There are plenty of ways to celebrate Black History Month here in Los Angeles, whether you’re looking to honor jazz innovators like Miles Davis or recognize those who are making history now, including a Black woman-founded grocery store that provides organic vegan produce to South L.A. neighborhoods.
This year marks the centennial celebration of Black history across the United States — though that time frame spans only a fragment of how long African Americans have been contributing to this country.
In 1926, historian Carter G. Woodson and the Assn. for the Study of Negro Life and History spearheaded the first celebration of Negro History Week during the second week of February, overlapping with Frederick Douglass’ birthday on Feb. 14 — to encourage the study of African American history. President Gerald Ford officially designated February as Black History Month in 1976, during the U.S. Bicentennial.
Jordan Stolz will be trying to win multiple gold medals in speedskating the Milan Cortina Olympic Games.
(Morry Gash / Associated Press)
Since making his Olympic debut at 17, Stolz has become a star in international speedskating. He was the first man to win three world championships in one year in 2023 and repeated in the 500, 1,000 and 1,500 meters in 2024. He also competes in the team pursuit. U.S. speedskating has several medal contenders, including two-time Olympic bronze medalist Brittany Bowe and gold medalist Erin Jackson, who became the first Black woman to win an individual gold medal at the Winter Olympics in 2022.
History was made in more than one way at Sunday night’s 68th Grammy Awards.
Bad Bunny’s “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” won album of the year — the first Spanish-language LP to take the Recording Academy’s highest honor. Kendrick Lamar and SZA’s “Luther” was named record of the year, making Lamar the winningest rapper in Grammy history (and just the fourth artist to go back-to-back for the record prize). Then there were Billie Eilish and her brother, Finneas O’Connell, who took song of the year with “Wildflower”; they’re now the only songwriters with three wins in that prestigious category.
To go by demographics, the ceremony clearly embodied the diversity gains the academy has been saying proudly are happening among its 15,000 voting members. But if new kinds of faces are becoming Grammy darlings, the music they’re being recognized for still upholds many of the academy’s old values. A night for making history was also a night for reveling in it.
Take “Luther,” a soulful hip-hop slow jam built on a prominent sample of Luther Vandross and Cheryl Lynn’s 1982 rendition of a love song Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell recorded in the late 1960s — an intricate piece of lineage-making meant to bridge multiple generations.
Olivia Dean performs.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
“First and foremost, let’s give a shout-out to the late, great Luther Vandross,” the producer Sounwave said as he, Lamar, SZA and the song’s other creators accepted their award at Crypto.com Arena. (Before they made it onstage, Cher misread the card identifying “Luther” as record of the year and said that Vandross himself had won.) Lamar added, “This is what music is about,” and expressed his gratitude for being allowed “the privilege” to use Vandross’ music as long as he and SZA promised the singer’s estate not to curse on their record.
You can hear a similar reverence for those who came before in Olivia Dean, the 26-year-old British singer named best new artist on the strength of her hit “The Art of Loving” LP, which looks back to the gleaming pop-soul of Diana Ross and Whitney Houston.
Even Bad Bunny, the Puerto Rican rapper and singer who became a superstar at the bleeding edge of reggaeton and Latin trap, achieved his Grammy breakthrough with something of a throwback move: “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” is an exactingly arranged tribute to his native island, with elements of Puerto Rican folk styles such as bomba and plena and more hand-played instrumentation than he utilized for 2022’s sleek “Un Verano Sin Ti,” which scored a Grammy nomination for album of the year but lost to “Harry’s House” by Harry Styles (who, as it happens, presented the album prize Sunday).
Part of Bad Bunny’s success this year can be attributed to the fact that he’s a far bigger celebrity than he was three years ago; indeed, his Grammy triumph impressively sets up the halftime performance he’ll give this coming weekend at Super Bowl LX. But not unlike Beyoncé’s rootsy “Cowboy Carter,” which finally brought her a win for album of the year in 2025 after a number of outrage-inducing defeats, “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” is also primo Grammy bait: a work steeped in tradition from a natural innovator.
SZA backstage.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
For years, the Grammys’ rearview gaze used to bum me out — and, to be honest, as lovely as Eilish’s “Wildflower” is, her song of the year win with the tender acoustic ballad felt like a failure of imagination among voters I wish had recognized the hurtling exuberance of “Golden,” from Netflix’s “KPop Demon Hunters.” (“Golden” did take the prize for song written for visual media, which made it the first K-pop tune to win a Grammy.)
Yet something about Sunday’s ceremony made it hard to get too worked up about all the historicizing. Perhaps it was how plainly yet passionately many artists used their time onstage to speak about the issues pressing on us right now. “Before I say thanks to God, I’m gonna say: ICE out,” Bad Bunny told the crowd as he accepted an award for música urbana album. “We’re not savage, we’re not animals, we’re not aliens. We are humans, and we are Americans.”
Lady Gaga on the red carpet.
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
Eilish said, “No one is illegal on stolen land.” Dean pointed out that she’s the granddaughter of an immigrant and that “those people deserve to be celebrated.”
I was also moved by how personal so much of the music felt — a cry of imperfection like Lola Young’s “Messy,” for instance, which she performed by herself on piano and which won pop solo performance in an upset over the likes of Lady Gaga and Sabrina Carpenter. “I don’t know what I’m gonna say because I don’t have any speech prepared,” she yelled into the microphone as she received her trophy. “Obviously, I don’t — it’s messy, do you know what I mean?”
Weirdly for a show with yesterday so heavily on its mind, a tribute to the late R&B trailblazers Roberta Flack and D’Angelo was a disappointment, with Lauryn Hill as bandleader moving way too quickly (in way too short an allotted time) through songs that require real space to unfurl.
That’s what Justin Bieber had for the evening’s most striking performance: a slow and radically stripped-down rendition of his song “Yukon” that he sang wearing only boxer shorts and socks, accompanying himself with a scratchy electric guitar riff he fed through a looping station.
