Antonio Villaraigosa

How to Resurrect California’s Republican Party

June 2, 2018 By Ed Ring 12 Comments

Anyone taking a look at California’s June 2018 state primary ballot would have plenty of evidence to suggest the Republican Party in that state is dead. For starters, California’s GOP has two credible candidates for governor, businessman John Cox and State Assemblyman Travis Allen, which in a normal state might be a good thing. But California’s Republicans are a super-minority party in an open “top-two primary” that pits them against at least two well-funded Democratic candidates, Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. Although Cox is polling better than Allen, they’re both likely to be aced off the ticket in November.

Worse, California’s Republicans have no viable candidate for U.S. Senate. The most recognizable candidate — indelibly listed as “Republican” on the ballot despite being kicked out of the recent GOP state convention — is Patrick Little, whose campaign website’s home page includes a “learn more” button on the topic of “How We Will End Jewish Supremacism.”

There is not one higher state office in California where a Republican has a realistic chance of victory. Nearly every position — lieutenant governor, attorney general, treasurer, controller, and state superintendent of schools — Democratic candidates are likely to win. The lone exception is insurance commissioner, where the respected Steve Poizner, who has already held that office as a Republican from 2007 to 2011, is now running as an independent.

California’s GOP Party Organization Has Failed

If you go to the California GOP website to view endorsements, you will see the party faithful failed to choose a gubernatorial candidate. This failure of leadership means that their two candidates, Allen and Cox, are likely to split the support of GOP voters, which increases the likelihood that neither Republican will advance to the general election. (Though current polling suggests Cox could squeak through.) Given the fierce determination of both these candidates, one might forgive the state GOP for not managing to make a selection.

But the state GOP’s failure to make endorsements, which are critical in open primaries where only the top two candidates advance, continues down the ticket.

For state treasurer, there is “no endorsement,” despite two Republican candidates on the ballot. For U.S. Senate, there is “no endorsement,” despite 11 Republican candidates on the ballot. That lapse renders it likely that the top Republican vote-getter in the race for U.S. Senate will be the candidate with the most name recognition — you guessed it, the loathsome Patrick Little.

For insurance commissioner, the state GOP apparently didn’t know what to do, since most of them realize former Republican Steve Poizner is a good choice. So instead of “no endorsement” showing up, they simply omitted that position from their list of endorsements. Why couldn’t the state GOP recruit and promote top candidates? Is there really any excuse for this, when there are still tens of thousands of highly successful men and women who are registered Republicans in California and would be good candidates?

When you look for leadership in California’s Republican party, you might consider the last candidate for governor who had a respectable showing: Meg Whitman. (The less said about Neel Kashkari, the better.) But Whitman just publicly endorsed a Democrat, Antonio Villaraigosa. With leadership like that, who needs enemies? Is Whitman a RINO? Is she a turncoat? Or, to be brutally honest, is she just recognizing the cold reality that California is a one-party state, so she wants to support the person she perceives to be the lesser evil?

Demographic Trends Favor the Democrats

If demographic trends and current voting patterns persist, California is going to be a one-party state for a very long time. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, among California’s “likely voters,” more whites are registered as Republicans, 39 percent, than Democrats, 38 percent. But “whites” are only 38 percent of California’s population, and that percentage is dropping fast. Among residents under 18 years old, excluding illegal aliens, whites are now barely 25 percent of California’s population. Why does this matter?

Because among likely voters, Latinos registered as Democrats (62 percent) far outnumber Latino Republicans (17 percent). Among blacks, the disparity is even greater—82 percent Democrat versus 6 percent Republican. Among Asians, where the disparity is less, the Democrats still have a nearly two-to-one advantage, 45 percent to 24 percent.

California’s Democrats successfully have tainted Republicans as racist ever since Governor Pete Wilson supported Proposition 187 in 1994. That citizens’ initiative, narrowly passed by voters then utterly decimated by liberal judges, would have—gasp!—denied taxpayer-funded public services to illegal immigrants. Ever since, any attempt to place realistic curbs on benefits for illegal aliens has been met with militant opposition by Democrats who control a supermajority in California’s legislature. California’s Democrats have played the race card with impunity.

In late 2016, when incoming President Trump proposed to deport criminal aliens, Democratic Assemblyman Ricardo Lara—now running for insurance commissioner—threatened to “fight in the streets” to preserve “the work we have done.” Democratic State Senator Kevin de León—now running for U.S. Senate against long-time incumbent Democratic Dianne Feinstein—frequently refers to “President Trump’s racist-driven deportation policies.” California attorney general Xavier Becerra has been quoted stating that “Trump was showing himself to be a racist in every respect.” Examples are endless. This November, California’s Democrats are going to make Patrick Little and Donald Trump the running mate of every Republican on every ballot in the state.

But will this work forever? Does California’s GOP have to stay dead? Will “people of color” continue to believe that California should be a one-party state?

Demographics Is Not Destiny

Eventually, California’s Democrats are going to go too far, because their policies are economically unsustainable. Gavin Newsom, the favorite to occupy the governor’s mansion in 2019, proposes a single-payer health care system for the state, something that would cost at least $200 billion a year, in addition to sowing chaos throughout California’s healthcare industry. Meanwhile, California’s Democrats propose to offer full health insurance coverage to illegal immigrants, spend tens of millions to provide free college tuition to illegal immigrants, in a state where taxpayers already fund over $25 billion per year to provide public services to illegal immigrants.

How long can this go on?

