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Politico
3 days ago
- Politics
- Politico
A Kamalaless confab in the shadows of Disneyland
Presented by California Environmental Voters DEM DERBY — California Democrats will gather in Anaheim this weekend to hold their largest meeting since native daughter Kamala Harris faceplanted in the presidential race and Donald Trump returned to besieging them from Washington. Harris' decision of whether to run for governor or president for a third time will hang over the 4,000 party faithful in attendance — but she's not expected to be among them. Only a vestige of her failed run, ex-running mate Tim Walz, is scheduled to be in the building. He'll rally the troops Saturday but is unlikely to have time for a ride on the tea cups at nearby Disneyland, as he's also headlining the South Carolina Democratic Party Convention on the same day. Let's hope Harris' would-be competitors in the governor's race aren't fiending for a Mickey-shaped pretzel, because they'll be busy stumping as if delegates aren't waiting to see if the former vice president gets in the race. Other would-be 2028 contenders will be around. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker is slated to speak, ideally for fewer than the 25 hours he recently spent filibustering on the Senate floor. And Rep. Robert Garcia of Long Beach is scheduled to take a break from his House Oversight bid to party with Planned Parenthood Friday night (DJ not yet announced). The party won't vote on endorsements this weekend, but candidates down the ballot in the lieutenant governor's and treasurer's race are descending on the city to promote their runs. Math problem: This initial phase of the endorsement fight will be especially critical for the governor's field — particularly if Harris doesn't get in — and the race remains as crowded. Candidates would need more than a majority of delegates to back them to get the party nod, though California Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks did not rule that out in an interview. 'They may or may not get 60 percent,' Hicks said. 'You know, in 2018 many folks didn't think that Gavin Newsom would get the endorsement.' The Kamala in the room: Hicks went to great lengths to praise his party's 'deep bench,' rattling off candidates in the field, but agreed Harris will be on attendees' minds. 'A former Attorney General, Senator, Vice President, and presidential candidate from California is certainly going to loom large, especially when everyone has had some interaction with her, has probably worked, certainly worked hard for her, and worked hard for her recently,' Hicks said. 'The decision is for her to make in the coming weeks and months.' GOOD MORNING. Happy Friday. Thanks for waking up with Playbook. You can text us at 916-562-0685 — save it as 'CA Playbook' in your contacts. Or drop us a line at dgardiner@ and bjones@ or on X — @DustinGardiner and @jonesblakej. WHERE'S GAVIN? Nothing official announced. CAMPAIGN YEAR(S) FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: A Democratic candidate to succeed Assemblymember Mike Gipson is excavating one of her opponent's left-leaning tweets on policing and oil in a bid to erode the challenger's labor bona fides and consolidate union support. Compton school board member Ayanna Davis' campaign has launched a website chock full of social media posts from progressive candidate Fatima Iqbal-Zubair in which Iqbal-Zubair expressed support for the Defund the Police movement in the wake of George Floyd's murder and called for divestment from oil companies. The campaign is also planning to blast out a memo full of opposition research to convention-going party delegates in the Assembly district in play this morning. 'Ban police associations. End qualified immunity. Prosecute cops,' Iqbal-Zubair wrote in a 2021 post featured on the site. The open race for Assembly District 65 is already shaping up to be a tough Dem-on-Dem contest. Davis and Iqbal-Zubair — the chair of the state party's progressive caucus and a legislative affairs staffer for California Environmental Voters who has challenged Gipson in the past — are also joined in the race by another Democrat, Myla Rahman, the district director for state Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas. Gipson is term-limited and running for the California Board of Equalization next year. Labor support was key for Gipson in locking down the seat in the past and could be critical in the heavily Democratic district again this cycle. Iqbal-Zubair in an interview said her values haven't changed but that 'it's important to preserve all union jobs in my district, that includes the jobs in the refineries at the ports.' 'Policing and prisons: There's union members in there that have good jobs,' she elaborated. Iqbal-Zubair bemoaned environmental pollution and police violence disproportionately affecting people of color in her Los Angeles-area district. She cast clean energy jobs as an opportunity to maintain union ranks while offsetting the effects of climate change. And she called for more social service workers to work in the criminal justice system. 'The whole underpinning of my campaign is undoing the systemic harms in the district,' Iqbal-Zubair told Playbook. 'Public safety is a huge part of that, obviously, because, if you ask community members in my district, they haven't had systems that have helped them feel safe.' TRADE CAUTIOUSLY OPTIMISTIC — State Attorney General Rob Bonta joined Democratic officials across the country who took a victory lap after a pair of federal court rulings struck down Trump's tariffs. But, the AG cautioned, economic turmoil over Trump's see-sawing tariffs is likely not over. 