Hilton’s magic number really is 40.82%

November 3, 2026 By James V. Lacy 1 Comment

Polls suggest he won’t finish as well as last GOP candidate for Governor.

Who will be our beloved California’s next Governor? Given the state’s persistent problems of inability to reduce homelessness, really high taxes including affordability of taxes on gas, wasteful spending on dubious transportation projects, fraud and mismanagement in the unemployment department and Medi-Cal, housing and more, after 20 years of the same party rule, we could really use a change and the facts support change. But polls tell us overwhelmingly that no change is in store for the Governor’s race. Our citizens complain about California, some flee the state, but the ones who stay fail to take action at the ballot box to change things for the better.

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I surely did not vote for Becerra, but he will be our next Governor. The opposition simply could not come together with what it needed to be unified and communicate a compelling message with a compelling candidate and I deeply regret offering this fact. In neighboring Oregon with similar problems to us, the GOP has a chance to win the Governorship despite antagonism to Trump.

Click here to read the full article at James V. Lacy’s Substack

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14 California lawmakers are posting not-so-secret instructions on how to attack their opponents

November 2, 2026 By Kate Wolffe and Nadia Lathan 2 Comments

Some candidates for the California Legislature are increasingly using a controversial tactic that experts and watchdog organizations say appears to flout the state’s campaign finance laws.

A CalMatters’ survey of legislative race websites found at least 14 candidates have detailed campaign messaging packaged on their websites in ways that make it easy for independent expenditure committees to use in advertisements.

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The technique, known as “red boxing,” is being increasingly used in the absence of oversight from state regulators.

CalMatters found at least three instances in which outside groups made digital campaign ads that mirrored the packaged messaging on candidate websites. Under state campaign rules, ads made “at the behest” of official campaigns are presumed to be “coordinated” spending — not independent expenditures — and may illegally exceed campaign finance contribution limits.

In one example, a section in a red box on Assembly candidate Jessie Lopez’s website says “Democratic and (No Party Preference) voters should know” that her competitor, fellow Santa Ana city councilmember David Penaloza, voted to approve a city contract with the surveillance camera company Flock, that he is funded by special interests, and that Jessie Lopez will “fight for working people.”

On Oct. 14, a 15-second ad popped up on the Facebook and Instagram feeds of Santa Ana residents highlighting Penaloza’s approval of the Flock contract, his funding from “big tech billionaires,” and nurses’ and educators’ support for Lopez. It was paid for by an outside group, Working People United sponsored by SEIU California State Council, which has spent at least $1.4 million in support of Lopez since April.

Lopez did not respond to a text message requesting comment, and her campaign did not respond to emailed inquiries about whether the information was intended for an independent expenditure committee. Working People United also did not respond to a request for comment.

But campaign strategists and watchdog groups agree the practice is becoming widespread in competitive California races.

“After Citizens United and all of that, and big money getting into politics, it’s gotten crazy, right? Things have just gotten unwieldy,” said Jorge Contreras, California Director of the Working Families Party, which supports Lopez.

“Because of that, the candidates are using red boxes to try to communicate.”

Click here to read the full article in CalMatters

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Karen Bass is back in the race

October 30, 2026 By MELANIE MASON and BLAKE JONES 3 Comments

TIGHTENING IN LA — How excited was Karen Bass’ campaign about a new poll showing her in a toss-up against Nithya Raman? Excited enough to post about it at 1:36 a.m.

Just last month, the Berkeley IGS — Los Angeles Times poll showed Bass down 11 points against Raman, a walloping lead that cemented Raman’s status as the front-runner in the mayoral race. Closing a double-digit gap within a month would be a remarkable comeback for Bass, especially because her negatives remain ominously high, with 65% of likely voters viewing her unfavorably.

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But after a rough summer of campaign missteps and brutal headlines, Bass has caught a break in recent weeks, with Raman suffering a series of self-inflicted wounds, largely on public safety. The Bass campaign has alternately hammered her with accusations of being too far left on public safety — citing her appearance in a video with a social media influencer who referred to Los Angeles as a fascist city and her call to replace current police chief Jim McDonnell — and too complimentary of law-and-order former chief Daryl Gates.

