history

The “biggest oil deal in history” was announced almost simultaneously by acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez and U.S. President Donald Trump on Aug. 28. However, many Venezuelans didn’t find out until the next day because massive blackouts — up to 16 hours a day and partly caused by increased oil production — kept them from scrolling the news.

At the United Nations a month later, Trump bragged that he had taken Venezuela’s “spoils,” while Rodríguez said the deal with the U.S. would contribute to resolving the energy needs of “the hemisphere and the international economy.” Venezuelans then asked: What about our energy needs and economy?

The oil deal, the legal and operational details of which are still unknown, covers the exploitation of 17 fields and 65 billion barrels, which equates to 20% of Venezuela’s total reserves — the world’s largest, at an estimated 303 billion barrels. U.S. companies will invest $100 billion in exploiting the fields, a figure which — according to Venezuelan government projections — would translate into more than $209 billion in tax revenue for Venezuela over the years of the contract.

The announcement sparked questions and criticism from different sectors of the country, with concerns about the lack of information and the impact on sovereignty. In response, Rodríguez tried to explain the deal’s benefits in a nationally televised address, noting, “How much does Venezuela receive? Based on a barrel price of $65 … revenue would reach $209.3 billion for the state. In concrete terms, this means that for every barrel produced and sold, about $19 goes to [Venezuela].”

Oil drives the Venezuelan economy. Currently, it accounts for 71% of the nation’s total exports, but now much of that revenue goes to the U.S. In the first quarter of this year, out of a total of $7.76 billion in exports, $5.5 billion came from oil activity. As the acting president’s address went on, many of us only had more doubts.

A few hours later, Venezuelan economist Francisco Rodríguez summed up some of the nation’s concerns: “Do the projected tax revenues … correspond to nominal amounts, inflation-adjusted amounts, or net present values? A nominal amount of $19 per barrel in 2051, the project’s final year, would correspond to a real value of about $9 today.”

“The $209 billion equates, over 25 years, to about $8.4 billion annually, a relatively low amount compared with the tax revenue Venezuela has collected in the past at similar production levels. The amount would be even lower if it corresponds to a nominal total.” According to Central Bank of Venezuela data, Venezuela took in a record $82.8 billion in 2008 alone from oil sales.

Contradictions

Trump later contradicted Delcy Rodríguez’s 25-year timeline, saying the deal would involve a century of concessions. Francisco Rodríguez, the economist, noted that extracting 65 billion barrels in 25 years would be impossible, due to lack of infrastructure. 

“What rights does the U.S. acquire over these resources after 25 years? Can a future Venezuelan government decide to withdraw from this deal if it doesn’t like it?” he asked.

And why wouldn’t they like it? Trump said on Truth Social that Venezuela will begin supplying the U.S. strategic oil reserve immediately through “a gift.” Nobody knows what that means exactly, but since the military intervention on Jan. 3, the revenue generated by the sale of Venezuelan oil — we don’t know how much that is either — is already “in the custody” of the U.S. Treasury.

“It doesn’t look like Venezuela will benefit broadly in the long term. It’s like being on floor minus-18 and going up to minus-10,” Venezuelan researcher Blas Regnault, who specializes in energy policy and oil governance, told Truthdig from The Hague, Netherlands.

“There could be an indirect reactivation of the economy because of the indirect jobs that may emerge in some regions. But let’s also keep in mind that the country has been 100% blockaded, suffocated, so any door that opens will bring some benefits, but this is not the benefit one would expect for a sovereign country,” he said. 

“That’s the other problem: There’s no sovereignty of any kind over the resource itself, over what’s being sold. On top of that, there’s a lot of opacity — you’re analyzing blind.”

This “opacity” is also illegal. Articles 150 and Article 187, Paragraph 9, of Venezuela’s Constitution state that contracts of national public interest with foreign states or entities require approval from the National Assembly. However, although the Assembly endorsed the announcement of the deal on Sept. 1, its president, Jorge Rodríguez, said it had not yet been “submitted” to the legislature. Then, a month later he said that “according to some legal experts, it doesn’t need to be reviewed.”

It’s clear that Venezuela is once again, as it was for much of the 20th century, a kind of “U.S. oil province,” Regnault says, “Recovering sovereignty won’t be easy because Venezuela is strategic to U.S. interests.”

“On top of that, the other side of the coin is that China has become a key player [globally]. Today the Chinese do what Saudi Arabia used to do when it cut production and pushed prices up. With this Strait of Hormuz crisis, after the naval blockade of Iran, it was discovered that China had more reserves than previously thought, and that kept the crisis from being bigger and the price from reaching $150.”

That is precisely why U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio celebrated the fact that several of the oil fields included in the deal were once “dominated by China and Russia and Iran.” At the same time, the U.S. government has decided to maintain sanctions against Venezuela, thereby preventing any new economic players. In fact, the U.S. Treasury Department, through its Office of Foreign Assets Control, updated its oil licensing policy for Venezuela in late September through Orders 46E, 48D and 49B, which benefit U.S. businesses but maintain an absolute ban on Russia, Iran, Cuba, North Korea and China.

“The [Venezuelan] government has already amended the Hydrocarbons Law to try to create more favorable conditions for investors in the oil and gas sector, but … the [U.S.’] problem isn’t domestic supply. They need to monopolize the world’s energy reserves, markets and prices in order to prevail in the rest of their economic activities,” oil expert David Paravisini explains to Truthdig from Caracas, referring to a legal reform that was passed on Jan. 29 and created the possibility of technical and operational management and direct commercialization by private companies. He believes that for Venezuela, the deal is a diplomatic “quest” to survive. 

