science-based’: California leads the way in banning ultra-processed school meals

Experts hope that a ‘California effect’ will push other states to ban UPFs, similar to its law against six synthetic food dyes

Cecilia Nowell, The Guardian

California has long led the way on school meals. In 2022, it became the first state in the country to make school meals free for all students, regardless of income. Many districts have implemented farm-to-school programs to bring local foods into the cafeteria. And last year, months before the “Make America healthy again” movement would make its way to the White House, it became the first state in the nation to ban six synthetic food dyes from school meals.

This week, it passed legislation that will put it in the lead on school meals in yet another way – banning ultra-processed foods. On Friday, California lawmakers passed a bill that will define, and then ban, ultra-processed foods from school meals. The legislation, which must now be signed by the governor, Gavin Newsom, is believed to include the first statutory definition of ultra-processed foods in the world.

Although nutritionists have been talking about UPFs for more than a decade, the US health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr – a longtime pseudoscience proponent – made them a household term through his “Make America healthy again” coalition. While the federal government has yet to take any significant steps to rein in UPFs – Kennedy’s rhetoric, and growing concerns over the safety of the food supply, have spurred more states to begin assessing ways they can limit UPFs.

But much of that work began in California. In 2023, the legislature passed a first-in-the-nation law, also sponsored by Gabriel, to ban four chemicals already prohibited in the European Union and other nations.

California faces federal funding cuts for special ed teachers; DEI targeted

California is about to lose federal funds used to train special education teachers after the U.S. Department of Education announced it will cancel over two dozen grants nationwide. The state will lose roughly $3.5 million in the coming year in special education teacher preparation grants for underserved communities.

Vani Sanganeria, EdSource

Trump administration officials terminated four California programs under Part D of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, based on “project activities” that reference diversity, equity and inclusion, which “conflict with the Department’s policy of prioritizing merit, fairness, and excellence in education,” according to a list of cancellations obtained by Education Week.

Funds from the cancellations, effective Oct. 1, will be redirected toward “more preparation grants,” the department said, but did not specify which ones. Existing programs, such as resource centers for families of children with disabilities, will receive paperwork with new conditions to ensure they “reflect this administration’s priorities.”

Of the total grants slated for cancellation, the federal Department of Education cut $2.3 million in funds appropriated for each year of special education teacher training programs in California. Recipients for these funds include the California Department of Education, whose grant was terminated because of a commitment to “hiring staff at all levels who are reflective, and representative of the communities served,” and San Diego State University, whose grant was canceled because of a goal “to increase the diversity of the enrolled candidates.”

More California students applied for FAFSA despite troubling circumstances

A 2021 law encouraging high school seniors to apply for financial aid and targeted regional outreach could be behind the increase.

Amy Dipierro, EdSource

On top of the typical anxieties of the college application season, California’s high school class of 2025 had some unusual hurdles to clear.

First, there was the two-month delay in when the 2025-26 Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) form was available to students and their parents. Then, devastating wildfires in the Los Angeles area that disrupted so many lives. And later, worries about student data privacy and immigration enforcement that could tear apart some families.

But this week, the California Student Aid Commission (CSAC) unveiled data suggesting many students hoping for college admission were not discouraged by those potentially daunting circumstances. Public high school students’ applications for state and federal aid rose 11% year to year, the commission reported, a partial recovery following the tumultuous and delayed rollout of the 2024-25 FAFSA. That meant an extra 33,300 applications for a total of nearly 340,000 statewide.

California’s $23 billion plan to restore Federal cuts to scientific research

Democrats are calling for the creation of a state equivalent of the National Institutes of Health, but first state lawmakers and then voters would need to approve it.

Shawn Hubler and Alan Blinder, NY Times

The move follows California, Washington and Oregon’s announcement that they would form a health alliance to review scientific data and make vaccine recommendations for their residents, in an attempt to bypass vaccine skeptics in the Trump administration.

The plan to back scientific research calls for lawmakers to pass, and for voters to approve in a 2026 ballot measure, a proposed $23 billion in bonds, financing that will allow the state to make grants and loans to universities, research companies and health care organizations.

It would be the largest state effort of its kind, and is considerably more aggressive than one floated in Massachusetts in July, when Gov. Maura Healey made a $400 million proposal for research there.