Objecting to these costly programs may attract accusations of racism, but growing numbers of Latinos, blacks, and Asians, along with white liberals, may eventually decide that Democrats no longer have the answer. All it will take is one major stock correction, or one more downturn in the historically cyclical tech industry, and California’s public finances will implode. All of a sudden, hundreds of billions in tax receipts necessary to sustain free health care, free tuition, and public-sector pensions, to say nothing of benefits for illegal aliens, will vaporize. Economic calamities that reach deep into the pocketbooks and tragically disrupt the lives of ordinary voters have a way of focusing the mind.

The GOP’s case in such times, and to prevent such times, is not abstruse. It goes like this: For decades, Democrats have told you that the most important issue in the world was protecting yourselves from white racism. But while you were voting for the people who kept telling you this, their government unions, controlled by Democrats, were destroying the public schools that might have provided your children with a useful education.

Their government bureaucracies, controlled by Democrats, were driving small businesses out of business with ridiculous, punitive regulations, forcing many of them to flee the state, denying you jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities.

Instead of investing in transportation and water infrastructure to enable a reasonable quality of life to long-time residents and new arrivals alike, Democratic politicians used taxpayers’ money to overpay the government employees, so that government unions would fund the Democratic Party.

The GOP’s case doesn’t end with exposing racism as a diversion from the real issues of economic growth. It also exposes extreme environmentalism, and the synergy between the environmental movement, the overbuilt public sector, and left-wing oligarchs.

For decades, these extreme environmentalists, all of them Democrats, prevented perfectly benign land development in a state literally sprawling with open space. They did this in the name of saving the earth, downplaying how the resulting real estate bubble pumped up government property tax receipts and goosed the returns for the real estate portfolios in government pension funds. They prevented private investment in cheap conventional energy—in particular, clean natural gas and nuclear power—so residents have to pay twice as much (or more) for electricity as people in other states. Democrats barred private investment in oil drilling and refining, and imposed automotive and fuel standards in conflict with the rest of the United States, so Californians pay substantially more at the gas pump.

A Pro-Growth Economic Opportunity Agenda for California

Turning California back into the land of opportunity isn’t that hard, since it still has the best universities, the best weather, and the largest, most diverse economy in America. And California’s GOP politicians can make it happen, by promoting a pro-growth agenda at the same time as they expose identity politics and extreme environmentalism for what they are — a gigantic scam that distracted voters from the real issues. Here is a pro-growth, economic opportunity agenda for California:

Education

Restore the balance in California’s colleges and universities so that the ratio of faculty to administrators is 2-to-1, instead of the current ratio that allows administrators often to outnumber teachers.

End all discrimination and base college admissions purely on merit. Expand STEM curricula so it represents 50 percent of college majors instead of the current 20 percent.

Enforce the Vergara reforms so it is easier to retain quality public school teachers and easier to fire the incompetent ones. Eliminate barriers to charter schools.

Criminal Justice

Restructure the penal system to make it easier for prisoners to perform useful public services. For example. along with working the fire lines during fire season, they could work all year clearing dead trees out of California’s forests. Use high-tech monitoring devices to reduce costs. Reserve current prisons only for the truly incorrigible.

Infrastructure

Scrap the high-speed rail project and instead use the proceeds to add one lane to every major interstate in California, and upgrade and resurface all state highways.

Use additional high-speed rail funds to complete plant upgrades so that 100 percent of California’s sewage is reused, even treated to potable quality.

Pass legislation to streamline approval of the proposed desalination plant in Huntington Beach, and fast-track applications for additional desalination plants, especially in Los Angeles.

Spend the entire proceeds of the $7 billion water bond, passed overwhelmingly by Californians in 2014, on storage. Build the Los Banos Grandes, Sites, and Temperance Flat reservoirs, adding over 5.0 million acre feet of storage to the California Water Project. Pass aggressive legislation and fund aggressive legal actions and counteractions, to lower costs and enable completion of these projects in under five years (which is all the time it used to take to complete similar projects).

Energy

Permit slant drilling to access 12 trillion cubic feet of natural gas deposits from land-based rigs along the Southern California coast. Build an LNG terminal off the coast in Ventura County to export California’s natural gas to foreign markets. Permit development of the Monterey Shale formation to extract oil and gas.

Permit construction of “generation 3+” nuclear power plants in geologically stable areas of California’s interior. Permit construction of new natural gas power plants.

Housing

Repeal the 2006 “Global Warming Solutions Act” and “Sustainable Communities and Climate Protection Act” of 2008 and make it easy for developers to build homes on the suburban and exurban fringes, instead of just “in-fill” that destroys existing neighborhoods.

Pensions and Infrastructure

Require California’s public employee pension funds to invest a minimum of 10 percent of their assets in infrastructure projects as noted above. They could issue fixed rate bonds or take equity positions in the revenue-producing projects, or a combination of both. This would immediately unlock approximately $80 billion in construction financing to rebuild California’s infrastructure. At the same time, save the pension systems by striking down the “California Rule” that prevents meaningful pension reform.

These reforms would lower the cost of living in California, at the same time as they would create resource abundance and hundreds of thousands of high-paying jobs.

Why Republicans Are the Most Qualified to Rescue California

Once you’ve debunked the narrative that Republicans are racists, it is easier for voters, regardless of their ethnicity, to see their virtues. To a startling degree, California’s Republican legislators typically come from business backgrounds, whereas most Democratic legislators come from a government agency or a nonprofit background.

