GOP

WASHINGTON – Republicans have tapped Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan to deliver the party’s response to President Obama’s State of the Union address on Tuesday, party officials said Friday.

The choice of Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, is meant to signal the party’s commitment to deficit reduction, the officials said. Ryan will deliver the GOP response from the Budget Committee’s hearing room.

“Paul Ryan is uniquely qualified to address the state of our economy and the fiscal challenges that face our country,” Speaker of the House John Boehner said in a statement. “We’re broke, and decisive action is needed to help our economy get back to creating jobs and end the spending binge in Washington that threatens our children’s future. I’m pleased that Paul will be outlining a common-sense vision for moving our country forward.”

For Obama’s first two addresses to a joint session of Congress, Republicans chose governors to deliver the response – first Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal, and in 2010, Virginia’s Bob McDonnell. The tradition of the opposition party delivering a formal response dates back to 1966.

Ryan, 40, has represented Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District since 1999. He was a member of Obama’s bipartisan fiscal commission, but voted against the panel’s final recommendations.

Obama is scheduled to travel to Wisconsin on Wednesday in a post-speech barnstorming trip.

mmemoli@tribune.com

WASHINGTON – The austere House budget drafted by Rep. Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) that has come to define the Republican Party was approved Thursday on a strict party-line vote, as the GOP argues that a balanced budget should now be Washington’s top goal.

The blueprint is merely a proposal, without the force of law, but its overhaul of the Medicare program and steep reductions to other social safety net spending serves as the GOP’s opening salvo in renewed budget negotiations with President Obama. It was approved, 221 to 207, with no Democrats and 10 GOP defectors, largely conservatives or congressman in swing districts.

Republicans are anxious to reopen the debate over government spending with the White House even though some attribute the party’s setbacks in the November election to the plan from Ryan, the party’s former vice presidential nominee.

Ryan achieved the party’s goal of balancing the budget in 10 years, a promise House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) made to restive conservatives to win their votes on other matters.

To bring revenues and spending into balance by 2024, Ryan relied on deeply reducing federal spending as well as new revenue coming from the New Year’s tax deal that raised income tax rates on the wealthy.

The centerpiece of the GOP plan would turn Medicare into a voucher-like program for the next generation of seniors, those younger than 55. When they become eligible, at age 65, those seniors will be offered a voucher that can be applied either to the purchase of private health insurance or toward the cost of Medicare, though the voucher may not cover all the costs of the policy chosen.

The Ryan budget also cuts Medicaid, the health program for the poor and seniors in nursing homes, as well as food stamps, welfare programs and student loans, while largely preserving money for defense accounts.

While Ryan temporarily counts the tax hikes from the New Year, his plan would ultimately lower top tax income rates from 39.6% to no more than 25%, while closing loopholes and deductions. The top corporate rate would also be dropped to 25%. Ryan believes that lower taxes will spur economic growth and essentially pay for themselves; but critics say the lower rates cannot be achieved without asking middle-income families to give up popular income-tax deductions or else adding to the deficit.

Before approving the Ryan budget, the House dismissed alternative proposals, including one from the Democratic minority that sought to raise taxes on corporations and wealthier Americans, while putting that new revenue toward infrastructure and state jobs, as well as decreasing the deficit. Also rejected was a more conservative budget that would have balanced in four years, as well as proposals from the progressive caucus and the Congressional Black Caucus.

The Senate, which has not approved a budget in four years, is set to do so later this week. The blueprint from the Democrats is a similarly partisan document, and passage will put the House, Senate and White House on another collision course as they begin budget talks toward the next deadline, in summer, when Congress will be asked to raise the nation’s debt limit.

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lisa.mascaro@latimes.com

Twitter: @LisaMascaroinDC

WASHINGTON — Five Senate Republicans broke with party leaders on Thursday to advance legislation that would rein in President Trump’s use of the U.S. military in Venezuela, a move that comes as a growing number of GOP lawmakers have expressed unease about the White House’s threats to use force to acquire Greenland.

The procedural vote, which came over the objections of Republican leaders, now sets the stage for a full Senate vote next week on a measure that would block Trump from using military force “within or against Venezuela” without approval from Congress. Even with the Senate’s approval, the legislation is unlikely to become law as it is unlikely to pass the House, and President Trump — who has veto power over legislation — has publicly condemned the measure and the Republicans who supported it.

“This vote greatly hampers American Self Defense and National Security, impeding the President’s Authority as Commander in Chief,” Trump wrote in a social media post shortly after the 52-47 vote in the Senate.

The Republican defection on the issue underscores the growing concern among GOP lawmakers over the Trump administration’s foreign policy ambitions and highlights the bipartisan concern that the president is testing the limits of executive war powers — not only in Venezuela but also in Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of Denmark, a U.S. ally.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Me.), one of the Republicans who voted for the resolution, said that while she supported the operation that led to the capture and extradition of Nicolás Maduro, she did not “support committing additional U.S. forces or entering into any long-term military involvement in Venezuela or Greenland without specific congressional authorization.”

The resolution is co-sponsored by Sens. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). The Republicans who supported it were Sens. Collins, Paul, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Todd Young of Indiana and Josh Hawley of Missouri.

“Finally, the Senate is exercising its constitutional power over the authorization of the use of force to prevent America from being dragged into a new war over oil,” Schiff said in a social media post after the vote.

Vice President JD Vance told reporters at the White House on Thursday that he was not concerned about Trump losing support among Republican lawmakers in Washington, adding that passage of the resolution in the Senate would not “change anything about how we conduct foreign policy over the next couple of weeks or the next couple of months.”

But Republican support for the resolution reflects a deepening concern within the GOP over Trump’s foreign policy plans, particularly his threats to acquire Greenland — a move that prompted European leaders earlier this week to call on the United States to respect the Arctic territory’s sovereignty

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters on Wednesday that he does not believe “anybody’s seriously considering” using the military to take control of Greenland.

“In Congress, we’re certainly not,” Johnson said.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) struck a similar tone the same day, telling reporters that he does not “see military action being an option” in Greenland.

Other Republican lawmakers have been more openly critical, warning that even floating the idea of using force against a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, a defense alliance that includes the United States, risks weakening America’s position on the world stage.

“Threats and intimidation by U.S. officials over American ownership of Greenland are as unseemly as they are counterproductive,” Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in a statement. “And the use of force to seize the sovereign democratic territory of one of America’s most loyal and capable allies would be an especially catastrophic act of strategic self-harm to America and its global influence.”

In a statement Tuesday, the White House said acquiring Greenland was a “national security priority” and that using the military to achieve that goal was “always an option.” A day earlier, Stephen Miller, Trump’s deputy chief of staff for policy, told CNN that “Greenland should be part of the United States.”

