Tag: gavin newsom

Gavin Newsom’s Wife Pocketed $300K a Year from Political Insiders

California’s “First Partner,” Jennifer Siebel Newsom, has built a business empire that thrives on political connections. 

Public records reveal that the wife of Gov. Gavin Newsom runs companies filled with her husband’s former Democrat aides and confidants. 

At the same time, she collects hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments from the state and lobbyists.

Siebel Newsom, a documentary filmmaker and activist, operates The Representation Project, a nonprofit that pushes progressive messaging in schools and public institutions. 

That nonprofit has accepted donations from corporations actively lobbying Gavin Newsom’s administration, raising serious concerns about influence peddling. 

Her companies and foundations have also benefited from the support of the governor’s political allies, creating a direct overlap between California’s government apparatus and the Newsom family’s personal ventures.

The financial entanglements are wide-ranging. 

In recent years, her nonprofit has received state contracts and corporate donations that coincide with policy interests before her husband’s office. 

Lobbyists and politically active firms saw their contributions rewarded with access to California’s decision-making machine. 

At the same time, Siebel Newsom’s family charity, the Siebel Family Charitable Foundation, directed tens of thousands of dollars back into her nonprofit, further blurring the line between charitable activity and personal enrichment.

This network of organizations and donors has allowed the Newsoms to advance a politicized agenda in California schools while financially benefiting from it. 

The Representation Project has been at the center of programs that promote progressive identity politics and diversity initiatives, often funded with taxpayer dollars. 

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Newsom Blocks Firefighter Pay Raise After Record Wildfire

California Governor Gavin Newsom on Friday vetoed a bipartisan bill, designed to give raises to California state firefighters, only nine months after the state’s most expensive wildfire raged through Los Angeles.

The raise would have bumped their salaries by between 11 and 29 percent. 

Current base pay for state firefighters is $54,122 per year, while Los Angeles city firefighters make $85,315.

Governor Newsom argued that the bill would create “significant cost pressures for the state” and undermine collective bargaining power for salary increases. “Establishing a statutory floor for employees of a single department undermines this process, to the detriment of both the state and other bargaining units,” Newsom wrote.  

Union members condemned the governor’s decision.

“Cal Fire is an all-risk fire department, just like a San Francisco Fire Department or Santa Rosa or San Jose Fire Department,” Tim Edwards, the president of the Local 2881 union representing CAL FIRE workers, said. “We don’t have the staffing like they do. We don’t have the workweek like they do, and we definitely don’t have to pay like they do, but we do the exact same job at the exact same training, and we’re expected to do the exact same, the exact same services.”

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Gavin Newsom’s American dystopia

‘President Gavin Newsom met today in Carmel, California with the representatives of the “Ten” – a consortium of giant tech and finance firms who control most of America’s business assets. Facing a challenge from front-running New York senator Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is pushing for a radical redistribution of wealth and property, Newsom has struck a deal with the oligarchs. He has imposed a universal basic income to head off a mounting populist revolt.

Some have called it a second Magna Carta – an accommodation between state and oligarchy. Others see the outlines of a new feudalism, or a technocratic fascism, rather than anything resembling liberal democracy.’

Implausible? Hardly. At a time when a handful of firms now dominate industries from tech to entertainment and media, and incomes for all but the wealthy are stagnating or falling, ever fewer see the system as working for them. According to Edelman, a strong majority in 22 countries now believe capitalism does more harm than good.

In the US, rising inequality and fear of downward mobility are fuelling support for state expansion and redistribution. Most under-40s favour socialism. Worse for the oligarchs, a majority of young people also favour limiting higher incomes. A new radical politics is incubating in cities like Oakland, Minneapolis, Seattle, Los Angeles and, most obviously, New York – its likely next mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is a self-described ‘democratic socialist’.

The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) could accelerate this trend, cutting even white-collar and graduate employment while boosting the profits, as well as the market share, of a handful of giant firms. Like Mickey Mouse, as the sorcerer’s apprentice in Fantasia, techies have unleashed forces that threaten many in their own class of educated professionals. Some 82 per cent of millennials believe AI will damage their careers. The displacement could soon reach 30 per cent of the workforce. Skilled professionals in finance, media and the arts could be undercut as AI trains itself on their past work. As one Marxist writer put it, no power on Earth is more fearsome than ‘the swelling population of college graduates caught in a vice of low-paying jobs’.