In 2016, an analysis of the biographies of California’s state legislators showed that 69 percent of Republican legislators came from a business background, 19 percent of them had some business and some government or nonprofit experience, and only 11 percent of them came exclusively from a government or nonprofit background. By contrast, only 6 percent of Democrats came from a business background, only 18 percent of them came from a mixed business and government or nonprofit background, while a whopping 76 percent of them came exclusively from a government or nonprofit background. One can draw profound conclusions from this unambiguous data.

In business, competence is emphasized; in government, personal connections are everything. In business, the objective is to competitively build and run productive companies; in government, to control, coerce, and redistribute. To work in business one must study engineering or finance and accounting. To work in government, one may study sociology or earn a major in any number of social justice-oriented “studies.”

What is the result of California’s Democratic lawmakers, in overwhelming numbers, lacking any experience in business? A state where financial realism is eclipsed by confrontational, utopian fantasy. A state where self-righteousness and self-deception are the currency of governance, instead of factual analysis and hard choices. A state where the infectious optimism that defines and is a prerequisite for business leadership is absent from a dismal capital.

Republicans can offer an irresistible alternative. They can promote abundance instead of scarcity; prosperity instead of an “era of limits;” hope and opportunity instead of resentment, retribution and redistribution; universal upward mobility instead of divisive scrapping for diminishing wealth.

They need to get busy.

Edward Ring co-founded the California Policy Center in 2010 and served as its president through 2016. This article originally appeared on the website American Greatness.

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Antonio Villaraigosa, Ed Ring, John Cox, Steve Poizner, Travis Allen

Moderate Republicans Have Been Conned Into Supporting Antonio Villaraigosa: The Most Hard-Left Gubernatorial Candidate in History

May 30, 2018 By Steve Baldwin 9 Comments

Photo courtesy Center for American Progress Action Fund, flickr

There are very important reasons why we should unite behind Cox. First, it’s about voter turnout in November. The top of the ticket always affects voter turnout so a ballot with no Republican at the top could suppress our turnout by enough to cause losses in many races down-ticket. Indeed, liberal strategists claim California is key to winning back the house and they’re hoping to flip at least five congressional seats. If that occurs, Pelosi becomes speaker, the Dems will impeach Trump based on phony Russia collusion allegations and the Trump agenda will come to a screeching halt. Moreover, there are important propositions on the ballot that will be affected by a low GOP turnout. Furthermore, we shouldn’t rule out the possibility of Cox winning in November. Yes, that would be a major upset, but then again, no one thought Trump would win and it’s entirely possible that Californians may be finally realizing they’ve had enough of big government, high unemployment, high taxes and open borders.

This is why it’s shocking to see so many moderate Republicans like Reed Hastings, Jim Cunneen, Meg Whitman, Richard Riordan and others come out in support of Antonio Villaraigosa. Like many moderate Republicans, they are not thinking about the larger political picture nor do they seem to be aware of the long-term goals of the left. Nothing new. And they are playing right into the hands of the left who have launched a campaign to attack Cox in order to end up with two Democrats on the November ballot so that GOP voter turnout in November is affected. If Cox didn’t have a chance of placing 2^nd, why then are the Democrats, and their moderate Republican front groups, spending millions attacking him?

We also need to keep in mind that California is key to the anti-Trump resistance and they must keep the governorship in order to maintain its role as the lead resistance state. California is providing taxpayer-financed legal work to oppose many of Trump’s initiatives, particularly having to do with immigration. It’s all part of the left’s long-term strategy to legitimatize the idea that illegal aliens have the right to vote and to delegitimitize the idea that a nation needs borders and citizenship to govern effectively or to govern at all. The money and power California is providing to the resistance movement rests largely upon maintaining control of the governor’s house. The attack on American sovereignty, the concept of citizenship and the rule of law have always been targets of the left, but never did they imagine they would be able to con a few powerful moderates into supporting their dark agenda.

One PAC, headed by wealthy GOP moderates such as Reed Hastings and Eli Broad, and also funded by former New York liberal Republican governor Michael Bloomberg, is sending out numerous mailers full of falsehoods about Cox. The mailer is sponsored by a group called “The California Charter School Associate Advocates.” I’m sorry, but the CCSAA doesn’t represent all charter schools; in fact, I don’t know any charter schools who are CCSAA members and I was the leading advocate of charter schools when I served as the chairman of the Education Committee in 1994. Nor is CCSAA operating in any kind of democratic fashion. There wasn’t any kind of vote by charter school leaders to endorse Villaraigosa and to engage in phony attacks on John Cox. CCSAA is mostly a play-thing for a handful of politically naive moderates who don’t even know they’re being used.

Indeed, the idea that Villaraigosa is some kind of education reformer, as implied by CCSAA, is bunk. The entire time I served with Villaraigosa, he never broke ranks with the education unions. Not once. Indeed, in his past, he worked as a consultant for the California Teachers Association (CTA) and served as an Area Representative for the United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA), two radically left unions which have never supported any education reforms whatsoever. Nor was Villaraigosa anywhere to be found when the battle to create and expand charter schools was fought. Only now, decades after all the key charter bill battles were fought, is Villaraigosa claiming to be a charter school supporter all along. Is Hastings and his crowd really that stupid to think that after a lifetime of promoting the union line, Villaraigosa will be an education reformer as governor?

California remains near-last in the country in math and reading scores and has been there for decades. The turning point was in the 1990s when the teachers unions basically became so powerful and entrenched that the system reached the point of no return. It may be too late for any serious reform to ever occur. The only reforms that would have mattered would have been to infuse the education system with private funding and entrepreneurs by use of a voucher system, but Villaraigosa opposed all such efforts.