Raman was slow to apologize for the Gates comment and offered contradictory answers on McDonnell’s future. The crime-focused news cycle dragged on for days, forcing Raman off her preferred framing of the race: a referendum on Bass’ tenure. Now, Raman’s favorability is underwater for the first time in that poll, with 49% of likely voters holding unfavorable views versus 42% who viewed her positively.

To the Bass campaign, the results are a validation of its recent strategy.

“It’s an affirmation of the past few weeks of Nithya being exposed as not being up for the job,” said Bass spokesperson Alex Stack.

The poll contains some warning signs for Bass. Raman leads among Democrats and independents, and has a slight edge among white and Latino voters. Bass’ strength is with Republicans and Black voters — an incongruous coalition that would not be enough alone to win in an overwhelmingly Democratic city where Black residents are less than 10% of the voting population.

Still, the Bass campaign was eager to tout the findings, a reversal from last month when it dismissed the Berkeley IGS survey as an outlier.

Click here to read the full article in Politico

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Major California water plan faces ‘huge mess’ as deadline looms

October 27, 2026 By Kurtis Alexander Leave a Comment

At the urging of Gov. Gavin Newsom, California water officials have been working with a group of agencies for years on a far-reaching plan to protect the rivers that nourish the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.

The Newsom administration is seeking an arrangement in which urban and agricultural suppliers across the state agree to take less water from California rivers, and help restore river habitat, in exchange for more flexibility using water and meeting regulations. The goal is to halt the ecological slide of the delta, a sprawling estuary and water supply hub for nearly 30 million people.

But even as the governor has made finalizing what’s called the Bay Delta Plan a priority before he leaves office in January, the state’s negotiations with the water agencies appear to have come up short. The State Water Resources Control Board is scheduled to adopt the plan this week, yet water providers up and down the state are taking issue with it, many saying it isn’t the collaborative deal they were promised. The Trump administration is also protesting.

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The division, after nearly a decade of private discussions, is not just a setback for the parties involved. It leaves the fate of the Bay Delta Plan and, importantly, the future of delta water management, in disarray.

Without appropriate action, the watery 1,100-square-mile region between the Bay Area and Sacramento will face a worsening crisis of dwindling freshwater, degraded habitat, rising pollution and perishing wildlife, notably salmon runs. Ultimately, delta water exports to some of California’s biggest cities and farms are at stake.

“This is a huge mess,” said Jennifer Pierre, general manager for the State Water Contractors, a group of water agencies that receive state water exports and a participant in the Bay Delta Plan negotiations. “It didn’t need to be this way. It’s very unfortunate that this is where we are now (with the plan). We’ve been working on it for a long time.”

Water suppliers, including such Bay Area giants as the East Bay Municipal Utility District and Santa Clara Valley Water District, cite a range of concerns. The common complaint is that state regulators aren’t giving the agencies enough operational leeway, undercutting the suppliers’ hope of managing rivers without rigid rules and with enough latitude to adjust as conditions change.

Click here to read the full article in the SF Chronicle

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Billionaire tax could cost California $39 billion, Stanford economists say

October 24, 2026 By Christian Leonard 1 Comment

Californians are already voting on a proposed billionaire wealth tax, but the debate over the policy among experts — including some Bay Area economists — is only ramping up.

One of the latest salvos is a new report by two economists at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, a conservative think tank. Not only do they think that the one-time levy won’t raise the advertised amount — it might actually cost the state billions in the long run.

The first piece of the argument is about the takings of the wealth tax itself. The economists’ working paper, which hasn’t yet been peer-reviewed, argues that the tax would collect only about $36 billion, about a third of the $100 billion projected by its supporters.

The second piece at issue is a different set of taxes altogether — the income taxes the ultra-wealthy already pay. The paper’s authors, Benjamin Jaros and Joshua Rauh, estimate the one-time billionaire tax would drive away many of the state’s wealthiest residents — and the income taxes the state collects from them, resulting an average of $30 billion to $40 billion in lost revenue.

For opponents of the tax proposal, which is on the ballot as Proposition 40, the economists’ findings are evidence that the policy would do more harm than good. Prop 40 would levy a one-time 5% wealth tax on people with a net worth of at least $1 billion who lived in California on Jan. 1, 2026. The threat of that loss, and the possibility of similar taxes in the future, has reportedly already caused some billionaires to leave California even before the start of this year.

A political action committee funded by some of those billionaires, including Google co-founder Sergey Brin, has poured more than $300 million into efforts to defeat the tax, including by supporting ballot measures that would counter it.

