Kevin de Leon – Page 5

New State Controlled Pension System – Will Taxpayers Have to Bail It Out?

October 1, 2016 By Joel Fox Leave a Comment

Gov. Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 1234 to establish a state supervised retirement fund called Secure Choice for private workers. One wonders if at some future time this action will be remembered much like Gov. Gray Davis’s signature on SB 400 of 1999, which put taxpayers on edge by driving public pensions into deep debt.

The bill Davis signed expanded public employee pension benefits putting in place an investment scheme that has not met the demands of pension liabilities. Many of the local taxes on November ballots will see revenue used to satisfy pension obligations, with local pensions increased along the lines of SB 400. SB 1234 by Senate Pro Tem Kevin de Leon has no provision for taxpayer involvement. However, skeptics believe, with good reason, that because of the state’s involvement, taxpayers will be backstop if the system falters.

Brown’s signature ended a four-year quest to establish a private worker retirement fund. There is no argument workers must save more for retirement. The question is should government oversee such a venture. SB 1234 would require employers to take a small percentage out of worker’s checks and deposit into a retirement fund unless the worker opts out. It is estimated than 7 million California workers would be covered by the plan.

The business community objected to the legislation until some late amendments were added to shield employers from liability and administrative burdens while making it clear that the employer is not the sponsor of the retirement plan. The California Chamber of Commerce and some local chambers pulled opposition and, in the end, stood neutral on the measure. Business will still have the obligation of enrolling workers into the system.

Still, taxpayers should be wary considering the history of promises made about the public pension system that expanded under SB 400. Supporters of that bill declared public pensions would be easily funded by investment revenue, even with employees taking retirement at earlier ages. It has not played out that way, with the state looking at billions in public employee pension debt.

As State Senator and financial expert, John Moorlach, commented after the governor signed SB 1234, “You can anticipate that this ‘secure’ investment has the potential to morph into a massive boondoggle.”

While a couple of other states are looking at a similar private worker retirement system, it should be noted that the drive for state controlled private sector pension programs might have a political connection to public pensions.

The term “pension envy” has been used to describe private workers distaste for the public employees superior benefit packages. Private workers have to save for their own retirement while funding the guaranteed public pensions through their taxes. While the creation of a system to establish a private worker fund would help those private workers in retirement, public unions hope to establish a connection between private workers and public pensions, making voters more sympathetic to the public workers if reformers attempt to reel in public pensions.

As I wrote on this site when SB 1234 first surfaced four years ago, “With the glare of the spotlight on public retirement debt, public unions want to change the focus and talk about private employees retirement.”

Thanks to the governor’s signature, Secure Choice is now in place. It will probably take a couple of years to get started. We’ll see a decade from now if echoes of the SB 400 criticism attaches to SB 1234.

This piece was originally published by Fox and Hounds Daily

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Fox and Hounds Daily, Gray Davis, Jerry Brown, Joel Fox, Kevin de Leon, Retirement Plan

Controversial Climate Change Legislation Signed by Gov. Jerry Brown

September 16, 2016 By James Poulos 9 Comments

Photo courtesy Steve Rhodes, flickr

Over staunch opposition on his right, Gov. Jerry Brown signed several new climate bills into law, aiming to keep California on the regulatory trajectory first set during former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s administration.

That suite of laws, “in which polluters pay to offset emissions under a declining cap, is on tenuous footing amid litigation and uncertainty in the Legislature,” the Sacramento Bee noted. The idea of a new set of rules, “negotiated by Brown and legislative leaders last month, was significant to many moderate Democrats who viewed spending in their districts as critical to buttress a state climate program that has faced heavy resistance from industry,” the paper added.

Complex divisions

Some Democrats with that stance have worried that national and statewide populist sentiment could pose an especially sharp threat to their political fortunes this election year. Complicating the ideological picture still further, “many lawmakers representing low-income communities of color made themselves a force in the state’s climate change debate after complaints that existing policies weren’t doing enough to benefit the districts they represent,” as the Los Angeles Times noted.