Then there is socialized medicine, with my friend and former roommate, former Assemblyman Jim Cunneen, telling me he supports Villaraigosa due to his opposition to Senate Bill 562, a bill that would allow the state to take over all health care at a cost of $200 billion – an amount larger than the entire state budget. Any idiot could have seen that there was no way the state could afford that bill, so opposing SB562 was really not a profile in courage. But voters need to know Villaraigosa does not oppose socialized medicine, just that particular bill. He says so himself on his own campaign website. He states that “our priority should be to achieve universal health care in California by expanding the Affordable Care Act [Obamacare]… .” I guess no one told the moderates, but Villaraigosa over and over says “we must – and will – protect the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and work towards universal care.”

The moderates seem to be completely ignorant of Villaraigosa’s record. One of the most serious state budget problems is the state pension system in which hundreds of thousands of state employees are benefiting from a system far more generous than comparable private systems. Villaraigosa claims to be a champion of pension reform but he refused to vote for the one bill that could have averted the current crisis. When Assemblyman Howard Kaloogian offered a bill in 1996 that would, as he stated, “permit all jurisdictions (including cities, counties, special districts and school districts, not just the state employer) to offer a 401K type of defined contribution plan,” it would have saved state and local government millions of dollars and prevented the chronic state budget crisis that we are now constantly dealing with.

Indeed, Villaraigosa has voted for every tax increase he’s ever encountered and will advocate for more tax increases as governor. But he’s always been a big government advocate; for crying out loud, he used to be the president of the American Federation of Government Employees, Local 3230. The moderates point to the fact that Villaraigosa had to cut spending as Los Angeles mayor, when the budget, due to all the liberal social programs and its out-of-control pension plan, was way out of balance. But he didn’t have a choice; balancing the city budget is required by law and Villaraigosa did not have all the budget gimmicks he relied on in Sacramento to hide millions of dollars. Unlike the state budget, the Los Angeles budget is very straight forward.

But to regard Villaraigosa as a fiscal hero is preposterous. As mayor, he spent millions of federal dollars intended for city services on renovating a million-dollar yacht owned by the city. He also gave massive raises – some as high as 25% – to the city’s 22,000 employees during his tenure. And not just once. There is little doubt that as governor Villaraigosa will increase the size of government and sign into law all kinds of new taxes. This is why he will not sign the Americans for Tax Reform pledge to not raise taxes. John Cox has. With the state already suffering from one of the highest tax burdens in the country, his policies will further devastate the state’s economy and chase more business owners out of state. Perhaps Mr. Hastings can explain to the voters exactly how Villaraigosa’s big government policies will help the state economy.

Indeed, none of this should surprise anyone who knows Villaraigosa’s political background. He has spent his entire life as a professional leftist agitator and was even president of the Southern California chapter of the ACLU where one of his actions was to sue cities that tried to ban the poor gangbangers from city parks. He supports open borders, strengthening California’s status as a “sanctuary state” and, as he has made clear, will look for ways to further defy federal immigration law, even if it means jeopardizing the safety of Californians by refusing to release – or even detain – illegal aliens involved with criminal activity. Already, it is costing California’s welfare, education, health care and criminal justice systems tens of billions of dollars to handle the 3 million illegal aliens already here. More troubling, though, is that by maintaining California’s sanctuary status, as Villaraigosa will, it sends a signal to millions south of the border to cross the border. Illegal aliens are bankrupting the state but Villaraigosa does not care because he believes illegal aliens have all the rights citizens have. Just ask him.

Indeed, Villaraigosa’s history of involvement with radical Hispanic separatist groups is perhaps the most troubling part of his background. As a student, he was president of MEChA at UCLA, a Hispanic supremacist group that calls for the re-annexation of the Western United States to Mexico. It regards California as an “occupied state” and calls for the “physical liberation of our land.” Not kidding. MEChA rallies always feature racist and violent language. He was also chairman of the United Mexican-American Students (UMAS), founded by Eliezer Risco, a communist revolutionary trained by Castro’s thugs. He also wrote for Sin Fronteras (Without Borders), a vicious, anti-American, open borders propaganda organ for the Hispanic separatist movement. Villaraigosa gave angry hate-filled speeches at rallies in opposition to Prop. 187, which simply required all state programs to benefit only legal citizens.

The California Coalition for Immigration Reform issued a statement claiming that “Mr. Villaraigosa’s participation at the Latino Summit Response to Proposition 187 in January, 1995, placed him among those activists who harbor anti-American sentiments and beliefs bordering on sedition.” He also participated in the “Marcha de Libertad” march on Washington in 1996, again, organized by the Hispanic separatist movement. This march called for free education, health care and welfare for all Latinos, regardless of citizenship. This rally also featured revolutionary banners and signs featuring statements such as “Get off our land.” Villaraigosa actually spoke at this hate rally and again called for more “rights” for all Latinos, regardless of citizenship.

Indeed, I watched Villaraigosa spend many hours in Sacramento trying to figure out how to give more “rights” and benefits to illegal aliens. He was the author of the bill that gave illegal aliens the “right” to obtain driver’s licenses, which, of course, made it easier to obtain welfare benefits and to register to vote. His long involvement with Hispanic separatist groups, his advocacy for illegal aliens his entire career and now his support for the “resistance” movement that forces California’s law enforcement community to not cooperate with the federal government on immigration policies, make it clear that his loyalty is to his race first and to his country second. He is not fit to be governor.