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California Governor Vetoes Bill Mandating New Health Curriculum for Elementary and Middle Schools

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has vetoed a bill that would have directed the State Board of Education to approve new teaching for health classes in elementary and middle schools.

The bill, sponsored by Assemblywoman Tasha Boerner, a Democrat who represents Encinitas, California, sought to compel the State Board of Education to finalize health education resources by mid-2028. These materials were to follow the guidelines set in a 2019 statewide plan for health instruction.

In explaining his choice, Newsom said the bill should be considered only after finishing an ongoing evaluation of health teaching programs across California. This study aims to assess current practices and identify potential improvements before mandating new tools.

According to opponents of the measure, implementing the bill could lead to introducing lessons as early as third grade that teach children that reproductive organs do not always align with an individual’s sense of gender.

“Teaching controversial gender theories to students as young as eight or nine years old is not a practice that most Californians support, nor want to see happening in our schools,” state Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones, a Republican from Santee, wrote in a Sept. 26 letter to the governor, urging him to veto the bill.

Jones, in his letter, wrote that the 2019 health framework “introduces the theory that reproductive anatomy does not necessarily determine a person’s gender.”

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Gavin Newsom Just Gave California’s 800,000 Uber and Lyft Drivers a One-Way Ticket to the Unemployment Line

California Governor Gavin Newsom just gave his state’s Uber and Lyft drivers a one way ticket to the unemployment line.

Newsom signed a landmark agreement on Friday that would allow Uber and Lyft drivers to form a union.

The Democrat said at a press conference that the unionization deal will offer ride-hailing drivers a “voice, to give them choice, give them dignity and a say about their future.”

“I say that because it needs to be said: I’m not naive about how people are feeling about their future,” he explained.

California has become the second state in the nation, after Massachusetts, to allow Uber and Lyft drivers to unite at an industry level to negotiate for higher pay and benefits, such as health coverage.

The arrangement was finalized in August through talks between Democratic lawmakers in Sacramento, SEIU union officials, and representatives from Uber and Lyft.

The measure, known as AB 1340, was introduced by Assemblymembers Buffy Wicks and Marc Berman and sponsored by SEIU California.

It establishes rules that allow app-based drivers to bargain collectively for improved wages and access to employee-style benefits, including health insurance.

Yet sadly, it does not take a genius to work out that all Newsom is condemning the state’s 800,000 Uber and Lyft drivers to losing their jobs altogether.

Companies such as Uber and Lyft are already aggressively driving down the wages earned by their drivers as part of their efforts to become profitable.

The decline in wages is also linked to the exploding popularity of ride-sharing as a profession, in many cases embraced by immigrants and people who are searching for more permanent work.

Nowadays, most long-time drivers reminisce about the “glory days” when they could earn a respectable living from their work.

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California Ends Kamala Harris’s Truancy Law Punishing Parents

California parents will no longer face arrest if their children miss school following Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Oct. 1 decision to approve legislation repealing Kamala Harris’s truancy law.

The 2011 law that the former vice president sponsored when she served as the state’s attorney general made it a misdemeanor for parents if their children were chronically truant by missing 10 percent or more of school days, starting in kindergarten.

The law punished parents with a fine of up to $2,000 or one year in county jail. At the time, she said the bill was an “effective strategy” to reduce chronic elementary school truancy and a smart approach to crime prevention.

This week, Newsom signed into law Assembly Bill 461 to end the criminalization of truancy for parents and remove the 2011 law from the state’s penal code. Newsom did not explain why he signed AB 461 in his press release about legislation decisions on Oct. 1. The bill, one of 105 bills signed into law that day, takes effect on Jan. 1.

The bill’s author, Assemblyman Patrick Ahrens, a Silicon Valley Democrat, called the truancy law a “failed policy.”