'He's pretty stubborn, he wants to do it how he wants and when he wants,' Bonta told Playbook. 'He's clearly, in our view, far overstepped his legal authority.' The Trump administration is appealing the decisions, which found the president unlawfully invoked emergency economic powers to unilaterally enact tariffs on dozens of countries without congressional approval. A federal appeals court temporarily reinstated Trump's sweeping 'reciprocal' tariffs while litigation plays out. California, led by Bonta and Newsom, was the first state to sue over Trump's taxes on imports. The state is still challenging his actions in a separate but related lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. 'These are our own arguments… included in court orders,' Bonta said of the two rulings. 'That's validating. Of course, we're interested in durable, permanent results.' SAN FRANCISCO PELOSI MANS UP — Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi this week endorsed a San Francisco county party resolution urging Democrats to pay more attention to the well-being of men and boys — siding with moderate leaders who've sought to force Democrats to confront criticisms that the party isn't male friendly. Pelosi backed the measure at the SF Democratic County Central Committee's monthly meeting, albeit after a minor friendly amendment. Gary McCoy, Pelosi's proxy representative to the county party, said she shares the sentiment that Democrats 'need to do more' to reach out to men and boys and listen to their issues. Party leaders overwhelmingly approved the resolution. Emma Hare, a local Democratic county vice chair who wrote the resolution, said it's designed to spark an intraparty conversation about how to win back male voters who have flocked to Trump, including through efforts like universal paid parental leave for fathers, apprenticeship job programs and more behavioral health resources targeted at men. CLIMATE AND ENERGY EMISSIONS DISCOUNT — The state's latest quarterly sale of pollution permits to high-emitting companies went worse than it ever has since the pandemic, leaving the state with a third less revenue from the program this fiscal year than last. Read last night's California Climate for more on how questions around the future of California's signature cap-and-trade program are becoming budget problems. Top Talkers YER FIRED— Floyd Brown said on X today that he was fired yesterday by Richard Grenell, the presidential envoy for special missions, from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts one month after being recruited to be the center's vice president, POLITICO's Cheyenne Daniels reports. He theorizes that his firing may have had something to do with an inquiry from CNN, where they asked him about his 'past writings and statements about traditional marriage and homosexual influence in the @GOP.' 'The only explanation is the one given to me at the time of my firing,' he wrote ''Floyd, you must recant your belief in traditional marriage and your past statements on the topic, or you will be fired.' Needless to say, I refused to recant and was shown the door. My beliefs are much more common to Biblical Christianity.' APUSH LESSON— California Rep. Judy Chu says President Donald Trump's decision to revoke Chinese students' visas is 'xenophobic,' the Los Angeles Times reports. 'This is yet another example of the Trump administration targeting Chinese people instead of the Chinese government, assuming that every Chinese person is a pawn for the Chinese Communist Party,' Chu said. 'That is what xenophobia is all about, and it is reminiscent of the Chinese Exclusion Act.' AROUND THE STATE — San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie wants to cut about 1,400 city jobs as the city confronts a roughly $800 million budget deficit. (San Francisco Chronicle) — Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho wants to establish a registry for people convicted of fentanyl murders. (The Sacramento Bee) — Twelve people who were charged with crimes at a pro-Palestinian protest at Stanford's executive offices were arraigned in Santa Clara County. (The Mercury News) PLAYBOOKERS PEOPLE MOVES — John Goodwin was named vice president of global brand at Back Market. He was most recently at Ogilvy, Razorfish, Klaviyo and Patagonia. — Josué Estrada has just been named chief operating officer at the Center for AI Safety. He's a former COO at both Salesforce and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, now stepping into the AI safety space to help scale research and impact. — Stacey Geis, former deputy assistant administrator at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, has joined Crowell & Moring's environment, energy and natural resources and white collar and regulatory enforcement groups as senior counsel in its San Francisco office. — Chris Shimoda joined the Supply Chain Federation as strategic policy adviser. He will continue to operate his firm Shimoda Government Strategies which he opened in April 2025. BIRTHDAYS — POLITICO's Maggie Miller … songstress Idina Menzel … rapper Remy Ma BELATED B-DAY WISHES — Tami Grossglauser in the office of Assemblymember Rick Zbur You may have noticed that the lead-in to California Playbook, 'The Buzz,' has disappeared from your screen. After many years, we've decided it was time to retire it. We woke up today feeling a little lighter for it. Onward. WANT A SHOUT-OUT FEATURED? — Send us a birthday, career move or another special occasion to include in POLITICO's California Playbook. You can now submit a shout-out using this Google form.