“Yukon” is from Bieber’s impressive “Swag” album, which he released last year after a lengthy stretch in the pop-star wilderness; it’s an LP, kind of like “Messy,” about learning to forgive yourself for your flaws, and here he sang “Yukon” like a guy who’d figured out — maybe a guy figuring out — how to build a life outside the punishing expectations of celebrity. The music had the past in it, of course, but didn’t feel constrained by it.
George Skelton and Michael Wilner cover the insights, legislation, players and politics you need to know in 2024. In your inbox Monday and Thursday mornings.
When government officials arrogantly persist in blatantly lying, the public just might turn angrily against the prevaricators.
Or maybe they’re not lying technically. They simply might not care whether they’re telling the truth, or what it is. Their only intent is to spew a tale that fits a political agenda. Regardless, the citizenry can stomach only so much.
But, in fact, the public rebellion has been building during a yearlong nightmare of unjustified, inhumane, un-American violence by federal immigration agents. Their targets have been people with brown skin suspected of living in the country illegally. Never mind that many not only are documented, they’re U.S. citizens.
Such has been the slipshod and authoritarian way President Trump’s promised mass deportation program has been carried out.
Polls have consistently shown that voters strongly support the president’s goals of protecting the border and also deporting the “worst of the worst” undocumented criminals. But people have increasingly objected to his roughhouse methods, including masked federal agents slapping around and pepper-spraying legal protesters.
It’s not clear whether the two Minnesota citizens victimized by quick-draw federal agents were protesting. You can’t believe the Trump administration.
And that’s the danger in habitually lying: People can become so cynical that most disregard whatever they’re told by their so-called leaders. And that cripples what’s necessary for an ongoing healthy democracy: a cooperative relationship based on trust between citizens and those they’ve chosen to govern.
Some things we do know about the slain Minnesota citizens.
Alex Pretti, 37, was an intensive care nurse in a VA hospital. He was shooting video with his cellphone of agents and protesters when he was pepper-sprayed and wrestled to the ground by several agents as his legally carried handgun was removed. Then he was shot in the back several times.
He was not a “domestic terrorist” and “assassin” who wanted to “massacre law enforcement,” as Trump sycophants immediately lied on TV before backing off, after most of America saw videos of the killing and the president got nervous.
Renee Good, 37, was a mother and poet who appeared merely to be trying to drive through protest chaos when an agent shot her three times through the windshield. She did not try to run down the agent, as the administration claimed.
Good was not “obviously a professional agitator” who “violently, willfully and viciously ran over the ICE officer,” as Trump wrote on social media.
Public outrage at the lying and the brutish immigration enforcement has pressured elected officials into action all around the country.
Sure, you can call it political grandstanding and, of course, much of it is. But good politics and sound democracy involve listening to the public and acting on its desires.
In Sacramento, the state Senate held an emotional two-hour debate over a bill aimed at permitting people to sue federal law enforcement when their constitutional rights are violated. Rights such as the ability to peacefully protest and to be protected against excessive force. Lawsuits already are allowed against state and local officers. But federal agents are practically untouchable.
Senate Bill 747 by Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) passed on a 30-10 party-line vote — Democrats for and Republicans against. The measure moved to the Assembly.
The vote was yet another sorry sign of today’s unhealthy political polarization. Not one Republican could break out of the Trump web and vote to hold illegally operating federal agents accountable in civil courts. But neither could one Democrat detect enough fault in the bill to vote against it.
Some law enforcement groups oppose the legislation because they fear it would spur additional suing against local cops. Look for an amendment in the Assembly.
The heated Senate debate reflected Democratic lawmakers’ frustration with Trump — and many of their constituents’ fears.
“The level of anxiety and anger is higher than I’ve ever seen in my 13 years in the Legislature,” Sen. Tom Umberg (D-Santa Ana) told me.
“People are coming into our offices fearful for relatives or friends who are hiding out, afraid to go to doctors’ appointments and their kids are staying away from schools.”
During the debate, several senators mentioned two young protesters who were each permanently blinded in one eye by rubber bullets shot by Homeland Security officers in Santa Ana. Lawmakers also railed against “kidnappings” off the street of people simply because of their skin colors, accents and dress.
“California is not going to let these thugs get away with it,” Wiener vowed.
“There’s a lot of hyperbole on this floor,” Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Huntington Beach) asserted. He called for repeal of California’s “sanctuary” laws that greatly restrict cooperation by state and local officers with federal immigration agents.
Easing those laws is probably a good idea. But more important, we’ve got to restrain undisciplined federal agents from shooting unarmed people in the back.
Sen. Shannon Grove (R-Bakersfield), who revealed that she has been packing a firearm for 30 years, said that Pretti should never have brought his gun to a protest even if it was legal — which it isn’t in California.
And she’s right. But he never brandished the weapon and shouldn’t have paid with his life.
Neither should Pretti have been immediately attacked as a bad guy by lying federal officials. They’re now paying a political price.
This time 36 years ago, Fabrice Morvan was preparing for his first Grammy Awards. It had been a wild few years for the 23-year-old Parisian and his best friend Robert Pilatus from Germany. The duo known as Milli Vanilli had rocketed to fame, going from obscure dancers in Munich to dominate the pop music scene. Not only were they nominated for best new artist, but they were expected to perform live. Underneath it all, the pair were quickly reaching their breaking point.
Don Henley’s “The End of the Innocence” was nominated for both song and record of the year. Indeed, for the tens of millions of Milli Vanilli fans who bought their records, the 1990 Grammy ceremony marked an end of innocence of sorts. To this day, Milli Vanilli are the only artists in the history of the Grammys to have their award revoked.
L-R: The pop duo Milli Vanilli comprised of Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus, the subject of the Paramount+ documentary Milli Vanilli, streaming on Paramount+ beginning October 24, 2023.