But for supporters of the wealth tax, among whom are some Nobel Prize-winning economists, the Hoover researchers go too far. The assumption that the wealthy have (or will) leave California to avoid losing a twentieth of their net worth is just too gloomy, the proposal’s authors argue. Just this week, Meta revealed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that Mark Zuckerberg was considering leaving California, but agreed to stay after the company gave him a new stock deal. The authors also say the tax is needed more than ever to cover massive federal cuts to healthcare funding.

It’s worth considering how the Hoover economists got to their estimates. The pair, who also co-authored a recent paper arguing state overspending is to blame for California’s health care funding gap, critiqued the pro-tax side’s $100 billion revenue estimate in a few ways. First, the Hoover experts reckoned that seven billionaires, including Brin, Google co-founder Larry Page and Palantir founder Peter Thiel, would vanish from the potential tax base, citing news reports suggesting they moved out of the state before the Jan. 1 cutoff.

Removing just those seven people from the data reduces the tax’s potential revenue to roughly $72 billion, the authors said. The exclusion of others would knock it down even more. If Zuckerberg successfully fought his projected tax liability, for example, the revenue would decrease by another $6 billion.

Finally, they argued that because the tax is likely to face legal challenges if it passes the ballot, it should only be estimated to receive half of its potential revenue: about $30 billion.

“Depending on what litigation risk (a) taxpayer faces … the state of California is gonna bat .500 on these,” said Jaros, one of the paper’s authors. “It started to make a lot of sense. Half the tax base is a function of five people.”

As that handful of billionaires departs, Jaros and Rauh said, so too would the income tax they already pay — the value of which would probably exceed the value of the wealth tax paid by those who stayed, at least over the long term. If even more billionaires leave, the balance sheet could fall even deeper into the red, with the authors estimating a net loss of $39 billion in the average scenario in the long run (although that includes Zuckerberg, who’s apparently staying).

That’s the critique. The tax’s authors — UC Berkeley economist Emmanuel Saez, UC Berkeley tax law professor Brian Galle, UC Davis tax law professor Darien Shanske and University of Missouri tax law professor David Gamage — had their own critique of the critique. They pointed to their own research, which indicated the wealthiest households pay far less income tax than the Hoover economists believe. They also took issue with the Hoover economists’ calculation of the tax’s legal risk, with Saez calling the estimated 50% cut “somewhat arbitrary.”
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Voters’ Prop 36 Delivers Accountability: Repeat Thief Sentenced to 9 Years in State Prison

October 19, 2026 By Katy Grimes 1 Comment

Two years ago, you said enough is enough’

California is getting good results with Proposition 36. San Luis Obispo County District Attorney Dan Dow made this announcement Friday:

Today Lauren Pamela Johnston, 35, of Paso Robles, has been sentenced to 9 years in California state prison, with an additional 2 years stayed pending the outcome of an open felony case in Monterey County. She pleaded no contest to all 31 felony counts from a string of car break-ins and identity-theft crimes against North County residents during the 2025 Thanksgiving and Christmas season.

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District Attorney Dow said the case is clear: local evidence that Proposition 36 works. Fifteen of Johnston’s 31 felony convictions were filed under Penal Code section 666.1, the felony for repeat thieves that California voters created when they approved Proposition 36 in November 2024. Without that law, every one of those 15 thefts could have been charged only as a misdemeanor.

“I want to thank the voters of San Luis Obispo County and California,” Dow said. “Two years ago, you said enough is enough. Our county approved Proposition 36 with 66 percent of the vote, and the state approved it with more than 68 percent. This sentence is the direct result of that vote. You gave prosecutors the tools to hold repeat thieves accountable, and in this case those tools protected your neighbors.”

On October 13, 2026, Johnston pleaded no contest before San Luis Obispo County Superior Court Judge Jesse J. Marino to:

  • 15 counts of theft with two or more prior theft convictions (Penal Code section 666.1), the felony created by Proposition 36
  • 9 counts of identity theft (Penal Code section 530.5(a))
  • 3 counts of identity theft with a prior identity-theft conviction (Penal Code section 530.5(c)(2))
  • 3 counts of grand theft (Penal Code section 487(a))
  • 1 count of second-degree vehicle burglary (Penal Code section 459)

She also admitted that she committed these felonies while out on bail in a pending Monterey County case (Penal Code section 12022.1), and she admitted a prior “strike” conviction for first-degree residential burglary. She also admitted an aggravating circumstance: she had previously served a prison term (California Rules of Court, rule 4.421(b)(3)). She was remanded to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. A restitution hearing is set for February 2, 2027.