Trump is also maintaining some of his domestic support by presenting Venezuela as the great economic and geopolitical victory of his administration, especially after the war against Iran — which was supposed to last “only a couple of weeks” — reached the six-month mark and cost more than $37.5 billion through the end of July. In fact, Trump has claimed again and again that this oil deal will lower fuel costs inside the U.S. and come “at no cost whatsoever to the American taxpayer.””

Does this mean the $100 billion investment will come from private companies? The deal also aims to exploit eight greenfield blocks, areas where crude has been identified but which have not yet been developed. But what happens if that investment does not materialize? Since Jan. 9, Trump has been trying, without success, to persuade U.S. oil companies to invest in Venezuela.

Corruption is fine if the U.S. profits

So far, the only company we’ve heard about is North American Blue Energy Partners (NABEP), which was selected on Aug. 31 by the Trump administration to lead oil extraction projects in the 17 Venezuelan fields.

According to the White House, the Department of Defense will hold a 35% equity stake in NABEP and, in addition, the Barbados-registered company will grant Washington the right to buy 20% of the oil it produces at the cost of production.

NABEP, which has only operated in Venezuela for two years, was awarded the deal without a prior bidding process. The company belongs to Venezuelan businessperson Alejandro Betancourt, who was under investigation by federal prosecutors in Florida until January 2026 for allegedly laundering more than $1 billion from the state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA). The case was then closed suddenly under the orders of U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche (now the attorney general), after a decade-long investigation. He is still the subject of open investigations in Switzerland and Spain.

Betancourt comes from a middle-class family but studied at the private religious school Instituto Cumbres de Caracas, where he befriended Javier Alvarado Pardi, son of Javier Alvarado Ochoa, who later became president of Electricidad de Caracas, deputy energy minister and a PDVSA executive.

Back in 2009, Alvarado Ochoa presented Betancourt and his engineering firm, Derwick Associates, as the best solution to Venezuela’s power generation crisis. Betancourt went on to receive 12 government contracts, awarded without competitive bidding, worth a total of $5 billion, which were either never completed or were implemented improperly, according to Transparency Venezuela and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (which is funded by the U.S. government, among other countries).

So why Betancourt? Rubio said that he is no longer under investigation by the U.S., has supported the Venezuelan opposition and he has demonstrated his ability to produce oil. In that vein, NABEP claims it produces 200,000 barrels of crude a day, just behind Chevron.

However, Victor Hugo Majano, a Venezuelan investigative journalist and director of the well-known outlet La Tabla, told Truthdig that Betancourt overbilled the Venezuelan state by billions of dollars for power plants that never worked. He cited information from Thor Halvorssen, an anti-Chavista activist and cousin of Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López. With that money, Betancourt bought a Dassault Falcon private jet and the historic Alamíin Castle in Spain.

Halvorssen also says Betancourt, who is also linked to 50 companies spread across 15 countries, paid former New York prosecutor Adam S. Kaufmann to halt prosecutions; former Wall Street Journal reporters to discredit whistleblowers; and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani to bring the U.S. Justice Department over to his side.

“Despite this, the U.S. still doesn’t attack Venezuelan corruption. They want to protect the dollar and the U.S. financial system. They are only worried about securing capital flow, money that is not controlled by the state, the [Venezuelan] government,” Majano said.

More oil for the U.S., less electricity for Venezuela

Meanwhile, Venezuelans are paying the price for both Betancourt’s alleged corruption and the oil deal. So far this year, oil production has increased by 29.9%, going from 924,000 barrels per day (bpd) in January to an average of 1.2 million bpd. The increase has been driven by the need to deliver oil to U.S. companies, and it has directly worsened the nation’s electricity crisis.

Authorities acknowledge this; Venezuela’s interior minister, Diosdado Cabello, said in May the country is seeing higher electricity demand due to the growth in oil production, which “is a very serious problem.” The Ministry of Electrical Energy also noted that demand has reached 15,625 megawatts (MW), “the highest energy consumption figure in the last eight years, an increase of 3.6% compared with the peak reported in 2025.”

However, this statement omits that Venezuela actually has a nominal installed capacity of approximately 35,000 MW, double the country’s peak demand, but stable real generation barely reaches 11,000 MW. This shortfall is a result of both U.S. sanctions and domestic corruption, which together have led to disinvestment, lack of maintenance, fuel shortages (plants designed to run on natural gas have been forced to use low-quality diesel) and transmission problems.

Where does oil production come in? Víctor Poleo, an electrical engineer and former vice minister of Energy and Mines from 1999 to 2001, told Truthdig that “the national oil industry uses up about 1,500 MW, of which about 250 MW is self-generated, but another 1,250 MW is taken from the national interconnected system. This draw is 24/7 and must be continuous in order to carry out crude extraction, transport, pumps and compressors and refining.”

Poleo, who bases his analysis on studies by fellow electrical engineer Nelson Hernández, says light, medium and heavy crudes are estimated to require between 9 kilowatt-hours and 15 kilowatt-hours per barrel to produce. For extra-heavy Orinoco crudes, the estimate is 24 kilowatt-hours per barrel. “As a result, citizens lose their quality of life so that oil can be produced.”

This deterioration is particularly notable in Zulia state, Venezuela’s so-called oil cradle, where production has risen to between 350,000 and 370,000 barrels per day of light and medium crude — far below the historic peak of 1.5 million bpd in 2004, but a figure that, for its residents, has translated into daily blackouts exceeding 12 hours.

From the Isla Dorada residential complex in northern Maracaibo, capital of Zulia, José Javier León tells Truthdig that power failures “have worsened dramatically.” In his area, outages used to last four hours but now exceed seven. 

“In many places there are double rounds, meaning the power goes out in the morning and at night, or at night and then before dawn. All the problems have gotten worse, and we don’t know the real reasons. In the suburb of Cuatricentenario, one of the most working-class areas and where the government had the most electoral support, the cuts are the worst,” he says.