(Ingrid Segeith/Ingrid Segeith/Paramount+)
“Rob and Fab,” as they were known, never sang — live or in studio — on any of the smash hit singles from their 6x platinum debut North American album, “Girl You Know It’s True.” Their Grammy performance was them lip-synching to a playback.
The real singing was done by paid session vocalists John Davis, Brad Howell and Charles Shaw while Rob and Fab captivated with their charisma, athletic dance moves and eye for style. In the wake of the fallout, Milli Vanilli remained steadfast that what they did was wrong. There was, in fact, plenty of blame to go around even if Rob and Fab suffered the brunt of it.
“They removed the platinum records from the wall at Arista,” says Morvan, now 59. He is perched on the edge of a poolside lounge chair from a boutique hotel in the heart of Hollywood. It’s a sunny December day, but he’s dressed all in black with glasses to match, slim fingers adorned with a custom silver skull ring. He loves the sunshine, but offers for my sake to move somewhere in the shade. Able to pass for decades younger, he now basks in life on the other side of infamy.
“They say the truth will set you free. The truth takes the stairs while the lies take the elevators. And that is true,” Morvan said. “So finally, after 35 years, my truth comes to the surface.”
(Stephen Shadrach)
Now, in a redemption as astounding as his rise, Morvan is back in the running for the 2026 Grammys as the only person in Recording Academy history nominated after a prior revocation.
This time, the voice is unmistakably his. Nominated in the audio book, narration, and storytelling recording category for his memoir “You Know It’s True: The Real Story of Milli Vanilli,” Morvan’s lilting French dialect and soft tone are hypnotizing and he has a natural knack for storytelling. The recording was performed alone in his home studio.
“They say the truth will set you free. The truth takes the stairs while the lies take the elevators. And that is true. So finally, after 35 years, my truth comes to the surface,” he contends. “And people, they get it, they understand that.”
Sadly, Rob Pilatus isn’t here to see it. Unable to handle the fallout and struggling in addiction, he died in 1998. In one of the more moving parts of his memoir, Morvan speaks to his former partner, laying bare for the first time some of the more unhealthy aspects of their relationship but in a way that makes clear his love for Pilatus runs deep.
After Pilatus’ death, Morvan tried his best to move on. He taught French at a Berlitz school for a while when not performing at small venues. “I’m not even looking at becoming big,” he told Times journalist Carla Rivera in a 1997 profile. He even had a stint on radio hosting “Fabrice’s Fabulous Flashbacks” for KIIS-FM. But he always returned to making music.
“Music was always there with me,” he says, his excitement building. So when it came to moving forward in life, and, I said, ‘OK, what am I going to do?’ Music kind of popped up and said, ‘Hey, show me how much you love me.’ And then I worked on that, and I learned how to play guitar, and I learned how to produce, and I learned how to write … it allowed me to take the pain away, to remove it.”
But after 20 years in Los Angeles, Morvan felt it was time to leave “Hotel California,” as he calls it, for opportunities in Europe. In a follow-up Zoom call from his home in Amsterdam, he confides that he almost felt like giving up, but figured maybe a change of scenery was what he needed.
“I was very disillusioned,” he says, headphones crowning his dreadlocked updo. “I found a producer that I could work with and build something with, but due to certain circumstances, it didn’t come together. So I met some Dutch people that wanted to launch a fashion line. And I heard that Holland was a place where dance music was evolving.”
Becoming a DJ, he played festivals and kept Milli Vanilli’s legacy alive, performing with a live band.
Morvan with his wife Tessa van der steen and their four children
While preparing for a project about 15 years ago, Morvan met his current partner, Tessa van der Steen, who is Dutch and works as a health and fitness coach and alternative medicine practitioner. Together, they have four children: a 12-year-old boy, 9-year-old girl, and a set of 4-year-old twin boys.
During Milli Vanilli’s heyday, powerful male (mostly white) figures held the cards, but in this phase of his life it’s women who play big roles. Not mentioned in his book is Kim Marlowe, who Morvan says, in the 1997 Times article was his manager and best friend. They at one point married; Marlowe quietly filed for divorce in L.A. in 2024.
Van der Steen, however, is the love of his life. She had no idea who he was when they first met, he was simply “Fabrice.” And according to Morvan, she is fiercely protective. “Fab is the most loving partner and father I could ever imagine,” Van der Steen writes over email. “We are soulmates. We have been together for more than 15 years. We understand each other, and it happens often that we are thinking of the same things, without saying a word.” She champions his efforts to release original music and continue performing.
In recent years, changes in culture, technology and the music industry have opened up conversations casting Rob and Fab in a more sympathetic light. Morvan himself took part in the well-received 2023 Paramount+ documentary “Milli Vanilli.” That same year, “Girl You Know It’s True,” a well-made biopic directed by Simon Verhoeven, came out.
And Morvan was caught off guard when Ryan Murphy featured Milli Vanilli prominently in his 2024 series on the Menendez brothers, a move introducing the group to new generations unfamiliar with the story. Motivated by the renewed interest, he recorded a stripped down, acoustic version of the Diane Warren-penned hit “Blame It on the Rain.”
As recently as November, Milli Vanilli came up in the zeitgeist, sparked by a comment on X by veteran producer Jermaine Dupri commenting on AI “artists” charting on Billboard.
Of course there are still detractors, but in an era in which public cancellations abound and apologies are scrutinized for any whiff of inauthenticity, Milli Vanilli’s wrongdoings can now seem quaint.
Benjamin Matheson, assistant professor at the University of Bern’s Institute on Philosophy, studies collective shame and writes on celebrity apology. He offers the startling thought that certain fans might be more willing to forgive a moral wrong, even an egregious one like unlawful intercourse with a minor in the example of director Roman Polanski, as opposed to artistic deception because it can be seen as more authentic.
