Tag: california

DOJ Probes University Of California Over Alleged Race And Sex Hiring Quotas

The Justice Department has opened a civil rights investigation into the University of California (UC) system to determine whether its efforts to boost faculty diversity run afoul of federal anti-discrimination laws.

In a June 26 announcement, the Department of Justice (DOJ) stated that it is probing whether the university’s “UC 2030 Capacity Plan” and related campus-level programs constitute a pattern or practice of unlawful employment discrimination based on race and sex, in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

“Public employers are bound by federal laws that prohibit racial and other employment discrimination,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon, who leads the department’s Civil Rights Division. “Institutional directives that use race- and sex-based hiring practices expose employers to legal risk under federal law.”

According to the Justice Department, the UC system’s strategic hiring plan explicitly encourages campuses to measure and increase the number of new hires by race and sex to meet internal diversity targets. Officials described the framework as potentially unlawful, citing provisions in the plan that direct campuses to recruit “diverse” faculty in line with demographic benchmarks.

The UC 2030 Capacity Plan outlines several such goals, including the recruitment of at least 40 percent of its graduate students from its own undergraduate programs and from other minority-serving institutions, including Hispanic-serving institutions, historically black colleges and universities, and tribal colleges and universities. The plan also outlines a goal to hire more than 1,100 new ladder-rank faculty members by 2030—an effort the university says will help diversify its academic workforce, noting that new hires tend to be more diverse than the existing faculty.

“Identity-based hiring is not only wrong—it is illegal,” Dhillon wrote in a post on social media. “Public employers ignore our civil rights laws at their peril.”

A request for comment sent to the University of California by The Epoch Times was not immediately returned.

A university spokesperson told The Hill that the university “is committed to fair and lawful processes in all of our programs and activities, consistent with federal and state anti-discrimination laws.”

“The University also aims to foster a campus environment where everyone is welcomed and supported. We will work in good faith with the Department of Justice as it conducts its investigation,” the spokesperson said.

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Moment Border Patrol use huge explosion to blast their way into house with woman and two children

A California mother-of-two was left in tears after Border Patrol agents used a massive explosion to blow down her front door during a terrifying early-morning raid caught on camera.

The shocking scene unfolded in Huntington Park, Los Angeles, where Jenny Ramirez and her two young children, ages one and six, were jolted awake by a deafening blast before a dozen armed agents in full tactical gear stormed the home.

Surveillance footage obtained by NBC Los Angeles shows agents planting an explosive device on the door before detonating it – shattering a window and sending shockwaves through the quiet neighborhood.

Moments later, around a dozen federal agents charged toward the house with weapons drawn.

Inside were Ramirez, her boyfriend Jorge Sierra-Hernandez, and their two children. Speaking through tears, Ramirez told NBC it was one of the loudest explosions she’d ever heard.

‘I told them, ‘You guys didn’t have to do this, you scared by son, my baby,’ Ramirez told NBC. 

Ramirez said she was given no warning about the raid and insisted that everyone in the home is a U.S. citizen.

According to Ramirez, the agents said they were searching for her boyfriend, who she claims was recently involved in an accidental collision with a truck carrying federal officers.

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Trump’s DOJ Sues Orange County, California for Allegedly Hiding Illegal Voter Registrations of Noncitizens

President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ) has filed a lawsuit against Orange County, California, election officials, accusing them of concealing voter registrations of noncitizens on its voter rolls.

“Voting by non-citizens is a federal crime, and states and counties that refuse to disclose all requested voter information are in violation of well-established federal elections laws,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division said in a statement:

Removal of non-citizens from the state’s voter rolls is critical to ensuring that the State’s voter rolls are accurate and that elections in California are conducted without fraudulent voting. The Department of Justice will hold jurisdictions that refuse to comply with federal voting laws accountable.
[Emphasis added]

The lawsuit accuses the Orange County Registrar of Voters, Robert Page, of violating both the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) and the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) by allegedly refusing to hand over voter information to the Justice Department and hiding voter registrations of noncitizens on the county’s voter rolls.

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Homelessness Reaches Record High in Bay Area County

Santa Clara County’s total homeless population rose by 8.2 percent to a record high of 10,711 people, according to early results from the county’s latest point-in-time count.

The count used data taken in one night in January 2025, and it serves as the main data source to determine federal funding and homelessness estimates within the county.

The total number of people experiencing homelessness rose from 9,903 in 2023 to more than 10,000 now, consistent with expert observations that “more people are entering homelessness than exiting homelessness in the region,” the report states.

Among the homeless population, the number of sheltered individuals increased by 30 percent, which the county attributes to better use of available shelter beds and more shelter capacity overall.

“Even as we face extraordinary challenges and threats to critical federal and state funding for safety-net services, the County continues to make significant investments in both shelter capacity and permanent housing to combat homelessness in our community,” County Executive James R. Williams stated in a statement.

The investments include approximately $446 million in funding to address homelessness in the 2024–2025 fiscal year. With this funding, the county was able to move more than 8,000 homeless individuals into housing from 2023 to 2025.