Politico
03-03-2025
- Politics
- Politico
Scoop: LGBTQ+ rights power picks fight with Trump
Presented by THE BUZZ — FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: 'GLOVES ARE OFF' — Equality California, the state's top lobbying force on LGBTQ+ issues, will this year confront President Donald Trump with an agenda heavily focused on buttressing transgender rights. The group will, in plans first reported here, push state lawmakers to require that courts more quickly allow transgender and nonbinary Californians to change the name and gender on their driver's licenses. Its other priorities include making court records of people's name and gender confidential and blocking law enforcement from accessing the state's prescription drug database without a warrant — an attempt to prevent discrimination against Californians receiving gender-affirming care. The advocacy drive is a response to Trump's rescission of several rights previously afforded to transgender Americans. They can no longer get passports that list their gender — rather than their sex assigned at birth — or indicate that they are nonbinary with an 'X' in place of an 'M' or 'F' on the federal ID. The White House has also moved to bar transgender women and girls from playing on sports teams matching their gender, and banned federal employees from including their preferred gender pronouns in email signatures. 'With Donald Trump and his extremist administration waging unprecedented attacks on LGBTQ+ people — especially transgender people — the gloves are off in California when it comes to protecting the safety and civil rights of our community,' Equality California Executive Director Tony Hoang told Playbook in a statement. Equality California's legislative agenda will likely play an important role in shaping California's resistance to Trump on gender issues during his second term. The group's bill package typically overlaps heavily with that of the Legislature's LGBTQ Caucus, which is expected to unveil its own policy priorities in the coming days. Members of that caucus are carrying almost every proposal Equality California is sponsoring. They include: The package focuses on expanding state-controlled programs, potentially avoiding legal conflict with the federal government. The Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom have already in recent years shown willingness to expand some of the same services, establishing benefits for workers helping their chosen families and expanding PrEP access. 'These bills are essential to ensuring California remains a national leader in LGBTQ+ equality while standing strong against the rising tide of hate and discrimination fueled by the Trump administration's cruel policies attacking transgender and nonbinary Americans,' Hoang said. GOOD MORNING. Happy Monday. Thanks for waking up with Playbook. You can text us at 916-562-0685 — save it as 'CA Playbook' in your contacts. Or drop us a line at dgardiner@ and bjones@ or on X — @dustingardiner and @jonesblakej. WHERE'S GAVIN? Nothing official announced. LOS ANGELES REFORM PURGATORY — It's been more than six months, and LA Mayor Karen Bass still hasn't appointed members to a commission charged with changing the city's charter and preventing further corruption scandals at City Hall. 'The inaction from the mayor's office makes Bass the most conspicuous logjam in a process fraught with political tripwires, a reworking of the city's balance of power certain to face backlash from those who enjoy tremendous sway under the status quo,' our colleague Melanie Mason writes in her latest report from southern California. The stalled reforms have already dashed confidence that sweeping changes will be made in wake of the leaked City Hall tapes that consumed the city's politics. 'The further we get from that moment of the tapes leaking, the harder it will be to … institute true reforms,' said city Councilmember Nithya Raman. 