Thousands call out UC leaders following UC Berkeley’s ‘capitulation’ to federal government

Numerous coalitions of the academic community — at UC Berkeley, statewide and globally — have banded together to express concern toward recent UC compliance with President Donald Trump’s administration and to urge that they not capitulate further.

Eleanor Dalton, Daily Cal

A number of letters have been publicly issued and addressed to various UC officials. Multiple came in response to last week’s release of documents containing personally identifiable information of roughly 160 campus students, staff and faculty to the federal government.

Another came after learning that “secretive negotiations” had begun between the Trump administration and the UC Board of Regents earlier this month, said Amanda Goldstein, a UC Berkeley associate professor of English.

The latter, addressed to the members of the UC Board of Regents, was signed by more than 200 UC Jewish faculty as of press time, many of whom teach on campus.

Goldstein helped draft, edit and distribute the letter. She said, despite differing views among signatories on their definition and quantification of antisemitism, the letter asked that the Regents not make concessions in their name in the midst of negotiations with the federal government.

“Antisemitism is being used as an excuse to consolidate power over an institution that is inconvenient for an authoritarian regime, because it is a powerhouse of free inquiry, thought, dissent and research in the public interest,” Goldstein said.

On Sept. 15, several UC Berkeley Ph.D.s who now teach at a number of universities in Israel also issued a letter, this time to Chancellor Rich Lyons and UC President James B. Milliken.

“If universities are to survive this moment as free institutions and to preserve their critical role in democracy, then they absolutely must adhere to the letter and spirit of long-established law and norms,” the letter said. “Naming names in a new ideological witch hunt shames the university and undermines its foundations.”

A WORD ON CLIMATE

California will fare better than other states as Trump guts climate reporting rules

Trump’s EPA seeks to end a greenhouse gas reporting program that tracks 8,000 major polluting facilities across the country. Experts say California has its own greenhouse gas emission reporting program that could offer some protections at the state level.

Hayley Smith, LA Times

The EPA this year has also proposed rolling back more than 30 rules and regulations that govern air and water quality while simultaneously promoting oil and gas production. Among the proposed repeals is the so-called endangerment finding, which establishes that fossil fuel emissions pose a threat to human health and the environment.

California, however, may be better prepared to weather the storm than other states.

The California Air Resources Board — a major state agency under the umbrella of the California EPA — administers its own state-level greenhouse gas reporting program that in some ways exceeds that of the federal one that is now on the chopping block. State officials said the federal government’s decision will not have any effect on the state’s long-standing program.

“An end to the national program for collecting greenhouse gas data will not stop climate change impacts from happening, impacts like the fires in L.A. earlier this year and the floods in Texas,” CARB spokesman Dave Clegern said in an email. “U.S. EPA must be leaning into the idea that if there is no data, there is no problem and therefore no need to act.”

What Native-held lands in California can teach about resilience and the future of wildfire

So far, surveys of the vegetation on these lands suggest that they could serve as places that sustain both flora and fauna as the climate changes.

Nina Fontana & Beth Rose Middleton Manning, The Conversation

Largely inaccessible for more than a century, and therefore so far of little actual benefit to those it is meant for, this land provides an opportunity for Indigenous people to not only have recognized land rights but also to care for their land in traditional ways that could help reduce the threat of intensifying wildfires as part of a changing climate.

In collaboration with families who have long been connected to this land, our research team at the University of California, Davis is working to clarify ownership records, document ecological conditions and share information to help allottees access and use their allotments.

Allotments are in a wide range of ecosystems, though more are in blue oak woodlands than any other single type of habitat. Images created by James Thorne, Ryan Boynton, Allan Hollander and Dave Waetjan.

Many of these allotments were remote – ecologically rich, yet hard to access. They were carved out of ancestral territories but often lacked access to infrastructure like roads, water or electricity. In some cases, allotments were separated from traditional village sites, ceremonial areas or vital water resources, cutting them off from broader ecosystems and community networks.

Because of their remoteness, many of these lands remained relatively undisturbed by human activity and are home to diverse habitats, native plants and traditional gathering places. And because they are held in trust for Native people, they present an opportunity to exercise Indigenous practices of land and resource management, which have sustained people and ecosystems through millennia of climate shifts.