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Does Kamala Really Think This Will Revive Her Political Career?

After her billion-dollar humiliation in November, many are wondering what Kamala Harris’s next move is going to be. Will she go for a third failed presidential bid? Will she run for governor of California? Maybe just start an unlistenable podcast? According to past reports, she would be making a decision about her political future before the end of the summer. But reportedly, she’s leaning toward running for governor.

Sources close to Harris say she’s seriously mulling a bid for governor, with one insider claiming the prospect has put “a glimmer in her eyes.” Of course, there are plenty of voices in her ear telling her this is her best shot — maybe her only shot — at remaining relevant. I’m sure some of those voices are from actual people, too. 

However, even among her own circle, there’s pushback. Not everyone is convinced Harris can — or should — wade into an already crowded Democratic field, which includes the likes of former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former state Attorney General Xavier Becerra, both of whom have deeper roots and broader appeal in California and don’t specialize in word salads.

But that’s why a trial balloon has been leaked to the media, and we’re not going to know for sure until the end of the summer. According to a report from The Hill, Kamala is “planning to take some time off in July, when sources say she hopes to further reflect on the next step in her political career.”

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Federal Judge In California Remains At The Ready To Wrest Control Of National Guard From Trump

“The fight doesn’t end here.” Gavin Newsom made that announcement on Thursday, soon after a federal appellate court ruled President Donald Trump retains control over the California National Guard. By Friday morning, the overturned district court judge repeated the mantra, but in subtler, more judicious terms designed to obscure his bias and his intent to halt the president’s use of the National Guard and Marines in Los Angeles. The apparent plan is now to find the president’s deployment violates the Posse Comitatus Act, which goes to show that judges bent on executing a coup by courts also have six ways to Sunday to rebel against the duly elected president.

After rioters attacked ICE agents and federal property in California, on June 7, 2025, President Trump federalized the California National Guard. Once under federal command, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ordered thousands of National Guard troops to deploy to Los Angeles. Secretary Hegseth later also deployed some 700 active-duty U.S. Marines from Camp Pendleton to Los Angeles.

Within days of the president’s federalizing of the California National Guard, Governor Newsom filed a multi-count complaint in a San Francisco federal court. Then, at 11:00 a.m., on June 10, 2025, the governor asked the court to immediately (by 1:00 p.m.) grant him an ex parte temporary restraining order, barring the deployment of troops in Los Angeles and directing the president to return control of the National Guard to the governor. Presiding Judge Charlies Breyer instead provided the Trump administration 24 hours to respond to the motion and set a hearing for June 12, 2025, at 1:30 p.m.

Judge Breyer opened the June 12, 2025 hearing by noting he had refused to grant the requested injunction on an ex parte basis, with the Clinton appointee stressing the importance of hearing from both sides before ruling. However, Judge Breyer soon made clear his fist was firmly on Governor Newsom’s side of the scale, with the federal judge appropriating the language of the left and declaring we have no king in America.

It came as no surprise, then, to court listeners that by day’s end Judge Breyer had entered an injunction against President Trump, enjoining him “from deploying members of the California National Guard in Los Angeles,” and directing the Commander-in-Chief “to return control of the California National Guard to Governor Newsom.” The court stayed his order until noon on Friday, June 13, 2025.

The Trump administration immediately sought a stay of Judge Breyer’s injunction in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals — the federal circuit court that hears appeals from district courts in California, among other western states. Within hours, a three-judge panel of the federal appellate court entered an administrative stay of Judge Breyer’s order, keeping the president in charge of the National Guard. The Ninth Circuit then set an expedited briefing schedule and scheduled a hearing for Tuesday, June 17, 2025.

Last Tuesday, Trump appointees Judges Mark Bennette and Eric Miller, joined by Biden-appointee Judge Jennifer Sung, heard the parties’ argument concerning the propriety of the injunction. Two days later, in a unanimous opinion, the court held the Trump administration “made the required strong showing that they are likely to succeed on the merits of their appeal,” and stayed the lower court’s injunction against the president. That stay left the California National Guard under federal control and deployed in Los Angeles, as directed by Secretary Hegseth.

In concluding that Trump was likely to succeed on the merits of his appeal, the Ninth Circuit focused on Newsom’s claim that the president lacked authority under 10 U.S.C. § 12406 to federalize the California National Guard. That federal statute authorizes the president to federalize the National Guard of a state whenever, among other things, “the President is unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States . . . ”

While Judge Breyer concluded that Trump had failed to establish that he was unable with regular forces to execute the laws of the United States, the Ninth Circuit rejected the lower court’s reasoning in two respects. First, the three-judge panel concluded that courts owe great deference to the president’s conclusion that regular forces are unable to execute federal law.

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Cackling Sellout Kamala Harris ‘Leaning Toward Entering California Governor’s Race in 2026’

On Sunday, June 22, The Hill reported that failed 2020 and 2024 presidential candidate Kamala Harris is “leaning toward entering the [2026] California gubernatorial race, per sources familiar with the former vice president’s thinking.”

