Tag: california

Calif. taxpayers funding multi-city, int’l security detail for Harris’ book tour

Unbeknownst to many Golden State residents, California taxpayers are reportedly covering the costs of a multi-city and international security detail for former Vice President Kamala Harris as she promotes her memoir, “107 Days.”

Since September 2025 — following the revocation of her extended federal Secret Service protection — dozens of California Highway Patrol (CHP) officers have accompanied Harris on nationwide tour stops and international travel, including visits to London and Toronto, with expenses like travel, overtime, and logistics funded by California taxpayers.

This arrangement, coordinated with input from Governor Gavin Newsom’s (D-Calif.) office and local authorities, has since drawn scrutiny amid the state’s budget challenges and questions about precedent for providing such extensive state resources to a private citizen during a commercial book tour.

In late August 2025, President Donald Trump issued an executive memorandum revoking the Secret Service protection for Harris. While standard law provides six months of protection, which ended in July 2025, former President Joe Biden had extended her detail via executive order.

Trump rescinded this extension effective September 1, 2025. However, following the federal withdrawal, Newsom and Los Angeles Democrat Mayor Karen Bass coordinated to provide security through the CHP and the LAPD.

Since these are state and local officers, the costs for salaries, travel, and overtime are being underwritten by California taxpayers.

Meanwhile, the discovery has since sparked a heated debate over the use of state resources for a private citizen’s “commercial venture” during a period of significant state budget deficits.

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One in Five California Home Sales Canceled Due to Unaffordable Insurance

Glenn and Lorraine Crawford paid about $500 a month to insure their home in Agoura Hills northwest of Los Angeles when they bought it in 2012.

The Crawfords say they have little alternative but to pay the bill that arrived last month, which, at more than $44,000 a year, is almost as much as their mortgage bill. The only other insurer willing to cover their home, Lloyd’s of London, quoted them $80,000 a year.

More than a year after infernos tore through Los Angeles County, millions of Californians like the Crawfords are suffering through a home-insurance crisis that has rolled on for years with eye-watering rate increases, canceled policies and rejected claims.

Two of the biggest insurers, State Farm and Allstate, aren’t selling to new customers in the state, despite getting double-digit rate increases approved for their existing policyholders. A third, Farmers Insurance, has committed to cover more homes in fire-prone areas, but only a fraction compared with the drop in its overall number of policies since the crisis began.

The insurance dysfunction has spread to California’s housing market, the country’s biggest and most expensive, with nearly one-in-five real-estate agents reporting a canceled sale last year because of clients unable to find affordable insurance, according to a survey by the trade body California Association of Realtors.

The roots of California’s insurance crisis go back years. The state’s tough rate caps kept premiums low. But home insurers eventually balked, saying they couldn’t charge enough to cover rising wildfire and other losses, made worse by climate change and development. Insurers didn’t renew tens of thousands of policies, especially in fire-prone areas.

California’s uphill battle to draw insurers back could prove a template—or cautionary tale—for other disaster-prone states. New rules implemented last year, for instance, require home-insurers in the state to pledge to sell new policies in high-risk wildfire zones, in return for allowing them to charge higher rates.

As part of a request for a 6.99% rate increase, Farmers, the second-biggest home-insurer in the state, pledged to add at least 5,596 policies in high-risk areas by September 2028. That is less than a 10th of the 59,806 reduction in Farmers’ total number of California home-insurance policies in the previous two years, according to a Consumer Watchdog analysis.

Others continue to shun the state despite winning big concessions. California regulators approved a 34% rate increase for Allstate in 2024. Yet it has no “growth aspirations” in California home insurance, Chief Executive Tom Wilson said last year, adding that it would take time to fix the market. A spokesman said that remains Allstate’s position.

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California Law Forces Age-Tracking Into Every Operating System by 2027

California wants to build a surveillance layer into every device its residents touch. Assembly Bill 1043, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom and taking effect January 1, 2027, requires every operating system provider to collect age information from users at account setup and broadcast that data to app developers through a real-time API.

Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, Linux distributions, Valve’s SteamOS: if it runs an operating system, it’s covered by this overreaching law.

The proposals are particularly dumb for open-source Linux operating systems. Linux exists specifically because some people want computing that doesn’t surveil them. That’s not incidental to why the platform exists; it’s foundational.

Distributions like Arch, Debian, and Gentoo have no centralized account infrastructure by design. Users download ISOs from mirrors, modify source code freely, and run systems that report to nobody.

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SCOTUS Blocks California School Policy Hiding Kids’ ‘Gender Presentation’ From Parents

The U.S. Supreme Court delivered a major win for California parents seeking to protect their children from LGBT ideology in state schools on Monday.