“I think that perhaps,” Matheson writes over email, “Milli Vanilli suffered because they were an early ‘created’ pop band, and the public hadn’t been acclimatized to this kind of music. Whereas now I think people are much more comfortable with autotuning, AI music, and so on — though I’d love it if there was a bit more push back on this kind of thing.”
Morvan has plenty of thoughts on the state of the music industry past and present. He welcomes the change in perspective, and while he doesn’t live in regret, looking back, he would give his younger self a little advice.
“Keep working on your craft now. No matter what, and don’t ever start drugs. And don’t let your buddy Rob start with that. With those two, things would have been different.”
The pop duo Milli Vanilli comprised of Rob Pilatus(left) and Fab Morvan are the subject of the Paramount+ documentary Milli Vanilli, streaming on Paramount+ beginning October 24, 2023.
(Paul Cox/Paramount+/Paul Cox/Paramount+)
When the Los Angeles Tribune editorial staff selected “Girl You Know It’s True” as its movie of the year, Morvan met Parisa Rose, his co-writer and executive producer for the recording of the memoir. Rose, a first-time author and mother of two, first met Morvan when she interviewed him for the quirky paper — now in its fourth revival. She is now chief operating officer of the Tribune, which has expanded to include a publishing house.
Rose, who grew up in Pasadena, helped Morvan reckon with parts of his background he had long buried. One of the most compelling parts of the memoir is when he breaks the fourth wall, narrating letters to individuals from his past.
“You need to say everything you have never said before to them that you’ve always wanted to say,” she says of the exercise they conducted for the interludes. “You need to know that this is the last conversation you will ever have with them. And you need to imagine they are sitting across from you now.” Reached over the phone, Rose said she also helped with research, uncovering details on the seaside sanatorium in France where Morvan spent much of his early childhood.
A great part of Morvan’s motivation for the memoir was to leave a legacy for his kids. His oldest son is getting into music and recently found an old Milli Vanilli vinyl and plays it along with Daft Punk and Michael Jackson. Remaining “zen” about the idea of winning, he’s enjoying the moment. And the big dreams never die. He plans to tour in the next year and come back to perform in America. And who knows? Maybe one day he can play Coachella.
He’s particularly thrilled over his Grammy outfit, a collaboration with Spanish designer Helen López, whom he previously worked with on a Milli Vanilli-inspired line. “When you’ll see what I’m wearing … you’ll see that I don’t play,” he says with a twinkle in his eye. “No matter what the outcome in life, you have to just be, be in the moment. Enjoy the moment. Whatever happens will lead you to something else. I have no expectations.”
Novak Djokovic stuns reigning two-time champion Jannik Sinner to set up Australian Open final against Carlos Alcaraz.
Published On 30 Jan 202630 Jan 2026
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Novak Djokovic channelled his halcyon days in a five-set classic to dethrone Jannik Sinner and become the oldest man to reach the Australian Open final in the professional era at a rocking Rod Laver Arena.
Four months before his 39th birthday, Djokovic showed he remains unbeatable on his day as he sent the double defending champion packing with a 3-6 6-3 4-6 6-4 6-4 win in a 1:32am finish early on Saturday in Melbourne (14:32 GMT on Friday).
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“It feels surreal to be honest, playing over four hours,” Djokovic said on court.
“I was reminiscing in 2012 when I played Rafa [Nadal] in the final, that was six hours almost.
“The level of intensity and quality was high [against Sinner], and that was the only way to have a chance to win.
“He won the last five matches against me, he had my mobile number, so I had to change my number tonight.
“Jokes aside I said at the net: ‘Thanks for allowing me at least one’. Tremendous respect, an incredible player. He pushed me to the limit, so he deserves applause for his performance.”
Novak Djokovic of Serbia plays a forehand against Jannik Sinner of Italy [Quinn Rooney/Getty Images]
Djokovic will meet world number one Carlos Alcaraz in Sunday’s decider, the Spaniard having fought off Alexander Zverev in the longest Australian Open semifinal.
Eighteen years after his first Melbourne crown, Djokovic will strive for a record-extending 11th against Alcaraz and the unprecedented 25th Grand Slam title that has eluded him.
Djokovic needed incredible fortune to reach the semifinals, with his quarterfinal opponent, Lorenzo Musetti, retiring injured after taking the first two sets.
The Serb enjoyed a walkover in the fourth round as well, when Jakub Mensik pulled out.
But it was hard work and mental toughness that got Djokovic over the line against Sinner, a player who had beaten him in their previous five matches.
Jannik Sinner of Italy plays a forehand in the Men’s Singles semifinal at Melbourne Park[Phil Walter/Getty Images]
Victory came grudgingly.
He had to save a slew of break points in the decisive set before finally getting a look at Sinner’s serve at 3-3.
Flooring the Italian in three punishing rallies, the Serb broke him to lead 4-3, raised one fist and threw an icy stare at his player’s box.
Djokovic had to save another three break points in the next service game, but sent Serbian fans into delirium when he survived them all and held with an ace.
Serving for the match at 5-4, Djokovic summoned the grit and champion spirit of 20 years at the top, setting up two match points with a forehand winner down the line.
Sinner saved both, but finally fired a backhand wide to concede, leaving Djokovic to throw away his racket, get down on his knees and cross his chest.
WASHINGTON — It took Democrats nearly a year to respond with a unified message to President Trump’s signature policy initiative, harnessing national outrage over the administration’s immigration enforcement tactics in Minnesota this week to leverage government funding and demand change.
Yet divisions persist as the party barrels toward midterm elections and, a year from now, the start of primary season. And Gavin Newsom stands right in the middle of them.
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George Skelton and Michael Wilner cover the insights, legislation, players and politics you need to know in 2024. In your inbox Monday and Thursday mornings.
A calibrated position by the California governor has placed him to the right of the party’s progressive base that has opposed the very existence of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for years — well before Republican lawmakers passed legislation doubling the agency’s budget, increasing its presence and visibility in American life.
