LGBTQ+ Archives - California Political Review

Wiener Roasted and Devoured by LGBTQ Mob: Kicked Out of Trans March, Harassed at SF Bar Over Israel

June 29, 2026 By Megan Barth Leave a Comment

Wiener built his political career as one of California’s most aggressive advocates for LGBTQ causes

San Francisco State Senator Scott Wiener, a longtime champion of radical LGBTQ and transgender policies, was confronted and ultimately driven out of two separate locations in the city this week by leftist activists, including allies of the very community he has long empowered over his support of Israel.

The incidents highlight the growing fractures within progressive coalitions of the Democratic party, where foreign policy purity tests on Israel and Gaza now override domestic alliances on social issues.

On June 24, during a World Cup match at The Napper Tandy Irish Restaurant and Sports Bar in the city’s Mission District, anti-Zionist activist Jesus “Frisco Lens” Coba approached Wiener and berated him on camera.

Coba demanded Wiener leave, shouting, “Wiener, you gotta get the f*** up out my hood, bro. It’s free Palestine here… we against the genocide.” He accused the senator of pushing a “genocidal agenda” as a “Zionist” and pressed him to say “Free Palestine” for the video. Wiener, seated with his back to the wall, remained largely silent and denied taking money from AIPAC when accused.

After the recording ended, Coba and a group of about six associates continued harassing Wiener for roughly 30 minutes, yelling and banging on the wall behind him. Bar owners eventually forced the agitators to leave.

The video quickly went viral on social media.

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Just two days later, on June 26, Wiener attended the annual San Francisco Trans March in Dolores Park, an event he has supported for years as a key backer of transgender legislation.

Activists, including self-described “Trantifa” elements aligned with pro-Palestinian causes, surrounded him, shouted profanities, and demanded he leave over his stance on Israel.

Video footage captured the scene: demonstrators chanted against “Zionists,” called Wiener a “piece of sh*t,” and told him repeatedly to “get the fu*k out of here.” One activist filming acknowledged Wiener’s work on trans issues but declared, “your policy on the genocide in Gaza is terrible. You do not belong here anymore Scott and it breaks my heart.” Others yelled, “We fu*king hate you” and “Everybody fu*king hates you.”

Click here to read the full article in the California Globe

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: Israel, LGBTQ+, Wiener

California’s Absurd ‘Gay Certification’ Process for Utility Contracts California’s experiment in sexual-orientation credentialing for contracts is a textbook example of identity politics run amok

June 21, 2026 By J. Mitchell Sances Leave a Comment

California’s experiment in sexual-orientation credentialing for contracts is a textbook example of identity politics run amok

Recent reporting has pulled back the curtain on yet another California scheme that prioritizes identity over merit in the distribution of public resources. Through the California Public Utilities Commission’s Supplier Diversity Program under General Order 156, large investor-owned utilities face escalating procurement “goals” for state-certified LGBT Business Enterprises (LGBTBEs). These targets reached 1.5 percent in 2024 and beyond, channeling hundreds of millions of dollars (figures cited in recent analyses approach $633 million annually across related categories) toward businesses whose owners must prove their sexual orientation or transgender identity to government-approved certifiers.

This is not neutral supplier outreach. It is preferential treatment baked into the contracting process for entities ultimately funded by ratepayers. And the mechanism for accessing those preferences is a bureaucratic checklist so intrusive and subjective that it would be laughable if it were not backed by the force of state policy and the threat of penalties for misrepresentation.

To qualify as an LGBTBE, a business must demonstrate that 51 percent is owned and managed by individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. Verification falls to the Supplier Clearinghouse, which maintains an explicit list of acceptable proofs. Among them: three letters from personal contacts written on company letterhead or personal stationery attesting that the owner is LGBT (with the writer having known the individual for over a year); a letter from a recognized LGBT organization signed by its leader or board member; proof of media coverage explicitly identifying the owner as LGBT; joint living arrangement documents naming a same-sex partner (leases, utility bills, wills, insurance policies, retirement plans); evidence of parenting or family-building efforts with same-sex partners, including surrogacy or adoption records; domestic partnership or marriage certificates; and, for transgender applicants, physician letters regarding gender reassignment or legal name/gender change petitions.