But Democrats further to the left did not want to back down, or be seen as backing down, to industry interests. At the same time, however, their own interests have not shifted measurably closer to Gov. Brown’s, which have wound up at loggerheads with party members to his left over allocations to projects such as the state’s bullet train. With talks moving slowly, “Brown negotiated the spending plan with top Democratic legislative leaders Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon of Paramount and Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon of Los Angeles,” according to KPBS. “It was approved on the last day of the legislative session, Aug. 31.”

Big ticket

Environmental activists and policymakers embracing their cause had to scramble to craft the fresh scheme in a way that seemed to ensure it could survive a spirited fight during the legislative process. “The new plan, outlined in SB32, involves increasing renewable energy use, putting more electric cars on the road, improving energy efficiency, and curbing emissions from key industries,” NPR reported. “Brown signed another bill, AB197, that gives lawmakers more oversight of regulators and provides aid to low-income or minority communities located near polluting facilities such as oil refineries and factories.” All told, the package amounted to some $900 million in outlays sourced from the state’s cap-and-trade revenues. “The money represents two-thirds of the available funding from California’s carbon-emission fee,” noted KPBS.

On hand for Brown’s signing ceremony in Fresno, Republican Mayor Ashley Swearengin touted the prospect of statewide infrastructure construction associated with Brown’s environmental agenda, which would include the long-simmering high-speed rail effort. With success, “Swearengin added, the Valley will see a 40 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions over the next 20 years,” the Business Journal noted.

Lingering resistance

But business, energy and conservative groups, which had struggled to turn the tide against the bills, quickly vented their frustration. “Taken together, SB32 and AB197 impose severe caps on the emission of greenhouse gases in California, without requiring the regulatory agencies to give any consideration to the impacts on our economy, disruptions in everyone’s daily lives or the fact that California’s population will grow almost 50 percent between 1990 and 2030,” said Allan Zaremberg, California Chamber of Commerce president and CEO, in a statement.

Under Zaremberg’s leadership, the organization has spearheaded litigation targeting the current cap-and-trade regime. “A state appellate court is considering a challenge by the California Chamber of Commerce, which argues the fee is a tax that needed support from two-thirds of the Assembly and Senate in order to be valid,” KPBS recalled. “Republicans have in the past said it’s irresponsible to spend money generated from a fee being challenged in court.”

Originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Anthony Rendon, Climate change, high speed rail, Jerry Brown, Kevin de Leon

Legislature clings to “gut and amend” powers

August 11, 2016 By Matt Fleming 9 Comments

Even as a measure to end the most egregious offenses waits for voters in November, even as the procedure is discouraged by leadership and even as the move is prohibited by the Legislature’s rules, Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon will continue to allow bills to be gutted and amended, his staff confirmed.

Gut and amend is a catchall phrase thrown around Sacramento. In general, it means removing all or a substantial part of a bill and replacing it with new provisions that have little or nothing to do with the bill’s original intent, especially after the bill’s shell has passed through a part of the process, like a committee hearing or a vote in one chamber.

Proponents say there are instances when it’s necessary, but detractors say it leads to bad legislation and limits the power of those with an opposing view. The times that irk opponents the most are when a bill is gutted and amended sometimes just hours before a vote.

Members of Rendon’s staff said the Paramount Democrat, who has taken a more soft-handed approach to leadership than some of his predecessors, does not encourage the practice, but leaves legislators to decide how to best handle their legislation.

“There are many situations where a gut and amend may be actually be needed,” said Rendon spokesman John Casey. “Regarding the Speaker’s involvement on the issue, he does not tell members to do anything. They are the masters of their own legislation and are entitled to amend their bills in any way they see fit.”

Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon’s office did not respond to requests for comment, but the Los Angeles Democrat has not opposed gut and amends in the past.