“Nobody is going to fight the United States militarily over the future of Greenland,” Miller said.

Miller’s remarks angered Republican senators, including Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) who in an interview with CNN on Wednesday called the idea of invading Greenland “weapons-grade stupid.”

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C), who has served as the top Republicans on the Senate NATO Observer Group since 2018, criticized the idea as well in a searing Senate floor speech.

“I’m sick of stupid,” Tillis said. “I want good advice for this president, because I want this president to have a good legacy. And this nonsense on what’s going on with Greenland is a distraction from the good work he’s doing, and the amateurs who said it was a good idea should lose their jobs.”

Tillis, who is not seeking reelection this year, later told CNN that Miller needs to “get into a lane where he knows what he’s talking about or get out of this job.”

WASHINGTON — In a remarkable rebuke of Republican leadership, the House passed legislation Thursday, in a 230-196 vote, that would extend expired healthcare subsidies for those who get coverage through the Affordable Care Act as renegade GOP lawmakers joined essentially all Democrats in voting for the measure.

Forcing the issue to a vote came about after a handful of Republicans signed on to a so-called “discharge petition” to unlock debate, bypassing objections from House Speaker Mike Johnson. The bill now goes to the Senate, where pressure is building for a similar bipartisan compromise.

Together, the rare political coalitions are rushing to resolve the standoff over the enhanced tax credits that were put in place during the COVID-19 crisis but expired late last year after no agreement was reached during the government shutdown.

“The affordability crisis is not a ‘hoax,’ it is very real — despite what Donald Trump has had to say,” said House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, invoking the president’s remarks.

“Democrats made clear before the government was shut down that we were in this affordability fight until we win this affordability fight,” he said. “Today we have an opportunity to take a meaningful step forward.”

Ahead of voting, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that the bill, which would provide a three-year extension of the subsidy, would increase the nation’s deficit by about $80.6 billion over the decade. It would increase the number of people with health insurance by 100,000 this year, 3 million in 2027, 4 million in 2028 and 1.1 million in 2029, the CBO said.

Growing support for extending ACA subsidies

Johnson (R-La.) worked for months to prevent this situation. His office argued Thursday that federal healthcare funding from the COVID-19 era is ripe with fraud, pointing to an investigation in Minnesota, and urged a no vote.

On the floor, Republicans argued that the subsidies as structured have contributed to fraud and that the chamber should be focused on lowering health insurance costs for the broader population.

“Only 7% of the population relies on Obamacare marketplace plans. This chamber should be about helping 100% of Americans,” said Rep. Jason Smith (R-Mo.), chair of the House Ways and Means Committee.

While the momentum from the vote shows the growing support for the tax breaks that have helped some 22 million Americans have access to health insurance, the Senate would be under no requirement to take up the House bill.

Instead, a small group of senators from both parties has been working on an alternative plan that could find support in both chambers and become law. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said that for any plan to find support in his chamber, it will need to have income limits to ensure that the financial aid is focused on those who most need the help. He and other Republicans also want to ensure that beneficiaries would have to at least pay a nominal amount for their coverage.

Finally, Thune said there would need to be some expansion of health savings accounts, which allow people to save money and withdraw it tax-free as long as the money is spent on qualified medical expenses.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), who is part of the negotiations on reforms and subsidies for the Affordable Care Act, said there is agreement on addressing fraud in healthcare.

“We recognize that we have millions of people in this country who are going to lose — are losing, have lost — their health insurance because they can’t afford the premiums,” Shaheen said. “And so we’re trying to see if we can’t get to some agreement that’s going to help, and the sooner we can do that, the better.”

Trump has pushed Republicans to send money directly to Americans for health savings accounts so they can bypass the federal government and handle insurance on their own. Democrats largely reject this idea as insufficient for covering the high costs of healthcare.

Republicans bypass their leaders

The action by Republicans to force a vote has been an affront to Johnson and his leadership team, who essentially lost control of what comes to the House floor as the Republican lawmakers joined Democrats for the workaround.

After last year’s government shutdown failed to resolve the issue, Johnson had discussed allowing more politically vulnerable GOP lawmakers a chance to vote on another healthcare bill that would temporarily extend the subsidies while also adding changes.

But after days of discussions, Johnson and the GOP leadership sided with the more conservative wing, which has assailed the subsidies as propping up ACA, which they consider a failed government program. He offered a modest proposal of healthcare reforms that was approved, but has stalled.

It was then that rank-and-file lawmakers took matters into their own hands, as many of their constituents faced soaring health insurance premiums beginning this month.

Republican Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick, Robert Bresnahan and Ryan Mackenzie, all from Pennsylvania, and Mike Lawler of New York, signed the Democrats’ petition, pushing it to the magic number of 218 needed to force a House vote. All four represent key swing districts whose races will help determine which party takes charge of the House next year.

Trump encourages GOP to take on healthcare issue

What started as a long shot effort by Democrats to offer a discharge petition has become a political vindication of the Democrats’ government shutdown strategy as they fought to preserve the healthcare funds.

Democrats are making clear that the higher health insurance costs many Americans are facing will be a political centerpiece of their efforts to retake the majority in the House and Senate in the fall elections.

Trump, during a lengthy speech this week to House GOP lawmakers, encouraged his party to take control of the healthcare debate — an issue that has stymied Republicans since he tried, and failed, to repeal Obamacare during his first term.

Mascaro and Freking write for the Associated Press. AP writer Matt Brown contributed to this report.

Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, one of the top Republican candidates running for California governor, met a woman sprawled on the sidewalk as he walked around Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles.

“I’m waiting for the sun to come out from the clouds. I’m sunbathing,” the woman said Tuesday morning, lying on her jacket on the cold concrete, denying that any drug use was taking place in the roughly 50-block swath of downtown Los Angeles. “This is what we do here in California.”

Bianco and Kate Monroe, chief executive of VetComm, talks with a woman on the sidewalk as they walk around of Skid Row.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)

Bianco shook his head, and as he walked away said there was zero chance the woman was not high on methamphetamines or something else. He said it was immoral for the state’s leaders to allow people to live in such conditions, and pledged to clean up Skid Row within four years if he is elected governor in November.

“Why on God’s green earth, why would we allow this to happen?” Bianco later said. “And why would you have something that you call Skid Row, that you just accept, instead of doing something to fix … these people’s lives.”

Bianco squarely blamed the problem on waste, fraud and mismanagement under Gov. Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and prior elected leaders, who he argued failed to effectively tackle the issue. He is among the critics who points to a 2024 state audit that found the state had spent $24 billion to combat homelessness over the prior five years without tracking the results.

A spokesman for Newsom disputed such characterizations of the spending.