We and our UC Davis research team partner with allottee families; legal advocates including California Indian Legal Services, a Native-led legal nonprofit; and California Public Domain Allottee Association, an allottee-led nonprofit that supports allottees to access and care for their lands. Together, we are studying various aspects of the remaining allotments, including seeking to understand how vulnerable they are to wildfire and drought, and identifying options for managing the land to reduce those vulnerabilities.

Allotments have a range of fire risk, though many are in very-high-risk areas. Images created by James Thorne, Ryan Boynton, Allan Hollander and Dave Waetjan.

So far, our surveys of the vegetation on these lands suggest that they could serve as places that sustain both flora and fauna as the climate changes.

DEMOGRAPHICS IN THE NEWS

California’s persistent poverty crisis: 2024 rates remain alarmingly high

California’s poverty rate remains among the highest in the nation (17.7%), with children, people of color, and renters most affected. Recent federal actions threaten to worsen these trends, highlighting the urgent need for bold state leadership

California Budget & Policy Center

California’s poverty rate, at 17.7%, continued to be the highest (alongside Louisiana) in the United States in 2024, with no tangible improvement from 2023. Racial poverty gaps also remain stark, with Black and Latinx Californians experiencing poverty at approximately ten percentage points higher than white Californians, according to new Census data. California’s poverty rate means that about 7 million state residents lacked the resources to meet basic needs last year — roughly equivalent to the populations of Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose, and San Francisco combined.

These figures reflect a troubling trend that began with the rollback of historic anti-poverty investments that were created to mitigate the harm of the COVID-19 pandemic —underscoring that poverty is a policy choice. Bold investments in the federal Child Tax Credit (CTC) and other economic security-promoting policies during the pandemic were associated with a historic drop in poverty in 2021. When Congress allowed these effective policies to expire, they immediately reversed progress, causing the largest increase in the national poverty rate in 50 years, and a significant spike in California’s poverty rate.

Recent federal and state cuts to life-saving programs will likely contribute to an even greater rise in poverty and increased economic inequality across California next year and beyond, unless policymakers take bold action to respond.

The most and least diverse states in America: See where California ranked

California ranks as the most diverse state in the nation. It leads the country in language diversity: while nearly 56% of residents speak only English at home, about 28% speak Spanish, and close to 10% speak an Asian or Pacific Islander language.

Chris Williams, Fox11 Los Angeles

The state also holds the second-highest level of racial and ethnic diversity. Nearly 35% of Californians identify as white, about 40% as Hispanic, more than 15% as Asian, and around 5% as Black.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

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Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative

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Issue #242: Time to start talking about "soft secession"

Fri, 29 Aug 2025 16:03:06 GMT

Nearly 50 people involved with the effort shared details with POLITICO about the tightly guarded process.

ICE continues to misbehave
California vs Texas: redistricting battle heats up
California inks broad climate deal with Denmark

REDISTRICTING WAR CONTINUES

How California bluffed its way into a redistricting war with Trump

Melanie Mason, Jeremy B. White, Shia Kapos, Dustin Gardiner and Aaron Pellish, AXIOS

When word got out that Texas might undertake an extraordinary mid-decade redistricting at Donald Trump’s behest, a handful of top California Democratic operatives floated an idea to Rep. Zoe Lofgren: Could California respond in kind?

Lofgren, the chair of California’s 43-member Democratic delegation, consulted in June with a trusted data expert who dismissed it as absurd — a foolhardy end-run around the state’s popular redistricting panel with no guarantee of yielding enough blue seats to fully offset Texas. Deterred by those misgivings, California Democrats instead spent weeks putting up a front, dangling the threat of a countermove without making any real plans to do so.

“It seemed to me worth a bluff,” Lofgren said. “If the Texans and Trump thought they’d go through all of this and they’d end up not gaining anything, maybe they would stop.”

“But they didn’t stop,” she added. “They just doubled down.”

So did California Democrats.

Is California really more gerrymandered than Texas? It’s complicated.

While California’s map clearly has a Democratic tilt, there are many Congressional delegations that are out of sync with their statewide partisan vote share.