'We may have already missed that moment, frankly.' NEWSOMLAND GRAB YOUR RAKE — Newsom declared a state of emergency over wildfires on Saturday, suspending environmental rules to speed preventative brush clearing in what appeared to be an attempt to mollify a president who often instructs the state to rake its forests. The declaration, first reported by POLITICO, came as Newsom seeks nearly $40 billion in aid from Republicans in Washington to help LA recover from its deadly wildfires. STATE CAPITOL GETTING THE BOOT — Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas expelled some of the Legislature's most outspokenly critical Republicans from coveted committees and replaced them with moderate members of the GOP in a late Friday afternoon purge. Rivas kicked firebrand freshman Assemblymember Carl DeMaio and Assemblymember Alexandra Macedo off the chamber's Budget Committee. He also cut Elections Committee Vice Chair Bill Essayli from that panel. The shakeup moved several hardliners from plum committees to low-profile panels such as Water, Parks and Wildlife where it will be more difficult to garner attention online. DeMaio, in particular, was having success turning confrontational exchanges with Newsom administration staffers over budget issues into viral clips on X. 'I think they lost their shit and realized, 'Oh my God, we've got to shut this guy down. We've got to shut him up. We can't have him asking these questions,'' DeMaio told Playbook. Moderate Republicans including Assemblymember Phillip Chen and Laurie Davies received new assignments, and the GOP gained one committee seat in the shuffle while Democrats' maintained the same number. The changes appeared punitive, mostly targeting Republicans who had been more aggressive in their questioning of Democratic staffers during initial hearings. State Senate and Assembly leaders frequently use their unilateral power over committee assignments to reward key allies and punish members for behavior they find undesirable. Rivas' camp didn't cast the moves as retributive in a statement. 'The Speaker routinely addresses committee needs throughout the year, and his goal is always to ensure members are in optimal roles to collaborate effectively and deliver for Californians,' Rivas spokesperson Nick Miller said. CLIMATE AND ENERGY THESE ARE THE BRAKES — Trump has California's electric vehicle mandate on the ropes — and California car dealers are joining in. Read Friday's California Climate for more on what their opposition might mean for the state's nation-leading rules. Top Talkers ERASING DEI — USC deleted its website for its university-wide Office of Inclusion and Diversity after the Trump administration told schools to dismantle diversity, equity and inclusion programs, the LA Times reports. It also scrubbed several college and department-level DEI statements, renamed faculty positions and, in one case, removed online references to a scholarship for Black and Indigenous students amid the administration's threats to withhold funding from institutions over DEI efforts. BASHING FROM BARSTOOL — Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy tore into Newsom over his new podcast in an interview with Fox News Digital, calling him 'trash' and a 'slick politician.' 'They asked me to go on. I said, 'No,' because I just don't like the guy so much,' Portnoy said. AROUND THE STATE — Off-duty national park rangers held protests from Yosemite National Park to Muir Woods National Monument in protest of layoffs ordered by the Trump administration. (San Francisco Chronicle) — Huntington Park is the latest California city to be rocked by political corruption allegations. (Los Angeles Times) — Fresno swore in its first female chief of police, Mindy Casto. (Fresnoland) PLAYBOOKERS PEOPLE MOVES — Jacob Regalado joins Street Level Strategy as a vice president leading the Sacramento office. Regalado most recently served was a principal consultant to the Assembly Democratic Caucus and senior strategic adviser to Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas. BIRTHDAYS — Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis (favorite cake: vanilla with chocolate frosting) … former Rep. Paul Cook … Stacey Reardon of Change Craft LLC … BELATED B-DAY WISHES — (was Sunday): Assemblymember Rick Zbur … Nick Warshaw, associate attorney at Loeb & Loeb … Rep. Ami Bera … Sally Rosen Phillips … Levi Russell of Morgan Stanley … SF Chronicle's Joe Garofoli … (was Saturday): Joshua Marin-Mora, field representative for Zbur … CalMatters reporter Nigel Duara … former LA City Councilmember Joel Wachs … former IBM CEO Lou Gerstner … Zev Garber, former president of the National Association of Professors of Hebrew … Mandalay Entertainment CEO Peter Guber. WANT A SHOUT-OUT FEATURED? — Send us a birthday, career move or another special occasion to include in POLITICO's California Playbook. You can now submit a shout-out using this Google form.