The National LGBTQ+ Chamber of Commerce offers its own parallel certification path, accepting one document from a primary list or two from a secondary list. These include attestations from personal references, joint financial or property documents, media articles, social media profiles (with caveats), awards from LGBT groups, or even evidence of past discriminatory actions documented in police or HR records. Falsely representing a business as LGBTBE can carry criminal penalties under state law, including up to a year in county jail for corporate officials involved in the misrepresentation.

One struggles to imagine a more direct assault on the principle that government contracting should be blind to irrelevant personal characteristics. The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment demands that similarly situated persons receive equal treatment under the law. When the state erects a system that awards advantages in bidding and procurement based on an owner’s claimed sexual orientation or gender identity, complete with a state-sanctioned process for documenting private sexual behavior and relationships, it classifies businesses according to a protected characteristic and tilts the playing field accordingly.

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The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard dismantled race-based preferences in education on equal protection grounds, rejecting the notion that the government may engage in such classifications without satisfying strict scrutiny. The logic extends forcefully here. Sexual orientation and sex-based distinctions in government programs trigger comparable constitutional concerns. There is no compelling governmental interest in carving out identity-based set-asides for utility contracts, nor is an intrusive certification regime narrowly tailored to any legitimate end. Ratepayers deserve suppliers chosen for competence, price, and reliability, not for how convincingly their owners can assemble letters from friends or produce joint utility bills.

Click here to read the full article in CalMatters

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: Equal Protection Clause, Gay Certifcation, LGBTQ+

California’s ‘First Partner’ One-Ups Maryland Schools’ LGBTQ-Themed Storybooks

April 26, 2025 By Katy Grimes 3 Comments

Governor Gavin Newsom’s wife Jennifer Siebel Newsom has been selling ‘gender justice’ movies to public schools

The group of parents who sued the Montgomery County Board of Education in Maryland over its refusal to allow parents of elementary school children to opt out of classes with LGBTQ-themed storybooks, argue that the school system cannot require children to sit through lessons involving the books if their family has religious objections, the New York Post reported. It’s a clear First Amendment issue.

California has its own First Amendment issue, and ours involves California Governor Gavin Newsom’s wife, “First Partner” Jennifer Siebel Newsom’s non-profit, The Representation Project, which raises money from a who’s who of the governor’s backers and state vendors, feeding young public school kids a steady diet of “gender justice,” LGBTQ-themed books, website addresses of porn sites, radical gender and sexuality messages, and the “genderbread” person.

The Montgomery County, Maryland case is actually more devious than at first blush. LGBTQ books were originally presented in Health and Safety classes, where parents could opt-out. Many parents objected to the sexually-charged, trans-themed and gender questioning books, and acted on the opt-out. So school officials moved the books to English classes where parental opt-out was not allowed, and kids as young as age 3 were exposed to these books.

Thus, the lawsuit, which accuses district officials and many teachers of deliberately sexually grooming very young children, as well as manipulating very young children into questioning their gender.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett “expressed concerns that the LGBTQ-laced classroom instructions aren’t merely trying to expose students to different ideas, but are about trying to impress upon students that ‘this is the right view of the world’ and ‘how you should think about things.’”

California can one-up Maryland

California Governor Gavin Newsom’s wife, “First Partner” Jennifer Siebel Newsom, has been “advancing ‘gender justice’ through her charitable nonprofit The Representation Project, Open the Books reported in 2023. According to tax documents the organization is ‘committed to building a thriving and inclusive society through films, education, and social activism.’”