Lauren Pamela Johnston. (Photo: San Luis Obispo County District Attorney)

A Season of Harm for Local Families

From mid-October through early December 2025, Johnston opened unlocked cars and broke into locked ones in high-traffic places, including the Atascadero High School parking lot, shopping-center parking lots, and apartment complexes. She took purses, wallets, phones, cash, and bank cards. Within hours, she used the stolen cards at gas stations, convenience stores, fast-food restaurants, and grocery stores. Victims learned of the thefts when alerts from their banks reached their phones.

The harm reached well past the dollar amounts. One mother’s car was entered in December. The losses included her prescription eyeglasses and sunglasses, her children’s sunglasses, her bank and health savings account cards, and her family’s medical insurance cards. Her bank froze her account for a 90-day fraud investigation. In a statement filed with the court, she wrote:

“This theft shattered my sense of security and trust. I have spent countless hours reviewing financial records, filing police reports, and communicating with banks and other institutions in an effort to repair the damage caused by someone else’s deliberate actions… Accountability is essential, both for my own healing and to help prevent similar harm to others.”

Another victim told the Probation Department that the defendant “terrorized the community.” At least one victim was a juvenile whose wallet was taken from his locked vehicle while he was in class at Atascadero High School.

“Behind every count in this case is a neighbor who did nothing wrong,” Dow said. “These were parents picking up their kids, shoppers running holiday errands, and a young man whose wallet was stolen from his locked car. They lost money and property. They also lost their sense of safety, along with many hours spent canceling cards, filing fraud claims, and protecting their identities. This prosecution was for them.”

The Community Spoke Up, and Law Enforcement Answered

During the 2025 Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday season, District Attorney Dow began hearing from community members and local social media groups. They described repeated car break-ins and fraudulent card charges across North County, and a suspect who had already been arrested yet remained free and kept committing new crimes. Residents on a community Facebook page helped identify the suspect. Surveillance video and an eyewitness placed her at the crimes.

Working with the Atascadero Police Department, the Paso Robles Police Department, and the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office, the District Attorney’s Office gathered seven separate police investigations into one felony prosecution built on the new tools of Proposition 36. On December 10, 2025, officers served a search warrant and arrest warrant at Johnston’s Paso Robles home. There they recovered property belonging to the December victim, which was returned to her. Johnston has been in custody since that day. At her first court appearance, she was held without bail.

Deputy District Attorney Hunter Starr then asked the court to combine the separate cases into one prosecution. He showed that the crimes shared the same pattern. In case after case, Johnston claimed she had “found” the cards, used them by accident, or was pressured by someone else. Surveillance footage contradicted those claims. The court granted consolidation in December 2025 and again in April 2026.

“This case is what collaboration looks like,” Dow said. “Victims reported. Neighbors shared what they saw. Officers in three agencies did careful, connected police work. Our prosecutors brought it together into one case that showed the whole picture. When the community and the criminal and victim justice system work together, repeat offenders can be stopped.”

Proof That Proposition 36 Works

Johnston’s record of theft is long. Between 2014 and 2016, she was convicted in Sacramento and Placer Counties of petty theft, attempted vehicle theft, multiple identity-theft felonies, receiving stolen vehicles, vehicle burglary, and a first-degree residential burglary in which family heirloom jewelry was stolen. She was sentenced to a combined 8 years and 4 months in state prison and was paroled in December 2017.

Under Proposition 47 (2014), theft of property worth $950 or less was generally a misdemeanor, no matter how many times the offender had stolen before (Legislative Analyst’s Office). A misdemeanor petty theft or shoplifting conviction carries no more than six months in county jail. Proposition 36 took effect December 18, 2024 (California Attorney General). It created Penal Code section 666.1, which allows a felony charge for petty theft or shoplifting when the offender has two or more prior theft-related convictions (Penal Code 666.1). Those prior convictions count no matter how old they are (California Attorney General). The law also requires a judge to review a person’s risk to public safety before releasing anyone arrested under it (Penal Code 666.1).