“There is no ‘lost’ $24 billion for homelessness. All the money is accounted for,” Newsom spokesman Izzy Gardon said. “What the report found was that not all state programs required locals to report, at the time, how those dollars improved homelessness outcomes. Gov. Newsom has since changed the law to fix this longstanding issue.”

Bianco also pledged to use existing laws against drug dealing, human trafficking, prostitution and other crimes to clean up these blocks, while offering addicts and the mentally ill who are breaking the law the option of going to jail or being placed in treatment programs.

Democrats shot back that Bianco was not offering realistic approaches to an intractable problem.

Bianco talks with Antonio Fuller, left, and John Shepar.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)

“Chad Bianco is the best example of an all-hat, no-cattle politician with tough talk and no solutions,” state Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks said. “That is not what California voters want in our next governor.”

Throughout his campaign, Bianco has leaned into his role as a law enforcement leader. On Tuesday, as his allies shot video after his visit to Skid Row, he pulled up the edge of his T-shirt to reveal his Riverside County sheriff badge.

Amid scenes of desperation, chaos and squalor, Bianco was surrounded by a gaggle of invited media.

Los Angeles Police Department patrol cars were frequently seen nearby as the group sidestepped feces, used condoms, sidewalk fires, open-air drug use and drug dealing, barely clothed women, and people screaming and cursing.

People make their way around Skid Row on Tuesday.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)

Monroe talks with Emilio Marroquin.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)

Bianco was accompanied by veteran and homeless advocate Kate Monroe, who handed the homeless envelopes containing $5 bills and cigarettes as encouragement to talk. Some did not take kindly to the offer.

“Get out of my face. Get out of my face. You’re offering me cigarettes,” the woman said. Monroe replied, ‘I’ll give you five bucks.” The woman repeated, “Get out of my face.”

But others were more receptive, including Emilio Marroquin.

The 42-year-old said he had started drinking as a teenager as he struggled with being gay in a Christian home. He didn’t come out until his father, a pastor, passed away. His drinking spiraled out of control, he said, leading friends and family to abandon him. After Marroquin ended up on the streets eight years ago, he said, he started using crystal meth and crack, and explained the splotchy wounds on his hand were the result of being beaten up for failing to pay drug debts.

After learning that Marroquin briefly lived in sober housing, Bianco asked him about the difficulties of transitioning from living on the streets to structured housing, and then spoke with a passing community service provider who identified herself as S.R.

“We need a new change. We need something other than what we’ve been hearing for the past, I don’t know, 20 years or longer,” she said, to which Bianco replied that she had “more courage, passion and commitment and a big heart than probably anyone to be able to come down here and do this over.”

Bianco greets a man who goes by Cigaretteman.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)

The Riverside County sheriff’s appearance on Skid Row comes as the 2026 governor’s race is finally starting to see some energy.

A crowded field of prominent though little-known Democrats is competing to finish in the top two spots in the June primary. If they all remain in the race, the Democrats could splinter the vote and allow one of the far smaller number of top Republican candidates to win one of the spots.

Bianco’s top GOP rival, former Fox News commentator and British political strategist Steve Hilton, held a rainy-day news conference on Monday in front of the California Employment Development Department in San Francisco to highlight alleged fraud in state government.

Saying that Newsom has turned the state into “Califraudia,” Hilton and GOP controller candidate Herb Morgan called on the U.S. Department of Justice and other federal officials to investigate waste and fraud in state spending.

“This gets to that question that every Californian is asking: How is it that we have the highest taxes in the country? They’ve doubled the budget of the state of California nearly in the last five years, and everything is worse,” Hilton said. “We have the worst outcomes in America. How is that possible, that they spend so much and we get so little? … We are going to get to the bottom of this when we are elected.”

WASHINGTON — President Trump on Tuesday defended his actions during the Capitol riot five years ago, joked about being liberal-minded to win the votes of transgender people and mocked a predecessor’s use of a wheelchair while delivering a meandering speech to House Republicans as the party enters a critical election year facing a razor-thin majority in the House.

The remarks were intended to ensure both the GOP’s executive and legislative wings are aligned on their agenda heading into the November midterms that will determine party control of Congress. But Trump spent more time rehashing past grievances during the lengthy appearance than he did talking about the capture of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro or specific steps he’s taking to bring down prices as polls say inflation is the public’s top concern.

He also did not discuss new policy initiatives or legislation on his agenda for the year.

“We won every swing state. We won the popular vote by millions. We won everything,” Trump said, recounting his performance in the 2024 presidential election while seeming to acknowledge that history will side with the Democratic Party in November.

“But they say that when you win the presidency, you lose the midterm,” he said.

Political trends show that the party that wins the White House usually loses seats in Congress during the midterm elections two years later.

But Trump did try to rally the caucus at times, asserting that his first year back in office was so successful that Republicans should win in November on that basis alone. He briefly touched on Venezuela and talked about money coming into the U.S. through tariffs and direct investment and negotiations to bring down drug prices.

“You have so many good nuggets. You have to use them. If you can sell them, we’re going to win,” Trump said. He claimed that “we’ve had the most successful first year of any president in history and it should be a positive.”

The House GOP is facing a sudden narrowing of their already thin majority with the death of California Rep. Doug LaMalfa, announced Tuesday, and the resignation of former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, which took effect at midnight.

“You can’t be tough when you have a majority of three, and now, sadly, a little bit less than that,” Trump said after paying tribute to LaMalfa, noting the challenges House Speaker Mike Johnson faces in keeping their ranks unified.

The president also noted that Rep. Jim Baird (R-Wis.) was recovering after a “bad” car accident, further slimming Johnson’s vote margins.

House Republicans convened as they launch their new year agenda, with healthcare issues in particular dogging the GOP heading into the midterm elections. Votes on extending expired health insurance subsidies are expected as soon as this week, and it’s unclear whether the president and the party will try to block its passage.

Trump said he would be meeting soon with 14 companies to discuss health insurance.

In remarks that approached 90 minutes, Trump also mused about unconstitutionally seeking a third term as president. He claimed it was never reported that he urged his supporters to walk “peacefully and patriotically” on Jan. 6, 2021, to the Capitol, where they rioted to try to overturn his election loss. He used his wife, First Lady Melania Trump, to poke at President Franklin D. Roosevelt, a Democrat who used a wheelchair.

According to the president, she thinks the dancing he does at his rallies is not presidential.

“She actually said, ‘Could you imagine FDR dancing?’ She actually said that to me,” Trump said. “And I said there’s a long history that perhaps she doesn’t know.”

GOP lawmakers were hosting a daylong policy forum at the Kennedy Center, where the board, stocked by Trump with loyalists, recently voted to rename it the Trump Kennedy Center. The move is being challenged in court.