Examples

Proponents of a bill generally care little for how it gets passed as long as it becomes, and remains, law. So the murky gut and amend process is a means to an end for advocates.

For example, last year, the Legislature officially amended a shell with 104 pages of language changes that dissolved 400 redevelopment agencies statewide, which subsidized local development, which advocates of the move said eliminated wasteful and corrupt agencies.

However, right or wrong, the gut and amend circumvented the normal vetting process, critics said.

“SB 107, redevelopment rewrite, may (or not) be a great bill but springing it on final day of session as a budget trailer bill is shabby,” Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters tweeted at the time.

A year prior, the Legislature pushed through a 112-page bill limiting school districts’ ability to fund reserves, without even a committee hearing, which Walters called one of the “most pointlessly cynical legislative act(s) of this still-young century.”

And years before that, the Legislature jammed through a bill streamlining the strict environmental review process for local development to pave way for a proposed football stadium in Los Angeles — the shell of the bill required recycling and compost bins in schools — only to have a court later rule part of the measure “unconstitutional.”

And so on.

Rules

Legislative rules in both chambers already prohibit “non-germane” amendments, meaning those amendments that have nothing or little to do with the shell. A prime example waiting in the wings is Democratic Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez’s bill to even out when farmworkers are given overtime pay — a measure that died earlier this year but has since been added to a bill originally focused on teachers.

However, the rules can be, and are routinely, waived. Leaders generally like having as many legislative tools as possible at their disposal, and anything that speeds up the process or lacks scrutiny limits the power of the minority to impact in the debate.

Proposition 54, which is to be decided by the voters this November, would, among other things, require the final version of a bill to be in print and made available online for 72 hours prior to a vote.

“The only way to actually fix this problem is by changing the California Constitution,” said Sam Blakeslee, a former Republican legislative leader and proponent of Prop. 54.

But do some deals need to be passed in the eleventh hour?

Prop. 54 would prevent the last-minute gut and amends, but it would also thwart other quickly-passed and negotiated bills that may not qualify as gut and amends, like the 2008 budget deal advocates say staved off bankruptcy.

Democratic political consultant Steven Maviglio argues that Prop. 54 is just another “tool” for special interests to unravel legislative deals at the last second, pointing to the 2008 budget agreement, the 1959 Fair Housing Act, the 2006 climate change bill (AB32) and the 2014 water bond — all voted on without 72 hours notice.

“Let’s not give special interests any more tools to prevent lawmakers from doing the right thing, whether it be unnecessary delays in enacting legislation or ways to demonize the Legislature,” wrote in The Sacramento Bee.

This piece was originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Anthony Rendon, CalWatchdog, Dan Walters, Gut and Amend, Kevin de Leon

Legislature Returns to Action in August: What to Watch For

July 31, 2016 By Matt Fleming 4 Comments

August is sure to be a busy month in Sacramento, as legislators fight to get their priorities passed before the legislative session ends on August 31.

While a large number of bills will be debated, there are four things to watch for:

Environment

With the political backing of new polling, Senate Bill 32 — which would extend and increase the state’s greenhouse gas emission reduction goals — is sure to reappear.

Not only is it a legacy project for the termed-out Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills — who authored the 2006 measure that this bill would extend — but it is backed by both Democratic leaders, Speaker Anthony Rendon and Senate President Pro Tempore Kevin de Leon.

“A clear majority of Californians strongly support our state’s climate policies and expect their elected leaders to build on our progress battling climate change and air pollution while making investments in clean energy across our state,” de Leon said in a statement on Wednesday. “This is why the Legislature should extend our climate targets in statute by passing Senate Bill 32.”

Republicans are opposed to the measure, which leaves the power to a handful of moderate, pro-business Democrats. The bill passed the Senate in 2015, but was defeated on the Assembly floor and then granted reconsideration.

An interesting data point: 15 Assembly members didn’t vote — which is a way of voting “no” without any accountability.