Elena Shao and Nick Corasaniti, The New York Times Robert Mackey

Democrats control about 80 percent of California’s seats in the U.S. House but earned roughly 60 percent of the statewide vote in the 2024 presidential election, a more than 20 percent point disparity. Texas Republicans won 58 percent of the vote, yet hold 66 percent of the seats — an 8-point gap.

But this statistic, taken by itself, ignores several critical factors, like how voters are geographically sorted in a state; how close the elections were in some of those congressional districts; the importance of protecting the rights of voters of color; and the ability of a popular congressional incumbent to run against statewide trends.

The comparison between seat share and vote share is one of many useful, but imperfect, measures experts use to quantify gerrymandering, or the intentional distortion of political districts to give one party an advantage in elections.

In fact, different measures can produce very different pictures of gerrymandering. For example, by one metric, known as the mean-median difference, Texas districts favor Republicans more than California districts favor Democrats.

Obama calls California’s redistricting plan ‘a responsible approach

Former US president wades into national conflict over House maps, as Texas lawmakers approve map to favor GOP

Robert Mackey, The Guardian

Barack Obama waded into states’ efforts at rare mid-decade redistricting efforts, saying he agreed with California governor Gavin Newsom’s plan to counter the new Texas congressional map by launching an effort to redraw his own state’s map and create more Democratic-friendly districts, calling it “a responsible approach”.

“I believe that governor Newsom’s approach is a responsible approach. He said this is going to be responsible. We’re not going to try to completely maximize it,” Obama said at a Tuesday fundraiser on Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts. “We’re only going to do it if and when Texas and/or other Republican states begin to pull these maneuvers. Otherwise, this doesn’t go into effect.”

Obama also called Newsom’s strategy “measured”, as it only temporarily grants the California legislature the ability to redraw maps mid-decade.

While noting that “political gerrymandering” is not his “preference,” Obama said that, if Democrats “don’t respond effectively, then this White House and Republican-controlled state governments all across the country, they will not stop, because they do not appear to believe in this idea of an inclusive, expansive democracy”.

CALIFORNIA VS. ICE

Most California voters disapprove of Trump’s immigration enforcement policies, poll shows

Most California voters strongly disapprove of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies and believe that raids in the state have unfairly targeted Latinos, according to a new poll.

Andrea Castillo, Los Angeles Times

The findings, released Sunday, reflected striking emotional reactions to immigration enforcement. When voters were asked to describe their feelings about news reports or videos of immigration raids, 64% chose rage or sadness “because what is happening is unfair.”

Among Democrats, 91% felt enraged or sad. Conversely, 65% of Republicans felt hopeful, “like justice is finally being served.”

Such divisions were consistent across 11 questions about the administration’s overall immigration strategy and specific aspects of the way enforcement is playing out in the state, with divisions along partisan lines. The UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll was conducted for the Los Angeles Times.

Democrats almost unanimously oppose President Trump’s tactics on immigration, the poll showed. Most Republicans support the president, though they are not as united as Democrats in their approval.

The poll found that 69% of respondents disapprove of the way immigration enforcement is being carried out in the state.

Among Democrats, 95% disapprove, as well as 72% of voters with no party preference or others not affiliated with the two major parties, whereas 79% of Republicans approve.

California family demands answers after ICE agents shot at car

A San Bernardino family is calling for a criminal investigation after federal immigration agents fired at their car last week, an encounter that escalated into a tense standoff and days of protest in the neighborhood

Angelique Brenes, NewsNation

On Aug. 16, Francisco Longoria was driving home with his teenage son and his daughter’s boyfriend when, according to attorneys for the family, several masked individuals in mismatched uniforms jumped out of an unmarked vehicle and surrounded them. The family said they asked for identification but received no response. Without warning, one of the men smashed the driver’s side window and struck Longoria, who then drove away in fear. Moments later, shots rang out. At least three bullets struck the car door near where Longoria’s son was seated, the family’s attorneys said.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have confirmed that agents were involved in the incident but offered a different account. A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said Longoria refused to exit his vehicle and drove toward officers, injuring two. That, the spokesperson said, “forced a CBP officer to discharge his firearm in self-defense.”

No one in the family’s vehicle was struck by the gunfire.