Trump and Johnson are trying to corral Republicans at a time when rank-and-file lawmakers have felt increasingly emboldened to buck Trump and the leadership’s wishes, on issues such as the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files.

The meeting also comes days after the Trump administration’s dramatic capture of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela, which occurred after a months-long U.S. campaign to pressure the now-deposed leader by building up American forces in the waters off South America and bombing boats alleged to have been carrying drugs.

The Maduro capture is reigniting the debate about Trump’s powers over Congress to authorize the campaign against Venezuela, though House Republican lawmakers have largely been supportive of the administration’s efforts there.

Kim and Superville write for the Associated Press. AP writers Lisa Mascaro and Will Weissert contributed to this report.

California Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Richvale) has died, GOP leadership confirmed in a social media post Tuesday morning.

“Jacquie and I are devastated about the sudden loss of our friend, Congressman Doug LaMalfa. Doug was a loving father and husband, and staunch advocate for his constituents and rural America,” said Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), the House majority whip, in an X post. “Our prayers are with Doug’s wife, Jill, and their children.”

LaMalfa, 65, was a rice farmer from Oroville and staunch Trump supporter who had represented his Northern California district for the past 12 years. His seat was one of several that was in jeopardy under the state’s redrawn districts approved by voters with Prop 50.

LaMalfa’s death reduces the GOP’s already slim House majority to 218-213.

This story is developing.

THE CURRENT spat between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and President Bush echoes a California discord that contributed to the Republicans losing the presidency in 1916. A lesser prize is at stake this time — the governor’s initiatives — but rankled feelings may end with conservatives losing another November election.

Schwarzenegger’s refusal to join the president at a Ronald Reagan Presidential Library ceremony, and Bush’s rejection of the governor’s plea to postpone a local fundraiser until after next month’s special election, made national as well as local headlines. Neither man blinked, although their sagging popularity cries out for compromise and cooperation within the Republican ranks.

On the eve of the 1916 presidential election, California Gov. Hiram Johnson and Charles Evans Hughes, the GOP presidential candidate, exhibited similar obstinacy. It ended in a stunning defeat for Hughes, who expected to carry a heavily Republican California but instead lost the state and the election to Woodrow Wilson by a handful of votes.

Progressive Republican Johnson, a popular reform governor who was a candidate for the state’s U.S. Senate seat that November, was not a favorite of the more conservative wing of his party. He faced opposition in the GOP primary from mossbacks who rejected his efforts toward social and economic change. That August, Hughes made major speeches in California. At the same time, Johnson was furiously campaigning throughout the state in a close fight for his party’s senatorial nomination.

In mid-August, Hughes and Johnson spent several days in L.A. County. Taking a break from the campaign, Hughes made a quick trip to Long Beach, staying at the Virginia Hotel. Johnson had already checked in at the Virginia, and when word reached him that his party’s presidential candidate was there, he expected a courtesy call from him. But Hughes left without meeting with Johnson, a slight that irritated the progressive wing of the party.

The Times, an ardent supporter of Hughes and critic of Johnson’s progressive Republicans, neither reported Johnson’s campaign visit to Southern California nor Hughes’ snub. But other papers did. During the remaining two months of the campaign, Hughes’ seemingly insurmountable Republican majority evaporated. Among the reasons was his gaffe, which apparently turned off many would-be Republican voters.

(That wasn’t all that hurt Hughes. When he crossed a picket line in San Francisco, he made certain that the media were aware that he had intentionally done so. In an industrializing state, voters turned to Wilson, a more labor-oriented candidate.)

Johnson won the Senate race. Hughes lost California — and the presidency — by less than 4,000 votes.

The Schwarzenegger/Bush brouhaha, occurring in the midst of sagging poll numbers for both men, further weakens their appeal. The governor’s initiative proposals, already in trouble with the voters, may have suffered a fatal setback. The lame-duck president is fortunate not to be on the ballot this fall.

Embattled Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan, who was convicted of obstruction last month for helping an immigrant evade federal officers, has sent her resignation letter to the governor.

The letter was sent Saturday. Republicans had been making plans to impeach her since her Dec. 19 conviction. A spokesperson for Gov. Tony Evers said his office received Dugan’s letter, and he would work to fill the vacancy without delay.

Dugan wrote that over the last decade she handled thousands of cases with “a commitment to treat all persons with dignity and respect, to act justly, deliberately and consistently, and to maintain a courtroom with the decorum and safety the public deserves.”

But she said the case against her is too big of a distraction.

“As you know, I am the subject of unprecedented federal legal proceedings, which are far from concluded but which present immense and complex challenges that threaten the independence of our judiciary. I am pursuing this fight for myself and for our independent judiciary,” Dugan said in her letter.

Last April, federal prosecutors accused Dugan of distracting federal officers trying to arrest a Mexican immigrant outside her courtroom and leading the man out through a private door. A federal jury convicted her of felony obstruction.

The case against Dugan was highlighted by President Trump as he pressed ahead with his sweeping immigration crackdown. Democrats insisted the administration was trying to make an example of Dugan to blunt judicial opposition to the operation.

Republican Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos praised Dugan’s decision.

“I’m glad Dugan did the right thing by resigning and followed the clear direction from the Wisconsin Constitution,” Vos said.

Democrat Ann Jacobs, who is chair of the Wisconsin Elections Commission board, said she agreed with Dugan that Milwaukee should have a permanent judge in place while this fight plays out.

“Despite her situation, she is ever the champion of justice, wanting to remove the judiciary from a political battle over her fate. I’m sure this is terribly hard for her but she is true to her faith and her principles,” Jacobs said in a post on X.

On April 18, immigration officers went to the Milwaukee County courthouse after learning 31-year-old Eduardo Flores-Ruiz had reentered the country illegally and was scheduled to appear before Dugan for a hearing in a state battery case.

Dugan confronted agents outside her courtroom and directed them to the office of her boss, Milwaukee County Chief Judge Carl Ashley, because she told them their administrative warrant wasn’t sufficient grounds to arrest Flores-Ruiz.

After the agents left, she led Flores-Ruiz and his attorney out a private jury door. Agents spotted Flores-Ruiz in the corridor, followed him outside and arrested him after a foot chase. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced in November he had been deported.

Funk writes for the Associated Press.

HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S. C. — With the wounds from last week’s election defeats still tender, Republican governors and political leaders met Monday in this robustly sunny resort to chart a suddenly clouded political future.

Calls for increased emphasis on education and the environment were squelched by other sounds: teeth-gnashing, backbiting and bemoaning of the turn of political events.

Just a year ago, in the flush of George Bush’s presidential victory, Republicans saw the 1990 elections as a historic opportunity to overthrow the Democrats and control the powerful reapportionment process stemming from the 1990 census.