Transportation

The Legislature has been in a special session on transportation since last summer to come up with a funding plan to fix the state’s crumbling roads — but with little headway. Gov. Jerry Brown estimates there are almost $6 billion worth of unfunded repairs throughout the state each year.

The dispute is largely between Democrats who have proposed additional revenues (taxes) and Republicans who believe new taxes aren’t necessary as the money already exists but has been redirected to stop budget shortfalls in other areas.

Rumor has it that Democrats will propose what could be a massive package including new revenue, like a gas tax hike, sometime next month — although, since there’s a special session, it could be introduced after the regular session ends.

Republicans are unlikely to budge, but it may not matter what they want. Republicans are in danger of ceding a supermajority to the Democrats in November. If that happens, Democrats would be able to approve new revenues without Republican support.

Of course, the required two-thirds majority wouldn’t leave much room for defections from moderate Democrats.

Overtime for farmworkers

While farmworkers do get overtime, it has a much higher threshold than other professions. A revived bill would, over time, bring the threshold in line with other professions. You may remember that this bill was defeated in June, but it has been repackaged into another bill.

Proponents argue that farmworkers shouldn’t be exempt from the same overtime and break rules as everyone else. Opponents say farmers can’t afford it, and that an industry dependent on weather and external price setting can’t be regulated the same as other professions.

It’s unclear what would be different when the next vote comes that would make business-friendly Democrats, who sided with Republicans to defeat the measure, change their votes. Election year pressure may sway some vulnerable incumbents.

Of course, the measure was only three votes shy of passage, so proponents may target the seven Assembly members who simply didn’t vote, six of whom are Democrats.

Housing

It’s widely reported that the state faces an affordable housing crisis, particularly in urban centers.

Gov. Jerry Brown has been trying to increase affordable housing supply with a plan to reduce regulatory barriers for developers trying to build low-income housing. His ideas have not been embraced by the Legislature and he faces opposition largely fromunions and environmentalists.

Meanwhile, Sen. Jim Beall, D-San Jose, still has hopes of putting a $3 billion, low-income housing bond on the November ballot.

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: AB32, affordable housing, farmworkers, Fran Pavley, Housing, Jerry Brown, Kevin de Leon, Legislature, SB32, Transportation

Are Environmentalists Losing Influence in Legislature?

July 17, 2016 By Chris Reed 5 Comments

California environmentalists have long been one of the most powerful forces in the Legislature. But in 2015, the centerpiece of the green agenda — a provision in a broader measure that would have mandated a 50 percent reduction in gasoline use in the state by 2030 — stalled in the Legislature despite heavy prodding from Gov. Jerry Brown and appeals from then-Speaker Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, and Senate President Kevin de Leon, D-Los Angeles. The development was such a break from the norm that it won heavy coverage from The New York Times, which called it “a major setback for environmental advocates in California.”

Now there’s a fresh sign that environmentalists’ clout may be on the wane. De Leon has stunned green groups by endorsing a moderate incumbent — Assemblywoman Cheryl Brown, D-San Bernardino — who opposed the push for a sharp cut in gasoline use over another prominent Inland Empire Democrat, attorney Eloise Gomez Reyes. As Calwatchdog reported earlier this year, Brown was indirectly blasted by one of de Leon’s leadership team, Sen. Connie Leyva, D-Chino, who said she was backing Brown’s opponent because “she was a principled human being.”

In a strange twist, the document making the rounds in media circles showing de Leon’s endorsement of Brown contends that Leyva and all his fellow Senate Democratic leaders agree with him.

“I support Eloise Reyes. Period. Somehow the pro tem must have misunderstood my position, although I thought I was quite clear,” Leyva told The Los Angeles Times.

Whatever the logistical problems with de Leon’s endorsement, it amounts to a striking rejection of environmentalists’ argument that they know Brown’s district better than she does. This view was voiced again this week by one of Reyes’ consultants, Leo Briones, who told the Times, “Cheryl Brown can have every special interest and every Sacramento politician … but she still is a legislator that does not represent progressive values or her district when it comes to issues of working families, of consumers, of guns and public safety and the environment.”