Just think for a second. If John Cox was president of a white separatist group, spewed racist rhetoric at KKK rallies and spoke about breaking away, say, southern states for a white separatist nation, would the media have covered it? Of course they would have. But no one in the media will ask Villaraigosa questions about his past involvement with hate groups. Surprised? You shouldn’t be. Now it’s time for the voters to speak.

Steve Baldwin is a free lance writer based in San Diego, a former member of the California States Assembly and former Executive Director of the Council for National Policy.

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Affordable Care Act, Antonio Villaraigosa, Illegal Immigration, Immigration, John Cox, Steve Baldwin, Travis Allen

Campaigns Try to Fool California Voters

May 26, 2018 By Dan Walters 13 Comments

Politics – the means by which we govern ourselves – can be a positive, even uplifting human enterprise.

Too often, however, political tactics are based on the cynical assumption that voters can be easily fooled and the current election season is, unfortunately, rife.

Take, for example, the television ads that Democratic Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, the leading candidate for governor, has been airing about John Cox, a San Diego businessman and the leading Republican.

Superficially, it’s logical that a Democratic candidate for governor would attack a Republican candidate. But these ads, alleging that Cox is closely allied with the National Rifle Association, have another, less obvious motive.

Newsom and his advisors know that if a Republican places second in the June 5 primary voting and thus wins a place on the November ballot, it would make Newsom’s election a near-certainty.

Conversely, were Democrat Antonio Villaraigosa to finish second on June 5, Newsom would have a real fight on his hands.

Therefore, the anti-Cox ad is not truly aimed at dragging him down, but rather to build him up among Republican primary voters, who are likely to be more pro-NRA and also likely to resent attacks on Cox by Democrat Newsom.

Clever? Yes, but also quite cynical, when you think about it.

In another example, Southern California’s 49^th Congressional District is a prime battleground this year, thanks to Republican Congressman Darrell Issa’s decision to retire and the fact that the district favored Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump in 2016.

Democratic hopes of picking up a seat are complicated by having a bumper crop of Democratic candidates on the June 5 ballot, along with two well known Republican figures, Assemblyman Rocky Chavez and Board of Equalization member Diane Harkey.

Chavez and Harkey could finish 1-2 on June 5 and freeze Democrats out.

Therefore, the national Democratic congressional apparatus is hitting Chavez with allegations – aimed at GOP voters – that he is an untrustworthy Republican because he voted for Gov. Jerry Brown’s cap-and-trade program to reduce greenhouse gases and the state budget.

Finally, California voters are seeing the usual quota of “slate mailers” that purport to advise them to vote for particular candidates.

While some do genuinely reflect the interests of the sponsoring organizations, many are nothing more than commercial enterprises.

Take, for example, mailers from a Torrance-based outfit called “Budget Watchdogs” that purports to favor candidates who are tight with the public’s money.

Uber-conservative Republican Travis Allen gets its nod for governor, but the rest of the mailer’s favored candidates are Democrats. They include arguably the Legislature’s most liberal member, state Sen. Ricardo Lara of Bell Gardens, who is running for insurance commissioner and wants to double the state budget by adopting single-payer health coverage.

Budget Watchdogs was created by Rex Hime, a one-time Republican political aide who for years headed the California Business Properties Association.

Budget Watchdogs is a non-profit corporation and, Hime told me a few years ago, “I don’t get squat” from the money it collects for its various projects, including the mailer. “It’s not a commercial enterprise.”

Nonetheless, we know that all Budget Watchdog’s recommendations reflect money paid by endorsees because state law requires them to be marked by asterisks.

There’s an even darker side to the slate mailer business – a kind of extortion. Some slate mail operators tell campaigns that if they don’t pay to have their candidates or ballot measure positions “recommended,” their opponents will be promoted for free.

Regardless of underlying motives, it’s a grubby trade based on assumptions about the gullibility of voters.

Dan Walters is a columnist for CALmatters

This article was originally published by Fox and Hounds Daily

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Antonio Villaraigosa, Darrell Issa, Diane Harkey, Gavin Newsom, Jerry Brown, John Cox, Rocky Chavez

Poll: Republican Travis Allen Won California Gubernatorial Debate

May 11, 2018 By Adelle Nazarian 4 Comments

The debate is likely the last one before the June fifth primary. “Travis Allen wins #CAGovDebate!!!” Allen posted to his Twitter and Facebook pages along with a public opinion poll from NBC News.

The first poll had him at 43% and a second one had him at 72%

****@JoinTravisAllen WINS #CAGovDebate!!! **** Poll from NBC Bay area shows Travis Allen just won the debate https://t.co/zuRwplztLC pic.twitter.com/Ul0yufgT6g

— Travis Allen (@JoinTravisAllen) May 9, 2018

The media largely reported the debate as five-against-one with Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, the clear target as the race’s frontrunner.

“If you can’t trust Gavin with his best friend’s wife, how can you trust him with your state?” Allen reportedly asked, referring to an affair that came to light during Newsom’s time as Mayor of San Francisco.

Newsom responded that he had apologized for the relationship, saying, “I admitted it. I was wrong,” before suggesting that the attack was strange coming from a supporter of Donald Trump. “It’s hard, with respect, to hear from Mr. Allen, who is a devout supporter of Donald Trump, talk about the issue of sexual harassment,” Newsom said.

The event was moderated by NBC’s Chuck Todd and other issues covered included the gas tax and immigration.

Allen and John Cox were the sole Republicans on the Democrat-dominated debate. In addition to Newsom, the other Democrats included former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, State Treasurer John Chiang, and former State Superintendent of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin.