Now, as they looked forward, mostly what they saw was the troubling issue of abortion, which is credited with breathing new life into the Democratic Party and is at least partly responsible for last week’s Democratic gubernatorial victories in New Jersey and Virginia.

“If you look at last Tuesday’s results, you are hard pressed not to say . . . that the pro-choice coalition has indeed, definitely, become a force,” Republican pollster Linda DiVall warned the governors.

“If we in the Republican Party don’t recognize that, we are setting ourselves up for some major defeats.”

The emergence of abortion as a potent tool to be wielded against anti-abortion Republicans has sent the party scrambling to regain the offensive for 1990.

Strategy for 1990

In plans outlined Monday, party leaders detailed a two-pronged approach to next year’s elections–playing down abortion while pressing issues that could overshadow that emotional topic.

Vice President Dan Quayle, in a speech here Monday, pointedly did not mention abortion but tried to rally support for a more activist 1990 program modeled after Bush’s 1988 race.

“We will continue to work and identify with issues beyond peace and opportunity,” he said, “and (will) relate to opportunity the importance of education, the importance of the environment, the importance of enhancing our competitiveness, renewing an attack on poverty.

“These will be Republican issues,” he said.

Also, Quayle underlined the firm break between the 1990s-version Republican Party with its Reagan-era predecessor. He touted the importance of government–a position precisely the opposite of that pronounced by Ronald Reagan at the turn of the last decade.

“We cannot adopt an idea that somehow all government or any government is simply evil,” Quayle said. “That’s not the case.”

In talking to reporters later, the vice president said that an emphasis on popular topics like education and the environment will help Republican candidates. And he argued that the party’s anti-abortion stance “is going to be a neutral issue.”

But other Republicans roll their eyes at such rosy predictions and worry nervously that abortion will prove the difference in 1990’s elections.

Next year, 34 Senate seats, 36 governorships and all 435 House seats will be on the ballot. More important, the elections will put into office governors and state legislators who can shape new boundaries for political districts, which will remain in force for 10 years. Whoever wins in 1990, in short, has a distinct advantage for the next decade.

Republicans are still smarting over the last reapportionment, in which Democrats controlled the process and came away with strong holds on many states, most particularly California.

Despite the success of the GOP in winning the presidency, Democrats currently hold 29 governor’s seats and control 28 legislatures. Among the 1990 battlegrounds will be California, Texas and Florida, which have gained in population and thus will gain congressional seats, and the Northeast and Great Lakes states, which are losing seats.

Major GOP Efforts

Republicans will be mounting major efforts as well in states where they are close to holding a majority of legislators in a legislative body–Illinois, Pennsylvania, Oregon and Florida among them, Republicans here said.

Republicans acknowledge that there are limits to their ability to force abortion onto the back burner. The Supreme Court, which unleashed a fury of political activity with its July decision permitting the states to place some restrictions on abortion, is due to consider the subject again next term. And abortion rights groups, which mobilized in the wake of the court decision, have vowed to exact revenge on anti-abortion legislators in 1990.

But, as they shift focus to newly embraced issues like education and the environment, the Republicans hope to take the edge off of the abortion issue by instructing party candidates to announce their position and stick to it. Many Republicans here castigated their losing gubernatorial candidates–J. Marshall Coleman of Virginia and James Courter of New Jersey–for waffling on the issue.

“You don’t shift positions,” said Florida Gov. Bob Martinez, who after the Supreme Court decision called a special session of the Florida Legislature to adopt new abortion restrictions–only to have the Legislature table the proposals.

“If you’re shifting around on quicksand based on the political winds, you’re gonna die,” he added.

Conservative South Carolina Gov. Carroll A. Campbell Jr. spoke what is rapidly becoming the party line–that voters will accept an anti-abortion stance as long as it is consistent and expressed sensitively.

There has been no large-scale test of the theory since the Supreme Court’s decision was announced.

“The problem with Republicans is that they have not gone out in advance and told the public what they believed in,” Campbell said.

“The Democrats in this instance (last week’s races) went out and defined the issue (and) left the Republican candidates there with no clear message of what they stood for. And I’m going to tell you something: You’ll beat nothing with something every time.”

Thompson Disagrees

Illinois Gov. James R. Thompson, a moderate who has opted not to run again in 1990, split ranks with Campbell on the direction that party candidates must take in the future.

“At least at the state level, a candidate in any party who takes a strong pro-life stance is going to lose,” Thompson said.

“The old days when only the pro-life movement was political are gone,” he added. “The Republican Party is going to be pushed in the direction of the pro-choice movement.”

Most Republicans agree that all but the most rabid anti-abortion activists will have to silence in 1990 their once-public demands for a constitutional amendment banning abortion and for other highly restrictive measures.

“There’s room for an offensive–but the offensive is clearly in the middle,” Republican National Committee member Haley Barbour of Mississippi said.

Like others, Barbour suggested that moderate attempts at abortion restrictions–like advocating that parents be notified when a young girl seeks to have an abortion–will remain on the agenda, because polls show Americans to be more sympathetic to them than to more comprehensive barriers.

“Politics is the art of the achievable,” he said.

Terrorism and the Middle East are continuing to roil the Republican Senate contest after a letter written by former congressman Tom Campbell emerged that appeared to contradict statements Campbell and his aides had made about his dealings with a radical Muslim professor.

The professor, Sami Al-Arian, contributed to Campbell’s unsuccessful campaign in 2000 for the U.S. Senate. On Sept. 26, 2001, when he was teaching at the University of South Florida, Al-Arian gave an interview to Fox TV host Bill O’Reilly in which he conceded that he had said, “Jihad is our path. Victory to Islam. Death to Israel. Revolution. Revolution until victory. Rolling to Jerusalem.”

Those statements quickly generated a furor and the university moved to discipline Al-Arian. Campbell, by then a law professor at Stanford University, wrote a letter to Judy Genshaft, the president of the University of South Florida, protesting any punishment.

Campbell had previously conceded that he wrote a letter on Al-Arian’s behalf, but had said during a candidates’ debate Friday that he did so before Al-Arian’s interview with O’Reilly. His campaign’s website also said the letter was written before the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

The text of the letter showed otherwise. Dated Jan. 21, 2002, it said, “ . . . I respectfully wish to convey my sincere alarm that Professor Al-Arian may be treated harshly because of the substance of his views.”

Campbell went on to write that “I have formed this fear because of the paucity of evidence supporting the purported reasons for this discipline against him. I read a transcript of the ‘O’Reilly Factor’ interview last autumn, and I did not see anything whereby Professor Al-Arian attempted to claim he was representing the views of the University of South Florida.”