Green official: Brown a ‘nice person,’ bad lawmaker

This argument was offered by a high-profile environmentalist in a January Sacramento Bee story that rubbed some minority lawmakers the wrong way:

“There’s no doubt Ms. Brown, who’s a very nice person, has not been representing her constituents when it comes to environmental issues, particularly clean-air issues,” Sierra Club California director Kathryn Phillips told the Bee. “She’s collected too much money from the oil industry and let that guide too many of her votes.”

As Calwatchdog reported then …

Phillips, who works out of Sacramento, is a white UC Berkeley graduate who used to work for the Environmental Defense Fund. Brown, who turns 72 next week, has been a fixture in the Inland Empire African-American political establishment for more than three decades. She co-founded a weekly publication that focuses on black issues in 1980 and has worked on a wide variety of African-American causes in western San Bernardino County.

Assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas, D-Los Angeles, told the Bee he didn’t care for how environmentalists were treating his fellow African-American lawmaker. “I think it’s a tone-deaf approach. … The environmental community, and the broader environmental coalition, needs to figure out whether or not it’s going to be a collaborator and … work with black California on policy, and shared political goals, or if it will be an adversary.”

Ridley-Thomas is a vocal supporter of de Leon’s efforts to have a Superfund-type cleanup of the Exide battery plant in Vernon.

Originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Cheryl Brown, environment, Kevin de Leon, Legislature, UC Berkeley

Is Bill Amending Gavin Newsom’s Gun-Control Initiative Legal?

July 7, 2016 By Matt Fleming 7 Comments

Legislative Democrats pushed through a gun-control measure last week that is almost certain to be challenged in court — where it’ll have a tough time surviving — all for the sake of what some claim is a political grudge.

The Legislature passed 11 bills in all, six of which were signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown and the rest vetoed. But one is fraught with peril as it circumvents the Elections Code by amending a November ballot initiative regulating ammo sales.

The difference between how the bill, sponsored by Senate President Pro Tempore Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles, and the ballot measure, sponsored by Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, regulate ammo sales is not substantial. But Democrats have had a hard time providing legal justification for going around Section 9034 (c) in the Elections Code, which says the Legislature does not have the authority to “alter the initiative measure… .”

Republicans tried

Assembly Republicans tried raising the issue just before final passage, but were brushed aside.

“Don’t we have a statutory or Constitutional problem in amending something that hasn’t even become law yet and is proposed to go to the voters for a vote,” asked Assemblyman James Gallagher, R-Plumas Lake.

Assemblyman Kevin Mullin, who was presiding at the time, said the Legislature had the authority under “the initiative process and statute.” The San Mateo Democrat, however, was unable to identify a particular law or statue, offering instead that legislative counsel said it was OK.

Assemblyman Don Wagner tried next.

“I think you’re wrong,” the Irvine Republican told Mullin, citing the Elections Code. Wagner appealed the ruling, saying the Legislature was “trampling the will of the people,” who signed a ballot measure without de León’s amendment, adding that the Legislature was “acting illegally and in violation of the Elections Code.” Assembly Democrats pushed forward and Wagner was overruled.

Attempts to get justification

According to documents provided by de León’s office, legislative counsel did not review the legality of the measure. Instead, legislative counsel issued an opinion on how the amendment would affect the ballot measure.

No legal justification for the law has been provided to CalWatchdog, although de León’s office pointed to an instance from 1990 when the Legislature amended Prop. 129. The measure failed by a wide margin, however, and CalWatchdog has been unable to find a legal ruling setting precedent.

Language in the measure

Next, de León’s office pointed to a provision in Newsom’s ballot language stating: “The provisions of this measure may be amended by a vote of 55 percent of the members of each house of the Legislature and signed by the Governor so long as such amendments are consistent with and further the intent of this Act.” But it’s unclear if the legislative intent of that passage is referring to before or after the measure becomes law, although that’s likely irrelevant. Until the ballot measure is approved by the voters (if it is approved by voters) it has no force of law.