Newsom has rejected calls for ICE to be abolished since the 2024 campaign, when Democrats saw clear alarms in public polling that showed President Biden and his vice president, Kamala Harris, on the back foot against Trump on immigration. To the contrary, Newsom has highlighted California’s cooperation with the agency, and his efforts to protect that relationship from progressive local lawmakers.
While Trump’s federalization of the California National Guard last summer was prompted, in part, by protests in Los Angeles against ICE raids across the city, the governor’s reaction focused more on the president’s alleged abuses of power than on the ICE raids themselves. To the extent he did comment on them, Newsom characterized their deployment as unnecessary and gratuitous, a political tool used to intimidate the population.
After the killing of U.S. citizen Renee Good, 37, by ICE officers earlier this month, and days before the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, also 37 and a U.S. citizen, by Border Patrol agents last weekend, Newsom told conservative podcaster Ben Shapiro that his position against abolishing the agency had not changed. And he disassociated himself from a social media post by his office that characterized ICE’s conduct in Minneapolis as “state-sponsored terrorism.”
“California has cooperated with more ICE transfers probably than any other state in the country, and I have vetoed multiple pieces of legislation that have come from my Legislature to stop the ability for the state of California to do that,” Newsom told Shapiro.
The immigration enforcement agency received a massive influx of cash for detention facilities and recruitment last year with the passage of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Republicans now hope to build on that law with even greater appropriations this year, providing ICE with more funding than most foreign militaries, including the armies of Iran, Turkey, Canada and Mexico.
“I disagreed when I think a candidate for president by the name of Harris said that in the last campaign,” Newsom added, of calls to abolish the agency. “I remember being on [MS NOW’s Chris Hayes’ show] hours later saying, ‘I think that’s a mistake.’ So, absolutely.”
A progressive rallying cry
It’s a position in stark contrast with potential 2028 Democratic hopefuls that could pose a challenge to Newsom’s presidential ambitions.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democratic lawmaker from New York said to be considering a bid, has referred to ICE as “a rogue agency that should not exist.” The agency “doesn’t deserve a dime” of federal dollars, she has said, “until they can prove they are honoring human rights.”
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Fremont), also rumored to be considering a run for the nomination, has advocated explicitly for ICE to be replaced with a new entity, built from scratch, without the baggage of the Sept. 11–era agency.
“Frankly, we need to tear down the ICE agency and have a new federal agency to enforce immigration law under the Justice Department,” Khanna said this week.
After Pretti’s death, Newsom also called for a pause to any “new funding” for ICE. He did not call for a review of its existing, historic levels of funding.
“Suspend the LAWLESS mass deportation raids nationwide NOW — ICE is no longer just deporting dangerous criminals,” the governor wrote on X. “Send the border patrol back to the border. End the militarization of ICE.”
Showdown on Capitol Hill
Pretti’s death is already complicating efforts to avert another government shutdown in Washington, as Democrats — joined by some Republicans — view the episode as a tipping point in the debate over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies.
Senate Democrats pledged this week to block funding for the Department of Homeland Security unless changes are made to ICE operations in Minnesota. And Democrats in the House are calling for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s departure as a condition in shutdown negotiations with the White House. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) threatened to pursue her impeachment if Trump doesn’t fire her first.
Both demands track with Newsom’s latest position. The California governor was harshly critical of Senate Democrats when, during the shutdown late last year, a core bloc voted with Republicans to reopen the government without achieving any meaningful concessions in their weeks-long fight over healthcare tax breaks.
The latest Democratic uproar over ICE tactics threatens a similarly broad spending package that also includes funding for the rest of the government, including the departments of Defense, Education, Health, Labor and Transportation.
“Senate Democrats have made clear we are ready to quickly advance the five appropriations bills separately from the DHS funding bill before the Jan. 30 deadline,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said this week.
“The responsibility to prevent a partial government shutdown,” he added, “is on [Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.)] and Senate Republicans.”
Times staff writer Ana Ceballos, in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.
A note to readers: I will be out on parental leave until April, but fear not, California Politics will be in capable hands. You’ll keep getting the latest each week from my distinguished colleagues.
I’ll see you all soon, Michael Wilner
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Last year, Spotify paid out more than $11 billion to the music industry, bringing the company’s total payouts since launch to nearly $70 billion.
The milestone year reflected the “largest annual payment to music from any retailer in history,” the company announced on Wednesday in a post. In 2025, Spotify’s payout amount grew by over 10%, making the Sweden-based streamer one of the industry’s main revenue drivers.
“Big, industry-wide numbers can feel abstract, but that growth is showing up in tangible ways,” wrote Charlie Hellman, the company’s new head of music. “Despite rampant misinformation about how streaming is working today, the reality is that this is an era full of more success stories and promise than at any point in history.”
When music streaming was first introduced, there was some controversy about how much artists earn from streams. According to Spotify, independent artists and labels accounted for half of all royalties. Additionally, the company said there are currently more artists earning over $100,000 a year from Spotify alone than were getting stocked on shelves at the height of the compact disc era.
Founded in 2006, the company, with a large presence in L.A.’s Arts District, has become the world’s most popular audio streaming subscription service. The platform offers access to over 100 million tracks, podcasts and audiobooks in over 180 markets.
At the top of the year, founder Daniel Ek moved from his CEO position to become executive chairman. Spotify named two co-CEOs, Gustav Söderström and Alex Norström, in his place.
This month, Spotify raised prices for its premium subscribers in the U.S., bringing the costto $12.99 per month. Hellman disclosed that as Spotify’s audience continues to grow, the higher prices are designed to help with the company’s ongoing expansion. According to the post, Spotify makes up roughly 30% of recorded music revenue and pays out two-thirds of all music revenue to the industry. The other third gets invested back into the company to maintain an “unrivaled listening experience.”