In its per curiam opinion, the high court vacated a stay (“pause”) issued by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on a December injunction by a California-based district court judge. That permanent injunction prohibited enforcement of a California policy that permitted or forced school employees to “mislead[] the parent or guardian of a minor child in the education system about their child’s gender presentation at school.”

In his order, District Judge Roger Benitez, a Bush 43 appointee, further required California officials to notify school personnel of his ruling and to include in materials for parents and faculty a statement acknowledging parents’ “federal constitutional right to be informed if their public school student child expresses gender incongruence.”

California parents’ victory was short-lived, however, because the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals froze Benitez’s order a few weeks later. In its unanimous ruling, the appellate court’s three-judge panel of Democrat appointees claimed that state officials “have shown that ‘there is a substantial case for relief on the merits,’” and said it was “skeptical of the district court’s decision on the merits.”

The 9th Circuit’s decision prompted plaintiffs to file an application with SCOTUS, in which they requested that the high court vacate the 9th Circuit’s stay and allow Benitez’s injunction to take effect.

In its unsigned opinion, SCOTUS granted the plaintiffs’ request to vacate the 9th Circuit’s injunction “with respect to the parents because this aspect of the stay is not ‘justified under the governing four-factor test.’” The high court noted that the parents are likely to succeed on the merits of their claims and that they will suffer “irreparable harm” if the 9th Circuit’s ruling is allowed to remain in place.

The court’s order does not apply to the plaintiff teachers suing over the policy, however. Associate Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito said they would have granted the plaintiffs’ application in full.

Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented.

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California Child Molester With Three Life Sentences Paroled Under Newsom-Backed Law, Then Re-Arrested On New Charges

In California, justice is a revolving door—but only if you’re the criminal. Victims, meanwhile, are left standing outside wondering when their nightmare will return. The Golden State’s progressive experiment in “rehabilitation” has produced no shortage of cautionary tales, but few as stomach-turning as what unfolded this month in Sacramento.

A 64-year-old man who spent decades behind bars for unspeakable crimes against children was granted his freedom. Not because he’d served his time. Not because new evidence exonerated him. But because California decided that monsters deserve second chances too.

David Allen Funston was convicted in 1999 on 16 counts of kidnapping and child molestation. His hunting ground was the suburbs of Sacramento, where he prowled neighborhood streets in his car, searching for prey. His weapons of choice: Barbie dolls and candy. His victims: at least eight children—seven girls and one boy—ranging in age from three to seven years old.

One victim, a five-year-old immigrant girl who barely spoke English, was assaulted and abandoned fifty miles from her home. The judge who sentenced Funston called him “the monster parents fear the most.” The court handed down three consecutive life sentences.

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California bill seeks to restore Medi‑Cal coverage for undocumented adults in 2027

A proposed California bill could pave the way for undocumented Californians ages 19 and older to once again receive Medi-Cal coverage, beginning Jan. 1, 2027.

State Sen. María Elena Durazo and Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula, both Democrats, introduced the Medi‑Cal Access Restoration Act to end the freeze and reinstate full‑scope Medi‑Cal benefits for undocumented adults.

As of Thursday afternoon, the bill states that it would “make an individual who is 19 years of age or older, who does not have satisfactory immigration status, eligible for the full scope of Medi-Cal benefits subject to certain limitations, such as the payment of premiums and certain dental benefits.”

According to the Fresno Bee, California faced a deficit of more than $10 billion last year before rolling back health insurance access for undocumented adults, a benefit the state had been expanding for several years, to help balance the 2025‑26 budget.

The state is again projecting a nearly $3 billion deficit as lawmakers prepare next year’s spending plan.

Lawmakers say the freeze does not eliminate health needs and instead shifts costs to counties, hospitals and emergency rooms.

“Undocumented Californians pick our crops, build our homes, and care for our families – and they pay billions in taxes to do it,” said Senator Durazo. “Denying them basic health coverage isn’t saving money, it’s borrowing trouble. We pay more when people end up in the emergency room. SB 1422 is the fiscally responsible thing to do, and it’s the right thing to do.”

According to officials, undocumented Californians contribute $8.5 billion annually in state and local taxes and make up roughly one-tenth of the state’s workforce.

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California’s green policies destroy blue-collar jobs

Gavin Newsom complains of “faux outrage” over his comments to a largely black audience in Atlanta about his SAT scores, in which he implied a shared lack of ability.

No state makes more of its “enlightened” stance on racial justice than California. But few states do worse.

Governor Newsom and his Sacramento claque have embraced reparations for the descendants of slaves. They are also working overtime to preserve affirmative action policies, despite the electorate’s widespread rejection.