And if the legislative intent was to allow the legislature to amend the measure’s language prior to a vote of the people, it’s unlikely that Newsom or any other ballot initiative proponent has the power to temporarily rewrite the Elections Code.

Proponents have a period to amend pending initiatives, but that period ended a while ago.

Lack of accountability

The attorney’s general office has not responded to requests for comment. Gov. Jerry Brown signed the bill into law last week, but his office deferred to de León.

A spokesperson for the ballot initiative said proponents were focused on getting the measure passed and did not say if they would challenge the law.

Newsom/de León fued

In recent weeks, the Newsom/de Leon feud has spilled out into public, with a Newsom spokesman calling the move “sickeningly cynical.”

“Is (de León) someone who truly respects the will of the voters and wants to reduce gun violence or is he merely a self-serving cynic completely consumed with petty personal grudges,” spokesman Dan Newman told The Sacramento Bee.

De León has had it out for Newsom for a while over the gun issue. When Newsom announced plans to introduce the measure last year, de León — who’d made background checks for ammo purchases a pet priority — slashed the size of Newsom’s staff.

This article was originally published by CalWatchdog.com

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Elections Code, Gavin Newsom, gun control, Jerry Brown, Kevin de Leon

Lawmakers send sweeping gun package to Jerry Brown

June 30, 2016 By Christopher Cadelago, Jim Miller and Rachel Cohrs 7 Comments

As reported by the Sacramento Bee:

California’s Democrat-controlled Legislature on Thursday approved far-reaching bills to bolster the state’s strong gun restrictions, sending Gov. Jerry Brown a package of measures revived after the deadly attack last year in San Bernardino.

Lawmakers, led by Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles, moved a dozen bills, including those expanding California’s historic 1989 ban on assault weapons, barring possession of high-capacity magazines that accommodate more than 10 rounds of ammunition, instituting tighter deadlines for owners to report lost or stolen firearms and regulating ammunition sales.

While California’s gun-control laws are among the toughest in the nation, the latest effort comes amid a series of unabated massacres dominating the headlines – from the December shooting in San Bernardino where two terrorists killed 14 people to the recent attack at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Fla., where an aggrieved shooter gunned down 49 people and injured more than 50 others, the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.

De León authored the ammunition regulation bill after a past attempt requiring in-person ammo sales was tossed out in court for being too vague. He called it “ridiculous” that terrorist sympathizers and some gang members are using America’s broken gun laws system to harm communities. …

Click here to read the full article

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: gun control, Jerry Brown, Kevin de Leon, Legislature, Orlando, San Bernardino

Golden State Democrats Divide Over Race

June 22, 2016 By Troy Senik 8 Comments

The California Republican Party—an institution accustomed to embarrassment—suffered a novel and stinging indignity in the June 7 Golden State primary. Once the votes were tallied, it was revealed that the GOP’s candidate for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Democrat Barbara Boxer in the November election would be . . . nobody. It’s not that Republicans failed to recruit any contenders. Two former (and relatively obscure) state party chairmen, Tom Del Beccaro and Duf Sundheim, competed in the primary, as did activist businessman and one-time gubernatorial candidate Ron Unz. Rocky Chavez, a state assemblyman from San Diego County who led the GOP field in early polling, had also been in the mix before abruptly withdrawing—at the beginning of a debate, no less—in February. So how does a party enter a race with four candidates and still emerge without a nominee?

Like most riddles associated with California politics, the answer is direct democracy. In 2010, voters approved Proposition 14, a ballot measure that abolished conventional party primaries for statewide and congressional races. Instead, the initiative created a system wherein primary voters get to cast their ballot for any candidate, regardless of party—but where only the top two finishers compete in the general election. This year, that process yielded a U.S. Senate contest between two Democrats: Attorney General Kamala Harris and Orange County congresswoman Loretta Sanchez.