Allen said he would repeal Gov. Jerry Brown’s gas tax. “I am the original author of the repeal the gas tax,” he said, adding, “Jerry Brown lied to the California people in 2010 when he was elected on a simple promise of no new taxes without voter approval. He bribed four legislators a billion dollars of your tax money to pass the largest gas tax increase and car registration fee increase ever in California.”

Cox insisted, “I’m the chairman of the real gas tax repeal” and then went on to accuse Allen of stealing $300,000 of a contribution he received for his own campaign. Allen said, “I’d just like to respond to my angry opponent from Chicago. Let me be clear: I was the original author of the gas tax repeal.”

Allen and Cox stated they are against sanctuary cities and Newsom said he will fight and “push back against Donald Trump and Jeff Sessions and all of the others here who are trying to divide us through these games of political theater,” referring to Allen and Cox. Eastin also said she supports sanctuary cities and believes they are constitutional.

At one point, Cox said Trump’s border wall must be built because he does not “want to live next door to MS-13” gang members.

Newsom shot back saying, “This is the kind of rhetoric that has no place… we don’t tolerate diversity, we celebrate it.”

Villaraigosa noted that the “Dreamers didn’t come here on their own, They came here because their parents brought them here, and we’ve got to say that they have a right to have a legalized status.”

Todd concluded the debate by asking the candidates to weigh in on California’s top-two or “jungle” primary system which allows for the top two vote-getters to proceed to the General Election on November 7, regardless of political party.

“A Republican would be ideal in the general election,” Newsom reportedly said with a grin before looking over at Cox and Allen and adding, “Either one of these would do.”

“Be careful what you wish for, Gavin,” Cox shot back.

However, in his response to Todd, Allen said, “There’s only one Republican in the race anyway,” referring to Cox’s acknowledgment that he did not vote for Trump in 2016 and instead voted for Libertarian Gary Johnson; a decision he reportedly says he now regrets.

Adelle Nazarian is a politics and national security reporter for Breitbart News. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

This article was originally published by Breitbart.com/California

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: Antonio Villaraigosa, Gavin Newsom, Travis Allen

New Bullet Train Woes Cause Fresh Headaches for Democrat Gubernatorial Candidates

March 17, 2018 By Chris Reed 3 Comments

The March 9 release of the first updated business plan in two years for the state’s high-speed rail project could sharply intensify the pressure on Democratic gubernatorial candidates who back the project to explain their support.

The Republican candidates – Assemblyman Travis Allen of Huntington Beach and Rancho Santa Fe businessman John Cox – reflect the GOP consensus that the project is a boondoggle that’s unlikely to ever be completed. But the major Democratic hopefuls – Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, state Treasurer John Chiang and former Superintendent of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin – have all indicated they would continue with rail project, albeit with little of the enthusiasm shown by present Gov. Jerry Brown.

While the new business plan was depicted by the California High-Speed Rail Authority’s new CEO, Brian Kelly, as a constructive step toward salvaging the project, the plan’s key details were daunting:

The estimated cost of the project, which has yo-yoed from $34 billion to $98 billion to $64 billion, changed once again. The business plan abandoned the previous $64 billion estimate for an estimate of $77 billion – accompanied by a warning that the cost could go as high as $98 billion.

Even at the lower price tag, the state didn’t have adequate funds to complete a first $20 billion-plus bullet-train segment linking populated areas. The present plan for a Central Valley route has an eastern terminus in a remote agricultural fieldnorth of Shafter. That’s because the $9.95 billion in bond seed money that state voters provided in 2008 has only been buttressed to a relatively slight degree by additional public dollars from cap-and-trade pollution permits.

The business plan cites the possibility of additional federal funds beyond the $3.3 billion allocated by Washington early in the Obama administration. It doesn’t note, however, that domestic discretionary spending has plunged in recent years amid congressional concern about the national debt blowing past $20 trillion.

The business plan also promotes the possibility of outside investors. It doesn’t mention that such investors have passed on the project for years because state law bars the California High-Speed Rail Authority from offering them a revenue or ridership guarantee.

From 5 years behind schedule to 10 years behind

The initial operation of a bullet-train link serving California residents went from five years behind schedule, in the estimate of the Los Angeles Times, to 10 years behind schedule. The business plan said the project would begin operations no sooner than 2029.

The potential immense cost overrun of the bullet train segment in the mountains north of Los Angeles was fully acknowledged for the first time. A 2015 Times story laid out the “monumental” challenge.

Democratic candidates to succeed Brown have chosen to focus on housing, single-payer health care, immigration and criticism of President Donald Trump in most early forums and campaign appearances. But front-runners Newsom and Villaraigosa in particular seem likely to be pressed on how they can square their claims to be experienced, tough-minded managers with support for a project which seems less likely to be completed with every passing year.

Proposition 70 on the June primary ballot also will keep the bullet train on the campaign’s front burner, to some extent. It was placed on the ballot as part of a 2017 deal cut by the governor to extend the state’s cap-and-trade program until 2030. If Proposition 70 passed, it would require a one-off vote in 2024 in which cap-and-trade proceeds could only be used for specific needs with two-thirds support of each house of the Legislature. Republicans may be able to use these votes to shut off the last ongoing source of new revenue for the high-speed rail project.

This article was originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Antonio Villaraigosa, bullet train, Gavin Newsom, high speed rail

California school superintendent race: Democratic reformer vs. union ally

February 14, 2018 By Chris Reed 3 Comments

The 2018 race for state superintendent of public instruction may not have an incumbent but is likely to feel like an encore of the 2014 race, pitting a Democrat aligned with the California Teachers Association and the California Federation of Teachers against a Democrat who backs reforms opposed by the unions.