Carly Fiorina, one of Campbell’s opponents in the primary race, called on him to release the letter last week. The text of the letter was first disclosed by the website of the Investigative Project on Terrorism. Campbell’s aides, who had said the candidate no longer had a copy of the original letter, then posted a link to it on the campaign website.

On Monday, Campbell said in an interview that despite the language of his letter, he had never read the full transcript of the O’Reilly interview, specifically the “Death to Israel” language. If he had seen it, he said, he never would have written the letter.

“That’s too zealous,” he said. “Unacceptable. Calling for death to a country or individual is unacceptable.”

Campbell has previously said that Al-Arian never contributed to his 2000 Senate campaign; Campbell later admitted that he had.

In 2006, Al-Arian pleaded guilty to providing aid to a terrorist group.

Campbell spokesman James Fisfis said the candidate’s memory of his dealings with Al-Arian is foggy because he did not have an original copy of the letter and because the events occurred nearly a decade ago.

“It was a long time ago,” Fisfis said. “We’re trying to piece together everything about that time period.”

A spokesman for one of Campbell’s rivals, Assemblyman Chuck DeVore (R-Irvine), said the letter is the latest in a troubling pattern.

“Whether it’s absent-mindedness or deception — the only person who knows that for sure is Tom Campbell — there’s a pattern of inaccuracy whenever Tom Campbell ventures into these subjects,” Joshua Trevino said.

“We have to double-check everything he says about his past associations with these radicals because we can’t trust him to give us the whole truth.”

The disclosures came as Campbell and Fiorina filed the paperwork Monday to make their candidacies official. DeVore planned to file his paperwork Wednesday. The winner of the primary will face three-term Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.).

seema.mehta@latimes.com

DES MOINES, Iowa — Democrat Renee Hardman was elected to the Iowa state Senate on Tuesday in a year-end special election, denying Republicans from reclaiming two-thirds control of the chamber.

Hardman bested Republican Lucas Loftin by an overwhelming margin to win a seat representing parts of the Des Moines suburbs. The seat became vacant after the Oct. 6 death of state Sen. Claire Celsi, a Democrat.

Hardman, the CEO of nonprofit Lutheran Services of Iowa and a member of the West Des Moines City Council, becomes the first Black woman elected to the 50-member Senate.

“I want to recognize that while my name was the one on the ballot, this race was never just about me,” Hardman told a room of supporters in West Des Moines after declaring victory.

With 99% of votes counted, Hardman led by about 43 percentage points.

Her win is latest in a string of special election victories for Iowa Democrats, who flipped two Senate seats this year to break up a supermajority that had allowed Republicans to easily confirm GOP Gov. Kim Reynolds’ appointments to state agencies and commissions.

Democrat Mike Zimmer first flipped a seat in January, winning a district that had strongly favored Republican President Trump in the 2024 election. In August, Democrat Catelin Drey handily defeated her GOP opponent in the Republican stronghold of northwestern Iowa, giving Democrats 17 seats to Republicans’ 33. Celsi’s death brought that down to 16.

Republicans would have regained two-thirds control with a Loftin victory Tuesday. Without a supermajority, the party will need to get support from at least one Democrat to approve Reynolds’ nominees. The GOP still has significant majorities in both legislative chambers.

Ken Martin, chair of the Democratic National Committee, called Hardman’s victory “a major check on Republican power.”

“With the last special election of the year now decided, one thing is clear: 2025 was the year of Democratic victories and overperformance, and Democrats are on track for big midterm elections,” Martin said.

In November the party dominated the first major Election Day since Trump returned to the White House, notably winning governor’s races in Virginia and New Jersey. Democrats held onto a Kentucky state Senate seat this month in a special election. And while Republican Matt Van Epps won a Tennessee special election for a U.S. House seat, the relatively slim margin of victory gave Democrats hope for next year’s midterms. The party must net three House seats in 2026 to reclaim the majority and impede Trump’s agenda.

Loftin, a tree trimmer turned data manager, congratulated Hardman and told the Associated Press he’s praying for her as she embarks on this important chapter.

Iowa GOP Chairman Jeff Kaufmann applauded Loftin and his supporters for putting up a fight in what he described as “a very tough district.” Democrats outnumber Republicans by about 3,300 voters, or 37% to 30%.

“Although we fell short this time, the Republican Party of Iowa remains laser-focused on expanding our majorities in the Iowa Legislature and keeping Iowa ruby-red,” Kaufmann said.

The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee pledged Tuesday to help defend the party’s gains in Iowa and prevent the return of a GOP supermajority next year.

Schoenbaum and Fingerhut write for the Associated Press. Schoenbaum reported from Salt Lake City.

WASHINGTON — When Charlie Kirk was killed by an assassin this fall, Republican leaders credited the organization he founded for enabling President Trump’s return to power.

Now that organization is mobilizing behind Vice President JD Vance.

Uninterested in a competitive Republican primary in 2028, Turning Point USA plans to deploy representatives across Iowa’s 99 counties in the coming months to build the campaign infrastructure it believes could deliver Vance, a Midwesterner from nearby Ohio, a decisive victory, potentially short-circuiting a fractious GOP race, insiders said.

It is the latest move in a quiet effort by some in Trump’s orbit to clear the field of viable competitors. Earlier this month, Marco Rubio, the secretary of State previously floated by Trump as a possible contender, appeared to take himself out of the running.

“If Vance runs for president, he’s going to be our nominee, and I’ll be one of the first people to support him,” Rubio told Vanity Fair.

After Kirk’s widow, Erika, endorsed Vance on stage at Turning Point USA’s annual conference in Arizona last week, a straw poll of attendees found that 84% would support Vance in the coming primaries. Yet, wider public polling offers a different picture.

A CNN poll conducted in early December found that Vance held a plurality of Republican support for 2028, at 22%, with all other potential candidates, such as Rubio and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, registering in single digits.

The remaining 64% told pollsters they had “no one specific in mind,” reflecting an open field with plenty of room for other figures to gain ground.

While a recent Gallup poll found that 91% of Republicans approve of Vance’s job performance as vice president — an encouraging number entering a partisan primary — only 39% of Americans across party lines view him positively in the role, setting Vance up for potential challenges should he win the nomination.

Potential presidential candidates on both sides of the political aisle are expected to assess their chances over the next year, before primary season officially kicks off, after the midterm elections in November.

Closing out the Turning Point USA conference, Vance called for party unity amid escalating conflicts among right-wing influencers over the acceptability of racism and antisemitism within Republican politics.

“President Trump did not build the greatest coalition in politics by running his supporters through endless, self-defeating purity tests,” Vance said. “Every American is invited. We don’t care if you’re white or Black, rich or poor, young or old, rural or urban, controversial or a little bit boring, or somewhere in between.”

Charlie Kirk, he added, “trusted all of you to make your own judgment. And we have far more important work to do than canceling each other.”

Vance’s remarks drew criticism from some on the right for appearing to tolerate bigotry within the party. The vice president himself has been subjected to racist rhetoric, with Nick Fuentes — a far-right podcaster who has praised Adolf Hitler — repeatedly directing attacks at Vance’s wife and children over their Indian ancestry.

“Let me be clear — anyone who attacks my wife, whether their name is Jen Psaki or Nick Fuentes, can eat s—,” Vance said in an interview last week, referring to President Biden’s former press secretary. “That’s my official policy as vice president of the United States.”

In the same interview, Vance praised Tucker Carlson, another far-right podcaster who has defended Fuentes on free speech grounds, as a “friend of mine,” noting that he supported Vance as Trump’s vice presidential pick in 2024.

Trump has floated Vance as his potential successor multiple times without ever explicitly endorsing his nomination, calling him “very capable” and the “most likely” choice for the party.

“He’s the vice president,” Trump said in August. “Certainly he’s doing a great job, and he would be probably favored at this point.”

Several of Trump’s most ardent supporters have pushed the president to seek a third term in 2028, despite a provision of the Constitution, in the 22nd Amendment, barring him from doing so.

Trump himself has said the Constitution appears clear on the matter. But Steve Bannon, an architect of Trump’s historic 2016 campaign and one of his first White House strategists, continues to advocate a path forward for another run, reportedly disparaging Vance as “not tough enough” to lead the party to victory.

“He knows he can’t run again,” Susie Wiles, the president’s White House chief of staff, told Vanity Fair in a recent profile of her. “It’s pretty unequivocal.”

Trump, who will be 82 when he is slated to leave office, has told Wiles he understands a third term isn’t possible “a couple times,” she added.

Alan Dershowitz, a prominent constitutional law professor and a lawyer to Trump during his Senate impeachment trial, recently presented Trump with a road map to a third term in an Oval Office meeting, which he will publish in a new book slated for release next year.

Even he came away from their meeting believing Trump would pass on another bid.

“That is my conclusion based on what he has said in public,” Dershowitz told The Times.

“He has said in the past,” he added, “that it’s too cute.”

WASHINGTON — The national Republican Party leadership, spurred by chairman Lee Atwater, today cut all ties to former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, the newly elected Louisiana Republican state lawmaker.

Party spokeswoman Leslie Goodman said 28 voting members of the party’s executive committee unanimously repudiated during a telephone vote Duke’s racist and anti-Semitic views and barred financial or other assistance for him.

Duke, 38, a former klan grand wizard, was elected to the Legislature Saturday from a suburban New Orleans district in a narrow victory over builder John Treen, 63, who was backed by President Bush and former President Ronald Reagan.

The resolution adopted by the national Republicans in effect “excommunicates” Duke, according to Atwater, who said Duke is neither a Republican nor a Democrat but “a charlatan and a faker” using Republicans to promote his racist agenda.

WASHINGTON — Republican Sen. Ben Sasse told Nebraska constituents in a telephone town hall meeting that President Trump has “flirted with white supremacists,” mocks Christian evangelicals in private and “kisses dictators’ butts.”

Sasse, who is running for a second term representing the reliably red state, made the comments in response to a question about why he has been willing to publicly criticize a president of his own party. He also criticized Trump’s handling of the coronavirus crisis and said Trump’s family has treated the presidency “like a business opportunity.”

The comments were first reported by the Washington Examiner after it obtained an audio recording of the senator’s comments, which has been posted on YouTube. Sasse spokesman James Wegmann said the call occurred Wednesday.

Other Nebraska Republicans, including U.S. Rep. Dan Bacon and state GOP executive director Ryan Hamilton, told the Omaha World-Herald that they disagree with Sasse’s characterizations of the president.

“Sen. Sasse is entitled to his own opinion,” U.S. Rep. Adrian Smith, another Nebraska Republican, said in a statement. “I appreciate what President Trump has accomplished for our country and will continue to work with him on efforts which help Nebraska.”

Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh declined to comment on Sasse’s remarks, the World-Herald said.

Sasse has positioned himself as a conservative willing to criticize Trump at times, and he is seen as a potential presidential candidate for 2024. His comments Wednesday were in response to a caller who asked about his relationship with the president, adding, “Why do you have to criticize him so much?” Trump carried Nebraska by 25 percentage points in 2016.

The senator said he has worked hard to have a good relationship with Trump and prays for the president regularly “at the breakfast table in our house.” He praised Trump’s judicial appointments.

But he said he’s had disagreements with Trump that do not involve “mere policy issues,” adding, “I’m not at all apologetic for having fought for my values against his in places where I think his are deficient, not just for a Republican, but for an American.”

Sasse began his list with, “The way he kisses dictators’ butts,” and said Trump “hasn’t lifted a finger” on behalf of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong.

“I mean, he and I have a very different foreign policy,” Sasse said. “It isn’t just that he fails to lead our allies. It’s that we, the United States, regularly sells out our allies under his leadership.”

Sasse said he criticizes Trump for how he treats women and because Trump “spends like a drunken sailor,” saying he criticized Democratic President Obama over spending.

“He mocks evangelicals behind closed doors,” Sasse said. “At the beginning of the COVID crisis, he refused to treat it seriously. For months, he treated it like a news-cycle-by-news-cycle PR crisis rather than a multiyear public health challenge, which is what it is.”

C. Montgomery Johnson, 81, a veteran political strategist and former Washington state Republican Party chairman, died of complications from a stroke and diabetes May 21 in Olympia, Wash.

Widely known as “Gummie,” Johnson directed Daniel J. Evans’ successful 1964 gubernatorial campaign.

He was the first full-time chairman of the state Republican Central Committee from 1964 to 1971, during which he helped purge members of the John Birch Society from the state party.

During that time, Johnson also served as an executive member of the Republican National Committee.

In partnership with his third wife, Democratic lobbyist Ann Quantock, he founded the political consulting firm C. Montgomery Johnson Associates.

The cigar-smoking Johnson, who was known for being opinionated, profane and progressive, campaigned for public education, the environment, Native Americans, libraries and hospitals. As a champion of equal rights for women, Johnson advised the campaign that elected the state’s first female governor, conservative Democrat Dixy Lee Ray, in 1976.

The Seattle native received a master’s degree in forestry from the University of Washington in 1950, and later worked as a forest ranger before becoming public relations director for Weyerhaeuser, a forest products company.

Dec. 19 (UPI) — Wisconsin’s Republican leaders will begin impeachment proceedings against Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan if she does not resign after her felony obstruction conviction.

State Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and Assembly Majority Leader Tyler August, both of whom are Republicans, issued the ultimatum in a joint statement, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported on Friday.