What Proposition 36 changed in this case:

Click here to read the full article in the California Globe

 

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‘DEI Bike Lanes’ – Sacramento City Council Inflates Bicycling Numbers for Federal Taxpayer Grants

October 13, 2026 By Katy Grimes 3 Comments

Complaint alleges the City of Sacramento used false bike trail-usage figures to win nearly $10 million

Recently, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced the end of federal funding for “DEI bike lanes.”

Sacramento didn’t get the memo.

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“Sean Duffy, Mr. Trump’s transportation secretary, has argued that when bike lanes cut into space for cars and trucks, the result is more congestion, ‘longer travel times and wasted fuel,’” The New York Times reported. “But Mr. Duffy and his colleagues have also deployed rhetoric that suggests the bicycle is hopelessly lefty, belonging in the same category as green-haired baristas, Rosie O’Donnell and yard signs professing that love is love.”

 

At issue in Sacramento, California is construction of an approximately 3.8-mile levee-top multi-use trail for bicycle and pedestrian recreational use and commuter travel between Garcia Bend Park and Zacharias Park in Sacramento’s  Pocket neighborhood. The project will include neighborhood access ramps and pedestrian crossing improvements. The Sacramento City Council approved the preliminary design plan and adopted the Addendum to the 1997 EIR on October 14, 2025.

The Sacramento City Council appears to have boosted the numbers of bicycle riders from the 32-mile American River Parkway and applied them to the more obscure 3.8 mile bike trail atop the levy on the Sacramento River, to land millions in federal transportation funds – funds that are supposed to be used for reducing traffic congestion.

A Sacramento resident recently filed a complaint with the US Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General, alleging that the City of Sacramento used false bike trail-usage figures to win nearly $10 million in competitive federal grants for the Sacramento River Parkway trail project.

The Transportation OIG has reviewed the complaint and referred it to the Federal Highway Administration for review.

The Sacramento River Parkway’s grants fall squarely within Secretary Duffy’s “DEI bike lanes” review window, specifically targeting projects that touted “equity” benefits. Sacramento’s applications explicitly invoked Environmental Justice community status to score competitive points, and its funds are not yet fully obligated.

At the core of Sacramento’s “DEI bike lane” project is the city’s projection that the Sacramento River Parkway Bike Trail would have as many users as the region’s American River Parkway – a 32-mile parkway that has beaches, recreational amenities, equestrian trails, and a nature center. It’s a ridiculous and fraudulent comparison. Those numbers presumably helped the city receive millions in competitive grants, while other more deserving projects in the region that would actually reduce congestion received nothing.

The City claims 9,000 average daily trips on the 3.8 mile bike trail, will translate into 15,006 annual auto trips reduced, and 56,871 annual auto Vehicle Miles Traveled reduced.

This is preposterous. Sacramento’s Pocket neighborhood has about 27,000 residents.

From the federal complaint:

THE PATTERN ACROSS BOTH ROUNDS

The misconduct described in this complaint is not an isolated error. It is a documented pattern across two successive competitive grant rounds:

In 2021, the City submitted 13,500 — 100% of the American River Parkway’s daily usage equivalent — as the Average Daily Trips/Traffic (ADT) for a 4.0-mile residential levee trail that terminates before the downtown connection is complete, with the ADT field left blank at zero in the simultaneously submitted PPA tool. The City received $3,120,000.

In 2022/23, the City submitted 9,000 — 67% of the American River Parkway’s daily usage equivalent — implemented by inserting “2/3” into the prior year’s otherwise identical note, with no new study, no new model, and no new analysis. The same application submitted 9,619 in the CMAQ calculation — a different, higher, internally inconsistent figure within the same package. The City received a staff-recommended award of approximately $6,803,000.

In neither round did the City cite a trail demand study, demand model, comparable facility analysis with supporting data, or any other documented basis for the specific Average Daily Trips figure or percentage used. In neither round did the City’s cost-effectiveness ADT figure bear any traceable analytical relationship to the observed transportation characteristics documented in its own required PPA materials. In neither round did SACOG’s program review cross-check the cost-effectiveness ADT figure against the PPA data submitted in the same application package — a systemic gap this complaint asks the OIG to address through program-level recommendations.