“Thank you to Gov. Newsom for signing my bill to repeal this failed policy of criminalizing struggling California families for their children missing school,” Ahrens said in a statement. “Fining or imprisoning parents did nothing to get kids the education and support they need.”

While California’s truancy law remained on the books for more than a decade, school districts were becoming less likely to enforce the punitive measures against parents, according to EdSource, a nonprofit educational resource focused on the state’s school systems.

The first arrests under the law were of five parents in Orange County in 2011. The parents were handcuffed and taken to Orange County Jail before being released on their own recognizance for ignoring repeated requests to get their children to school.

While parents have been arrested in California under the truancy law, it was unclear how many cases resulted in criminal charges. Most school districts instead went beyond the law to reach out to parents with emails, letters, and phone calls to resolve truancy problems, according to the California District Attorney’s Association.

The new law was sponsored by End Child Poverty California, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) California, and the Western Center on Law and Poverty. Several justice and parent organizations, including the California State Parent-Teacher Association (PTA), also supported it.

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California Gov. Gavin Newsom Threatens to Withhold Billions from State Colleges Signing Trump ‘Compact’

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has threatened to withhold billions in state funds from any college that signs an agreement to support President Donald Trump’s education agenda.

Deemed the “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education,” the Trump administration seeks to require universities to adhere to “rules written by the administration in a variety of areas, including admissions, hiring, free speech on campus, teaching and the use of endowments,” per KCRA.

“Institutions of higher education are free to develop models and values other than those below, if the institution elects to forego federal benefits,” the compact states.

Gavin Newsom denounced the compact as a “radical agreement” and pledged to withhold billions in state funds should any college cooperate with it.

“IF ANY CALIFORNIA UNIVERSITY SIGNS THIS RADICAL AGREEMENT, THEY’LL LOSE BILLIONS IN STATE FUNDING — INCLUDING CAL GRANTS — INSTANTLY. CALIFORNIA WILL NOT BANKROLL SCHOOLS THAT SELL OUT THEIR STUDENTS, PROFESSORS, RESEARCHERS, AND SURRENDER ACADEMIC FREEDOM,” Newsom said in an intentionally uppercased statement as a troll of President Trump.

At least nine universities in the country have received the compact, with only one — University of Southern California (USC) — residing in the Golden State.

“USC is a private school that receives Cal Grants from the state. Cal Grants are part of the state’s financial aid program that provides funding to students that does not need to be paid back,” per KRCA.

“According to the California Department of Finance, USC received a total of $28.4 million in Cal Grant funding in the past year. The independent AICCU intuitions together received $227.6 million in total in that same year,” it added.

Abigail Jackson, a spokeswoman for the White House, said Newsom opposes the protection of free speech.

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‘Big losses’: Study confirms Newsom’s $20-an-hour minimum wage decimated industry

Gavin Newsom, California’s far-left Democrat governor, is known to have presidential aspirations.

If he chooses that path, one of issues on which he will face a grilling will be economics.

And a new study has revealed it won’t look good.

It’s because since he imposed a $20-an-hour minimum wage for fast food workers in his state, California has lost close to 20,000 such jobs.

“That’s nearly 25% of the country’s fast-food job losses during that same period, according to an analysis of quarterly data released this month from the Bureau of Labor Statistics,” charged a report in the Washington Examiner.

“These grim statistics should be a wake-up call for Newsom and other policymakers pushing for drastic wage hikes that will cause unintended consequences,” said Rebekah Paxton, if the Employment Policies Institute.

The Examiner report noted Newsom “was all smiles two years ago when he signed the FAST Recovery Act, creating a $20 minimum wage for fast-food workers in his state. He called the legislation a win-win-win that would benefit restaurant owners, their employees, and customers alike.”

But it’s actually left behind “big losses.”

Besides job losses, there have been staff cuts, huge menu price increases and a turn to automation, the report said.

“California made national headlines when two large Pizza Hut franchises laid off more than 1,200 in-house delivery drivers to cut costs, while others, such as Mod Pizza and Foster’s Freeze, decided to close up shop entirely,” the report noted.