Among California’s political and media elite, the result is being discussed mainly as a sign of the GOP’s irrelevance in the nation’s most populous state—a reading with plenty of evidence to support it. Higher office has now been out of the party’s grasp for a decade, with Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 2006 reelection as governor marking the last time that a Republican won any statewide contest.

Yet, while public attention is focused on the GOP’s deathbed vigil, another equally consequential trend is unfolding largely under the radar: California Democrats, far from enjoying a frictionless ascendancy, are finding themselves sharply divided along racial lines. The breakneck demographic shifts in the state over the past few decades partly explain the tension. In 1990, California was more than 57 percent white, while Latinos made up just over a quarter of the state’s population. By 2014, however, Latinos had surpassed whites as the state’s largest ethnic group. At the same time, the state’s Asian population (the nation’s largest) had grown to 14.4 percent, more than double the number of California’s African-Americans. In a minority-majority state dominated by a party that practices identity politics, each group now finds itself in a zero-sum competition for a handful of positions at the commanding heights of Golden State politics.

Those spots don’t come open very often, making competition that much fiercer. Boxer and her Senate colleague Dianne Feinstein were both first elected to the upper chamber in 1992, a time when California was, in demographic terms, an entirely different place. They’re not the only members of California’s governing class who seem like relics of a bygone era. While the state’s population is ethnically diverse and young (in 2014 the median age was 36, sixth-lowest in the nation), its most visible political figures—Boxer, Feinstein, Governor Jerry Brown, and House minority leader Nancy Pelosi—are lily white and have an average age of nearly 78.

When Boxer announced her retirement in early 2015, it unleashed a frenzy of activity among California Democrats aiming to make their leadership more reflective of the party’s diversity. The problem was that no one could agree on exactly how to fulfill that mandate. Certainly Harris, born to a Jamaican father and an Indian mother, represented a break from the past. But the swiftness with which she attracted endorsements led to a backlash from Latinos, who felt they were being taken for granted. When the attorney general garnered near-instant backing from influential national Democrats such as Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker, California State Senate president pro tem Kevin de Leon told Politico,“National figures should slow their roll a bit.” Arturo Vargas, head of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, cautioned, “Hispanic leaders are concerned about some kind of coronation, as opposed to a real electoral campaign.”

The coronation, however, largely proceeded apace. Harris’s substantial war chest and stack of endorsements deterred some of the state’s most prominent Latinos—namely former Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and House Democratic Caucus chairman Xavier Becerra—from mounting a challenge. Sanchez, previously more of a comic figure than a serious political force (her main contribution to California politics has been a series of increasingly bizarre Christmas cards featuring her cat), exploited the vacuum for a Latino alternative, riding the discontent all the way to a spot on the November ballot.

Most observers—though not all—expect Harris to prevail in November, but the underlying tensions show little sign of abating. In May, Texas Democratic congressman Filemon Vela blasted the California Democratic Party for endorsing Harris, calling the act “insulting to Latinos all throughout this country” and “a disrespectful example of wayward institutional leadership which on the one hand ‘wants our vote’ but on the other hand wants to ‘spit us out.’” California Hispanics may share that sentiment. Though Harris won 40.3 percent of the vote to Sanchez’s 18.5 percent in the primary, a USC/Los Angeles Times poll released shortly before the contest showed 43 percent of Hispanics supporting Sanchez to just 16 percent for Harris.

Status anxiety is now pervasive among the racial caucuses within California’s Democratic Party. Hispanics worry that their votes will be taken for granted, while their elected officials are passed over for higher office. African-Americans, outnumbered two-to-one by Asians and six-to-one by Hispanics, fret that they’ll be relegated to junior-partner status within the party. Asians, meanwhile, chafe at certain liberal orthodoxies—a tension that became public in 2014 when a small band of Asian Democrats in the legislature blocked their black and Hispanic colleagues’ efforts to revive racial preferences in California college admissions.