In 2014, Tom Torlakson – a former teacher and state lawmaker – won a second term, touting higher graduation rates and somewhat better test scores. He defeated former Los Angeles charter school executive Marshall Tuck 52 percent to 48 percent in a race in which $30 million was reportedly spent, triple the campaign spending in that year’s quiet governor’s race.

With the strong support of wealthy Los Angeles area Democrats who have been fighting for changes in L.A. Unified and who remember the job he did running Green Dot charters, Tuck is running again.

Subbing for termed-out Torlakson is Assemblyman Tony Thurmond, D-Richmond, who has worked closely with teachers unions on many fronts – most notably joining in maneuvering last summer that helped kill a tenure reform bill that had gotten off to a strong start in the Legislature. He has also opposed efforts to more closely monitor how education dollars are being spent under the Local Control Funding Formula. The law was supposed to be used specifically to help districts with high numbers of English language learners, students in foster care and students from impoverished families to improve their academic performance. But civil rights groups say the extra dollars often have been used for general spending, including for teacher raises.

Thurmond was also among lawmakers who expressed interest in helping teachers deal with California’s high housing costs, proposing legislation to award $100 million in rental grants to teachers in need. It didn’t advance.

Tuck may have better shot than when he challenged incumbent

The conventional wisdom is that Tuck has a better chance than in 2014 because Thurmond has much lower name recognition than Torlakson. But that could be erased with a heavy television ad run by the teachers unions using the same anti-Tuck themes as in 2014: Making the argument that the charter schools he led are part of a corporate scheme to take over public education.

If Tuck, 44, gets his way, the debate will focus on his reform agenda – the idea that charters serve as healthy competition for regular schools; the need for much better oversight of how the Local Control Funding Formula is used; adopting teacher tenure reform; and accountability standards that make it easier to judge whether a school is improving.

Thurmond’s website emphasizes his view of California educators doing battle with President Donald Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos over what he describes as their intent to “gut” and “defund our public schools.” Thurmond, 49, a military veteran who was a social worker before running for office, also said teachers need “bonuses and other incentives” to address the shortage of qualified instructors.

Complicating the Tuck-Thurmond race is the likelihood that for the first time in the 21st century, a prominent Democratic gubernatorial candidate is running as an anti-union reformer – which could make schools a more prominent issue in the 2018 election cycle than is normal.

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who repeatedly tangled with the United Teachers Los Angeles while seeking authority over L.A. Unified, has already won the endorsement of the state Democratic lawmaker recognized as the leader of education reform efforts: Assemblywoman Shirley Weber of San Diego.

The CTA endorsed Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom in the governor’s race and Thurmond for superintendent in October. The CFT did as well in December.

This article was originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Antonio Villaraigosa, education, education reform, Los Angeles, Marshall Tuck, Tony Thurmond

Sexual harassment scandal at state Capitol causing headaches for other state Democrats

November 2, 2017 By Chris Reed 1 Comment

The far-reaching reverberations from the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment scandal continue to roil the state Capitol more than two weeks after 147 women released a letter denouncing a culture of pervasive male harassment and abuse in the Legislature.

On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Daily News published an editorial that said the only sitting lawmaker known to have been formally rebuked for sexual harassment – Assemblyman Raul Bocanegra, D-Los Angeles (pictured) – should resign.

“While Bocanegra has apologized for his conduct, we believe the best way for him to serve the public at this point is to resign from office,” the Daily News editorial concluded.

The Los Angeles Times story that revealed Bocanegra’s rebuke could also portend headaches for Democratic lawmakers who knew about the incident that got him in trouble but who either kept quiet or actively helped Bocanegra’s career. The story was based on an interview with his victim, Elise Flynn Gyore, who provided a copy of the Assembly Rules Committee letter rebuking Bocanegra.

The incident that led to the complaint to the Rules Committee came at a 2009 Sacramento event in which Bocanegra – then the chief of staff for then-Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes, D-Los Angeles – allegedly reached down the blouse of Gyore, then a staffer for state Sen. Ron Calderon, D-Montebello. Bocanegra also acted in a way Gyore characterized as stalking.

A subsequent Sacramento Bee story detailed how Bocanegra’s rebuke didn’t get in the way of his political ascent. He was elected to the Assembly in 2012. Among those who helped him with donations or endorsements: then-Assemblyman Isadore Hall, D-Compton, who served on the Assembly Rules Committee while it reviewed the allegations against Bocanegra, and then-Sen. Calderon, whom Gyore said knew about what Bocanegra had done.

Hall went on to serve in the state Senate before losing a bid for Congress last year. In January, Hall was appointed by Gov. Jerry Brown to the California Agricultural Labor Relations Board, with an annual salary of $142,095. Hall, 45, is expected to seek elected office again in coming years.

Calderon was convicted in 2016 of federal corruption charges and is now serving a 42-month prison sentence.

Gyore is now chief of staff for Sen. Richard Roth, D-Riverside, who has been among the leading advocates in the Legislature for holding lawmakers accountable for their bad behavior.

Villaraigosa, Newsom may face questions over their past scandals

The Bocanegra case has many insiders wondering what California politician might next come under fire for inappropriate behavior or worse. But the increasing focus on politicians’ treatment of and attitudes about women could eventually lead to tough questions for the two Democratic frontrunners to replace termed-out Gov. Brown in the 2018 election.