Moreover, the harm from the false Average Daily Trips representations extends beyond the federal funds directly awarded to the City of Sacramento. The SACOG Regional Program Transformative Category operates as a competitive zero-sum program with a fixed federal funding pool each cycle. Every dollar awarded to the Sacramento River Parkway Project based on artificially elevated cost-effectiveness scores was a dollar unavailable to other projects competing in the same round.

Federal Funding Source: Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ) and Regional Surface Transportation Program (RSTP) funds administered by the Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG) as the designated Metropolitan Planning Organization

Known Federal Awards (Prior Rounds):

  • 2020/2021 SACOG Regional Program round: $3,120,000
  • 2022/23 SACOG Regional Program round: approximately $6,803,000 (staff-recommended award)
  • Combined total awarded to date: approximately $9,923,000

Currently Programmed Metropolitan Transportation Improvement Program (MTIP) (2025 FSTIP):

  • SAC25264 (Phase 1): $11,644,000 total; $7,954,000 federal; construction target 2027
  • SAC25265 (Phase 2): $4,059,128 total; $850,000 federal; construction target 2028
  • Combined MTIP total: $15,703,128; federal portion: $8,804,000
  • FY2025/26 federal funds at immediate risk of obligation: $1,995,000

 The City took the American River Parkway’s total annual system-wide visitation and simply applied it as the projected daily usage for this specific 4.0-mile project segment.

Click here to read the full article at the California Globe

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Becerra’s Baggage Would Have Taken Down Anyone Else

October 11, 2026 By Katy Grimes 1 Comment

How is media not hammering Becerra on the missing migrant children, the Awan brothers scandal, and $22.6 billion in grants for migrants from 2020 to 2024?

There are serious questions about Xavier Becerra’s long record in elected office that deserve answers. His tainted tenure as President Joe Biden’s Health and Human Services Secretary, and the government’s handling of unaccompanied migrant children, which has been the subject of extensive investigative reporting, including by The New York Times. Migrant children are still missing and legacy media doesn’t seem too interested.

Whatever Becerra’s explanation is, shouldn’t California voters hear it directly from him? How is media not hammering Becerra on the missing migrant children?

The Globe has covered Becerra extensively for many years: Xavier Becerra as HHS Secretary doubled down on tyrannical COVID policies, including mandatory masking and vaccines for everyone including pregnant women and infants, as well as business and school lockdowns.

House Oversight Chairman James Comer recently accused Xavier Becerra when he was HHS Secretary of potentially hiding Anthony Fauci’s COVID-era diary and cellphone from Congress — documents that contained references to “COVID-19,” “gain-of-function,” and “Wuhan” that Republicans specifically requested in November 2023. Becerra either intentionally withheld the materials or failed to conduct an adequate search, according to Comer.

The California Post recently reported that Xavier Becerra disparaged migrant children as “little Juanitos and Juanitas” while leading former President Joe Biden administration’s health department, a former colleague alleges — fueling Democratic insiders’ fears about California’s would-be governor.

“I never heard a single person disparage immigrant children,” a former Biden administration official who worked with Becerra told the California Post. “He was the only person who brazenly said, ‘these little Juanitos and Juanitas.’”

But wait! There’s more!

Under HHS Secretary Becerra’s authority, “the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) ramped up grants for migrants from 2020 to 2024 — which included cash assistance to buy cars, homes and even build credit for startup businesses, according to a shocking watchdog report that found taxpayers were left on the hook for $22.6 billion.

According to the OpenTheBooks report:

Robin Dunn Marcos, who led HHS’s Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) under former President Joe Biden, oversaw $22.6 billion in grant distributions since 2020, with her former employers emerging as top beneficiaries. The International Rescue Committee (IRC), where she spent 23 years as a senior director, received $598 million, while Church World Service, her employer of four years, was awarded $355 million.

The corruption runs so deep it’s literally rinse and repeat.

A few years earlier, then-Congressman Xavier Becerra chaired the House Democratic Caucus, from 2013 to 2017, when IT aides Imran Awan, his brothers Abid and Jamal Awan, and other family associates, worked for many Democratic offices, including Becerra’s.

The Awan brothers logged into the Democratic Caucus server thousands of times without authorization. Capitol Police also investigated procurement irregularities, equipment that did not appear on inventories, and unauthorized network access.

Imran Awan was later arrested on federal bank-fraud charges.

Becerra’s office and the Dem caucus paid the family more than other members, Daily Caller’s Luke Rosiak reported.