Jennifer Siebel Newsom solicited state vendors and the governor’s campaign donors for large gifts to her charity, The Representation Project, the Globe reported in California’s First Lady Produces ‘Gender Justice’ Films, Sells to State Public Schools. Just a little conflict of interest? That is what is known as “behest payments,” according to the California Fair Political Practices Commission.

Siebel Newsom has released four films advocating gender justice. The films are leased for screenings to individuals, corporations, and schools, and come with their own lesson plans. Schools spend between $49-$599 to screen these movies to children, we reported.

With her Governor husband, who would dare deny her solicitations?

So the governor’s wife has been pushing “gender justice” in California’s public schools. What makes Seibel Newsom any different than the Maryland school officials pushing LGBTQ-themed storybooks on young kids in public school who are a captive audience.

Who’s watching? 2.6 million California students in 5,000 schools.

“Auditors at OpenTheBooks.com watched Newsom’s movies and read the lesson plans. What we found was, at times, shocking: sexually explicit images, political boosterism, and something called ‘The Genderbread Person.’”

The Globe watched the Misrepresentation Middle School movie as well. It’s a documentary, but it hammers strong feminist and gender justice messages for school kids ages 11-14:

Women as sex objects
Women/girls “in a disempowered position”
Few female protagonists in movies
women/girls portrayed as only seeking men, husbands, marriage, pregnancy
boys should be trained to not be “hyper masculine” or “misogynistic”
Middle school children are served images of upside-down strippers with little left to the imagination
the “genderbread person,” who aims to show children how biological sex, “gender expression,” “sexual attraction,” and “gender identity” exist on a spectrum, which can be mixed and matched.

The movie is not age appropriate for Middle Schoolers, and really should not have any place in school curriculum. It is pure trans and gender propaganda.

California bans schools from forcing teachers to ‘out’ LGBTQ students

December 24, 2024 By Carolyn Jones 1 Comment

Amid a flurry of recent school board policies aimed at the rights of transgender students, California passed a new law in July that prevents schools from requiring staff to notify parents if a student identifies as LGBTQ.

The new law, AB 1955, came in response to a handful of school boards adopting policies that require teachers and other school staff to notify parents if a student identifies as a gender other than what’s on their school records.

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“Teachers can still talk to their parents,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said at a press conference on Monday in which he touted a new plan to improve career opportunities for adults. “What they can’t do is fire a teacher for not being a snitch. I don’t think teachers should be gender police.”

LGBTQ advocates said that “forced outing” policies, such as those adopted in Chino, Temecula and a dozen other districts, infringe on students’ privacy and could potentially harm students whose parents disapprove of their identity.

The state sued to stop Chino’s policy, and most districts either scrapped their policies, tweaked the language or put them on hold.

This act “could not be more timely or necessary, and LGBTQ+ students across California can breathe a sigh of relief,” Tony Hoang, executive director of Equality California, which advocates for LGBTQ rights, wrote. “LGBTQ+ youth can now have these important family conversations when they are ready and in ways that strengthen the relationship between parent and child, not as a result of extremist politicians intruding into the parent-child relationship.”

‘The battle continues’

Opponents of the new law said that parental notification policies actually strengthen ties between students and parents, and schools should not withhold information on such important matters. Even though a parental notification measure that would have applied to all schools failed to qualify for the ballot, opponents vowed to keep fighting.

“This (law) doesn’t clarify anything. And nothing prevents individual teachers from bringing the issue up with parents,” said Roseville school board member Jonathan Zachreson, an organizer of the failed ballot measure and whose district was among those that passed parental notification policies. “So the battle continues.”

Click here to read the full article in CalMatters

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: California Politics, LGBTQ+, Teachers

California Democrats strike back against local conservative rebellions on LGBTQ rights, abortion

September 4, 2024 By Alexei Koseff 2 Comments

Like many new political candidates at the time, Rebecca Bauer-Kahan first ran for the state Assembly in 2018 because she was troubled by the election of then-President Donald Trump and wanted California to fight back against his administration.