“Judge Hannah Dugan, while wearing judicial robes of the state of Wisconsin, attempted to impede the lawful work of federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents,” Vos and August said.

“The last time a Wisconsin judge was impeached was in 1853,” they said. “If Judge Dugan does not resign from her office immediately, the Assembly will begin impeachment proceedings.”

A jury of 12 on Thursday found Dugan guilty of obstructing federal agents as they attempted to arrest a man who was scheduled to appear on an unrelated matter in her courtroom in April.

The jury found her guilty of one count of obstruction, which is a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The jury acquitted her on one count of concealment.

Dugan’s legal team said they will appeal her felony conviction.

Vos cited the Wisconsin Constitution’s Article XII, Section 3(2), which says no individual who has been convicted of a felony is eligible to serve in “any office of trust” in the state, unless that person is pardoned according to WISN.

Federal prosecutors tried Dugan in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Wisconsin in Milwaukee after she interfered with ICE agents’ efforts to arrest Eduardo Flores-Ruiz for illegally being in the United States on April 18.

Court records show Dugan engaged the ICE agents in the court’s hallway after she helped Flores-Ruiz and his attorney use an entrance for jurors to exit the courthouse.

ICE agents arrested Flores-Ruiz after chasing him on foot.

A trio of federal judges questioned attorneys for Gov. Gavin Newsom and the California Republican Party on Wednesday in a legal case that will decide the fate of California’s new voter-approved congressional districts for the 2026 midterm elections.

Attorneys for the California Republican Party and the Trump administration’s Department of Justice during the hearing recapped the argument they made in their legal complaint, accusing Democratic legislators and redistricting experts of racial gerrymandering that illegally favored Latinos.

The state’s legal representatives, meanwhile, argued their primary goal was not racial but political — they worked to weaken Republicans’ voting power in California to offset similar gerrymandering in Texas and other GOP-led states.

But Wednesday was the first time the public got to hear the three federal judges of the Central District of California challenge those narratives as they weigh whether to grant the GOP’s request for a temporary injunction blocking the reconfigured congressional districts approved by voters in November under Proposition 50.

The GOP has repeatedly seized on public comments from Paul Mitchell, a redistricting expert for California’s Democratic-led Legislature who designed the Proposition 50 congressional districts, that “the No. 1 thing” he started thinking about was “drawing a replacement Latino majority/minority district in the middle of Los Angeles.”

On Wednesday, District Court Judge Josephine Staton suggested that GOP attorneys focused too much on the intent of Mitchell and Democratic legislators and not enough on the voters who ultimately approved Proposition 50.

“Why would we not be looking at their intent?” Staton asked Michael Columbo, an attorney for California Republicans. “If the relative intent is the voters, you have nothing.”

Nearly two-thirds of California voters approved the new Proposition 50 congressional district map in a Nov. 4 special election after Newsom pitched the idea as a way to counter partisan gerrymandering after President Trump pressed Texas to redraw maps to shore up the GOP’s narrow House majority.

The stakes for California and the nation are high.

If the new map is used for the 2026 midterms, it could give California Democrats up to five additional U.S. House seats. That could allow them to push back against the gains Republicans make due to redistricting in staunchly GOP states and increase Democrats’ chance of seizing the House and shifting the balance of power in Congress.

A win for Democrats could also boost Newsom’s national clout and help him pitch himself as the nation’s strongest and most effective Trump critic as he enters his final year as California governor and weighs a White House bid.

During closing arguments Wednesday, an attorney for the U.S. Department of Justice argued that the race-based aspect of the redrawn districts started with the drafting of the Assembly bill that led to Proposition 50 being placed on the ballot.

Staton, however, seemed unconvinced.

“These maps have no effect,” she said, “until the voters give them effect.”

The GOP cannot challenge the map on grounds of political gerrymandering: The Supreme Court decided in 2019 that such complaints have no path in federal court. That leaves them focusing on race.

But proving that race predominated over partisanship is a challenge, legal scholars say, and paying attention to race is not, in itself, prohibited under current law. To prove that race was the key motivation, plaintiffs have to show there is another way for map makers to achieve their desired political result without a racial impact.

During the hearing, Staton stressed that the burden was on the challengers of Proposition 50 to prove racial intent.

To that end, the GOP brought to the stand RealClearPolitics elections analyst Sean Trende, who said the new 13th Congressional District in the San Joaquin Valley had an “appendage” that snaked northward into Stockton. Such contorted offshoots, he said, are “usually indicative of racial gerrymandering.” Trende produced an alternative map of the district that he said retained Democratic representation without being driven by race.

But Staton questioned whether Trende’s map was substantially different from Mitchell’s, noting they both seemed to fall within a similar range of Latino representation.

U.S. District Judge Wesley Hsu lambasted Columbo over what he called the “strawman” attempt to pick out one district, the 13th Congressional District, to make the case that there was a race-conscious effort in the attempt to flip five seats in the Democrats’ favor.

Jennifer Rosenberg, an attorney for the state, also argued that Trende’s analysis was too narrow.

“Dr. Trende failed to conduct a district by district analysis,” Rosenberg said. “And as we can see, he only addressed two tiny portions of District 13 and really only focused on one of the subparts.”

U.S. District Judge Kenneth Lee questioned Rosenberg on how much she believed Mitchell’s public statements about wanting to create a Latino district in Los Angeles influenced his redrawing.

“He was talking to interested groups,” Rosenberg said. “He did not communicate that intent to legislators.”

However, Lee said that Mitchell’s closeness to Democratic interest groups was an important factor. Mitchell “delivered on” the “wants” of the Latino interest groups he interacted with, Lee said, based on his public statements and lack of testimony.

Lee also took issue with Mitchell not testifying at the hearing and the dozens of times he invoked legislative privilege during a deposition ahead of the hearing.

Abha Khanna, who represented the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, argued there was no racial predominance in Mitchell’s statements.

She showed judges the text of Proposition 50, an official voter guide and statements from Newsom, arguing they were overt declarations of partisan intent. She also pointed out instances in which Republican plaintiffs discussed Proposition 50 in exclusively partisan terms.

If the federal judges grant a preliminary injunction, California would be temporarily blocked from using the newly drawn map in the 2026 election. Attorneys for the state would probably appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Just two weeks ago, the nation’s highest court allowed Texas to temporarily keep its newly drawn congressional districts — which also faced complaints of racial gerrymandering — after a federal court blocked the Texas map, finding racial considerations probably made it unconstitutional.

The U.S. Supreme Court indicated it viewed the Texas redistricting as motivated primarily by partisan politics. In its ruling, it explicitly drew a connection between Texas and California, noting that several states, including California, have redrawn their congressional map “in ways that are predicted to favor the State’s dominant political party.”