LA ICE protests spurred US military to identify ‘hotels to avoid’ due to ‘harassment’

Organizers disrupted Trump’s immigration crackdown by targeting hotels where officers were staying, documents show

Sam Levin, The Guardian

When Donald Trump’s administration escalated immigration raids in Los Angeles earlier this summer, protest organizers responded with actions staged in an unusual setting: the hotels where immigration officers were staying.

Protests took place at several southern California hotels where Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents had been spotted. Some activists launched “No sleep for Ice” rallies, with chants and music blaring through the night, in hopes of pressuring the hotels to kick agents out.

Now, public records shared with the Guardian show that the protests indeed sent federal agencies scrambling to find hotels for their officers in LA where they would not be “harassed”.

A 16 June email from the US marines shows that military officials made a list of “LA Hotels to Avoid”. The information came from multiple law enforcement agencies who were tracking the community backlash to Ice and the border patrol, the marines said. The list was written by Army North, the domestic defense command deployed on the ground during the protests, and reviewed by the navy’s south-west division.

The documents, obtained by Property of the People, a government transparency non-profit, suggest protesters successfully disrupted Trump’s immigration crackdown by targeting hotels, though the extent of their impact is not clear from the records.

TRUMP TARGETS CALIFORNIA

Trump DOJ sues California over clean truck deal

The U.S. Department of Justice announced on Friday that it is suing California over its emission standards for trucks, escalating the battle over the state’s authority to set its own clean air standards.

Holly McDede, KQED

The DOJ filed two complaints in federal courts against the California Air Resources Board over a partnership the state inked with heavy-duty truck and engine manufacturers.

Through the Clean Truck Partnership, the Truck and Engine Manufacturers Association and other major truck manufacturers agreed in 2023 to meet the state’s vehicle standards that require the sale and adoption of zero-emissions technology. The manufacturers pledged to do so regardless of any legal challenges that might arise to the state’s authority to set more stringent emission standards.

Trump officials cut California sex-education funds over gender identity references

Move comes after state refused to remove gender identity, trans and nonbinary references from sex-ed curriculum

Carter Sherman, The Guardian

The Trump administration has terminated a grant that provided millions of dollars for a California sex education program after the state refused to remove all references to gender identity, transgender people and nonbinary people from its curriculum.

Advocates fear more states could lose more money in a burgeoning war between the Trump administration and supporters of comprehensive sex ed.

In June, the federal Administration for Children and Families warned California that it had 60 days to remove the references from the curriculum for the state’s Personal Responsibility Education Program (Prep), a federally funded sex-ed program that aims to prevent pregnancy and childhood STIs. It argued that such references were outside the program’s scope.

On Tuesday, California notified the Trump administration that it would not change its Prep curriculum, arguing that the materials were medically accurate, necessary to help prepare young people for the complexities of adult relationships and had already been approved by the Administration for Children and Families. Moreover, the letter argued, its materials were in line with the law, while the administration’s threat was not.

Trump sends troops to Newsom’s press conference

From President Trump’s first day back in office, he vowed to unravel California’s sway over the nation’s auto-emission standards by eliminating the state’s zero-emission mandates. He made good on that promise in the first several months of his second term.

Joan Walsh, The Nation

We’ve seen flashes of Trump administration fascism all over the country recently, from his takeover of the Washington, DC, police department and his National Guard deployment there to the ongoing arrests and removal of law-abiding immigrants with court dates at New York’s Federal Plaza, to raids at Home Depots and car washes in Los Angeles. On Thursday, though, there was a gratuitous display of federal muscle at a Los Angeles event that had nothing to do with crime or immigration: a press conference by California Governor Gavin Newsom and other state officials announcing plans to redistrict his state, and create more Democratic congressional seats, if the Texas GOP goes ahead with its plans to do the opposite.

Dozens of masked and armed Border Patrol agents turned up at the press conference, held at the Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo. Regional Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovino declared that his crew was making “Los Angeles a safer place, since we don’t have politicians who can do that. We do that ourselves.” Some of his men brandished rifles.

CALIFORNIA VS. MAGA

How California plans to boost EVs with no federal help

The symbolism of the Border Patrol’s gratuitous display wasn’t lost on the leadership of the Japanese American National Museum, where the event was held.