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Six years later, that dynamic has flipped on its head. In the just-concluded regular legislative session, the San Ramon Democrat and her colleagues instead battled a surging rebellion from conservative California communities against the state’s liberal governance.

On issues including abortion access, election rules and LGBTQ rights, Democrats in Sacramento passed legislation this year to stifle emerging local policies that they argued undermine the state’s commitment to diversity, civil rights and other progressive values.

“In certain ways, we have the right to hold the line for our constituencies,” said Bauer-Kahan, who compared the relationship between the Legislature and local governments to a system of checks and balances. “And I think that’s what we’re doing right now — we’re checking them.”

Tensions over local control are nothing new in California politics, as anyone who has followed decades of debate about land use and housing development can attest. But the last few years have opened a new front of conflict around cultural grievances more typical of red states.

With Republican power waning in California — the party hasn’t elected a candidate to statewide office since 2006 and labors under a superminority in the Legislature — conservatives are increasingly using the relative autonomy of city councils, county boards of supervisors and school boards to protest liberal state policymaking and assert a competing vision for their communities.

“There’s just a lot of built-up frustration and that’s one valve that’s being used,” said Assemblymember Bill Essayli, a Corona Republican who is often an outspoken opponent of bills to shut down conservative defiance. “We’re in an era in politics where you need an adversary.”

The result has been local laws to require voter identification at the polls, block abortion clinics from opening, review children’s library books for sexual content and mandate parental notification when students change their gender identity at school — prompting legislative Democrats to respond with measures that would ban those policies.

“They don’t want free people to make up their own minds,” said Fresno County Supervisor Steve Brandau, who developed a library material review committee for his county because he was disturbed by the children’s books included in a Pride Month display at a local library. “We’re fighting for our lives, we’re fighting for our livelihoods, we’re fighting for our beliefs.”

The clash began intensifying last year, with a showdown over an elementary school social studies textbook. When a Riverside County school board refused to adopt the state-approved curriculum because it referenced assassinated LGBTQ rights activist Harvey Milk, Gov. Gavin Newsom threatened to send the textbook directly to students and bill the district, which then reversed course. Legislators subsequently passed a law to penalize school boards that ban books because they include the history or culture of LGBTQ people and other diverse groups.

The Legislature also approved, and Newsom signed, a measure to limit when local governments can count ballots by hand, after Shasta County canceled its contract with a voting machine company because of unfounded election fraud claims pushed by Trump and his allies.

A spate of legislation has followed this year, most controversially Assembly Bill 1955 by Assemblymember Chris Ward, a San Diego Democrat, which prevents school districts from alerting parents when a student starts identifying as another gender. Such parental notification policies began sprouting up across California after the 2022 election, when Republicans focused on winning control of school boards, but critics argue they amount to forced outing. Essayli and Democratic Assemblymember Corey Jackson nearly came to blows on the Assembly floor over AB 1955, which Newsom signed in July.

Several other measures are headed to the governor’s desk after receiving final approval from the Legislature last week, including Bauer-Kahan’s AB 2085 to streamline the permitting process for reproductive health clinics. Though California has positioned itself as an “abortion sanctuary” since the U.S Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion — even putting reproductive rights into the state constitution — local opposition has prevented clinics from opening in cities such as Beverly Hills and Fontana.

“We saw the voters say they overwhelmingly support abortion rights, so it’s important that we as a state step in to ensure this access that they said they want,” Bauer-Kahan said.

Senate Bill 1174 by state Sen. Dave Min, an Irvine Democrat, would prohibit local governments from requiring voter identification in municipal elections, which Huntington Beach adopted this past spring as a security measure despite criticisms that it would create unnecessary hurdles for poor and minority voters.

Click here to read the full article in CalMatters

Filed Under: Trending News Tagged With: California Politics, Legislature, LGBTQ+