When Becerra left Congress in 2017, he asked to have his server wiped while it was under investigation, I reported. It was also revealed that the Pakistani IT staffers were sending sensitive information to the Muslim Brotherhood.

In 2017, I reported:

Becerra has his own troubles in D.C. as he was up to his eyeballs in the House Democratic Caucus Awan Brothers Congressional IT Scandal. Then-Rep. Xavier Becerra was the caucus chairman when he gave a fake server to the cops in order to obstruct their investigation. “The executive director of the Democratic Caucus was Sean McCluskie, who was Becerra’s chief of staff and is now chief deputy attorney general of California,” Daily Caller reporter Luke Rosiak reported in 2017. “The Awans and their associates collected more than $5 million in pay from congressional offices, often drawing chief-of-staff level pay though there is reason to believe many didn’t even show up. The House’s internal probe found they logged into servers they had no affiliation with, used members’ usernames, covered their tracks, and persisted even after being fired.”

Since the January 2017 appointment of Xavier Becerra to California Attorney General by California Governor Jerry Brown, I’ve questioned why Becerra was chosen out of all of the qualified Deputy AG’s and lawyers in-state, and suggested it was to provide distance between Becerra and DC, as well as a strong offense during the investigation into his leadership role in the Congressional IT scandal and cover up.

If the name Sean McCluskie, rings a bell, he is former chief of staff for the former U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, who pleaded guilty to stealing $225,000 from the former Biden Cabinet secretary’s campaign account in Governor Gavin Newsom’s former chief of staff Dana Williamson’s public corruption case.

The Congressional hacking suspects–the Pakistani born Awan brothers–ran the Information Technology (IT) for dozens of Democrat congressmen and women, and could read every email and communication sent or received. Members of the California Democrat House delegation also hired the Awan brothers, along with nearly 30 more House Democrats as a “shared employee,” according to Legistorm.

Click here to read the full article at the California Globe

 

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Gavin Newsom backs measure to kill the billionaire tax and ban future wealth taxes

October 11, 2026 By Jeanne Kuang Leave a Comment

Not only has Gov. Gavin Newsom vocally opposed the proposed California billionaire tax, but he also wants to prevent the state from ever passing a wealth tax in the future.

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On Friday he endorsed Proposition 42, a ballot measure that would cancel out Proposition 40, the proposed billionaire tax. Prop. 42 would prohibit retroactive taxes like the one-time 5% tax on assets that would apply to any billionaire who lived in California on Jan. 1, 2026 if Prop. 40 passes.

But Prop. 42, funded and placed on the ballot by billionaire and Google co-founder Sergey Brin to defeat the billionaire tax, also would go further, by banning any new taxes on personal property.

That includes pensions and 401K accounts before retirees start drawing retirement income from them. It also includes other investments, financial assets, business holdings, art collections and all other forms of personal wealth that would be affected by the billionaire tax or any future wealth tax.

Newsom’s decision to support Prop. 42 runs counter to his own Democratic Party and some labor unions. It also aligns him with some of the wealthy tech donors with whom he’s maintained longstanding relationships dating back to his days as mayor of San Francisco.

Proponents primarily argue that middle-class workers’ retirements and pension accounts should never be taxed as assets before the gains are later taxed a second time as income, even though there is no such proposal. Lawmakers have in the past proposed asset taxes but those bills went nowhere in the Legislature and any tax would require a two-thirds majority to pass. The proposed billionaire tax also exempts many kinds of retirement accounts.

“We all agree that Californians deserve to have their retirement and life savings protected from new state taxes so those savings are there when they need them,” Newsom said in a statement released by the proponents, who also include police and fire unions.

Proponents of the tax criticized his Prop. 42 endorsement as “in lock step with his billionaire backers.”

“By voting yes on Prop 42, he’s showing California his true colors,” said Debru Carthan, vice president of Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West in a statement. “He’d rather millions of children and families lose their healthcare than ask a couple hundred billionaires to finally pay their fair share.”

Newsom has not yet taken a position on Prop. 41, another Brin-backed, anti-billionaire measure that would nullify Prop. 40 by subjecting the tax revenues to certain state spending limits and audits, said spokesperson Izzy Gardon. The billionaire tax measure, funded by one healthcare union, would put 90% of the money it collects toward the state’s healthcare program for low-income residents, Medi-Cal.