Separately, Spotify said it is hoping to counter new developments in AI by reinforcing a human connection between artists and fans. This includes an emphasis on more artist-powered videos, continuing to promote artists’ live shows on the platform and expanding the role of the company’s music curators. The streamer also has plans to crack down on AI-driven artists on the platform.
“AI is being exploited by bad actors to flood streaming services with low-quality slop to game the system and attempt to divert royalties away from authentic artists,” said Hellman. “We’re going to introduce changes to the systems for artist verification, song credits, and protecting artist identity. It’s critical to ensuring listeners and rightsholders can trust who made the music they’re hearing.”
This charming village has been dubbed a ‘hidden gem’ by travellers and it’s packed with historic sites and highly-rated cosy food spots serving some of the best treats.
Head to this Northumbrian village for your next day out.(Image: Getty Images)
Positioned along the St Oswald’s Way walking route, between Rothbury and Warkworth, lies a delightful hidden gem village that ranks among Northumberland’s best-kept secrets.
Tucked away beside the River Coquet, this small village gained fame for accommodating Oliver Cromwell during his journey to the Battle of Dunbar. It sits 8.9 miles from Alnwick and 12 miles from Morpeth, just 37 miles south of the Scottish border.
Felton village offers an ideal blend of historic and modern elements, particularly around its centre. Two distinct bridges, positioned close together, link Felton with the opposite bank of the River Coquet.
The historic stone crossing originates from the 15th century and remains closed to vehicles, whilst the more recent concrete structure was constructed in 1926 – both hold Grade II Listed status and draw considerable interest from residents and visitors.
The older crossing – recognised for its historical and architectural significance – regularly hosts key village gatherings, including the beloved wassailing tradition at Christmas, reports Chronicle Live.
Additional historical treasures in this picturesque settlement include the Grade I listed St Michael and All Angels church, constructed around 1200, which appears almost enclosed within another structure due to numerous extensions and modifications over the centuries.
Rambling and angling represent two favourite pastimes for both locals and tourists in Felton, with the River Coquet readily reachable via the village centre. Beyond that, Felton boasts two highly-regarded food and drink destinations.
First up is The Northumberland Arms – a beautifully restored 1820s coaching inn originally built by the 3rd Duke of Northumberland.
This delightful historic treasure sits opposite the river near Felton and boasts a River Room Conservatory alongside a bar, restaurant and six ensuite luxury bedrooms.
One delighted guest wrote on Tripadvisor: “The hotel is a lovely historic building in a great setting, easy access to river walks.
“The rooms were attractive , clean and spacious, I thought fabulous, not what I expected when I walked through the door of an old village pub.”
For visitors seeking a brief refreshment stop in Felton, there’s an ideal option available. An artisan bakery named The Running Fox, cherished by locals, has been delighting guests for years.
Since welcoming its first customers in 2011, The Running Fox has become renowned for its afternoon teas and baked goods.
Set in stunning rural surroundings, The Running Fox nestles beside the River Coquet and is encircled by numerous scenic country walks.
One satisfied customer left a glowing review on Tripadvisor for the bakery, writing: “One of the best afternoon teas. Afternoon tea, freshly made sandwiches which were delicious various fillings to choose from with home made bread, such a change from the usual pre made cardboard efforts you get in other places, choice of a wedge of pie or quiche, scones fabulously light, and a slice of cake also homemade from huge selection. Breakfast and lunch menu also looked very appealing. Service excellent, staff very friendly and helpful.”
Another visitor shared their praise, commenting: “I think that the Afternoon Tea offered at the Running Fox is outstanding – great value for money and the food; the variety and the quality are always excellent! We will be back (again!)”
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George Skelton and Michael Wilner cover the insights, legislation, players and politics you need to know in 2024. In your inbox Monday and Thursday mornings.
SACRAMENTO — When a California governor goes to Europe and lectures world leaders that they must “grow a spine” and “stand tall” against the American president, I wince.
Not that they shouldn’t, nor that President Trump doesn’t deserve almost any nasty thing said about him. It just seems a tad arrogant.
A world stage in the Swiss Alps is not the proper place for a state governor to be scolding leaders of foreign nations about how they should deal with the U.S. president, no matter how despicably Trump behaves.
Gov. Gavin Newsom is merely the top elected official of one state, even if he can boast that it’s the fourth- or fifth-largest economy in the world. It still doesn’t have a seat at the United Nations or an awesome military that is the heart of NATO and the Western alliance.
Contrary to hackneyed bragging points, California is not a “nation state.” We’re a state — highly populated, but one of 50.
At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week, Newsom was like the lightweight boxer trying to punch far above his class.
And that’s fine for here in the U.S. This is the arena where it belongs.
One can argue that Newsom overdoes it, reaching for all the national exposure he can grab and not focusing enough on the job Californians hired him for at the state Capitol. But there’s no disputing his political success nationally. He’s leading the early polls of potential contenders for the presidential nomination.
But that was probably of little concern for the foreign leaders and other global elites attending the prestigious annual World Economic Forum.
Newsom was given two speaking slots, presumably to inform international movers and shakers about California’s golden investment opportunities. But after arriving, he began blathering about the evil American president, Trump’s threats to hike tariffs and seize Greenland and how European leaders are allegedly cowering before him.
The governor soon after was disinvited to speak at one event, a series of interviews hosted by Fortune magazine at USA House, the Trump administration headquarters.
Newsom blamed Trump for blocking his participation, accusing White House staffers of pressuring the event sponsors.
Well, duh! You can’t shoot spit wads like a little kid at a big meanie and not expect some to be shot back.
“No one in Davos knows who third-rate governor Newscum is or why he is frolicking around Switzerland instead of fixing the problems he created in California,” asserted White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly, using the classless president’s oft-repeated derogatory name for the governor.