Tony Briscoe, Los Angeles Times

After a series of controversial congressional votes in May, Trump signed legislation that effectively nullified several of California’s auto-emission standards, including the state’s landmark regulation to ban selling new, gas-only cars statewide by 2035.

The “One Big Beautiful Bill,” which Trump signed into law in July, will end federal tax credits for zero-emission vehicles — up to $7,500 for car buyers — on Sept. 30. Because electric vehicles generally cost more than their gas-powered counterparts, government incentives were critical in encouraging Americans to buy cleaner cars. There is already a slump in statewide sales of electric vehicles.

Without the federal rebates and subsidies to support widespread adoption of electric vehicles, California will almost surely fall short of its greenhouse gas reduction targets and remain in violation of federal air quality standards. Unless, that is, Sacramento steps in, in a big way.

Gov. Gavin Newsom in June signed an executive order reaffirming California’s commitment to its emissions goals, and effectively sending state agencies back to the drawing board in light of a newly antagonistic federal government. Their task: to reassert California’s climate leadership and identify policies to boost zero-emission vehicle sales.

On Tuesday, state officials delivered an eight-page report to the governor’s office detailing several strategies to do just that.

Oklahoma proposes ‘America First Test’ for teachers from New York and California

The test is meant to filter out teachers who hold views “antithetical” to Oklahoma values.

Jonathan Wolfe, The New York Times

Oklahoma will require teachers coming from New York and California to pass a test to combat what it calls “woke indoctrination” before being hired, according to the state's public schools superintendent.

Its America First Test is designed to filter out teachers with views contrary to Oklahoma values, said Ryan Walters, the state superintendent. It is meant to ensure that educators promote American exceptionalism and help protect against what he called “radical gender ideology.”

“If you come to Oklahoma, you will abide by our state law, you will abide by our standards and teach those in the classroom,” said Mr. Walters, a Republican, in an interview on Tuesday.

The test, designed by PragerU, a conservative nonprofit, is the latest attempt by education officials in Oklahoma to push the state’s education system to the right.

Exactly how much do Republicans loathe California?

If you’re firing up the U-Haul to leave California — where you feel you have little in common with your neighbors and waning pride in your state — you’re most likely a Republican.

Lindsey Holden, POLITICO

Voters are sharply divided in their sense of kinship to fellow Californians, whether they’re pleased to be living in the Golden State and if they’ve considered moving away, according to the results of a POLITICO-Citrin Center-Possibility Lab survey of more than 1,400 registered voters.

The results paint a clear picture of the state’s red/blue divide.

Asked whether they feel proud to live in California, just 40 percent of Republican respondents said they agree, while 84 percent of Democrats said the same.

Fifty-one percent of Republicans surveyed feel they have a lot in common with other Californians, compared to 81 percent of Democrats.

And a whopping 80 percent of Republicans have sometimes thought about moving to another state, while just 44 percent of Democrats have considered skipping town.

These findings are in line with Republican narratives painting California as a place with out-of-touch, elitist leaders who care more about regulations and social issues than reducing the state’s high cost of living. A Public Policy Institute of California survey from February on residents moving out of state showed most of those polled cited practical concerns — housing, family and employment — as their primary reasons for leaving. But previous PPIC surveys have also noted conservatives consider jumping the Golden State ship more frequently than liberals.

POWER AND PRINCIPLE

It’s time for Americans to start talking about “soft secession”

Blue states are finally learning what red states have known all along: you don’t need federal permission to govern.

Chris Armitage, The Existential Republic

Behind closed doors, blue state leaders are planning. They’re war-gaming scenarios where federal agents show up and continue to transgress further and further past what is “legal.” Daily the courts are showing that that something is legal when Trump wants it to happen, and illegal when he doesn’t. How does a government function under these circumstance?

For many state Attorney Generals and Governors, the legal briefs are already drafted. The strategy sessions have been running since December. “We saw this coming, even though we hoped it wouldn’t,” former Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum told The 19th days after Trump’s inauguration.

This is what American federalism looks like in 2025: Democratic governors holding emergency sessions on encrypted apps, attorneys general filing lawsuits within hours of executive orders, and state legislatures quietly passing laws that amount to nullification of federal mandates. Oregon is stockpiling abortion medication in secret warehouses. Illinois is exploring digital sovereignty. California has $76 billion in reserves and is deciding how to deploy it. Three sources on those daily Zoom calls between Democratic AGs say the same phrase keeps coming up, though nobody wants to say it publicly: soft secession.