Newsom, along with many other leading California Democrats and most Republicans, has vocally opposed the billionaire tax and tried to negotiate to keep it off the ballot. In general during his two terms as governor he has opposed state-level taxes on assets, out of concern the wealthy will leave the state and deprive the state of their income tax revenue.

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Trump Casts Long Shadow Over California Campaigns

October 10, 2026 By Susan Crabtree Leave a Comment

Even before Donald Trump’s confusing gaffe Monday night in Nebraska about Iran bombing Los Angeles and San Diego, the president was looming large over nearly every hotly contested California election campaign.

In one Southern California race, Trump’s long shadow produced a disjointed two-step. Rep. Ken Calvert is attacking fellow Republican Rep. Young Kim for her anti-Trump stances, even as a Calvert-aligned PAC sent Democratic voters in the district mailers playing up her support for and from Trump.

Confused? That’s understandable. Under the new map, Calvert’s 41st Congressional District in Southern California was redrawn as a solidly Democratic seat, so the 33-year incumbent chose to run in the neighboring 40th, which stretches from the eastern edge of Orange County into a large chunk of western Riverside County.

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That move set up the cycle’s strangest California race: Calvert versus Kim in a solidly Republican district that Trump carried by 12 points. It has been one of the nastiest campaigns in the country, with both sides fighting over who is more loyal to Trump. During the primary, a pro-Calvert super PAC, Americans 4 Security, spent $2.9 million on anti-Kim ads. Calvert has called Kim a “backstabbing RINO” and a “Trump-traitor,” and the PAC’s ads paint her as a liberal who hates Trump, citing her past vote to censure the president while ignoring her votes against Democrats’ efforts to impeach him.

Yet the same pro-Calvert super PAC sent two deliberately deceptive mailers to Democrats, playing up Kim’s pro-MAGA record. One showed a photo of a smiling Kim with the words “Young Kim, 100% with Trump,” and “a proven fighter who will stand with President Trump to deliver a bold American First Agenda.”

The goal was obvious: Turn off Democratic households and discourage party crossover support for Kim.

Kim answered with an ad focused on Calvert’s old scandals. It cites a 2009 Orange County Register editorial that ranked him among the most corrupt members of Congress, calls him swampy and sleazy, and revives a 1994 Los Angeles Times story about police catching him with a prostitute in his car. The ad ends by calling Calvert a “sleazebag.”

For all their fighting over Trump, both Calvert and Kim carefully avoided the furor over his Iran comments early this week, even as the remarks set off a raging debate on social media and in campaigns across the state. The timing could hardly have been worse for Republicans: The comments landed just as most California voters began receiving their mail-in ballots.

Speaking before a cheering crowd in Grand Island, Nebraska, Monday night, Trump defended his war with Iran with a line that landed hard 1,500 miles west: “Let them take out Los Angeles, let them take out San Diego.” The White House defended the line, saying the president was clearly warning about what Iran could do with a nuclear weapon, not encouraging it.

Although the explanation clearly fits the context of the president’s remarks, it didn’t satisfy everyone in his own party. By Tuesday morning, the Republican running in Southern California’s most closely watched open House seat was publicly breaking with him.

Jim Desmond, a San Diego County supervisor and Navy veteran who is the GOP nominee in the redrawn 48th District, said he “vehemently” disapproved of what the president said. The district is currently represented by retiring Rep. Darrell Issa.

Desmond’s quick distancing is a measure of how worried Republicans are about Trump’s waning popularity even in precincts he carried in previous elections – a dynamic playing out beyond California’s borders as well.

The newly drawn 48th district is a hook-shaped swath that includes areas in San Diego and Riverside counties, including around Vista, San Marcos, Palm Springs, and Temecula. The current configuration changed a 12-point Republican voter registration advantage to a 4-point Democratic lead. That, of course, was done by design. Late last year, state Democrats redrew the state’s congressional map through Proposition 50, the ballot measure voters approved last November. Gov. Gavin Newsom sold the measure to voters as a way to fight Republican “fire with fire,” abandoning independent redistricting to redraw California’s congressional map in Democrats’ favor (in response to Republicans’ redistricting effort in Texas). The new map was designed to put five of California’s nine Republican-held seats either at a strong Democratic advantage or within Democrats’ reach. The question now is not whether Democrats gain seats here, but how many. And the answer turns on a handful of genuinely competitive races.

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