Paxton said, “Newsom’s $20 wage has turned out to be nothing more than a boost to his own ego at the expense of fast food workers. His consistent claim that the law is a ‘win’ is out of touch with reality, and lawmakers looking to mirror his job-crushing policies should think twice.”

Further, the analysis found even workers who kept working lost.

“The law has cost nontipped restaurant workers 250 hours of work annually, according to the EPI analysis, which represents $4,000 in lost income under the state’s previous minimum wage for fast-food workers.”

And, according to the American Cornerstone Institute, it’s hit small businesses hardest.

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Gavin Newsom Escalates Rhetoric That Makes Political Violence Inevitable

Charlie Kirk was murdered less than three weeks ago by a deranged leftist who inscribed anti-fascist slogans on bullet casings. Kirk’s murder should have been a wake-up call that inflammatory rhetoric smearing conservatives as “fascists” or “Nazis” or “Hitler” has deadly consequences. Instead, it’s only emboldened the left to increase such rhetoric.

Nowhere is that more apparent than California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s official press account, which spent the weekend calling White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller a “fascist” and demanding Miller kowtow to the left if he wants to stop being slandered.

“STEPHEN MILLER IS A FASCIST!” the account posted on X on Sept. 26.

Newsom’s team doubled down on the rhetoric, saying they are “calling out [Trump] and his authoritarian stooges for being fascists.”

“Textbook definition,” Newsom’s team posted with a graphic they made claiming to prove Trump and Miller are “fascists.”

“DING DONGS IN THE WHITE HOUSE: IF YOU DON’T WANT US TO CALL YOU A FASCIST THEN STOP DOING FASCIST THINGS,” a separate post read.

This isn’t random name-calling. It’s an assassination prep campaign. The left — and in particular, the office of the governor of one of the largest states in America — is demonizing and vilifying conservatives as fascists in order to desensitize Americans to political violence.

Such language implicitly justifies resistance by any means necessary, since no free person wants to live under a fascist dictatorship. The logic goes: If Trump and his administration are legitimate fascists — the same people who slaughtered and oppressed millions during WWII — then violence against them is not merely permissible, it’s actually noble. The left preys on these historical associations, knowing that when people hear “fascist” or “Nazi,” they think of enemies who rightly had to be defeated. By blurring that line, the left conditions its audience to see violence against today’s so-called “fascists” as not only acceptable but necessary.

Even Pennsylvania Democrat Sen. John Fetterman has the clarity to see the danger of such rhetoric, posting on X: “Unchecked extreme rhetoric, like labels as Hitler or fascist, will foment more extreme outcomes. Political violence is always wrong — no exceptions.”

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California’s Ministry of Truth: SB 771 is Gov. Newsom’s and Democrat’s Plan to Ban Speech They Hate

California Governor Gavin Newsom and Democrats in the Legislature claim they want to regulate social media over hate speech. Senate Bill 771 by Sen. Henry Stern (D-Los Angeles) claims this is about “Personal rights: liability: social media platforms.”

SB 771 is an “anti free speech” bill, comes entirely from California Democrats, and is designed to silence opposing opinions. The bill is not about moderating hate speech; it’s about banning speech Democrats hate. 

This isn’t California Democrats’ first rodeo. In 2018, Democrat California lawmakers pushed legislation to create jack-boot agents of government through a “Fake News Advisory Council” – an Orwellian “Ministry of Truth” for the news they don’t like, I reported. “After having my Capitol Press Credential revoked in 2015 and only reissued after an Open Records Act request of 10-years of press credential applications, and viable threats of a First Amendment lawsuit, it appears Democrats in the California Legislature still don’t believe in making no law abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”

That obviously stands today, 10 years later.

BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!

In April 2022, the Biden administration announced it had created the Disinformation Governance Board – its own Ministry of Truth – a part of the Department of Homeland Security.

Americans from all walks of life were horrified. Fortunately for the potential enemies of the state, the board’s executive director and disinformation czar Nina Jankowicz had already beclowned herself in videos that went viral, demonstrating her stunning bias and partisanship. Within three weeks the Biden Disinformation Governance Board was shut down, and many Americans heaved a sigh of relief.

But not California Democrats.

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