“While the sources caution that Harris hasn’t made a final decision yet and is still considering all her options, they say she has made it clear that she is not done with public service and is giving the race strong consideration. Those who have spoken to Harris about the possibility of entering the race say it has given her a renewed sense of excitement and, as one source put it, ‘a glimmer in her eyes,” The Hill reported.

The American people were forced to endure watching Kamala Harris babble and cackle her way across the 2024 presidential campaign trail, once Joe Biden finally malfunctioned to the point that Democrats launched a backroom coup to cancel Biden’s candidacy.

Now, Harris appears keen on inflicting her latest assault against the downtrodden Republic of California, the world’s 4th largest GDP, estimated at $4.1 trillion, greater than all nations of the world besides the US, China, and Germany.

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California ordered to clean trans ideology out of classroom materials

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) sent a letter to California on June 20 ordering it to remove gender ideology references from educational curriculum and programs funded by a federal sexual education grant or face the loss of funding.

The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) reviewed materials created through California’s Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP), a federally-funded sexual education program, and uncovered “egregious content” teaching young students they can change their sex. HHS noted the PREP program has mission of providing minors with medically accurate education rather than ideological agendas.

“After requesting, receiving, and reviewing California’s PREP materials, ACF uncovered egregious content teaching young students that gender identity is distinct from biological sex and that boys can identify as girls,” states an HHS press release. “The educational materials promoting gender ideology have nothing to do with Personal Responsibility Education and are outside the scope of PREP’s authorizing statute.”

The California Department of Public Health didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Ninth Circuit Unanimously Upholds Second Amendment Foundation Victory Over California’s Unconstitutional “One-Gun‑Per‑Month” Rationing Law

In a unanimous decision, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals delivered a resounding victory for individual rights, unanimously reaffirming a lower court’s judgment that California’s “one‑gun‑per‑month” law is firmly unconstitutional.

The case—Nguyen v. Bonta—was brought by a coalition of individual plaintiffs and pro-Second Amendment organizations, including the Firearms Policy Coalition and the Second Amendment Foundation.

The plaintiffs challenged California’s draconian law, which prohibits law-abiding citizens from purchasing more than one firearm within any 30-day period, according to Breitbart.

Judge Danielle J. Forrest, joined by Bridget S. Bade and John B. Owens, delivered a plain-text, history-grounded dismissal of the law.

Writing for the majority, Judge Forrest stated:

California has a “one-gun-a-month” law that prohibits most people from buying more than one firearm in a 30-day period. The district court held that this law violates the Second Amendment. We affirm. California’s law is facially unconstitutional because possession of multiple firearms and the ability to acquire firearms through purchase without meaningful constraints are protected by the Second Amendment and California’s law is not supported by our nation’s tradition of firearms regulation.

The court concluded that the government cannot limit the frequency of a citizen’s right to acquire firearms—comparing it to limiting free speech to one protest per month or religious freedom to one worship service a month.

The opinion rejected California’s typical defense that its law was meant to prevent so-called “straw purchases” and illegal gun trafficking.

The court found that there is “no historical cousin” to California’s one-gun-a-month scheme. The decision emphasized that nothing in America’s constitutional tradition justifies this kind of blanket limitation.

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Top blue city councilor is arrested by FBI over arson and fraud plot

A city councilman in a small northern California community was arrested for allegedly burning down a farmhouse he owned so he and his accomplices could fraudulently collect on the insurance money.

Live Oak Vice Mayor Aaron Pamma, 30, was taken to jail Thursday along with his brother Simren Pamma, 28, who is a Live Oak Unified School District board member.

Also arrested for the alleged scheme was Gurtej Singh, 28, the Butte County District Attorney’s Office said in a statement.

The fire in question happened in February of 2024, authorities say Singh purchased the property in April 2023 under a Department of Agriculture mortgage scheme.

One month after the purchase, Singh transferred half of the ownership of the land to the two brothers, the Butte County DA’s office said.

The office confirmed to CBS Sacramento that the two are brothers and are friends with Singh.

Cal Fire Investigators said they discovered that Singh had purchased insurance for the property three months before the blaze. 

After the fire, he then allegedly filed a false insurance claim on the property, officials said.

The property was sold on after the fire and the three collected an insurance payment which gave them a profit of $200,000, the DA’s office said.

The three are facing charges of arson, Aaron Pamma is facing additional charges of fraud, perjury, supporting a false insurance claim and conspiracy to destroy insured property for fraud.

Simren Pamma is facing a charge of conspiracy to destroy insured property for fraud. 

Singh meanwhile faces charges of fraud, wire fraud, destroying an insured property for fraud, presenting a false insurance claim and perjury. 

Another man, Javier Molina-Bravo, 37, was charged with felony counts of check fraud last March.

Authorities say Molina-Bravo runs Big Dog Handyman and was hired to renovate the farmhouse. 

It is alleged that he purchased thousands of dollars’ worth of goods and materials from multiple businesses using checks on a non-existent bank account.

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