Record-breaking hurricane activity in Pacific Ocean is battering the California coast

October 14, 2026 By Hannah Fry Leave a Comment
  • Pacific storms have generated more accumulated cyclone energy this season than ever recorded, battering Southern California beaches, homes and roads and reshaping the coastline.
  • El Niño and warming ocean waters are helping fuel the activity, while an exceptionally strong El Niño could bring more coastal erosion, flooding and damage this winter — especially during high tides.

A season of tropical storms and hurricanes with record-breaking energy in the Pacific Ocean is battering the Southern California coastline.

Researchers at Colorado State University confirmed Monday that storms this summer have generated a higher level of accumulated cyclone energy than ever recorded, surpassing the prior seasonal record set in 2018. The metric is a measure of the total wind energy, intensity and duration of tropical storms and hurricanes.

“It’s been a wild season,” said Daniel Cayan, a climate researcher at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, noting that parts of Southern California‘s coast already have experienced significant damage ahead of any winter storms in store for the region amid the strongest El Niño on record.

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The historic Long Beach boardwalk buckled after a barrage of storms over the last month. As Tropical Storm Rachel approached the coast over the weekend, powerful waves slammed into oceanfront homes, leaving some on the verge of collapse.

In Newport Beach, water from a massive swell — double the size that was initially predicted — blasted through 20-foot berms erected at the beach and inundated roads with about a foot of sea water ahead of Rachel’s arrival.

Elsewhere along the coast, the continuous battering from higher-than-normal ocean levels and strong waves this summer has washed away sand, profoundly altering the Wedge in Newport Beach, as well as beaches in San Onofre, Laguna Beach and San Clemente. The coastal damage has been so significant that Orange County declared an emergency last month.

The exceptionally active hurricane season in the Pacific is influenced by several factors including a long-term ocean heating trend caused by global warming, and higher nearshore ocean temperatures and a decrease in wind shear from El Niño, which can significantly weaken hurricane activity, UC Agriculture and Natural Resources climate scientist Daniel Swain explained during a recent webinar.

“El Niño in the Pacific Basin decreases wind shear, so it removes the inhibitive storm-decapitating effect of wind shear at the same time that it amplifies water temperature,” Swain said. “So it adds more fuel and it makes that fuel more likely to take advantage of its environment.”

Typically, once storms enter the cooler water in the eastern tropical Pacific, they weaken significantly. But the marine heat wave and El Niño conditions — bringing ocean temperatures 10 to 13 degrees higher than normal — have provided a more conducive environment for hurricanes such as Rachel to get close enough to affect the California coast.

These storms, combined with high tides and the Kelvin wave, which can add 6 to 12 inches to background sea levels, have resulted in significant damage and a reshaping of the coast over the summer.

And it’s not over yet, experts say.

Click here to read the full article in the LA Times

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

October 13, 2026 By Katy Grimes 1 Comment

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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With Senate majority up for grabs, candidates fight for ‘kingmaker’ voters

October 12, 2026 By Justine McDaniel Leave a Comment
  • Analysts predict that Democrats are on track for the House majority. Senate control is a toss-up.
  • A Gallup poll found that 45% of American adults identify as political independents, a record high.

WASHINGTON — With the midterm elections just over three weeks away, the fight for control of the U.S. Senate is intensifying in battleground states, as Democrats push into red regions and Republicans pour money into key contests.

Campaigns are entering a crucial stretch for persuading the independent voters who will probably determine outcomes in swing races. Nearly all of the most competitive Senate races are in states with significant swaths of people unaffiliated with either major party — the “kingmakers” in these high-stakes midterms, said Jeremy Gruber, an independent-voting expert.

“Independent voters are going to be deciding this election in every respect,” said Gruber, senior vice president of Open Primaries, an organization that advocates for states to open primary elections to unaffiliated voters.

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The urgency around courting nonaligned voters has been on display at recent debates, in ads flooding the airwaves and in the campaign money pouring into key states. For Republicans, it has become an effort to put distance between themselves and President Trump; for Democrats, it’s often a rhetorical shift toward the center and away from the far left.

In Iowa, Republican Ashley Hinson used a Wednesday night debate to emphasize her willingness to break with Trump. In Kansas, Democrat Adam Hamilton is circulating a video in which he describes himself as both liberal and conservative. In Alaska, a GOP-backed ad blitz launched last week aims to persuade voters that Democrat Mary Peltola isn’t independent-minded.

Though many unaffiliated voters have made up their minds, those who remain undecided will begin making decisions soon, as mail ballots go out and early voting begins in some states.

“For Republicans who are running behind and are looking at a potentially devastating midterm election performance, what they really need to do is target the independents who lean Republican,” said Karen Kedrowski, an Iowa State University political scientist. “For Democrats in some place like Iowa … what they need to do is make it seem safe [to independents] to vote for a Democratic candidate.”

Click here to read the full article in the LA Times

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California’s biggest state worker union authorizes strike in Newsom’s last months

October 10, 2026 By Lynn La Leave a Comment

California’s largest state worker union says it’s ready to strike in the final months of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration.

SEIU Local 1000, which represents about 100,000 public employees, announced Thursday morning that its members overwhelmingly authorized a strike with 96% of people who voted in favor of walking out. The union set a date for one-day walkout on Oct. 21. It wants better pay, more affordable healthcare coverage and more flexibility to work from home.

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“It is an important step that state employees are taking,” said Anica Walls, the union’s president.  “They’re exercising their right to hold the line and say, we deserve to be respected, paid and protected for the work that we do.”

The union’s contract expired June 30. It’s pushing Newsom to provide a larger raise and boost to benefits than the administration offered. The union says the state has room to offer more, pointing to a $20 billion increase in general fund spending over the past two years.

The union also filed a complaint with the state’s Public Employment Relations Board, accusing CalHR, the state agency that handles labor negotiations on behalf of the administration, of bad faith bargaining, delaying negotiations and rejecting proposals outright. In late September the board sided with the union, and concluded that CalHR “refused to meet and confer in good faith.”

In response to the board’s findings, Angela Musallam, CalHR’s deputy director of communications, said in an email to CalMatters that “the state has been, and remains open to negotiation, and is prepared to move into mediation to assist the parties in reaching an agreement.”

Musallam added that its focus “continues to be on achieving a fair and responsible agreement, and we remain available at the bargaining table.”

A strike would be unprecedented for the union. It has never held a statewide walkout in the 44-year history of the labor groups that over time coalesced to become Local 1000. It came close to striking in 2016, but an eleventh-hour deal with then-Gov. Jerry Brown averted it.

The union represents almost half of the state government workforce, and includes a wide range of professionals including nurses, clerks, program analysts, information technology staff and custodians.

Its last three-year contract gave workers represented by Local 1000 three successive 3% raises and many received additional special salary adjustments. The total contract was expected to increase state spending cumulatively by $1.5 billion, according to estimates from the time.

A state budget crisis disrupted those plans. The deal was supposed to provide an additional 1% raise in 2025 if certain economic conditions were met, but the Newsom administration withheld that increase. Instead, unions in June 2025 agreed to temporary pay reductions that Newsom sought to balance the budget.

The reductions basically negated the contract’s promised salary increase. Local 1000 also delayed a raise that was supposed to take effect July 1 until next summer.

Civil servants received additional days off of work in those deals, which they can cash out in the future.

If a strike occurs, some of the immediate effects on Californians could include delayed services at the DMV and the state’s unemployment and disability insurance offices, said Walls.

“Realistically we are less than 3% of the budget,” said Walls. “We do all the work that keeps all the necessary benefits for the Californians that deserve them. And in order for us to continue doing the jobs that we do, we simply want the administration to bargain with us in good faith.”

Click here to read the full article in CalMatters

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Rachel to make rare sweep into Southern California; Southwest flooding, gusty winds upcoming

October 9, 2026 By Alex Sosnowski Leave a Comment

While millions are counting the hours to the end of the heat wave, Rachel, with its drenching rain, cooler air and gusty winds, is about to close in on Southern California and the southwestern United States.

Rachel, currently over the eastern Pacific, has a chance of crossing the California state line as a tropical storm, depression or tropical wind and rainstorm later this weekend.

The only official tropical storm landfall in Southern California was in 1939. Multiple storms have come close to making landfall since then with Hilary from 2023 being the most recent.

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Hilary was officially downgraded to what the National Hurricane Center calls a post-tropical cyclone before the center of the storm reached the United States. But, heavy rain continued with the storm, fitting AccuWeather’s classification as a tropical rainstorm since that rain was associated with the tropical storm and significant impacts related to flooding persisted for days.

A similar setup is unfolding across Southern California and the southwestern U.S. this weekend into early next week, provided that a well-defined center and tropical moisture remain intact with Rachel. AccuWeather meteorologists are projecting that Rachel will survive and have a significant impact well inland as a tropical wind and rainstorm.

Rachel was a less intense hurricane than Hilary, which peaked at Category 4 on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale. It is also much less intense than Hurricane Polo, which reached Category 5 intensity three separate times and had maximum winds of 180 miles per hour on two separate occasions.

Despite less initial energy with Rachel, interaction with the jet stream may allow strong wind gusts, with and without thunderstorm activity, to survive well inland over the Southwest, especially near and east and south of the storm center. The AccuWeather Local StormMax™ wind gust for Rachel is 90 mph.

Click here to read the full article at Accuweather

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Walters: Californians are in a sour mood but don’t want to change the political status quo

October 8, 2026 By Dan Walters Leave a Comment

Californians are in a sour mood these days, and for good reason.

The state’s economy is stuck in neutral with scant job creation since the end of the COVID pandemic. Major sectors, such as high technology, are experiencing layoffs and job shrinkage and California is tied with two other states for the nation’s highest unemployment rate.

Meanwhile, Californians’ cost of living — especially housing, utilities and fuel — has climbed sharply, more than 100% since 2000, while personal income, adjusted for inflation, has actually declined fractionally since 2020.

A recent poll by the Public Policy Institute of California reflects the angst.

“Majorities of California adults (54%) and likely voters (52%) say the state is headed in the wrong direction,” PPIC found. “This belief is held by nearly all Republicans (94%) and a majority of independents (55%), compared to one in three Democrats (32%).”

PPIC continues, “Californians are much more pessimistic about economic conditions over the next year, with seven in ten adults (71%) and likely voters (73%) as well six in ten or more across parties (61% Democrats, 90% Republicans, 72% independents) expecting bad economic times for the state.”

If Californians are dissatisfied with the present and sour on the future, one might assume that they would express that negative frame of mind by rejecting the state’s political status quo in favor of candidates who promise change.

However, with voting by mail beginning in a few days, the Democratic Party that has dominated California politics for the last three decades can comfortably expect to maintain — or even increase — its hegemony.

All of the statewide offices, including the governorship, will remain in Democratic hands. Polls by PPIC and UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies have found Democrat Xavier Becerra with a double-digit lead over Republican Steve Hilton for the governorship.

Democrats will retain supermajorities in both houses of the Legislature and probably gain a few congressional seats, thanks to gerrymandered districts that voters adopted last year to help neutralize Republican gerrymanders in other states.

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A handful of legislative and congressional districts are in play but the macro results favoring Democrats are certain. Republican candidates, from Hilton down, are handicapped by low voter registration and Californians’ deep disdain for President Donald Trump. Just 27% of California voters approve of Trump’s performance, according to the Berkeley IGS poll.

The most uncertain — and therefore most interesting — aspects of this year’s election are a very close battle for the mayoralty of Los Angeles, pitting veteran incumbent Karen Bass against a left-leaning city council member, Nithya Raman, a few Democrat vs. Democrat duels for congressional seats, and some polarizing ballot measures.

Five of the 14 statewide ballot measures relate to taxes, including two that would increase them and three that would make increases less likely.

The biggest and most controversial is Proposition 40, which would impose a one-time 5% tax on the wealth of about 200 billionaires, with proceeds mostly going to shore up healthcare services.

Click here to read the full article at the OC Register

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Trump suggests letting Iran ‘take out’ Los Angeles and San Diego at campaign rally

October 7, 2026 By Iris Kwok, Richard Winton and Ana Ceballos Leave a Comment
  • California Gov. Gavin Newsom called the president ‘deranged and dangerous.’
  • The crowd in Grand Island, Neb., cheered the remarks about Los Angeles and San Diego.

President Trump, speaking at a campaign rally Monday, suggested Iran could “take out” Los Angeles and San Diego — a comment that was possibly in jest but brought a quick reaction from leaders in California.

Trump said he wanted to “see a tremendous victory” in the November election, “’cause it verifies all the things we did. And again, remember, with the war it’s just artificial, it’s a little bit high.”

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“It’s a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe,” he continued. “They can take out a city, let ’em take out Los Angeles, let ’em take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay.”

The crowd cheered.

His comment was met with criticism from California leaders — including at least one Trump-endorsed Republican candidate from San Diego.

Gov. Gavin Newsom posted on X: “After sending the National Guard and Marines to occupy California, Donald Trump is now saying our foreign enemies should ‘take out’ Los Angeles and San Diego. … He is deranged and dangerous.”

Then from his press office account: “Let’s be clear: The President is advocating for an attack on 10+ million U.S. residents in two of America’s largest cities. This is not normal. None of this is. And we will continue to remind folks of that every day.”

“San Diego is not collateral damage,” San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria posted. “We are not expendable. And we are never a ‘small price to pay.’ Keep our city out of your reckless war talk.”

Trump made the remarks during a rambling speech in which he said gas prices would be lower soon, touted his ouster of Venezuela’s dictator and made attacks on news outlets.

He was in Grand Island, Neb., encouraging residents of the deep-red state to vote as if he were on the ballot.

White House communications director Steven Cheung pushed back on the criticism on X.

“The media freakout over President Trump’s comments is not rooted in reality. He was clearly stating U.S. cities would have been threatened if a nuclear Iran hadn’t been stopped. America is safer because of the President. Iran has no nuclear, no navy, no air force, and no money,” he wrote.

It was unclear whether Trump’s comments were based on any intelligence, and it’s far from clear that Iran has anywhere near the capability for a missile attack on the U.S.

In March, Iran launched missiles toward Diego Garcia, an Indian Ocean island that is home to a strategic U.K.-U.S. military base. The Associated Press reported at the time that Iran had a self-imposed limit on its ballistic missile program, limiting the range to 1,240 miles. Diego Garcia is well outside that range. U.S. officials, however, long have alleged that Iran’s space program could allow it to build intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Also in March, law enforcement agencies across California were warned that the Iran war could lead to a surprise drone attack in the Golden State. But sources told The Times there’s no credible intelligence to support it and officials said they did not take it seriously.

Trump has long had a strained relationship with Los Angeles, where he struggled to garner traction for his business ventures.

Click here to read the full article in the LA Times

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No single failure caused LA fires, report finds. Who fixes the system?

October 6, 2026 By Rachel Becker 1 Comment

No single failure explains the devastation of the Palisades and Eaton fires that burned through Los Angeles County in January 2025, a new report concludes. Instead, the blazes exposed weaknesses across a system never designed to combat a wind-driven conflagration that spread from structure to structure at sweeping scale.

The 723-page report dropped Friday morning. Commissioned by Gov. Gavin Newsom, it lands during his last months in office and just days after California’s Legislative session concluded. The report doesn’t pin the disaster on a single agency or decision. Its authors caution against seeking one culprit or one magic fix.

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As a result, the report, which completes an analysis of some of the most deadly, destructive and costly fires in state history, raises a harder question: If responsibility is spread across an entire system, who is responsible for fixing it?

A governor-ordered review

The Fire Safety Research Institute’s first report, published last November, offered a detailed timeline beginning Jan. 7, the day the Palisades and Eaton fires ignited less than eight hours and roughly 30 miles apart. The institute’s final report takes a closer look at the policy gaps the fires exposed.

“While the state continues to advance building codes, hazard mapping, fuels treatment programs and insurance-related reforms, these efforts are not consistently translating into reduced risk at the parcel, neighborhood, or landscape level,” the authors wrote.

Informed by interviews with nearly 300 people from 22 different agencies, another 200 conversations with residents within or near the fires footprints, and detailed analyses or alerts, communications and other information, the institute’s authors acknowledge gaps. Some agencies didn’t provide complete information, and some operational records were sparse, limiting parts of the analysis.

Taken together the recommendations from the state-funded consultants call for a systemic shift, including a realignment of government responsibilities at multiple levels.

“The problem is implementation and funding,” said Michael Wara, director of the Climate and Energy Policy Program and a senior research scholar at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment. “We can have the best plans in the world, but if we do not actually implement those plans, it will not matter.”

What the report found

Homes, structures and the built environment in general played a “substantial role” in spreading the fire. Embers and flames and heat radiated from building to building.

But the report concludes that no one resident’s fire hardening could have guaranteed their home’s survival; it’s community efforts that matter.

Though wildfire-resistant building features helped in some areas, whether homes survived “was also strongly influenced by surrounding conditions, neighborhood-scale exposure pathways, and defensive actions.”

Even before the fire started, the institute concludes that the state’s wildfire response system was already stressed and failing — particularly in communicating about risk and preparedness to residents. In interviews, fire survivors said they didn’t know whose information to listen to or act upon, or how to track evolving recommendations.

Click here to read the full article in the California Globe

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Gov Newsom Signs CA Disaster Preparedness Bill – But Protects Water Agencies From Liability

October 5, 2026 By Katy Grimes 1 Comment

The governor just conflated wildfire safety for Californians with indemnity for water agencies

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed SB 1153 into law on September 29, 2026. Why is this notable, you ask?

SB 1153 by Senator Anna Caballero (D-Merced), “requires all urban retail water suppliers that serve a high or very-high fire hazard severity zone to include incident-specific response procedures for wildfires as part of their disaster preparedness plans beginning on January 1, 2028,” according to the Governor’s Department of Finance.

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“This bill also clarifies that urban retail water suppliers are not responsible for maintaining water supply for wildfire defense.”

Boom. The governor just conflated wildfire safety for Californians with indemnity for water agencies, because no one can sue water agencies if there isn’t any water to fight fires with.

Remember that the Santa Ynez Reservoir was empty when fire fighters tried to fight the Palisades fires with nearby water? Today, Palisades residents have many lawsuits against the LADWP.

From the “You can’t make this sh*t up” file, the 117-million-gallon Santa Ynez Reservoir, the main local storage for Pacific Palisades, was offline and empty when the fire started on January 7, 2025. Los Angeles Department of Water and Power had drained it in early 2024 after a large tear was found in its floating cover, which officials said risked contaminating the drinking-water supply. State drinking-water rules required the shutdown. Repair contracting and work were slow: a relatively small contract was awarded in mid-2024, and work did not start until after the fire. Emergency repairs brought it back online in June 2025; further leaks later forced another drain, and a full liner-and-cover replacement was finished in September 2026. LADWP began refilling it again October 1st, aiming to return it to service by the end of the year.

The ostensible “California disaster-preparedness bill” by Democrat Senator Anna Caballero (D-Merced), passed both Houses of the California Legislature unanimously: 40–0 in the Senate and 77–0 in the Assembly.

It was sponsored by the Association of California Water Agencies, who have an interest in indemnity, and came after lawsuits over dry hydrants in the January 2025 Palisades fire, and Eaton fire claims, against the City of Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

Here is the mind-blowing caveat: The bill adds Government Code section 8607.3 and states that nothing, including any other law, imposes a duty on public water systems, including wholesale systems, to design, construct, or maintain a water system for wildfire defense or suppression.

It also provides that:

  • Failure of an urban retail water supplier to implement or comply with the new incident-specific procedures is not a “substantial cause” of wildfire damages.
  • Inability of any public water system to maintain water supply or pressure during a wildfire is not a “substantial cause” of those damages.
  • Spread of wildfire is not an inherent risk of the deliberate design, construction, or maintenance of a public water system.

Former LA Mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt, offered his analysis to this sham bill:

Buried in this bill Gavin signed is a big “fuck you” to the Palisades. We are suing LADWP for draining our reservoir (which was built for fire protection), and leaving us with dry hydrants. This bill now says LADWP doesn’t have to provide water for firefighting AT ALL. And when their negligence leaves us with no water to fight fire, Gavin is prohibiting any accountability for the water utility for leaving people to die, precluding fire victims from recovering losses from a catastrophic wildfire. At EVERY turn, this scumbag finds ways to block fire victims from being made whole by incompetent, negligent, and corrupt bureaucrats and big utility providers when they routinely destroy entire towns.

Click here to read the full article in the California Globe

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California and Arizona Still Fighting DOJ Lawsuits Over In-State Tuition for Illegal Immigrants

October 4, 2026 By Megan Barth Leave a Comment

Six other states have already lost or dropped their laws as the California and Arizona cases remain in court

California and Arizona are still defending laws that let illegal immigrants pay in-state college tuition as the U.S. Department of Justice finishes a nationwide campaign against every state with a similar policy.

The department said Sept. 10 that it had filed its final four complaints, against Hawaii, Arkansas, Utah and the District of Columbia, and that it has now sued every state with a law providing in-state tuition to illegal immigrants under circumstances the government contends violate federal law. The total is 25 cases against states and the District of Columbia. 

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Associate Attorney General Stanley E. Woodward Jr. said the department had “sued every state across our Nation that has a state law or regulation granting illegal aliens in-state tuition.” Six of those cases—Texas, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Illinois and Kansas—have produced orders permanently blocking the challenged provisions. 

California and Arizona are among the states still in court. At the center of both fights is a 1996 federal statute, Section 505 of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, codified at 8 U.S.C. § 1623. It provides that an alien who is not lawfully present in the United States shall not be eligible, on the basis of residence within a state, for a postsecondary education benefit unless a U.S. citizen is eligible for a benefit of the same amount, duration and scope regardless of whether that citizen lives in the state. 

The Justice Department argues that high-school-attendance rules used by California and Arizona are a proxy for residency and therefore conflict with the statute and the Supremacy Clause.

Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate said when the final suits were announced that “colleges cannot provide benefits to illegal aliens that they do not provide to U.S. citizens.”

California

The Justice Department sued California on Nov. 20, 2025, challenging Education Code section 68130.5, the statute rooted in AB 540. The law lets certain students who attended a California high school for at least three years and graduated in the state pay resident tuition regardless of immigration status. 

The complaint also targets later laws extending state scholarships and subsidized loans to those students. The United States named Gov. Gavin Newsom and the governing boards of the University of California, California State University and California Community Colleges.In its complaint announcement, the department said California extends in-state tuition, scholarships and subsidized loans to illegal aliens while requiring U.S. citizens from other states to pay higher rates. 

Then-Attorney General Pam Bondi said California was “illegally discriminating against American students and families.” 

Higher Ed Dive reported that California is home to roughly 103,000 undocumented residents enrolled in higher education, about a fifth of the national total tracked by the Higher Ed Immigration Portal.

The California Globe previously reported that the tuition suit was one of several Justice Department actions against California sanctuary policies, alongside challenges to the state’s mask restrictions on federal officers. That case remains pending, according to the department’s Sept. 10 status list.

The tuition fight sits alongside other state spending on noncitizen students that the Globe has documented. In June, the Globe reported that lawmakers were putting another $350 million into the CalNEW “immigrant newcomer” school program even as the state enrolled nearly 237,000 such students, the largest population in the country. 

Last week, the Globe reported that President Trump’s nearly $1 billion pocket rescission targeted leftover federal grants for illegal-alien services, including $25 million from Education Department Special Programs for Migrant Students.  Earlier Globe reporting also tracked AB 91, the 2023 bill to let certain students living in Mexico attend San Diego and Imperial County community colleges at in-state rates.

Arizona

Arizona was sued Aug. 27, 2026, along with New Mexico, Oregon and Washington. The target is Proposition 308, the 2022 ballot measure that lets students pay in-state tuition and receive state financial aid regardless of immigration status if they attended school in Arizona for at least two years and graduated from an Arizona high school. 

Voters approved it 51.2 percent to 48.8 percent.

The Justice Department’s announcement of those suits said the laws put illegal aliens ahead of U.S. citizens. In its Arizona filing, the department cited Arizona State University and said the gap between resident and nonresident tuition was roughly $24,000 a year. 

Click here to read the full article at the California  Globe

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