In 2007, when he was mayor of Los Angeles, Antonio Villaraigosa revealed that he was involved romantically with a much-younger TV journalist, leading to his marriage’s collapse and his divorce in 2010.

The Los Angeles Times reported then that Telemundo reporter-anchor Mirthala Salinas, 35, apparently began her affair with Villaraigosa, 54, while she was covering the mayor for her network.

Villaraigosa got remarried in 2016.

Also in 2007, then-San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom was involved in a messy office scandal. Alex Tourk, Newsom’s campaign manager and former deputy chief of staff, abruptly resigned “after confronting the mayor about an affair Newsom had with his wife while she worked in the mayor’s office,” the San Francisco Chronicle reported. Ruby Rippey-Tourk had been Newsom’s appointments secretary for two years.

The New York Times gave national coverage to what it described as “a fast-unfolding scandal with all the sex and betrayal of a tawdry novel,” noting that the affair came while Newsom was “in the throes of a divorce.” But after Newsom repeatedly apologized, his political career continued, seemingly unaffected.

In 2008, he got married for a second time.

This article was originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Antonio Villaraigosa, Daily News, Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles, Raul Bocanegra

Kamala Harris a Self-Professed ‘Blood-Sport’ Candidate

April 1, 2015 By James Poulos 3 Comments

Attributing her success to a “blood sport” view of politics, California Attorney General Kamala Harris has established herself as the leading contender to replace Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., who is retiring in Jan. 2017.

“I always start my campaigns early, and I run hard,” Harris told the New York Times. “Maybe it comes from the rough-and-tumble world of San Francisco politics, where it’s not even a contact sport — it’s a blood sport. This is how I am as a candidate. This is how I run campaigns.”

But that attitude has helped set up what could be a difficult dynamic for Harris in her quest for the Senate.

She has cleared away key potential competitors from Northern California, such as Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has opted to run for governor in 2018. But Harris has not dispatched credible Democratic contenders in the Southland, including Rep. Adam Schiff of Burbank, Rep. Xavier Becerra of Los Angeles and Rep. Loretta Sanchez of Garden Grove. Then there are potential Republican contenders, such as Assemblyman Rocky Chávez of Oceanside.

For years, Southern Californian Democrats have chafed at what many have seen as an excessive degree of dominance within the state party by San Francisco and Sacramento-area members, including Boxer and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, both from Marin County; and Gov. Jerry Brown, the former mayor of Oakland.

A wide-open field

Harris’ aggressive approach to political advancement has helped knock one nationally recognized L.A. Latino out of the Senate scramble. Former L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa bailed out of contention late in February.

“I know that my heart and my family are here in California, not Washington, D.C.,” he said in a statement posted to Facebook. “I have decided not to run for the U.S. Senate and instead continue my efforts to make California a better place to live, work and raise a family.” Villaraigosa’s decision was seen as signaling greater interest in pursuing a bid for governor.

Even though Villaraigosa himself was seen as one of Harris’ most formidable would-be rivals, his weaknesses as a candidate were far greater than other Southern California Latinos currently weighing serious Senate bids. Villaraigosa struggled with personal scandal and an embarrassingly rough landing after leaving office, when he had to scrounge for lucrative work through personal connections and the strength of his name recognition.

Ironically, that opened the field for others to challenge Harris. The kind of travails Villaraigosa faced haven’t been a problem for Harris’ most likely Latino challengers. Schiff, Becerra and Sanchez have “been waiting for colleagues to retire so they can move up, and they still face the constant threat that even after biding their time, rivals could outmaneuver them,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

“But with scant hope that Democrats could seize control of the House next year, they are also stuck in the relatively powerless minority. Democrats stand a better chance of retaking the Senate, so the potential leap may be that much more tempting.”

Meanwhile, noted the Times, Harris still hasn’t made an impression on more than half of California’s registered voters, according to a poll conducted with USC Dornsife.

Pressure on the right

Despite expressing strong interest, neither Becerra nor Sanchez officially has declared their candidacy. For now, that gives an advantage to Chávez, the only other candidate to declare after Harris.

And within the California GOP, as the Sacramento Bee observed, his “résumé and standing as a state legislator make him the most prominent Republican among those weighing bids. A former city councilman in Oceanside, he spent nearly three decades in the Marines and later served as acting secretary to the state Department of Veterans Affairs.”

Chávez’s political positioning also has raised hurdles for other Republicans considering a run. “He supports gay marriage and has chided members of his own party for blocking immigration reform,” noted the Bee. “He opposes abortion rights, however, a position he attributes to his Catholic upbringing.”

Running to the left or the right of Chávez could pose problems for GOP rivals. That could inspire the state party to rally around him relatively early. Although not an electoral cure-all, California Republicans could score a perceived coup by fielding a Latino candidate against Harris.

“A lot of things can happen on the way to a coronation,” Chávez recently told the New York Times.

Originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Antonio Villaraigosa, Election 2016, Gavin Newsom, Kamala Harris, Loretta Sanchez, U.S. Senate

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New Bullet Train Woes Cause Fresh Headaches for Democrat Gubernatorial Candidates

From 5 years behind schedule to 10 years behind

California school superintendent race: Democratic reformer vs. union ally

Tuck may have better shot than when he challenged incumbent

Sexual harassment scandal at state Capitol causing headaches for other state Democrats

Villaraigosa, Newsom may face questions over their past scandals

Kamala Harris a Self-Professed ‘Blood-Sport’ Candidate

A wide-open field

Pressure on the right

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