Whatever. Snatching Newsom’s mic was probably the right decision. Davos delegates didn’t need to hear a political stump speech attacking the American president or be berated by a governor for also not beating up on him.
This was some of the fiery, expletive-laced stuff the governor had been telling reporters, referring to European leaders:
“Wake up! Where the hell has everybody been? Stop this bullshit diplomacy of sort of niceties. … Have some spine, some goddamn balls ….
“The Europeans should decide for themselves what to do, but one thing they can’t do is what they’ve been doing. … And it’s embarrassing. Just, I can’t take this complicity, people rolling over. I should have brought a bunch of knee pads for all the world leaders. … I mean, it’s just pathetic.
“And I hope people understand how pathetic they look on the world stage.”
The leaders of Canada and France demonstrated how to make the same point — but with dignity — about standing firm against bullying.
French President Emanuel Macron said, “We do prefer respect to bullies. And we do prefer rule of law to brutality.”
Newsom was allowed to keep one speaking slot: an interview on the forum’s main stage with Ben Smith, editor in chief of the news outfit Semafor.
“Is it surprising the Trump administration didn’t like my commentary and wanted to make sure that I was not allowed to speak? No,” Newsom said. “It’s consistent with … their authoritarian tendencies.”
There’s something distasteful — perhaps even unpatriotic — about an elected American official, regardless of party, vilifying a U.S. president when among allied leaders abroad. Even if it is the dreadful Trump.
But American politics has changed greatly for the worse in recent years, as evidenced by the Newsom-Trump spitball flinging.
California Gov. George Deukmejian spoke at the 1989 Davos forum and was a model of civil diplomacy, promoting the state’s trade and investment opportunities and laying off demagoguery.
Of course, Deukmejian and President Bush were both Republicans. So the Duke didn’t assail the president, not that he would have anyway. He had too much respect for the presidential institution when traveling abroad.
But unlike today’s top elected Republicans, Deukmejian didn’t shy away from giving the president advice. At Davos, the governor urged Bush not to renege on his “read my lips, no new taxes” pledge that got him elected. To reduce the federal deficit, cut spending, the governor cautioned.
Bush ignored such advice and raised taxes — and lost his 1992 reelection bid to Democrat Bill Clinton.
Clinton’s campaign motto is still a classic: “It’s the economy, stupid!”
Newsom needs to pick up on that. Or at least work it into his anti-Trump rant.
In the roiling debate over California’s proposed billionaire tax, supporters and critics agree that such policies haven’t always worked in the past. But the lessons they’ve drawn from that history are wildly different.
The Billionaire Tax Act, which backers are pushing to get on the November ballot, would charge California’s 200-plus billionaires a one-time, 5% tax on their net worth in order to backfill billions of dollars in Republican-led cuts to federal healthcare funding for middle-class and low-income residents.
Critics of the proposal have argued that past failures of similar wealth taxes in Europe prove they don’t work and can cause more harm than good, including by driving the ultra-rich out. Among those critics is San José Mayor Matt Mahan, a tech-friendly Democrat who is contemplating a run for governor.
“Over the last 30 years, we’ve seen a dozen European countries pursue national-level wealth taxes,” Mahan said. “Nine of them have rolled them back. A majority have seen a decline in overall revenue. It’s actually shrunk the tax base, not increased it, and it’s because it creates a perverse incentive and drives capital flight.”
Backers of the measure acknowledge such failures but say that they learned from them and that California’s proposal is stronger as a result.
Brian Galle, a UC Berkeley tax law professor and one of four academic experts who drafted the measure, said if it gets on the ballot, every voter in the state will receive a copy of the full text, a one-page explainer on what it does, and nearly two dozen additional pages of “rules for preventing wealthy people and their army of lawyers from dodging” it.
Many of those rules, he said, are based on historical lessons from places where such taxes have failed, but also where they’ve succeeded.
“If you understand the actual lessons of history, you understand that this bill is more like the successful Swiss and Spanish wealth taxes,” Galle said. “Part of that is learning from history.”
Warnings from Europe
Since the 1990s, several European countries have repealed net wealth taxes, including Austria, Denmark, Finland, France and Germany.
A major example cited by critics of the California proposal is France, which implemented a much larger wealth tax on far more people, including many millionaires. The measure raised modest revenues, which fell as rich people moved out of the country to avoid paying, and the measure was repealed by the government of President Emmanuel Macron in 2017.
In a 2018 report on net wealth taxes, the Paris-based Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development found that European repeals were often driven by “efficiency and administrative concerns and by the observation that net wealth taxes have frequently failed to meet their redistributive goals.”
“The revenues collected from net wealth taxes have also, with a few exceptions, been very low,” it found.
Critics and skeptics of the California proposal say they expect California to run into all the same problems.
Mahan and others have pointed to a handful of prominent billionaires who already appear to be distancing themselves from the state, and said they expect more to follow — which Mahan said will reduce California’s “recurring revenue” beyond the amount raised by the one-time tax.
Kent Smetters, faculty director of the Penn Wharton Budget Model, which analyzes the fiscal effects of public policies, said net worth taxes in other countries have “always raised quite a bit less revenue than what was initially projected,” in large part because “wealth is easy, as it turns out, to try to reclassify or move around” and “there’s all these tricks that you can do to try to make the wealth look smaller for tax purposes.”
A bus in London promotes a campaign by British millionaires advocating for an end to extreme wealth and inequality.
(Carl Court / Getty Images)
Smetters said he expects that the California measure will raise less than the $100 billion estimated by its backers because billionaire wealth in California — much of it derived from the tech sector — is relatively “mobile,” as many tech barons can move without it affecting business.
“Policymakers have to understand that they’re not going to get nearly as much money as they often project from a purely static projection, where they’re not accounting for the different ways that people can move their wealth, reclassify their wealth, or even just move out of the state,” Smetters said. “So far, we only know of a few people — with a lot of money — who have moved out of the state, [but] that number could go up.”