León complains that residents are not alerted when the outages will happen. There is nothing like the electricity rationing schedules of the past, which would at least let them plan better. “In my area, there is no domestic gas, so we have electric stoves. Also, these are apartment buildings, where we have to turn on pumps to get water.” To make matters worse, the temperature in Zulia often reaches 39 degrees Celsius (102 Fahrenheit) because of the humidity.

In the Andes, outages add up to as many as 12 hours a day, and 16 hours in rural or border areas. From La Hechicera, an urban neighborhood in the city of Mérida, Silvana Solano tells Truthdig that the power used to go out for seven to eight hours, once a day, “but for the past two months, it goes out twice a day, the first time for seven hours and the other for around five hours, and we can’t predict the schedule. This also affects phone signals, which keeps us from communicating, making payments, etc.”

Some government institutions, including the Mérida mayor’s office, are open only from 8 a.m. to noon. Solano says she is worried that public schools, which operate until 3 p.m., will also adopt this schedule, in turn affecting parents’ working hours. Throughout September, residents of the towns of Caja Seca (Zulia state) and Nueva Bolivia (Mérida state) blocked the Pan-American Highway to protest the power outages.

To Venezuela’s north, on the famous Margarita Island, Alejandro Pérez tells Truthdig there are areas that have gone seven to eight months without water service. “Here we pay for water trucks, $50 for 10,000 liters of water, sometimes with $60 we get 13,000 liters, but you have to pay in foreign cash or at the parallel rate because the Central Bank of Venezuela exchange rate isn’t accepted here.” The black market or informal exchange rate is worth more, for those with foreign currency, than the official exchange rate.

Unlike other Caribbean islands, Margarita doesn’t have significant natural sources of fresh water. Some 90% of the area’s water comes from the mainland, crossing the sea through underwater pipelines that require gigantic pumping stations.

The contradictory rhetoric and the endless problems we face daily mean that, according to the latest AtlasIntel poll conducted for Bloomberg News, only 10% of Venezuelans believe the country will benefit from the oil pact with the U.S. — data that also aligns with the most recent study by the firm Meganálisis, the same one that after Jan. 3 said 92.2% of Venezuelans loved Trump. Emotions change, social problems persist, and without electricity, no economic improvement will be possible.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Venezuelanalysis editorial staff.

Source: Truthdig

The quiet crowd had come alive. The quiet pitcher had become unhittable. The quiet catcher had loudly blasted a ball that sent Chavez Ravine into tremors.

In the sixth inning Wednesday night, with their pursuit of history on the line against those pesky Milwaukee Brewers, the somnolent Dodgers had finally come to life.

Moments later, they were dead again.

The Brewers’ Garrett Mitchell yells after hitting a solo home run in the seventh inning off Blake Snell in Game 3 of the NLCS at Dodger Stadium on Wednesday.

(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)

And they will remain so next spring.

After an inspiring, two-run rally authored by a bases-loaded double from Will Smith, Dodgers starter Blake Snell allowed back-to-back homers to Jake Bauers and Garrett Mitchell to open the seventh and eventually close out the Dodgers’ season in a 6-2 loss in Game 3 of the National League Championship Series.

It’s not over, but it is. The Dodgers aren’t done, but they’re so done.

The chase for a third consecutive World Series championship is historically and essentially and practically kaput. Their pursuit of a three-peat has been smothered by the Brewers’ own version of a three-peat, and nearly all hope is lost.

The Dodgers now trail the Brewers three-games-to-none in this best-of-seven series, a virtually impossible mountain to scale, achieved only once in major-league history.

Yes, Dave Roberts stole the base that spurred the Boston Red Sox to work out of a similar hole against the New York Yankees in 2004, but he’s no longer on the field and any of that inspiration has long since vanished.

“I don’t know if some of those guys even know I played,” said Roberts before the game..

They could have used some of his fire Wednesday in a game played against a background of apathetic embarrassment.

Namely, it wasn’t a sellout. How can an NLCS game in the most perpetually crowded baseball stadium in America not sell out?

The huge swaths of empty seats were perhaps a sign that, after watching their team slog through two losses in Milwaukee, Dodger nation had already given up. The 50,708 fans who did show up made lots of noise, but it was too late to reverse the optics of a team abandoned.

Dodgers left fielder Teoscar Hernández reacts after taking a strike in the sixth inning of Game 3 of the NLCS at Dodger Stadium.

(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)

Not surprisingly, there were several standing ovations given to injured star Shohei Ohtani, who the Dodgers considered benching before allowing him to talk his way into staying in the lineup. Also not surprisingly, Ohtani did little to reward his devotees, He hit a soft flyout, he was hit by a pitch, he drew a walk to help fuel the Dodgers sixth-inning rally and he singled after the Brewers had taken a three-run lead. No heroics. No hard hits. No chance.

The injury-plagued season of Ohtani will end with the Dodgers surely realizing that they should have taken control of his situation instead of empowering him to dictate the terms of his participation. They shouldn’t have let him keep playing hurt, but they did because they didn’t want to upset him, and it was the team that ended up paying the price.

All this negativity swirling around Dodger Stadium Wednesday night and, to think, the Dodgers were just moments from saving themselves.

Snell was brilliant for six innings, allowing just a leadoff home run to Jackson Chourio.

The Dodgers then set him up for a victory by taking advantage of a terrible decision by Brewers manager Pat Murphy.

Entering the sixth inning Brewers starter Robert Gasser had allowed just three singles in five shutout innings and had thrown just 72 pitches. Yet he was stunningly pulled by Murphy in favor of heavily used Abner Uribe.

Sure enough, Uribe threw eight balls in his next nine pitches to walk Teoscar Hernández and Kyle Tucker. After Max Muncy struck out, Ohtani drew a five-pitch walk in one of his best plate appearances this month.

Up stepped Smith, who entered the game with one hit in his previous 25 postseason plate appearances. But this night was going to be different, as it was hours after Will Smith’s wife, Cara, announced the birth of their third child.

Oh baby! Dad powered a two-run double off the left-center field fence to give the Dodgers a 2-1 lead.

Snell took the mound in the seventh having retired the previous 14 Brewers and looking strong. But he had not pitched this deep all season. And the Chourio home run was the first he had allowed this season.

Should Roberts have pulled him? You decide. Snell opened the seventh by walking Andrew Vaughn and losing an 11-pitch duel to Bauers, who won the battle with a two-run homer. Two pitches later, Garrett Mitchell took Snell deep to almost exactly the same right-center field spot to give the Brewers a 4-2 lead they never lost.

Snell was gone, but it was too late and too much. The weary and distracted Dodgers never again showed much energy on a night when Dodger Stadium did its best.

There was Keith Williams Jr. hitting all the high notes — and even higher — during his usual incredible national anthem.

Brewers first baseman Jake Bauers hits a two-run home run during the seventh inning of Game 3 of the NLCS on Wednesday at Dodger Stadium.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

There was past Brewers playoff nemesis Chris Taylor chanting, “It’s time for Dodger baseball!.”

Late in the game, there was even unofficial Dodger emcee Ice Cube on the video board saying “We ain’t backing down to no one.”

The hardest part of all this is that Cube is wrong. The Milwaukee Brewers are a good team but make no mistake.

Blessed with an opportunity to step up and make history, the Dodgers backed down.

Soon to be knocked out.

Nearly 40 years have passed since a Californian was president.

Several have pursued the White House in the decades since Ronald Reagan ambled into retirement, in January 1989. But not a one succeeded. Kamala Harris, who was saved from political purgatory when Joe Biden chose her as his running mate, came closest — though not close — in 2024.

The 2028 race could bring at least three more California contestants, none of whom seem likely to end the state’s presidential dry spell.

Some of that speaks to the individual flaws and political frailties of those who are, at the least, eyeing a 2028 bid: Harris, outgoing Gov. Gavin Newsom and five-term Silicon Valley Rep. Ro Khanna.

The problem they all face is their return address.

“There was a cliche that dates to the ‘60s or ‘70s, or maybe before that,” said Matthew Dallek, who was born and raised in Los Angeles and now teaches political management at George Washington University. “‘As California goes, so goes the nation.’ I don’t think that world exists anymore.”

Or as Jim Newton, a former L.A. Times reporter and editor and now a biographer and California historian, bluntly put it, the state has migrated in the minds of many beyond its golden confines “from a kind of serious west of the West place to a kind of hippy-dippy silly place.”

Not necessarily an accurate assessment on the part of those naysayers, but a damning perception nonetheless.

Political bookends

In many ways, Reagan and Harris serve as ideal exemplars of their home state and how it’s changed — along with attitudes toward California — in the decades between Reagan’s 1980 election as president and what would be, in 2028, Harris’ third try.

(The former vice president hasn’t ruled in or out another White House bid. Newsom has said he won’t run if Harris does. Khanna is in limbo until after November’s midterm election.)

Reagan was a product of the nation’s heartland and a California transplant. The state that launched him to the White House was predominantly white and Republican, an arsenal of the Cold War and the birthplace of a grass-roots anti-tax movement that swept the nation. His conservatism was seen by many as an antidote to the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s.

“California was in some ways on the cutting edge of American politics because it was signaling the direction in which our national politics were trending,” said Dallek, who wrote a book about Reagan’s first electoral victory, in the 1966 gubernatorial race. “Reagan was kind of the tip of the spear.”

Although leaning to the right, especially in presidential races, California was a robust two-party state until the mid-1990s, with several Democrats holding statewide office and long periods when Democrats controlled one or both houses of the Legislature. That competitiveness, along with California’s sizable cache of electoral votes, helped boost Reagan’s political standing nationally.

Harris was born in Oakland, the daughter of a father from Jamaica and a mother from India. By the time the Democrat left for Washington in 2017, to serve as a U.S. senator, then vice president, California had turned as blue as a cloudless desert sky.

California had more brown than white residents. The military was no longer the all-mighty economic engine it had been. And with Democrats in hegemonic control of Sacramento, the state had become the country’s preeminent bastion of liberal values and policies.

Many see that progressivism as overly obsessed with identity politics, personal pronouns and the like, ignoring practicalities and the day-to-day concerns of most voters.

California “has sort of gone off the deep end,” said Ken Khachigian, a longtime conservative strategist in Orange County, who worked for both Reagan and Richard M. Nixon.

(Between the two, California had a seat in the White House for more than half a roughly 40-year stretch. Nixon served two terms as vice president before winning the presidency in 1968. His second term was cut short when the Watergate scandal drove him from office.)

Khachigian noted that Republicans rule over states that are just as politically lopsided as California: Indiana, Mississippi, Idaho and Utah, for instance. “But they don’t seem crazed like California,” he said.

That’s obviously one partisan’s perspective.

‘Far left … ungovernable’

But Dallek agreed it’s no longer a political asset to come from California, which much of the country sees as “pretty far to the left.”

“And somewhat ungovernable at this point,” he added. “You have incredible, insane amounts of wealth concentrated in places like Silicon Valley and parts of Los Angeles and then you have incredible amounts of poverty and homelessness…. There’s not a sense that what’s happening in California really resonates across the country.”

There is a case to be made that California is great and good in so many ways, beyond just its incredible natural splendor.

It has the world’s fourth-largest economy, as Newsom and others never tire of pointing out. It remains on the cutting edge of culture, research and technology. It’s still a place that offers fertile ground for the imagination, for reinvention and for second chances.

Newcomers, from other states and abroad, are welcomed like in few other places. The unofficial California credo — live and let live — makes it possible to be one’s authentic self without fear of shame, ostracism or constraint.

Harris, Newsom, Khanna or any Democrat hailing from California will doubtless argue those virtues are what makes the state truly shine, convinced it’s a model they can sell the rest of America.

Good luck with that.

What else you should be reading

Get smart: Is there a doctor in the House? Backlash to Trump, RFK Jr. may boost their political ranks
The deep dive: Republican Steve Hilton leans on cheeky ads, voter discontent in long-shot campaign for governor
The L.A. Times Special:Take a breath. Educate yourself. Then vote.

Until next time,
mzb
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The cultural exchange comes amid strengthening ties between the two countries.

Israel has returned 22 ancient artefacts stolen from Greece, a cultural exchange that comes as the two countries strengthen ties.

Greek and Israeli officials did not provide details on Tuesday on how the artefacts were discovered in Israel or the circumstances surrounding their illegal removal from Greece.

The Israel Antiquities Authority’s Theft Prevention Unit had located the items, Pninat Yanay, Israel’s ambassador to Greece, said.

Greek Minister of Culture Lina Mendoni accepted the objects from the Israeli Antiquities Authority at a ceremony held at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens.

“It is the first time that Israel has returned antiquities to Greece, marking the starting point of closer cooperation between the two countries for the protection of cultural heritage,” Mendoni said.

“Every return of a cultural object to its place of origin has a broader symbolic and moral dimension.”

The collection includes 15 Attic vases, six Corinthian vases, and a bronze female statuette.

The objects are dated between 700 BC and 320 BC.

Yanay said the return of the antiquities created “the conditions for further strengthening cooperation between Greece and Israel”.

Greece-Israel relations

Greece and Israel have strengthened energy and defence ties in recent years.

In August, Israel signed a $3.5bn defence deal to build a multi-layered air defence system in Greece, called the Achilles Shield. It is the largest defence deal between the two countries, and one of the most significant export agreements in Israel’s recent history.

Jimmy Crowley, the son of former Southern Section commissioner Dean Crowley, had a Friday night off from officiating Big Sky Conference football games, so he went to St. John Bosco last week to evaluate the high school officials for a game against Orange Lutheran.

Southern California high school football games have been used as a proving ground for years and a first stop for officials wanting to move to college and the NFL.

It used to be that the commissioners in the City Section and Southern Section were high school or college officials. Jim Cheffers, a former City Section commissioner, used to officiate in the Pac-8. Now his son, Carl, is one of the top NFL referees and has worked three Super Bowls.

Tony Corrente, a former baseball coach at La Mirada who won a CIF title in 1988, made it to the NFL for 26 years as an official and was referee for Super Bowl XI. Former Hollywood High principal Jim Tunney was a long-time NFL referee.

While fans sometimes don’t appreciate officials, in Southern California high school football, you might be watching a future college or NFL referee.

This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.

Wales have reached the play-off stages of qualification for a major tournament for only the third time in the history of the women’s national side.

Their first attempt, in qualifying for the 2023 World Cup, ended in agony.

Gemma Grainger’s team beat Bosnia-Herzgovina at the semi-final stage before – despite taking an early lead – losing out to a goal late in extra time of the final in Switzerland.

Two years later, it was an entirely different story as Wales overcame Slovakia and the Republic of Ireland to reach Euro 2025, the first women’s major tournament in the nation’s history.

Thanks in part to a lengthy injury list, James is one of only five players who began the decisive game in Dublin 22 months ago who are in contention to start against Albania.

The 146-cap Seattle Reign midfielder was also part of the side left heartbroken by that late defeat in Zurich in October 2022.

“[They were] two very different feelings after both games,” James said.

“The feeling that we had out in Switzerland, going so close in extra time and narrowly missing out, it fuelled us for Dublin.

“There’s a big group of us that experienced that and at the start of this camp we made sure the whole group was aware of how it feels to be on both ends of that.”

SACRAMENTO — The California Secretary of State has mailed a thick “Official Voter Information Guide” to every registered voter. It’s jam-packed with helpful material. But one bit should be totally ignored.

It tells voters to fill out their ballot immediately — ”today” — and return it right now. Don’t take any time, in other words, to think about what you’re voting on.

Here’s what it says in bold ink on the cover of the 173-page guide: “Don’t Delay, Vote Today! Return your ballot as soon as you receive it.”

That’s not just a throwaway line. It’s repeated throughout the guide.

Under “Quick Facts” for the Nov. 3 election: “Return your ballot by mail as soon as you receive it.”

Who’s writing this stuff? Officially it’s from Secretary of State Shirley Weber. But is some high school freshman who hasn’t taken a civics course the actual author? Isn’t Weber or anyone in the vast bureaucracy proofreading with raised eyebrows?

Doesn’t anyone realize there are 14 complex propositions on the state ballot that voters may want to mull over for more than two seconds? They aren’t all what they seem. Some require reading between the lines.

Proposition 1, for example, is an expensive $11.25-billion bond issue for affordable housing — mostly rentals — requiring at least $500 million in annual state costs for 25 years. That cuts into spending for other services such as education and healthcare. Is the new borrowing actually worth it?

Proposition 39 is relatively easy but needs some thought. It would require everyone to show a government ID before they’re allowed to vote. Is that really needed when there is scant evidence of voter fraud? And it would invariably slow vote counting even more.

Proposition 40 would impose a one-time 5% tax on billionaires’ wealth. Should we set the precedent of taxing people’s wealth? Who’s next? We’ve already got the nation’s highest state income tax.

Proposition 45 would substantially alter the landmark California Environmental Quality Act. It has been terribly abused, stymying housing development. But the Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom recently have streamlined CEQA to expedite home construction. This business-backed proposition is geared more toward easing infrastructure projects. Does it go too far?

Then there are some low-profile propositions that are just mind-numbing.

Not to mention some crucial congressional races that may determine control of the U.S. House.

We’re at the peak of campaign season. TV ads are running practically nonstop. Mailboxes are overflowing with political pitches. There are local candidate debates. And newspaper endorsements.

Let the election season play out. Don’t interfere with the political process.

I intend to do what I’ve always done: Wait until the last minute to vote. Something could happen to change my mind on an issue. I’ll take the filled-out ballot to a post office — or maybe a secure official drop box — a couple of days before the election.

Maybe I shouldn’t take the Secretary of State so literally. But since her “give me your vote now” admonition is featured in an official government publication, some voters are likely to accept it and obey.

This is what Weber apparently really means, as also stated in the guide: “Mail your ballot back as soon as possible. … To be counted, [it] must be postmarked no later than election day. We recommend mailing it at least seven days before election day.”

OK, that’s all she should say. End of lecture.

Still, I resent being urged to mail back my ballot a full week before the election. I’ll take my own sweet time that’s allowed by the law, thank you.

I queried the Secretary of State’s press office about the “vote now” edict but didn’t get a straight answer.

“Of course we absolutely encourage voters to carefully review the [guide] contents … and other trusted sources to make a decision that is best for them,” some unnamed spokesperson emailed. The top cause for ballots being rejected is their late arrival, the aide added.

The Postal Service has slowed its deliveries of all mail, especially in rural areas. Plus, President Trump tried to inject mail voting with crippling rules, but the Supreme Court stopped him.

The secretary’s office also emailed me that “when voters return their ballots early, it ensures more time for the ballot [counting] process.”

“It’s not good policy for the SOS to urge voters to vote the minute they get their ballot,” veteran Democratic strategist Garry South told me. “A lot can happen in the last month. And with a ballot that seems like it’s several feet long, I suspect it’s being done to deal with the criticism of how long it takes to count the votes in California.

“But the goal should be for voters to make considered and informed choices, not just to rush into marking their ballots.”

Dan Schnur, a former Republican operative who teaches political communication at USC and UC Berkeley, said: “Weber is under fire for taking too long to count votes. …. But the answer is for her to count faster, not to push voters to rush their decisions.”

Kim Alexander, president of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation, points out that vote counting, in fact, has sped up during recent elections. And this year, the Legislature appropriated $29 million to speed up counting much more.

But “I don’t agree with the message” in the voting guide, Alexander said. “It’s a long ballot. People need to take some time to decide.”

Voting is a very personal exercise. It’s my duty not only to vote, but to try to get it right.

It’s not my duty to make vote-counting easier for election officials. It’s their duty to count — more swiftly.

What else you should be reading

The must-read: What Steve Hilton doesn’t get about Xavier Becerra’s parents
CA vs. Trump: FBI whistleblower alleges Trump ordered investigations of L.A.-area immigration protesters.
The L.A. Times Special: Hilton warm on tax cuts, tepid on Trump, cold on offshore wind during gubernatorial town hall

Until next week,
George Skelton

—
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King Juan Carlos I summons party leaders after the failed 1981 coup. From left to right: Santiago Carrillo (Communist Party), Agustín Rodríguez Sahagún (Defence Minister), Adolfo Suárez (Prime Minister), Juan Carlos I, Felipe González (PSOE) and Manuel Fraga (People’s Alliance, later PP).

(“Gosh, no! Not another hyper-comparative article about two distant political conflicts…” Apologies. We’ll try to make it a fun read).

More often than not, our intellectual circles have felt tempted to look at alien historical episodes in a never-ending search for resolute answers that shed light on our present. In 2023, when Maduro flirted with attacking US-supported Guyana, some revisited the Falklands War as a sign that a serious military incursion would be a fatal mistake that would lead to the dictatorship’s downfall. Then came the road to the 2024 presidential election; many feared (rightfully, in the end) that the country would plunge into the “Nicaragua scenario” if the dictator refused to recognize his defeat. Others momentarily wondered if enough external pressure could give way to a Guatemala-style transfer of power and a weak transition government.

The days of terror seem to be behind us, yet there’s no progressive reformer like Raúl Alfonsín steering the wheel of justice. Instead, Donald Trump gave us the Pizza Hut scenario. Here, Delcy Rodríguez has become the poster girl of the MAGA international franchise. Here, too, US geopolitical ambitions and business interests at times seem to be competing with the need for free elections and a democratic regime.

Is Rodríguez our Mikhail Gorbachev, trying to open the economy and political system just enough while attempting to save the chavista State from outright collapse? What if chavismo is already dead and she’s the Yeltsin of the Caribbean, the feeble leader who will give away the country’s riches to oligarchs in an arbitrary fashion, laying the ground for a new form of autocracy?

Or might Delcy be the chavista version of Adolfo Suárez, the not-so-brilliant and obscure but highly charismatic Francoist insider? Suárez finished the job after a remarkable run, surviving a period of meagre political support, declining approval rates and a coup d’etat that could have killed him. The comparison now sounds like an insult to the Spaniard. Like Gorbachev in today’s Russia, Suárez has become a sort of mythical statesman abroad while Spanish right- and left-wing critics dispute his legacy.

There are genuine similarities between the process currently unfolding in Caracas and the outset of Spain’s democracy, as well as room for gross contrasts. While 2026 has been insane for Venezuelans, Spain exactly fifty years ago was astonishing due to the speed at which Suárez acted in unilaterally dismantling the regime from within the regime. The dictator was finally gone, and as soon as he had the chance, the new King ordered a politician without strong ideological convictions to establish a full parliamentary democracy.

Suárez took office in June 1976. The Law for Political Reform, meant to pave the way for a new democratic legislature (with the King acting as a key enforcer), was through six months later. Spain held general elections within a year. That was just the start. What followed was a sequence full of the raw materials that tend to feed these history-making episodes: secret meetings and grand bargains between rivals and strange bedfellows, journalists acting like hinges, political violence, and leaders who soon become overwhelmed by their own decisions and actions.

How the transition worked out

When scholars praise the atmosphere of consensus that defined Spain in the 1970s, they generally speak of the close cooperation between regime reformers and opposition moderates in devising broad agreements that fastened democracy, fundamental rights and regional autonomy with the recognition of the monarchy. In doing so, these figures refused to address legal and moral responsibilities for the violence left by the Civil War and four decades of military rule (more on this later).

The spirit of the Transición is best encapsulated by the political partnership between Suárez and Santiago Carrillo, leader of the Communist Party (PCE) and the most prominent figure in a scattered opposition. Much like María Corina Machado this year, Carrillo was a key veto player in the transition’s inception. Suárez had the power; democracy just couldn’t be without the legitimacy carried by Francoism’s utmost rival. The government legalized the PCE only after it abandoned Marxist-Leninist doctrine and Republican (“anti-Spain”) symbols. As Javier Cercas recounts in the brilliant Anatomy of a Moment, the duo protected each other’s backs amid hardline pressures, in a climate of growing economic hardship and political violence where ETA and Far Right violence threatened to destabilize their project.

In Spain’s first elections since 1936, Suárez won and the renewed PSOE of a young Felipe González managed to eclipse the old-looking communists. Once the new democratic parliament was settled, Suárez and representatives from major parties signed the Moncloa Pacts, then framed as a national agreement to save the economy. Parallels with Venezuela’s Puntofijo Pact are there: the political class came together on monetary policy and wage regulation; welfare and public spending; and fundamental freedoms for citizens, workers and members of the press. An amnesty for political prisoners followed. In 1978, Spanish voters overwhelmingly voted to approve a new consensus constitution.

As is only natural during these processes, the position of Suárez before Francoist remnants in the State became untenable. Time exposed the true nature of his goals: he eventually crossed all the red lines of the inmovilistas, wiping out Franco’s ultra-conservative and nationalist institutions. Far Right groups, elites, the military and even newspapers plotted to jeopardize the transition and restrain its main characters. However, much of the groundwork for political action and breakthroughs was laid by domestic and outside backers who had an unequivocal pro-democracy stance.

In the Francois legislature, King Juan Carlos appointed his personal tutor and advisor, Torcuato Fernández-Miranda, as president. In the diplomatic arena, regional leaders and international actors favored Spain’s democratization and European integration. Willy Brandt, Francois Mitterrand and even Carlos Andrés Pérez encouraged PSOE’s social-democratic turn and the rise of González. Meanwhile, Carrillo had the endorsement of fellow Eurocommunists that had broken with the Soviet Union.

However, royal and international support were neither constant nor salient enough in the Spanish case. Domestic variables and the consequences of political opening made Suárez grow weaker in 1979, and his government could have fallen apart. In Venezuela, where the level of tutelage in place is more decisive than in Spain back then, the approach of the United States remains gradual and its supervision restrictive for opposition actors. The speed of reforms also seems to be contingent on the diverse interests of the Trump administration. Unlike in Spain at this stage, elections don’t appear to be around the corner, and new policies and initiatives are either limited in scope or yet to show results.

The transition’s key omissions

When comparing the Spanish transition with the Venezuelan process, significant details reveal mistakes whose lessons should serve to prevent their repetition. The transitional justice model, the control of the security forces, and the polarization that affects public opinion after decades, are some of the aspects that can be adjusted to learn from what Spain did well. However, we must keep our eyes open regarding the issues left unresolved.

Six years after Franco’s death and following many important reforms, the Spanish government did not have control of its security apparatus. As a result, a group of Guardias Civiles led by Antonio Tejero, stormed the Congress of Deputies on February 23, 1981, taking Suárez, Carrillo and the entire government hostage while tanks occupied the city of Valencia. The coup failed, but it became clear that the nascent democracy was fragile and that military, police and political elements were able to undermine it. Just like Venezuela in the early sixties.

A change in government, even one negotiated and backed by the US, does not guarantee control over the Venezuelan armed forces. During the transition process, the loyalty of the military must be built and put to the test. There is no guarantee that Venezuela will not experience an episode like Spain’s 23-F; the only way to ensure otherwise is to include representatives of the military high command at the negotiating table from the very beginning.

Then we have the famous Pact of Forgetting. As the opposition basically got everything it wanted, la Transición did not establish any special justice mechanisms. Reconciliation was built on a pacto del olvido, an implicit agreement between regime reformers and a large part of the opposition that consisted of not judging the past, not establishing truth commissions, and adhering to a logic of equivalency between the Two Spains: the Republican Left and the Nationalist Right, the losers and the winners of the Civil War.

The “pact of forgetting” is far from what we Venezuelans aspire to. The victims of Francoism were unable to access mechanisms for reparations during the first 25 years of democracy. Later, the Ley de Memoria Histórica (Historical Memory Law, LMH) and the Ley de Memoria Democrática (Democratic Memory Law, LMD) were enacted to fill that void. The reality is that justice came too late, was biased, and failed to meet international standards on truth, memory, and non-repetition.

One only needs to take a close look at the 1977 Amnesty Law. It passed almost unanimously; its original intent was a genuine desire to bring closure. However, the same law granted amnesty to those who were politically persecuted as well as to “authorities, civil servants, and law enforcement officers” for violations against the rights of Spanish citizens. To an extent, these are the same flaws that have been criticized in the Venezuelan amnesty law enacted in January 2026.

Forgetting and silence created wounds in Spain that were not fully healed and vulnerable to political manipulation throughout this century. A 2008 study found that 55.7% of those surveyed stated that the victims of the dictatorship had not received the recognition they deserved. That sense of injustice has fueled the narrative promoted by the Spanish Left that the transition was a “deal” between elites rather than a pacted rupture with the regime.

Venezuela’s amnesty law bears the same risk and exacerbates it by ordering the destruction of records and criminal histories. Erasing the evidence that will one day be needed to reconstruct the patterns of repression is the opposite of reconciliation. The construction of memory is the only thing that can guarantee that in 2050, Venezuelans will not be having the same disputes that Spain continues to have about Franco. For our process to move toward transformation, we must establish special justice mechanisms that include both reparations and forgiveness. Without this, at best, the next generations will be prone to forgetting.

Coming to terms with post-chavismo

It’s important to make a clarification regarding our case. Today, chavismo is not a force that polarizes the country, capable of winning elections like Suárez did, but a political elite that faces widespread rejection. That does not mean it will disappear from the political landscape. On the contrary, the mere fact that chavismo continues to rule may hint that it will remain part of public life. Eventually, the heirs of chavismo could try to reframe the legacy of Chávez, “saving” him from the discredit brought on by Maduro-era atrocities. The Maduro-Flores faction and a few other figures will likely be erased from chavismo’s new narratives. They will be portrayed as a deviation from chavismo’s original ideas. They will try to bring in new faces, and perhaps Diosdado Cabello will hand over the PSUV to some new figure, such as Héctor Rodríguez and a crop of young, “converted democrats.”

Yet the suffering caused by the chavista project cannot be so easily erased from the memories of millions of Venezuelans who endured hunger, exile, repression and imprisonment.

The wounds that remain fresh among Venezuelans can be as deep as those borne by the older generations in Spain, who faced the destruction and trauma of armed conflict. Like Franco, Chávez and Maduro spent two decades trying to build a “new man” through the military and partisan occupation of public life. However, the nature of the crimes and mismanagement in 21st-century Venezuela is different from that in Francoist Spain, where thousands of dissidents were systematically persecuted and killed. Like in Cuba and the USSR, economic and social devastation has been so severe that it led to mass starvation and exodus. Our remaining task and the lesson learned from what was lacking in the Spanish transition, is to build a historical memory focused on ensuring that anything resembling that does not happen again, and that whoever wants to enter the political arena can do so according to the rules of democracy.

Bonus: Delcy vs. Suárez

Adolfo Suárez became prime minister in 1976, having emerged from the very structures of Francoism and State-owned media. He was certainly not a reformer, much less a democrat until Juan Carlos appointed him to lead the transition. Suárez eventually acted on his own volition, seeing the process through to the end. Delcy, as Maduro’s “Super Minister” and his last vice president, has been a far more prominent figure in the chavista State, and also more deeply involved with the repressive apparatus than Suárez was, as UN reports can attest). In the case of Delcy, US military intervention has pushed her to change certain policies, cool down repression and engage with a sector of the opposition, part of a strategy for political survival where her regime needs to balance Washington’s demands with avoiding chavismo’s downfall. That has nothing to do with a “democratic” conversion.

The comparison is still vague, but Venezuelan historians can re-assess if this process leads to its much-needed destination.

Timeline (optional read)

1973: A decrepit Franco steps down as PM, separating the headship of state and the presidency of government for the first time. He names his loyal right-hand man, Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco, as Prime Minister, with jurist Torcuato Fernández-Miranda as Deputy PM and conservative Carlos Arias Navarro at Interior. The global oil shock strikes Spain, ending fifteen years of economic boom (the Spanish Miracle) and unleashing severe inflation. In December, ETA assassinates Carrero Blanco in Madrid. Arias Navarro succeeds him with the backing of Franco’s family.

1974: Knowing that Franco’s death was imminent, the regime starts to split between moderates and hardliners while ETA consolidates as a lethal enemy of Madrid. Arias Navarro promises freedom of association, but under pressure from hardliners, the proposal ends up being a sham. The opposition favours gradual reform away from Francoism. European leaders encourage PSOE’s social-democratic turn, appointing a young Felipe González as Secretary General. Communist Party (PCE) leader Santiago Carrillo and other exiled figures call for a peaceful, democratic rupture with the regime.

1975: Franco dies in November. King Juan Carlos I is crowned head of state and reinstates Arias Navarro as PM, maintaining an impossible cabinet of both regime hardliners and moderate reformers like Manuel Fraga. ETA and left-wing terror groups step up attacks, while public strikes and protests demand amnesty and democracy. González enters Spain; Carrillo remains abroad.

1976: Arias Navarro’s sluggish reforms cause political deadlock and social unrest. Pressured by the King, he resigns in July. Juan Carlos appoints Fernández-Miranda as President of the Cortes and Torcuato’s former pupil, Adolfo Suárez, as PM. Suárez promises elections for 1977 and skilfully passes the Law for Political Reform through the Francoist parliament, dismantling the regime from within. Suárez tries to build democratic credibility by engaging with González. The more prominent Carrillo remains sidelined, leading the Communists from clandestinity, until he forces the regime to briefly arrest and release him.

1977: Carrillo and Suárez negotiate a pact in person. Suárez legalizes trade unions and, in a risky move during Holy Week, legalizes Carrillo’s PCE. The Communists abandon its Marxist-Leninist doctrine and traditional Republican symbols. In June, Spain holds its first free general election since 1936: Suárez’s UCD wins, closely followed by the renewed PSOE of González. