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The Republican caucus in California’s Legislature is growing more diverse as Latino and Asian American candidates apparently flipped three Democrat-held seats, including unseating an incumbent Democrat senator for the first time in a presidential election since 1980.

When new legislators are sworn in next week, Democrats will still control a supermajority in the Legislature. But the three flipped seats have Republicans hopeful that California’s reputation as a liberal enclave state may be shifting. They point to Latino and Black voters helping send Donald Trump to the White House for a second term. 

“As Californians grow increasingly frustrated with the failures of Democrat leadership, they are shifting toward Republican solutions,” Senate Republican Leader Brian Jones said in a statement. “Senate Republicans are not only growing in numbers but also diversity.” 

The Republican caucus is on pace to have at least 50% nonwhite members for the first time, according to the CalMatters Digital Democracy database. As it stands, based on unofficial results, 13 of the 27 legislative Republicans are not white. The caucus could become more than half nonwhite, depending on the outcome of two pending special elections in solidly Republican districts. Two Asian American Republicans, Sen. Janet Nguyen and Assemblymember Vince Fong, won election for other offices earlier this month, leaving their seats vacant.

Jones’ statement noted that six of the Senate’s 10 Republicans are women and three of the women are Latino.

Jones sent out his statement Monday, the same day Orange County Democrat Sen. Josh Newman conceded his seat to Republican Steven Choi, a Korean-American former Assemblymember. It was the first time since 1980 that Republicans ousted an incumbent Democratic senator in a presidential election.

The other two flipped seats were in the Assembly. In California’s Latino-majority Imperial and Coachella valleys, Republican Jeff Gonzalez beat a Democrat to win in the 35th Assembly District where Democrats had a 14-point registration advantage and the population is 70% Latino. 

And in the state’s closest legislative race, Republican Leticia Castillo had a 600-vote lead on Tuesday over Clarissa Cervantes for an Inland Empire seat vacated by Cervantes’ sister, Sabrina Cervantes, a fellow Democrat who won a state Senate seat. The Associated Press has not officially called the race, but Castillo declared victory Tuesday night.

If the results hold, it will be an impressive victory for Castillo. Thanks to her sister, Cervantes had substantially more name recognition than Castillo in her sister’s former district. Cervantes also raised more than $1 million for her campaign compared to Castillo’s $78,000.

Democratic leaders, however, say the results are hardly a groundswell or a referendum against their party, which continues to hold every statewide elected office along with the supermajority in the Legislature. They note that aside from Newman, none of the dozens of other Democratic incumbents up for reelection this year lost.

“In a challenging year for Democrats nationwide, our members fought and won some extremely competitive races,” Democratic Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas said in a statement. “It is clear that Democrats have maintained our supermajority and the caucus has maintained its historic diversity and strength.”

California Democrats also appear to have flipped three Republican-held Congressional seats.

Experts such as election analyst Paul Mitchell said it’s also worth keeping in mind that the party that lost nationally in a presidential election almost always surges back in the midterms. If that happens in 2026, he said Republicans could see the legislative gains they made this election vanish.

Will Republicans regain power in California? 

Nonetheless, experts say Democrats would be wise not to brush off Republican victories as anomalies, and they expect California’s GOP to continue to make inroads with non white voters, even if Republicans have a long way to go to retake political power in California.

“It’s not like (the Legislature is) crossing over to being majority Republican, or even close to it,” Mitchell said. “They’re probably not going to do that in our lifetimes. But if you’re a Latino Republican, and you can capture votes from Latino voters as a complement to a maybe diminishing Republican base … then that’s a powerful combo.”

Part of the change is that Republican-dominated districts are becoming more diverse, reflecting California’s population as a whole. Whites make up just 35% of California’s 39 million residents.

And there are other signs that a shift may be occurring.

Christian Grose, a political science professor at the University of Southern California, said surveys of non white voters in urban areas of California still show they are solidly Democratic. But in rural or suburban areas, he said there’s been a shift toward the Republican Party from nonwhite voters, particularly men and people without college degrees, that could have a noticeable impact on future elections.

“In California, the winning strategy for a Republican in these districts would be to run candidates who are ethnically diverse and represent their communities,” he said. “But the coalition for the Republicans is actually probably a white-voter majority in many of these districts like the Central Valley, plus some Latino voters.”

Mike Madrid, a longtime Republican consultant with expertise in Latino politics, took it further. He has called the election a “five-alarm fire” for Democrats. He sees the election as a sign that the racial-identity politics that defined the previous generation’s political affiliations are fading away. 

“The idea that race and ethnicity are cornerstones of our political beliefs will become an outmoded concept,” Madrid said. “It was definitive for the past generation, and now it will be a relic of the past. … The bigger issue here that the Democratic Party has to understand is there’s a class problem, and that … a multiracial, (multi)ethnic working class is emerging in the country.”

For their part, legislative Republicans say California’s voters – of all races – made a clear statement during the election that they were fed up with Democratic policies. They rejected progressive ballot initiatives to raise the minimum wage, allow cities to block rent increases and to prohibit unpaid inmate labor. And they resoundingly approved a ballot initiative to impose harsher sentences for crimes, despite Gov. Gavin Newsom and progressive leaders opposing it.  

But fresh off his victory in the Imperial and Coachella valleys, incoming Republican Assemblymember Gonzalez believes his victory mostly came down to the state’s high costs.

He said his district is close enough to the Arizona border that it’s easy for voters to see that gas is cheaper on the other side of the state line. Voters, he said, are smart enough to realize that Democratic policies are what makes California more expensive.

“California has become unaffordable for not only the Latino, but the average person,” Gonzalez said.

Assemblymember Kate Sanchez, a Republican from Rancho Santa Margarita, said the election proved that Latinos like her “feel unseen and unheard by the current majority in the state.”

She said it’s no coincidence that Gov. Newsom has been touring majority Latino counties since the election, touting his economic policies.

“I think he sees the writing on the wall and he realizes, ‘California, this is a new dawn,’ ” she said. “This is a new chapter in California history and California politics, and he’s wanting to get in good graces. However, we’ve all had to deal with the fallout of his administration and the extreme policies, and so I don’t think people are buying it.”

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If President-elect Donald Trump goes forward with Project 2025, California could lose out on at least $300 million a year in funding for abortions, family planning and contraception for millions of low-income residents.  

Project 2025, a right-wing blueprint for the next president, targeted the state with an ultimatum that would require California to start reporting abortion data to the Centers for Disease Control or risk losing critical Medicaid funding. 

Despite Trump’s attempts to distance himself from the plan during the campaign, at least 140 of his allies produced the report and he’s appointing key figures from the project to his administration. As California leaders rush to shield the state from a Trump agenda, preserving reproductive freedoms stands as a top priority. 

Newsom called a special session for next month to “Trump-proof” California, and he’s hiring lawyers to prepare for Day 1 of the Trump presidency. 

“Whether it be our fundamental civil rights, reproductive freedom, or climate action – we refuse to turn back the clock and allow our values and laws to be attacked,” Newsom said in a statement.

When CalMatters first reported on the ultimatum in September, the California Department of Health Care Services didn’t provide specific figures detailing how much the state receives in federal reimbursements for reproductive healthcare provided through Medi-Cal. The department now says the federal government reimbursed California about $310.7 million for reproductive healthcare last year, according to California Department of Health Care Services figures. In the previous year, the state received $334.5 million. That funding supports Medi-Cal, the single largest payer of maternity care in the country. Medi-Cal covers about 14.2 million Californians.  All told, the federal government reimbursed the state $90.9 billion for Medi-Cal last year.

Under Project 2025, all 50 states would be mandated to report detailed abortion-related data to the federal government, including information such as the reason for the abortion, the fetus’ gestational age, the birthing parent’s state of residence, whether the procedure was surgical or medication-induced, and more.

Currently, California, Maryland, and New Hampshire do not require abortion providers to share patient data with the federal government. Shortly after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the California Department of Public Health said that it does not report abortion data federally because it is not legally obligated to do so. States that do collect abortion data typically use it for public health analyses, which can help identify gaps in care and improve access to services.

Newsom’s office did not provide details on the projected costs of lawyering up, but said the  governor plans for legislation to give additional resources to the California Department of Justice and other state agencies. 

These resources are intended “to pursue robust affirmative litigation against any unlawful actions by the incoming Trump Administration, as well as defend against federal lawsuits aimed at undermining California’s laws and policies,” the governor’s office said. “The funding will support the ability to immediately file litigation and seek injunctive relief against unlawful federal actions.”

Trump tapped two individuals associated with Project 2025 for roles in his administration. Brendan Carr, who authored Project 2025’s section on the Federal Communications Commission, will lead the agency.  

Tom Homan, an immigration hawk who’s listed in Project 2025’s credits as having assisted in developing and writing the playbook, will serve as the border czar, overseeing immigration policies and implementing mass deportation strategies. The spot is not an official cabinet position.

To lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Trump tapped Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer who previously fought California over vaccine mandates. . The department controls oversight of Medicaid spending and plays a critical role in abortion reporting by setting federal guidelines and enforcing privacy protections under HIPAA. 

Kennedy does not appear to have endorsed Project 2025. His stance on abortion has been notably inconsistent over time. In May, he expressed support for unrestricted abortion access, stating he opposed any government restrictions, “even if it’s full term.” 

However, he later revised his position, advocating for legal abortion up to the point of fetal viability, the stage at which a fetus can potentially survive outside the womb. 

Roger Severino, who served as the Department of Health and Human Services’ director of the Office for Civil Rights under Trump, authored Project 2025’s abortion surveillance plan. He is now the vice president of domestic policy at the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank behind Project 2025. He declined an interview request.

Severino’s vision for remaking the department is a cornerstone of Project 2025’s effort to impose stricter federal oversight on abortion practices, particularly targeting states like California, which offers greater access to abortion services than most other states. 

“Because liberal states have now become sanctuaries for abortion tourism, [the Department of Health and Human Services] should use every available tool, including the cutting of funds, to ensure that every state reports exactly how many abortions take place within its borders, at what gestational age of the child, for what reason, the mother’s state of residence, and by what method,” reads the chapter on abortion reporting. 

The potential fallout isn’t limited to California. Experts have warned that other states with progressive abortion policies may face similar funding threats, amplifying the national debate over reproductive rights under Trump’s second term.

After Election Day, Newsom traveled to Washington, D.C. for meetings with the Biden administration and congressional leaders to “discuss strategies for safeguarding healthcare access,” said Anthony Cava, a spokesperson for the California Department of Health Care Services.

Cava would not elaborate on those strategies. He said the department “cannot speculate on the future of these programs under a new federal administration, but the Newsom administration is working to protect the health and well-being of all Californians.”

California has long positioned itself as a national leader in reproductive rights, actively opposing federal restrictions on abortion access. The state’s proactive policies, such as safeguarding providers who serve out-of-state patients, stand in stark contrast to the goals of Project 2025. As policymakers and advocates brace for how Trump plans to “Make California Great Again,” they’re treating Project 2025 as a looming possibility.

Planned Parenthood, one of California’s leading providers of reproductive healthcare services for low-income communities, said the organization is preparing for “a variety of scenarios.” 

Shelby McMichael, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, said “while specifics remain under wraps,” the group is prioritizing expanding California’s abortion provider workforce, increasing investments in abortion funds and infrastructure as well as analyzing data to “improve abortion care access and education.”

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Mass deportations promised by President-elect Donald Trump could have a seismic economic effect in California — potentially inflicting billions of dollars in direct damages to a wide range of industries, including small business, agriculture, construction and child care, advocates and academics said.

The impact could also spread outward to other sectors, including growth drivers like tech.

The Golden State relies heavily on the labor of immigrants, whether they’re naturalized U.S. citizens, have temporary visas or are undocumented. More than 10 million, or 27%, of California’s population is foreign-born, according to the most recent U.S. Census data. Roughly a fifth of those are thought to be undocumented; as of 2022, estimates ranged from 1.8 million undocumented immigrants, according to the Pew Research Center, to 2.4 million, according to the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. 

If undocumented immigrants “magically disappear, you’re going to erase 10% of California production,” said Giovanni Peri, professor of international economics at UC Davis. “We’re talking about hundreds of billions of dollars.”

The loss of workers only speaks to part of the financial impact of deportations. Undocumented immigrants also power the state’s economy as consumers and taxpayers. 

There may also be indirect impacts from the deportations. The loss of workers in construction, agriculture (including the state’s world-famous wine industry), hospitality and the care economy would have ripple effects on the rest of the state, according to Manuel Pastor, professor of sociology and American studies and ethnicity at the University of Southern California. 

“Behind every software engineer is an army of nannies, food-service workers and gardeners,” Pastor said. 

Pastor thinks businesses are likely to protest significant cuts to their workforces given how tight the labor market is. “They’ve come for the tax cut, they didn’t stay for stripping away their labor force,” he said, referring to business owners who supported Trump.

At his campaign rallies, Trump has said immigrants are “attacking” Black and Latino Americans’ jobs. Federal data undermines that claim, instead showing foreign-born, noncitizen Black and Hispanic workers predominantly work different types of jobs than their native-born counterparts. 

It could be costly to replace those who are deported. In the construction industry, for example, the median weekly earnings of full-time, U.S.-born workers as of 2020 were $1,031 vs. $786 for foreign-born workers, according to an analysis by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In California, the median hourly wage as of 2021 was $30 an hour for U.S.-born workers vs. $24 an hour for immigrant workers vs. $16 an hour for undocumented workers, according to the California Immigrant Data Portal, a project by the Equity Research Institute at USC, which is directed by Pastor.

Even if Trump does not fully carry out his plan — or takes a long time to do so — the mere threat of deportations will have an economic impact, said Maria Lemus, executive director of Vision y Compromiso, a national community-based organization started in San Francisco that supports promotores, people who serve as liaisons between immigrant communities and health and social service providers.

“There will probably be a lot of people not going to work for fear of getting picked up,” Lemus said. “Employers will suffer the repercussions of this also.”

If a segment of the population goes into hiding, they will earn less and spend less, she said. Their kids — who are likely U.S. citizens — may not go to school, either, Lemus added. 

And undocumented immigrants contribute not just their labor, they also pay significantly into government coffers. In 2022, they paid $8.5 billion in local and state taxes in California, according to a national study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Mass deportations would lead to lost sales, property and income taxes paid by those immigrants — including into programs they have never drawn from because they can’t, such as unemployment insurance benefits, or, until recently, Medi-Cal. 

Then there are the immigrants who have legal status and may be in the state for different reasons, such as for temporary work. During the campaign this time around, Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance mentioned that they would also target the Temporary Protected Status program, which allows immigrants to stay in this country and work legally if their countries are determined to be unsafe.

The Trump administration may also target different visas that allow people born elsewhere to come to California to work in the fields (the H-2A visa), or in the tech industry (the H-1B visa). During his first term, Trump loosened rules for the issuing of visas for temporary workers such as the ones who worked for businesses he owned, and tightened rules for H-1B visas. 

The U.S. approved more than 46,000 H-1B visas for California employers in September, according to the most recent U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services data. About 30% were for Google, Meta and Apple.

Preparing for what Trump’s deportations could bring

Chris Iglesias, CEO of Unity Council, a nonprofit affordable-housing developer that also provides social services to thousands of residents of Oakland’s Fruitvale neighborhood, said people there are alarmed but not panicked. 

Iglesias said there is “a lot of Trump-proofing” going on at organizations such as his, which serve low-income and marginalized communities that include undocumented immigrants. 

Though President Joe Biden’s administration has also deported immigrants, Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric is different. He has referred to immigrants as criminals, “rough people” and even animals. The incoming president has said he will use the U.S. military to carry out deportations.

“He built his whole campaign off vilifying Latinos and immigrants,” Iglesias said. “People feel ready. They know this is coming.” Iglesias said the previous Trump term, plus the pandemic, strengthened bonds in the community, which has found “different ways to feed and house” its members. 

He is also taking comfort in the fact that Oakland is a sanctuary city, and in the promises state officials have made, including Gov. Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta, to fight the Trump administration. Newsom has called a special session to ask the state Legislature to fund lawsuits against the incoming administration. Bonta told CalMatters in a recent interview that his office is preparing legal challenges to “a full frontal assault on our immigrant communities.” 

In San Francisco, Lemus’ organization has joined with other community groups to prepare for the deportations.

They are working on getting out information about what people can do to get ready and to inform them of their legal rights. “They don’t have to open their doors,” she said. “They can refuse to give out their information.”

She also said the fear is bound to be felt by others who could be mistaken for being undocumented: “I’m a dark Latina. What if I’m walking somewhere and don’t have my (ID)? What would happen to me?”

What business and industry are saying — or not saying

Business and labor representatives from some of the industries most likely to be affected refused interview requests from CalMatters, or had no comment. They include the California Restaurant Association, Napa Valley Vintners, the Wine Institute and the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California.

The California Chamber of Commerce emailed a statement from its president, Jennifer Barrera: “It is no secret that undocumented workers greatly contribute to California’s economy given our geographical proximity to the border, which is why CalChamber has been a long-time supporter of a national comprehensive effort that provides a pathway to citizenship or legal status for these individuals while at the same time addressing border security.”

A.J. Rossitto, advocacy director for the California Hotel and Lodging Association, said the group “does not anticipate a significant impact to hotel operations in California at this time.” 

That contradicts the view of Unite Here Local 11, a union that represents 32,000 hospitality workers in Southern California and Arizona who work in hotels, restaurants, universities, convention centers and airports.

“It’s really hard to hear that there would be no impact,” said Ada Briceño, co-president of the union. “It seems there’s a shortsightedness about not understanding who (the workers) are.”

She said the union is trying to figure out how to support those who would feel the impact of deportations, from its own members to their children and families. That includes educating the workers about what to do in case of workplace raids, or “making sure they’re able to assign legal guardians to their children.”

Many California small businesses could also be affected by deportations.

Iglesias, of Unity Council in Oakland, said “a lot of our merchants and business owners in Fruitvale, whether they’re immigrants with or without status, are worried about the impact on their businesses.”

Carolina Martinez, CEO of small business advocacy group CAMEO Network, said “entrepreneurs who are undocumented pay taxes and support the economy.” 

Latin American immigrants start businesses at double the rate of other Americans, she said, referring to a recent UCLA Luskin Public Policy analysis of U.S. Census data, which also found that immigrants started 36% of U.S. businesses last year.

Besides the deportation worries, Martinez is concerned about a possible drop in government funding that helps small businesses get up and running: “Business leaders and advocates need to speak up and support ongoing investments. Small businesses are a bipartisan issue.” 

California’s Central Valley will be left behind no more, its leaders and Gov. Gavin Newsom said today as the region became the first in the state to meet with the governor to submit its 20-year economic development plan, which aims to boost its agricultural industry and prepare for a key role in the green economy.

The event in Fresno builds on the governor’s initiative, which he introduced in March, to invest in economic and workforce development with a focus on 13 regions as the state tries to help create more opportunities outside of its traditional jobs centers, such as the Bay Area and Los Angeles. 

“A thriving Sierra San Joaquin region is essential to California’s future,” said Ashley Swearengin, chief executive of the Central Valley Community Foundation, which helped bring together the counties in the region to create the 502-page plan, which was funded by the state. She handed a binder with the plan to Newsom during the press conference.

Among other things, the counties of Madera, Fresno, Kings and Tulare are asking for $58 billion in public and private investments in the region over the next couple of decades, according to a draft of the plan from August. The region, which produces 25% of the nation’s food supply, has an annual output of $70 billion, the plan says.

Despite its agricultural contributions and the major role it’s expected to play in helping generate the state’s renewable energy, 1 in 5 people in the region live below the poverty line, said Swearengin, a former Fresno mayor. “The challenges that confront this region’s families must always be present in our minds.” 

The governor said he expects to take the other regions’ plans and release a statewide blueprint in January. The state has set aside $182 million so far in grants to follow through on the plans.

There’s optimism around the state’s focus on regions. Kate Gordon, CEO of California Forward, ​​a nonprofit organization that focuses on the California economy and a former director of the governor’s Office of Planning and Research under Newsom, said “across California, stakeholders are getting together on a thoughtful approach” to creating high-quality jobs. 

Gordon added that some people “don’t feel themselves as part of the economy right now,” and that the regions working on their own strategies was “an incredibly inclusive process.” 

Newsom acknowledged what he called economic uneasiness among the state’s residents despite fairly low unemployment.

“This is about people feeling on edge,” the governor said, adding that he is “excited” to support grant applications from the region. “It’s not talking about macro conditions, but about micro lived reality.”

A common takeaway from this year’s elections is that voters made their decisions partly because of their economic concerns, at least according to exit polls. 

Newsom, who is heading into his final two years as governor, says he’s responding to those concerns. Republicans continually criticize him for being out of touch with the daily struggles of many Californians. Even as his national stature has grown, the state’s voters are split on his performance as governor. 

The governor made today’s announcement in Fresno County, where 51% voted for Donald Trump and 46% voted for Vice President Kamala Harris, with all but 7,100 votes counted. In 2020, Trump lost the county to Democrat Joe Biden 53% to 45%.

Fresno County, which has a per-capita income of about $50,000 a year, among the lowest in California, has also consistently had among the highest unemployment claims in the state, according to data from the Employment Development Department. 

California’s unemployment rate inched up in October, to 5.4% from 5.3% the previous month. That’s the second-highest jobless rate in the nation, behind Nevada, while the U.S. unemployment rate is 4.1%. 

This week, the state’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s office noted in its fiscal outlook for the next year: “Outside of government and health care, the state has added no jobs in a year and a half.”

When police pulled over Tommy Bonds III on a chilly January day in 2022, the San Diego State University student had an idea why.

“What’s goin’ on, bro? How you doin’?” San Diego Police Officer Ryan Cameron said as he approached the car, shining his flashlight in Bonds’ face.

Bonds told Cameron he recognized him. The officer had previously stopped him for having an issue with his license plate cover, and Bonds let him know what he thought the interaction was about.

“We saw you turn around because you saw two guys — two Black guys in the car — obviously,” Bonds said.

“Well, part of it,” Cameron said, “with the hoodies up and stuff.”

“I mean, it’s cold outside,” Bonds said.

Bonds said he had an unloaded gun in the back of his car. As Bonds removed his firearm safety certificate from his wallet, Cameron said, “Easy. Easy.”

He told Bonds to exit his vehicle, then handcuffed him as he searched through his pockets.

“I’m just confused on why,” Bonds said as Cameron ordered him to walk toward the police car. “I mean, if it was two white boys driving down with hoodies in their car, you would’ve never turned around like that.”

After searching the car and finding a Glock in the rear passenger seat pocket, Cameron arrested Bonds for carrying a concealed weapon — one that he owned legally. While it is a misdemeanor in California to put a gun in a seat pocket if you don’t have a concealed carry permit, it’s a crime that’s typically charged against Black people in the state. Research from the University of Wisconsin has shown that in California, compared to white people, Black people are 16 times more likely to be arrested for stand-alone “gun possession” charges.

Cameron’s body camera captured the entire arrest scene. When the San Diego Public Defender’s Office took Bonds’ case, it seemed to attorneys as though Cameron had agreed that he had stopped him and his friend, in part, because they were Black. An admission like this fit the criteria to get the gun charge dismissed through a new law aimed at cases tainted with bias: the California Racial Justice Act.

The California Legislature passed the law in 2020 to allow people to show that discrimination contributed to their criminal charges or sentencing, and get their conviction or sentence modified. Essentially, the law allows defendants and their representation to put bias on the stand.

But when Bonds’ attorneys took their challenge to court, they ran into what has proven to be one of the biggest obstacles in achieving racial justice under California’s groundbreaking law: judges.

Four years in, the law has few success stories

The job of hearing challenges to the Racial Justice Act in San Diego fell to Judge Howard Shore. During Bonds’ first hearing, Shore questioned whether the Legislature had given judges sufficient guidance. 

Shore was skeptical of one of Bonds’ expert witnesses, a sociology professor at Cal State-San Marcos, who had written a book on racial profiling. So, Shore posed a hypothetical on whether people of color could be racist.

“I’ve had gang cases where Hispanics and Blacks are fighting each other, and the Hispanics refer to, if you excuse my language, niggers,” Shore said, “and the Blacks use discriminatory language against Hispanics.”

Shore said he was also skeptical of the conclusions of experts and statistics showing that Black people are subjected to traffic stops more frequently than other races. He said he believed Officer Cameron’s testimony that he didn’t see Bonds’ race before conducting the stop, and therefore there was no bias. Shore denied Bonds’ motion for relief under the Racial Justice Act.

In the four years the law has been in existence, defendants in only about a dozen cases have succeeded in proving that bias affected their criminal case, The Garrison Project and CalMatters found.

The state does not keep data on Racial Justice Act cases. There’s no courthouse code for a motion made under the act, leaving no systematic way to track cases. Successes tend to spread by word of mouth, while the details of rejections are buried in court filings.

In the absence of comprehensive data, the Garrison Project spoke with more than 40 attorneys, legal experts, and advocates, across more than a dozen counties to understand its effectiveness.

The results so far are mixed. While the law has offered a way to document instances of extreme bias and overt racism, its overall impact on California’s criminal legal system — the largest in the U.S. — has been weaker than its designers hoped when they crafted the legislation.

“I think that the numbers show a gap in reality,” said Geneviéve Jones-Wright, executive director of Community Advocates for Just and Moral Governance, a San Diego nonprofit focused on social justice. “The numbers are dismal, and it’s not good, because it could have a chilling effect. A lot of people may feel that RJA motions are not worth it, so why go through with it.”

The Garrison Project reached out to six district attorney offices to understand their experience with the law. The district attorney offices in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Alameda counties did not respond. The offices in Orange and San Diego counties declined to discuss the new law. 

“I think this law has done a lot of positive things, but I don’t think it’s sufficient, because you have really systemic problems that do not lend themselves well to these individual conclusions,” said David Angel, Santa Clara assistant district attorney and head of the office’s RJA committee.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the Racial Justice Act into law in September 2020 following the police murder of George Floyd. The bill’s sponsor, Ash Kalra, a Democratic assemblymember who represents most of San Jose, said at the time the ensuing racial justice protests and calls for “true justice in our court systems and across our entire justice system” made the moment right.

Black people are disproportionately represented in the state’s criminal legal system. In 2021, Black people were 9.5 times more likely to be incarcerated than white people, the fourth highest racial disparity among states. Even though they account for only 5% of California’s population, Black people make up about 28% of the prison population and 21% of people in jails.

A year after Shore rejected Bonds’ motion, the California Commission on Judicial Performance issued a severe public censure against the judge for being absent without authorization on at least 155 court days. The commission found that his conduct “constituted a dereliction of duty, a persistent failure to perform his judicial duties, and a failure to follow the directives.”

Frustrated with Shore’s arguments and decisions, Deputy Public Defender Abram Genser filed a motion to have him removed from one of his cases, and outlined some of the more egregious examples of his behavior.

In a February 2022 case, to discredit the use of statistics as evidence of bias, Shore compared the arrests of Black people to the Mafia heyday of Prohibition-era organized crime: “For example, back East, the 1920s, when mafioso were killing each other, there was a disproportion of number of Italians being prosecuted. Does that mean they were being discriminated against? No. It’s just that there were a lot of Italians committing crimes.”

In December 2023 he told a pair defense attorneys that “our Mexicans” in San Diego are like people in Gaza who cross the border to perform agricultural labor for Israelis.

Colleen Chien, a law professor at UC Berkeley, has been publishing legal data across California related to RJA and studying legal disparities. “What we’re seeing is that there’s what we already know, there’s a lot of racial disparity in our system, and it’s really pervasive — almost every single county, on every single charge,” she said. “It’s hard to believe that that could just be the product of things that don’t have to do with racism.”

There have been at least 21 Racial Justice Act filings in San Diego County since the law went into effect. Some cases are still pending, but no judge has ruled in favor of a motion under the law, according to the San Diego District Attorney’s Office.

Bonds appealed his case and had to hope that the higher courts would have a different reading of the Racial Justice Act than Shore.

How a Racial Justice Act case works

There are a number of steps to a challenge under the Racial Justice Act. First, a defense attorney has to file a motion and make the case to a judge that there is bias or animus in a case. If the judge agrees that there is more reason than not to believe the case has been infected with bias, the case moves to evidentiary hearings, where the judge will determine if the facts actually do amount to bias.

If a case meets that threshold, then it moves to remedy, where the judge decides how the bias can be cured—either through a new trial, resentencing on a conviction, or pretty much any legal outcome under their discretion.

A review of court documents, appellate rulings, and interviews with defense attorneys indicate the true power of a Racial Justice Act proceeding: the ability to add evidence of bias to the court record through motions.

One motion filed in February revealed that during a juvenile detention hearing in Sacramento County in July 2023, Judge Renard Shepard, who is also Black, referred to a Black minor as a “gangbanger” and said, “He’s got it in his blood, in his culture. He can’t get it out of his system.” 

In October 2021, Orange County’s district attorney, Todd Spitzer, held a strategy meeting with his prosecutors to explore using the race of a Black man’s former girlfriends in a case of double murder, allegedly stemming from a white woman breaking up with him. Ebrahim Baytieh, then the senior assistant district attorney, wrote in a memo to the defense that he recoiled at the tactic of using a victim’s whiteness. “DA Spitzer stated that he disagreed and he knows many black people who get themselves out of their bad circumstances and bad situations by only dating ‘white women,’” Baytieh wrote.

It was the first time in the Racial Justice Act’s history that a judge determined a district attorney was biased.

Another recent motion filed in Orange County involved the case of a Hispanic man experiencing a mental health crisis. Police enforced a restraining order and seemingly attacked and arrested him because he couldn’t speak English. “He starts speaking Spanish,” the officer told his supervisor. “You know what? I don’t have time for this [so] I just grabbed him.”

In the body-camera video, less than 15 seconds passed between the confused man being confronted by the police entering the home, and him being pulled to the ground by his neck.

“You don’t know the importance of just going into the court and fighting it and having these conversations,” said Elizabeth Lashley-Haynes, a deputy public defender for Los Angeles County. “It’s incredibly meaningful to be able to articulate and say to a judge, ‘No, this officer doing that is biased.’”

Emi MacLean, a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Northern California, published a review of Racial Justice Act cases earlier this year. The relatively few remedies, she said, show how difficult it is for defense attorneys to get the system to recognize officers’ prejudices.

“It is an uphill battle in many cases to be able to convince judges, not to mention prosecutors, who have been operating under a system that has severely limited the ability of individuals to bring challenges to racial biases,” she said. “We would certainly expect that there should be more based on extensively documented disparities in the criminal legal system.”

Life before the Racial Justice Act

Prior to the Racial Justice Act, Californians could only explicitly hold the system accountable for bias through a civil rights lawsuit filed through the civil courts. For some defendants, the new process offers the first-ever opportunity to confront racism and bias they’ve experienced in the criminal legal system—something Terry Bemore hadn’t previously been able to do as he sat on death row for two and a half decades while his case made its way up the appellate courts. 

In 1985, Bemore was arrested for a murder committed during a robbery in San Diego, one of a series of robberies at the time where a “tall Black male” was described as the perpetrator. Four years later, he was sentenced to death.

Court documents in Bemore’s death row appeal two and a half decades later revealed the ineffectiveness of his defense. His lead attorney, Logan McKechnie, allegedly billed the state for hundreds of thousands of dollars for improper trips and reimbursements, while also making comments about not wanting to go into Black neighborhoods with his investigator to pursue leads. In 2000, Elizabeth Barranco, the co-counsel in the case, wrote in a declaration that McKechnie struck jurors who he suspected were gay because he said he “just couldn’t trust queers,” and did little preparation.

McKechnie has gone on to have an esteemed legal career, arguing hundreds of jury trials, including 60 murder cases, winning over 100 awards for service and writing.

In its 2015 decision in Bemore’s case, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found Bemore had “constitutionally deficient representation.” But the panel of three white judges, all born nearly two decades before the passage of the Civil Rights Act, didn’t think the outcome of Bemore’s verdict would have changed with better representation. They upheld Bemore’s conviction, but reversed the death sentence.

In March, Bemore’s lawyers filed a Racial Justice Act motion, arguing McKechnie’s bias led to ineffective counsel. Attorneys working on Bemore’s case from the University of San Francisco School of Law’s Racial Justice Clinic contacted McKechnie to get his side of the case.

“I told Mr. Bemore, ‘Don’t get up there and act like a fucking nigger,’” McKechnie wrote in a declaration for the Racial Justice Act motion. McKechnie recalled that Bemore “was hyper and using street slang” just before he took the stand, writing, “I had never seen Mr. Bemore act ghetto like that before and I was afraid of how the jury would perceive him.”

When McKechnie initially discussed the case with the USF attorneys who were working on the motion, he initially stated Bemore was “shucking and jiving” but then wanted the detail changed: “Don’t say shucking and jiving because that’s too racist.”

In a statement emailed to CalMatters, McKechnie wrote that he wanted the jury to see the man he knew, not what he was becoming behind bars. “It was probably inappropriate to tell him to not act like a nigger on the stand. However, at the time, it was a message I wanted to get to him.”

In some cases, defense attorneys have won for their clients—but regretted not being able to hold the agencies accountable after prosecutors conceded.

In Los Angeles County, Torrance police officers exchanged racist and anti-gay texts in 2021, and some were charged with spray-painting a swastika on a car. Lashley-Haynes filed a Racial Justice Act motion for discovery of more text exchanges, but prosecutors agreed to her resentencing request instead, ending the need for additional disclosure.

“I was actually kind of upset,” she said, but, “I have to be very careful that my desire for the betterment of RJA doesn’t get in the way of what’s best for the client.”

Joseph Hayes was sentenced 41 years to life in prison for driving the getaway car in a 1995 street robbery that resulted in another person’s death. Hispanic and a member of the Choctaw Nation, he grew up in a San Jose neighborhood nicknamed “The Crime Zone.” He spent 25 years in maximum security prison until he connected with defense attorney Brian McComas. The law had been revised since Hayes had been inside to remove the murder culpability for someone indirectly associated with a killing, and he seemed eligible for having his life sentence removed.

But the Santa Clara County district attorney had other plans. The prosecutor on Hayes’ case agreed to remove the life sentence—but suggested replacing it with a sentence totaling 69 years in prison, substantially higher than white defendants charged with the same crime. In January 2022, McComas filed a Racial Justice Act motion using data to show that the new sentence was much higher than what a similarly situated white man would receive.

McComas said the judge had called the attorneys into his chambers to tell them that he was going to resentence Hayes so he would be released, but he wouldn’t be ruling on the Racial Justice Act motion.

“Rather than address the motion and do the right thing and make the RJA law so that it is precedential, he said, ‘I want this case to go away,’” McComas said.

“I’ve had two other cases where very similar things have happened,” he said, “and that’s fine for individuals, but in terms of the purposes of the law, which are to root out systemic racism, that’s not really achieving that goal.”

Hayes has been out of prison for two and a half years and has reestablished his life with his wife and children. He’s now the regional manager of a local custodial company with an ownership stake, but it still bothers him that he passed on a Racial Justice Act motion.

“I still feel guilty for having done that, because my people have been run over constantly by the government and the powers that be,” he said. “I had an opportunity to do my small part, but at the same time, that might’ve really meant me having to go back to prison for another five years, 10 years.”

A decision on Judge Shore

One of the most celebrated victories from the Racial Justice Act comes from Contra Costa County, where motions showed evidence of statistical bias in capital cases and also coincided with an FBI probe into racism and criminal conduct at the Antioch and Pittsburg police departments.

According to a Racial Justice Act motion filed in April 2023 for four defendants, the officers surveilling them exchanged multiple racist texts on March 25, 2021.

“I hate these idiots,” Antioch Police Officer Eric Rombough texted.

“The cops or the niggers?” Detective Jonathan Adams responded.

“All of them,” Rombough replied.

In November 2021, Rombough texted an officer, “Fuck your people. I hate this city.” He added, “I’m only stopping them cuz they black. Fuck them. Kill each other.”

The defendants, Terryon Pugh, Eric Windom, Keyshawn McGee, and Trent Allen, were originally indicted on charges including murder and attempted murder. A judge ruled that police racism tainted the investigation under the Racial Justice Act and that gang enhancements needed to be dropped. In May, all four defendants struck a deal with prosecutors that reduced their charges to manslaughter and removed gang enhancements on their cases. Instead of facing decades in prison, they received sentences between 13 and  20 years.

In February, the 4th District Court of Appeals overturned Judge Shore’s ruling in Bonds’ case.

“Whatever may be uncertain about the Racial Justice Act, there are a few things that are abundantly clear,” the justices wrote in their decision. “Perhaps most obvious is that the Racial Justice Act was enacted to address much more than purposeful discrimination based on race. Indeed, the primary motivation for the legislation was the failure of the judicial system to afford meaningful relief to victims of unintentional but implicit bias.”

The higher court found that Shore misunderstood the statute and did not “address the abundant evidence” that at least unintended racial bias influenced Bonds’ traffic stop; the court overturned Shore’s ruling, sending the motion back to the San Diego trial court for a correct application of the law in February.

A little over a month later, Orange County Judge Cheri Pham disqualified Shore from Racial Justice Act cases. “From his comments, a person aware of the facts could reasonably believe

that Judge Shore believes certain racial or ethnic groups commit more crimes than others,” Pham wrote in her ruling.

“I deny that any of my statements or rulings were based on bias, prejudice, or animosity,” Shore wrote in a court statement addressing the motion to have him disqualified. “The statements I made during these various court hearings were merely my efforts to gain a greater understanding of the facts and the law and were in the furtherance of the discharge of my judicial duty to accurately apply the law to the facts as presented.”

Shore’s department that handled pretrial screening was shut down.

But the San Diego Public Defender’s Office doesn’t have the resources to appeal all of his denials. And aside from ruling on Racial Justice Act motions, Shore has presided over hundreds of criminal jury trials.

This story was produced in partnership with the Garrison Project, an independent, nonpartisan organization addressing the crisis of mass incarceration and policing.

With tax revenues from high-earning Californians rebounding in recent months, the Legislature’s nonpartisan fiscal adviser projects that the state budget remains “roughly balanced,” but spending growth is expected to drive increasing deficits in the years ahead.

That could make it difficult for Gov. Gavin Newsom to pursue ideas that he has proposed in recent months to fight back against a second Trump administration and reboot California’s sluggish economy during his final two years in office.

In its annual fiscal outlook, issued today to prepare lawmakers for the upcoming budget process, the Legislative Analyst’s Office estimated that California will face a $2 billion deficit next year, a potential gap that could be resolved with minor solutions — and one that Legislative Analyst Gabriel Petek repeatedly warned leaves no room for new programs.

“The revenues are up, but the outlook ahead on that is a little more precarious,” he told reporters during a briefing. “There’s really no capacity for new commitments, because we do estimate there to be these pretty significant operating deficits in the subsequent years.”

Those shortfalls will reach about $30 billion annually by the 2028-29 fiscal year, according to the office’s projections, and there are additional uncertainties related to President-elect Donald Trump’s agenda. California’s economy is particularly vulnerable to plans he has floated to raise tariffs and limit immigration, while Trump has threatened further recriminations to the state on disaster aid and other funding if it bucks him.

Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas, a Salinas Democrat who will negotiate California’s next budget with Newsom and his counterpart in the state Senate, endorsed a cautious approach.

“We need to show restraint with this year’s budget, because California must be prepared for any challenges, including ones from Washington,” Rivas said in a statement. “It’s not a moment for expanding programs, but for protecting and preserving services that truly benefit all Californians.”

Newsom has already called a special session starting in December to appropriate potentially tens of millions of dollars to the state Department of Justice for expected litigation against the Trump administration. He is also developing a proposal for a backup disaster relief fund and wants to double to $750 million annually the tax credit program for the state’s struggling film and television industry, a critical economic sector in Southern California.

H.D. Palmer, a spokesperson for the governor’s Department of Finance, said the state is in far better fiscal condition than it was a year ago even with challenges ahead. He declined to discuss how Newsom would offset proposed new spending in his budget plan, which is expected in early January.

“It reflects his policies and his priorities,” Palmer said, which will be “will be accommodated within the overall framework of a balanced budget proposal.”

Newsom and the Legislature passed a $298 billion budget this summer that aimed to address a major deficit, estimated to be tens of billions of dollars over the next two years, by dipping into reserves, pausing some business tax credits and making widespread cuts to state government operations, prisons, housing programs and health care workforce development in order to maintain California’s social safety net.

Now tax collections are forecast to beat expectations by $7 billion for the year, largely driven by stock market gains, according to the Legislative Analyst’s Office fiscal outlook. Stock compensation for employees of major tech companies such as Nvidia has provided an outsized portion of the income tax windfall.

But that money is projected to be offset by spending more than $10 billion higher than the current state budget assumed, including more guaranteed funding for schools and community colleges from the additional revenue. Other large unexpected costs include for fighting wildfires and an expanding caseload for state health programs for seniors, as well as a November ballot measure approved by voters that raises reimbursement rates for doctors who treat poor residents.

That leaves a “small deficit” of $2 billion for the state to address before the start of the next fiscal year in July, the Legislative Analyst’s Office concluded. “Given the size and unpredictability of the state budget, we view this to mean the budget is roughly balanced.”

Yet there are warning signs in California’s economy, such as soft consumer spending, an uptick in unemployment and hardly any job creation outside of the government and health care. The office questioned the sustainability of the recovery in state income tax revenue.

The annual fiscal outlook by the Legislative Analyst’s Office is merely a forecast and can vary greatly from the projection by the Department of Finance that the governor uses for his budget proposal in January.

Last December, the Legislative Analyst’s Office estimated a $68 billion deficit for the next fiscal year — frustrating Newsom, whose spending plan relied on a smaller $38 billion expected revenue gap. He repeatedly criticized the media for its widespread reporting on the Legislative Analyst’s Office figure.

Seemingly recalling those criticisms, Petek published an essay last week defending his office and “the value of independence” as it helps the Legislature understand the choices it may face.

“Our independent fiscal assessment underlies the Legislature’s ability to assert an informed check on the executive branch, making any added complexity from diverging estimates a worthwhile trade-off,” Petek wrote.

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California has a notoriously slow ballot counting process — one that Kim Alexander describes as “a pig in the python.”

“This giant wad of ballots that all arrive at once, that all have to move through the process, and you can’t speed it up,” said Alexander, president of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation. “You have to do every single step, otherwise you lose the integrity of the process.”

To help voters understand and trust that process, Alexander’s group launched a tracker this election that is monitoring the vote count in California’s close contests between Election Day and certification of county results.

Dubbed the Close Count Transparency Project, the tracker — which debuted as a pilot program in 2022 — provides daily updates on the results of 11 competitive U.S. House races and seven state legislative races, as well as the statewide vote count status. The tool tracks candidates’ vote share, votes counted and the number of unprocessed ballots in each county the districts cover. 

As of late Tuesday, an estimated 570,500 ballots statewide were yet to be counted, according to the Secretary of State’s office. More than 126,000 ballots needed to be “cured” — they had been rejected for missing or mismatched signatures and voters have time to submit a form to verify their signatures. 

A total of eight key contests remained uncalled by the Associated Press as of late Tuesday, including two congressional races, five legislative races and one statewide ballot measure. (CalMatters and other news outlets use AP to declare winners while the vote count is ongoing.)

By making the vote count more transparent, the close contest tracker aims to inoculate against unfounded conspiracy theories about election fraud in California, Alexander said. 

Some prominent conservatives, including GOP U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, are spreading unproven claims that Democrats are “stealing” the 45th Congressional District race in Southern California, where Democrat Derek Tran is leading by a razor-thin margin over Republican Rep. Michelle Steel after trailing her for days. 

“We wanted to create a record of where the vote count stood each day, so that if someone came along later and said, ‘Something hinky is going on here,’ there would be a reliable source of information people could turn to to see how the vote count evolved over time,” Alexander said.

The tracker also comes as frustration about the lengthy process grows in California. State Assemblymember Joe Patterson, a Rocklin Republican, called the procedure “dumb” on social media, arguing that winners of state legislative races will be sworn in Dec. 2, before the results are certified by the Secretary of State. The lengthy process “sows distrust” in the state’s election system, he told KCRA. 

The state Assembly and Senate already held a joint freshman orientation last week for incoming lawmakers, while the five legislative races remain too close to call, Assembly Republicans spokesperson Jim Stanley confirmed to CalMatters. 

“It’s a real problem for incoming lawmakers if they miss out on that,” Alexander said.

Why it takes so long to count — and how to speed it up

While voters and campaigns want to see results sooner, it is particularly challenging in California, Alexander said. 

The state is home to more than 22 million registered voters, according to the state Secretary of State’s office. As of Tuesday afternoon, a total of 15 million ballots had been counted — a number bigger than the populations of 46 other states, Census data shows. 

California has also made it easier for voters to cast their ballots in recent years. A 2021 law made universal vote-by-mail permanent in California, meaning every registered voter receives a mail-in ballot roughly a month before Election Day and the ballots are counted as long as they arrive at county elections offices within seven days after Election Day. In the March primary, almost 90% of all voters voted by mail, according to the Secretary of State.

The widespread use of vote-by-mail slows down the vote count, Alexander said, because they take longer to process. 

“We have to open the envelopes, we have to verify the signature, and all of those things before we can actually accept that ballot,” said Secretary of State Shirley Weber in a press conference last week. 

Additionally, election officials have to first complete counting mail-in ballots before they move onto ballots cast by voters who register the same day they voted to make sure no voter votes twice, said Jesse Salinas, president of the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials and clerk-recorder in Yolo County. The number of same-day registered voters has grown over the years, further slowing down the vote count, he said.

But the slow vote count is also because races are closer than more than a decade ago, Alexander said. The state’s independent redistricting commission drew more competitive districts after the 2020 Census, she said, and the top-two primary process was designed to boost candidates who could appeal to a broader range of voters in the general election. 

Between 2002 and 2010, before voters approved the independent redistricting commission, there was an average of one or two close congressional races per general election, Alexander said. But following the 2011 redistricting and the 2012 adoption of the top-two primary, there was an average of five close contests per election cycle, she said.

“People would be less patient with our long vote count if we had more decisive victories, but we don’t,” she said.

Still, county election officials could benefit from more staffing and funding for better equipment, Alexander said. Kern County, for example, has acquired high-speed ballot scanners to tabulate votes faster, she said. As of Tuesday, Kern had processed nearly 280,000 ballots and had only about 8,500 to go. 

The state could also benefit from spending big on voter outreach, urging voters to mail in their ballots sooner, which would help county officials pre-process more ballots and reduce the workload post-election, Alexander said. 

But more importantly, she said, the state should allow voters to opt out of vote-by-mail if they want, although she acknowledged that under current law, voters have the option to cast the ballot they received in the mail in person instead. 

“A lot of people don’t want to vote by mail, and then you are stuck with this ballot, and that confuses voters,” she said.

CalMatters reporter Sameea Kamal contributed to this story. 

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Despite pledging to be the first California governor to release his tax returns every year while in office, Gov. Gavin Newsom has yet to make any additional filings public during his second term.

Newsom last disclosed a tax return nearly three years ago, in March 2022, as he was running for re-election. Under a state law, signed by Newsom himself, that requires gubernatorial candidates to release their five most recent income tax returns, the governor shared filings through 2020, when he and wife Jennifer Siebel Newsom earned nearly $1.5 million and paid about $480,000 in taxes.

A spokesperson for Newsom declined to provide CalMatters with any of his tax returns since then. Nathan Click said the governor’s team would organize an opportunity for reporters to review the documents in a controlled setting, as it has in the past, but did not provide a date or respond to any follow-up questions.

Newsom’s finances have come under renewed scrutiny since media outlets in San Francisco reported late Friday that the governor and his wife recently paid around $9 million for a new home in the Marin County town of Kentfield. The Newsoms revealed over the summer that they planned to move back to the Bay Area from the Sacramento suburbs “to ensure continuity in their childrens’ education.”

Following the publication of this story, the governor’s office clarified that Siebel Newsom had purchased the home using an LLC and no “entities outside of the family” provided financial assistance.

As governor, Newsom receives an annual salary of $234,101, but he also continues to earn income from a wine and entertainment empire that he placed in a blind trust before taking office in 2019. In their tax return for that year, disclosed in 2021, the Newsoms revealed that they had not yet sold their previous home in Kentfield — which was initially placed on the market for nearly $6 million — and were renting it out for $20,000 per month.

Newsom began releasing his tax returns on the campaign trail in 2017 as he was running for his first term for governor. It resumed a tradition abandoned by his predecessor, former Gov. Jerry Brown, who resisted disclosing his own returns, and was seen as a dig at then-President Donald Trump, whose refusal to make his tax filings public was an enormous political controversy at the time.

Two years later, Newsom signed a bill — previously vetoed by Brown — to keep presidential candidates off the California primary ballot unless they released their tax returns. The California Supreme Court ultimately struck down the law as unconstitutional, though they did maintain a secondary provision that extends the same requirement to gubernatorial candidates in the state.

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San Joaquin Valley Republican Vince Fong was on the ballot this fall for an Assembly race, but he didn’t want to win it. After all, he left that job for Congress earlier this year, and he planned to stay in the nation’s capital.

He even went so far as to endorse the Bakersfield city councilmember who was listed as running against him on the November ballot. 

But voters chose Fong anyway for the Assembly. They chose him again for Congress, too, since he was listed on the same ballot twice. And they did so overwhelmingly. By last count, Fong had more than 33,000 votes over fellow Republican Ken Weir for the Assembly seat.

Now, since Fong “won” his Assembly race, Kern and Tulare County taxpayers in Assembly District 32 will end up paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for a special election to fill the seat that Fong doesn’t want any more.

The good news for California voters and taxpayers is that a new law, passed this year in response to Fong’s ballot conundrum, will hopefully prevent future confusion over a candidate appearing on the same ballot for two different races. 

In September, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 1784. The law prevents a candidate from appearing on the same ballot for simultaneous races. The legislation came in response to judges telling California election officials that Fong had to stay on the ballot for both races. 

The confusion arose last winter when U.S. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, a Republican from Bakersfield and the former House speaker, resigned after a brutal battle within the GOP caucus. Fong, a longtime McCarthy acolyte who once served as his district director, announced he was running for his mentor’s seat with McCarthy’s endorsement.

But by that point, Fong, who’d been an Assemblymember since 2016, had already filed papers declaring his Assembly candidacy for the March primary.

Democratic California Secretary of State Shirley Weber argued that elections officials had long maintained that the state’s election code prohibited a candidate from running in two races simultaneously. Weber moved to block Fong from appearing on the ballot for the congressional seat.

Fong challenged Weber in Sacramento Superior Court. Judge Shelleyanne Chang overruled Weber, despite noting “it may result in voter confusion and the disenfranchisement of voters if Fong is ultimately elected for both offices but does not retain one.”

“Moreover, it somewhat defies common sense to find the law permits a candidate to run for two offices during the same election,” she wrote in her ruling. “However … the Court is compelled to interpret the law as it is written by the Legislature.”

Weber appealed, but the 3rd District Court of Appeal upheld Chang’s ruling.

“If the Legislature wants to prohibit candidates from running for more than one office at the same election, it is free to do so,” the appellate court ruled. “Unless and until it does so, however, we must take (the law) as we find it and enforce it as written.”

After, Weber said the courts’ rulings left “the door open to chaos, gamesmanship and voter disenfranchisement, and disadvantages other candidates.”

Law aims to prevent election confusion 

In response, Democratic Assemblymember Gail Pellerin, a former Santa Cruz County elections chief, and her colleagues introduced AB 1784, which expressly prohibits a candidate from seeking two seats simultaneously. The law also creates a process that allows a candidate to officially withdraw from one race to run in another. 

“The judge ruled it’s unclear,” Pellerin said Monday. “So we’re going to make it clear and make sure that that doesn’t ever happen again.” Her bill passed this fall with bipartisan support. 

Meanwhile, Fong remained on the ballot for the March primary for his Assembly seat, running without a formal opponent. He urged voters to write in Weir, the Bakersfield city councilman who got enough votes to qualify for the November general election. 

In May, Fong won the special election to serve the remainder of McCarthy’s term which ends in January. He had to run again in November to serve another two years in Congress. 

Fong again told voters to vote for Weir.

“Well, look, I don’t think there’s going to be much chaos,” Fong told a local television news reporter last month. “The message is clear: Vince Fong for Congress, Ken Weir for the Assembly.”

Not enough voters in Assembly District 32 got the message. Fong’s campaign didn’t return a message from CalMatters. 

Mike Gatto, a former Democratic Assemblymember from Los Angeles, said the confusion that resulted from Fong’s departure is a reminder that when it comes to down-ballot races, most voters don’t really pay that close attention to state political candidates.

“So many people in the Legislature have big egos,” he said, “but when all is said and done, it’s not like we are top of mind for the average voter.” 

Now, Newsom will have to call a special election in Tulare and Kern counties to fill Fong’s Assembly seat. It could come as early as March.

Pellerin said when she was an election official, it typically cost local taxpayers $4 to $8 per registered voter to hold a one-off special election. That would mean a cost of at least $1.2 million since there were around 305,000 voters in Fong’s district as of February.

Election officials in Kern County, which makes up the bulk of Fong’s district, didn’t return messages seeking an estimate of how much the special election would cost taxpayers.

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Big Tech and Big Oil drove a record-setting lobbying blitz this summer that saw nearly $168 million spent to influence state policymakers in just the third quarter of this year.

That’s up from this past spring, the previous quarter, when another record was set with more than $131 million spent on lobbying by labor unions, companies and nonprofit organizations, according to a CalMatters analysis of data from the California Secretary of State. 

Overall spending to lobby state legislators was nearly $420 million in the first nine months of 2024, compared to $484 million in all of 2023 and $443 million in the entirety of 2022. Both 2023 and 2022 set records for lobbyist spending.

Google was the single largest spender in the most recent quarter, reporting more than $10.7 million, most of it to buy advertising through consulting firms. That’s the single largest quarterly lobbying tab in a decade. 

Nearly $10 million of that spending went to two groups – $7 million to the Computer & Communications Industry Association and $2.75 million to the California Taxpayers Association –  for public affairs, including coalition building and grassroots campaigns, according to its most recent disclosure report. Together, the two associations spent $9.7 million on media consulting and ran advertisements on television and social media opposing two bills that would have put some tech companies on the hook for millions of dollars a year to finance California journalism. Both bills died in late summer after an agreement was reached on a program to help local newsrooms and to explore artificial intelligence.

Some of the tech giant’s persuasion purse was also allocated to fight a bill that would have increased regulations on AI, including a bill carried by Sen. Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat, that would have required that makers of large-scale AI systems test them for harm. The bill was vetoed by Newsom. 

Lobbyist employers are not required to report how much was spent lobbying on individual bills, just the total amount for the quarter.

A major oil trade group, the Western States Petroleum Association, ranked No. 2  for the amount of money spent this past summer with $10.1 million in expenditures, which is also the second highest amount spent by an organization in any quarter of the last decade.  The industry association is one of the most prolific lobbying groups, having been in the top five spenders over the last seven quarters and has spent more than $131 million over the last 20 years. 

For comparison, the next big spender over that time period by an organization unrelated to oil is the Service Employees International Union, or SEIU, a labor union composed of public and private workers. SEIU reported nearly $82 million in lobbying expenses since 2005.

The oil and gas industry had a lot to lobby in the last quarter, both during the regular legislative session and during a special session called by Newsom focused on gas prices. In the organization’s most recent disclosure, it reported lobbying on 25 bills during the regular session, a proposed constitutional amendment to guarantee Californians the rights to clean air and water and a healthy environment, and the special session legislation that requires oil refiners to maintain more inventory and was ultimately signed into law by Newsom. The association also reported trying to persuade a number of executive branch agencies, the governor’s office and the Energy Commission.