But Newsom’s racial rhetoric is, as the leftist site Jacobin suggests, nothing more than “pure rhetorical posturing.”

For example, the reparations promise new free tuition and housing subsidies to anyone who can prove they are descendants of slaves — but there’s little to no money behind this feint.

California’s adoption of such “reparations,” recently also embraced in San Francisco, also seems a bit absurd, given that it was never a slave state.

California, like every state, is burdened by a racist past, but much of this was aimed at what were larger populations — first Native Americans, then old Californios (descendants of Mexican/Spanish settlers) and, most of all, Asians, who were banned from landownership and were subject to brutal pogroms, the worst occurring in Los Angeles.

But the greatest irony is that both Latinos and African Americans do worse in California than in  “unenlightened places”  like Texas and Florida.

The key difference in California has been the imposition of draconian environmental regulations, which have devastated industries like construction, manufacturing, and logistics. 

It’s what attorney Jennifer Hernandez calls “the green Jim Crow.”  

Latinos have been hardest hit because many are employed in the “carbon economy,” which relies on energy and has been decimated by regulatory pressures. 

For example, Latinos constitute well over 50% of all California construction workers and the majority working in logistics, according to the American Community Survey.  

But due to regulatory constraints, construction in California has been among the weakest in the nation, making it hard to build what the market wants — namely, affordable apartments and modestly-priced single family homes. 

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Gavin Newsom’s father went to war with shadowy Bohemian Grove over members’ X-rated antics

California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s father once ruled that the super-secretive men’s club Bohemian Grove couldn’t bar women from working there — preventing members from going au natural at the exclusive redwoods retreat.

As a U.S. Appeals Court Judge, William Newsom an issued an opinion striking down a ban on hiring women at the 150-year-old club, saying it was no justification that members might be stopped from walking around the encampment nude.

He added that if the men felt embarrassed, they could use the enclosed shower and bathroom facilities.

The elder Newsom made the ruling in 1986, well before his son entered the California political arena and ascended to the state’s highest office.

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Democrat Registered Sex Offender PEDO Running For City Council In Fresno California?!

A registered sex offender, Rene Campos, has launched a campaign for Fresno’s District 7 City Council seat, sparking intense local and national backlash. Campos, who pleaded no contest to a 2018 misdemeanor charge for possessing child sex abuse material and remains on California’s sex offender registry, argues that he has rehabilitated and wants to turn his “lived experience” with the justice system into reforms focused on public safety.

Campos has told local media that “Fresno deserves leaders who are honest from the very beginning” and says he is “putting [his] life out there,” insisting that people “are not [their] past” and that his conviction gives him unique insight into fixing laws from “the inside out.” California law does not bar registered sex offenders who have completed their sentences and regained voting rights from running for local office, and Fresno County’s registrar has confirmed that Campos is legally eligible to appear on the ballot if he files in time.

Opponents in the crowded District 7 race, including fellow candidate Nav Gurm, contend that Campos’ status should effectively disqualify him from office, pointing out that a registered sex offender cannot visit school campuses and questioning how someone under such restrictions could fully represent families and children in the district. Several Fresno city council members have also said they plan to pursue an ordinance to prevent registered sex offenders from holding city office in the future, arguing that people convicted of crimes against children should not serve in positions where minors regularly visit city facilities.

On social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, reaction has been overwhelmingly negative, with viral posts describing Campos as a “literal sex offender” running on a “public safety” message and questioning how he can campaign on protecting children while being barred from school grounds. Commenters on high-traffic accounts and local news reels have called the candidacy “insane” and “only in California,” with many users demanding that lawmakers “change the law” so that registered child sex offenders cannot seek public office at all.

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Super-secretive Bohemian Grove society members allegedly leaked as who’s who of celebrity elite revealed

Some members of an elite, super-secretive men’s club based in California wine country have allegedly been leaked — with names ranging from former late-night host Conan O’Brien and billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

The membership list of Bohemian Grove — a private 2,700-acre campground in Sonoma County that hosts an annual two-week retreat and has a clubhouse in San Francisco — was allegedly obtained by an independent journalist and confirmed by a club member, according to the San Francisco Standard.

The extensive list of more than 2,000 members in 2023 features the crème de la crème of business, tech, finance — all divided into “camps,” much like fraternities.

The club is famous for its “Cremation of Care” ceremony and high-level networking, and is long rumored to have been acting as a social club for the powerful.

Other names on the list include former Speaker of the House Nancy’s Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, late crooner Jimmy Buffett and billionaire political donor Charles Koch.

A Bohemian Club spokesperson said the group does not maintain lists of its members due to the highly hush-hush nature of the secret society.

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