Kevin Ghassomian, a private wealth lawyer at Venable who advises rich clients, said he expects the administrative costs of enforcing the tax to be massive for the state — and much greater than the drafters have anticipated.
On the front end, the state will face a wave of legal challenges to the tax’s constitutionality and its retroactive application to all billionaires living in the state as of the end of 2025.
Moving ahead, he said, there will be litigation from wealthy individuals whose departure from California is questioned or who dispute the state’s valuation of their net worth or individual assets — including private holdings, which the state doesn’t have extensive experience assessing.
Valuating such assets will be “a nightmare, just practically speaking, and it’s going to require a lot of administrators at the state level,” Ghassomian said, especially considering many California billionaires’ wealth is in the form of illiquid holdings in startups and other ventures with fluctuating market valuations.
“You could be a billionaire today, and then the market plummets, and now all of a sudden, you’re a pauper,” he said. “It could really lead to some unfair results.”
Lessons from Europe
Backers of California’s proposal said they have accounted for many of the historical pitfalls with wealth taxes and taken steps to avoid them — including by making it harder for wealthy Californians to simply shuffle money around to avoid the tax.
“There are a lot of provisions that are designed based on what has worked well in other countries with wealth taxes in the modern era, especially Switzerland, and there are also provisions meant to shut down some of the holes in some of the earlier wealth tax efforts, especially the France one, that were viewed as not successful,” said David Gamage, a University of Missouri tax law professor and another of the proposal’s drafters.
Galle said the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development study found that many of Europe’s historical wealth taxes “hadn’t figured out how to solve the problem of what small businesses were worth,” so were more narrowly focused on publicly traded stock and real estate. “Over time, there was a lot of abuse where people shifted their assets to make them look privately held.”
The California proposal “tries to solve that problem” by including small businesses and other privately held wealth in their calculations of net worth, he said — and benefits from the fact that such wealth has gotten a lot easier to track and appraise in recent years.
Doing so would be a familiar exercise for many California billionaires already, he said, as it is hard to raise venture capital, for example, without audited financial statements.
Backers of the measure said it is harder for U.S. citizens to avoid taxes by moving abroad than it has been for Europeans, and that evidence from Switzerland and Spain suggests differing tax rates between a nation’s individual states do not cause massive interstate flight.
San José Mayor Matt Mahan, who might run for governor, opposes the proposed tax on California billionaires.
(Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)
For example, each state in Spain sets its own wealth tax rate, and Madrid’s is 0% — but that has not caused an exodus from other parts of Spain to Madrid, Galle said.
The risk of California billionaires avoiding the tax by simply moving to another U.S. state was further mitigated by the measure’s Jan. 1 deadline for avoiding the tax. Galle said the deadline “was intended to make it more difficult for individuals to concoct the kind of misleading, apparent moves that wealthy people have used in other places to try to avoid a wealth tax.”
Gamage said that “history shows if a tax on the wealthy can be avoided by moving paper around, claiming that you live in another location without actually moving your life there, moving assets to accounts or trusts nominally in foreign countries or other jurisdictions, you see large mobility responses.”
But when “those paper moves are shut down,” there’s much less moving — and “that’s the basis for the California model,” he added.
The outlook
Ghassomian, who said he has been “fielding a lot of inbound inquiries from clients who are just kind of worried,” said it is clear that the proposal’s authors “have done their homework” and tried to design the tax in a smart way.
Still, he said, he has concerns about the cost of administering the tax outpacing revenues, especially amid litigation. Residency battles alone with billionaires whose claims of departing the state are questioned could take “years and years and years” to resolve, he said.
“The revenue has to line up with expenditures, and if you can’t count on the revenue because it’s going to be tied up in courts, or it’s going to be delayed, then I think that creates some real logistical hurdles,” he said.
Smetters said predicting revenues from a tax on so many different types of assets is “really hard,” but one thing that has generally held true through history is that “most countries, even with less-mobile wealth, typically do not get the type of revenue that they were hoping for.”
David Sacks, a venture capitalist and President Trump’s AI czar who decamped from California to Texas, said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week that the measure was an “asset seizure” more than a tax, and that the state would be headed in a “scary direction” if voters approved it.
Darien Shanske, a tax law professor at UC Davis and another drafter of the proposal, said he and his colleagues did their best to “look at the lessons of the past, and apply them in a way that makes sense and is generally fair and administrable” — in a state where wealth inequality is rapidly growing and a wealth tax presents unique opportunities.
“Having a tax on billionaires does make particular sense in California because of the large number that live here and the large number who have made their fortune here,” he said.
Shanske said the proposed tax is designed to provide California a way to “triage” soaring healthcare premiums resulting from legislation enacted by the Trump administration and congressional Republicans. The proposal asks for contributions from people who will quickly recoup what they are taxed given the exponential growth of their assets, he said.
Emmanuel Saez, director of the Stone Center on Wealth and Income Inequality at UC Berkeley and another drafter of the measure, said many of the repealed European taxes targeted millionaires while providing loopholes for billionaires to avoid paying, whereas California’s measure is “exactly the reverse.”
He said the measure will raise substantial revenue in part because California billionaire wealth more than doubled from 2023 to 2025 alone, and is “the innovative and first-of-its-kind tax on the ultra-wealthy that the moment requires.”
Thomas Piketty, a French economist and author of “Capital in the Twenty-First Century,” called California’s proposed tax “very innovative” and “relatively modest” compared with massive wealth taxes after World War II — including in Germany and Japan — and said it would not only improve healthcare in the state but “have an enormous impact on the U.S. and international political scene.”
“In the current context, with a deeply entrenched billionaire class, wealth taxes meet even more political resistance than in the postwar context, and this is where California could make a huge difference,” he said. “The fact of targeting the revenue to health spending is also very innovative and can help convince the voters to support the initiative.”
Times staff writer Seema Mehta contributed to this report.