Intra-party friction, of course, isn’t exclusive to California. However, with the Republican Party in steep decline in the state and the top-two primary system as the law of the land, the situation in California is particularly combustible. California Democrats have long dreamed of the unfettered power that would accompany vanquishing the state’s rump Republican Party. Few, however, seemed to anticipate the stress fractures that inevitably emerge in a political monoculture. With no worlds left to conquer, they’re now left warily circling each other. And no one seems inclined to slow his roll.

Troy Senik is the vice president of policy and programs at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research.

This piece was originally published by City Journal Online.

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Barbara Boxer, City Journal, Dianne Feinstein, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Kevin de Leon, Loretta Sanchez, Troy Senik

Dems Battle Each Other Over Gun Control

May 9, 2016 By James Poulos 11 Comments

Seeking to bolster his early-bird campaign for governor, Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom forged ahead with a controversial ballot initiative designed to put severe strictures on guns in California. But in addition to raising the ire of Republicans statewide, Newsom has begun to clash with members of his own party in Sacramento, who don’t share his vision of the right political strategy on the issue in November and beyond.

Exploiting divides

Beyond “checks for ammunition purchases — like those already in place for guns — the measure would ban possession of large-capacity rifle magazines, require gun owners to notify police when their weapons are lost or stolen, and enact rules for courts to confiscate guns from criminals who are prohibited from possessing them,” the San Francisco Chronicle reported. “Other provisions would reclassify possession of a stolen gun as a felony and require California to share its background check information with the FBI.”

“Newsom said supporters will submit 600,000 signatures on petitions to qualify an initiative that would strengthen California’s gun-control laws, already some of the strictest in the nation. They need 365,880 signatures of registered voters to make the ballot.”

In 1982, the paper noted, gun control advocates’ last effort at taking their agenda directly to voters resulted in defeat at the hands of a well-organized opposition mobilized by the National Rifle Association. Republicans have already begun to plan for a similar effort. Congressional candidate Tim Donnelly called Newsom’s plan a “disaster” that would spur outsized Republican turnout at the polls, according to the Sacramento Bee. “Donnelly, who was once cited for bringing a loaded gun to an airport, said in recent months he’s become an even bigger supporter of gun rights, citing the terror attack in San Bernardino,” the paper added.

Two different playbooks

With the state GOP divided and stunned by Donald Trump’s sweep toward the Republican nomination for president, however, Newsom has not put a great deal of stock in opposition to his plan from the right. On the left, however, he has stepped on the toes of legislative Democrats, complicating his plans considerably. Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles, “wants him to agree to step aside if the issue can gain traction in the Legislature by June,” as the Los Angeles Times reported. De León “warned his fellow Democrat in a private letter on Thursday that pursuing the initiative could ‘derail’ gun control” — but “Newsom wrote back later Thursday urging de León to join his initiative drive. He voiced skepticism about legislative efforts to address gun control, adding that the measure de León supports is ‘fundamentally different’ from his ballot measure, the Safety for All Act.”

“Newsom said only an initiative, for instance, can amend part of 2014’s criminal justice measure, Proposition 47 — a portion that critics say would allow people convicted of theft of a firearm to be charged with a lesser crime than felony grand theft.”

For their part, Critical Democrats have expressed worries that Newsom is willing to risk a political miscalculation in order to establish his brand as a proactive progressive who shouldn’t be seriously challenged in his run for higher office.

Although both de León and Newsom could benefit from support from within the governor’s mansion, neither has managed to lock it in. “Evan Westrup, spokesman for Gov. Jerry Brown, maintained the governor has not taken a position on this initiative and generally doesn’t comment on pending ballot measures,” Fox News reported. “But in 2013 the governor vetoed a proposed reporting of stolen or lost firearms, saying he was ‘not convinced that criminalizing the failure to report a lost or stolen firearm would improve identification of gun traffickers or help law enforcement disarm people prohibited from possessing guns.’”