Not the violent rupture of 1861, but something else entirely. Blue states building parallel systems, withholding cooperation, and creating facts on the ground that render federal authority meaningless within their borders.

The infrastructure for this resistance already exists. Twenty-three Democratic attorneys general now gather on near-daily Zoom calls at 8 AM Pacific, which means the East Coast officials are already on their third coffee. They divide responsibilities and share templates for lawsuits they’ve been drafting since last spring.

Is America a democracy?

An interview with Osita Nwanevu, author of The Right of the People: Democracy and the Case for a New American Founding.

Nick Serpe, Dissent

Democracy became a watchword of U.S. center-left politics under the first Trump administration. Scholars debated terminology and sifted through the news for signs of backsliding, while pundits argued over the merits of a “pro-democracy” electoral strategy—which often amounted to little more than the idea that Trump was not normal, and the assumption that people just wanted to go back to how things were before he came to office.

In The Right of the People, Osita Nwanevu reexamines our commitment to democracy at a moment of growing threats to the existing constitutional order. Rather than enumerating the dangers of the second Trump administration, however, Nwanevu ranges over U.S. history and political philosophy to raise fundamental questions about our political system. What kind of government have we inherited (and amended) from America’s founders? When we seek to prevent Trump’s power grabs, what exactly are we trying to defend? And can democratic principles inspire us to something greater?

IN OTHER NEWS

Something deep in the Pacific is reshaping California’s weather. It may not stop anytime soon

A major ocean temperature index in the North Pacific has plunged to record low levels signaling a shift that tends to lock in coastal fog, delay California’s rainy season and reroute storms to the north.

Greg Porter, San Francisco Chronicle

New research suggests this isn’t just a temporary phase. The persistent sea surface temperature anomalies driving this cool phase pattern may reflect a longer-term shift in the Pacific’s ocean and atmosphere, one that climate change appears to be reinforcing.

The Pacific Decadal Oscillation, or PDO, is a long-term index that tracks sea surface temperature patterns in the North Pacific. The index shifts between warm and cool phases roughly every 10 to 30 years. In its warm phase, coastal waters off California are typically hotter and temperatures across the basin are more evenly distributed, causing conditions that weaken the marine layer and support wetter winters.

In a cool phase, near-shore eastern Pacific waters turn colder while the central and western Pacific warms, sharpening the temperature contrast across the basin. That contrast tends to strengthen the marine layer, delay the rainy season and reduce precipitation in Southern California and the Southwest.

This pattern generated the summer Californians have been living through, with a thick and stubborn marine layer, muted inland heat, and gray mornings that stretch well into the afternoon. The temperature contrast in the ocean enhances the inversion layer near the coast, allowing the marine layer to deepen and persist.

California and Denmark sign ‘comprehensive’ agreement on climate and tech

In a conference room high atop Salesforce Tower in San Francisco, looking out upon a sea of fog on Friday, officials from California and Denmark signed an agreement between the two governments focused on climate, technology and cybersecurity.

Laura Klivans, KQED

Underlying the press conference was a theme of inclusivity, which Gov. Gavin Newsom said “distinguished” California from the Trump administration.

“Our mindset is about encouraging people from all over the world to feel like they belong, they’re seen, they’re heard. It’s an economic strategy. And I feel like all those values are challenged at the moment,” Newsom said.

Officials said the memorandum of understanding will bolster commercial and research ties between the country and state, which would largely focus on green energy, sustainability and artificial intelligence.

“This is the most comprehensive kind of agreement we have made so far with any American state and we are extremely happy to do so,” said Lars Løkke Rasmussen, foreign minister and former prime minister of Denmark.

COVID rising fast in California, fueled by new ‘Stratus’ variant tied to Omicron

Rong-Gong Lin II, Los Angeles Times

This year, however, the Department of Health and Human Services led by vaccine skeptic Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has in effect delayed the rollout of this fall’s COVID shot.

ICYMI: ON OUR WEBSITE

Poll: 72% of Californians want police to arrest certain ICE agents

Poll: Californians ready to govern themselves, but slim majority would sink secession initiative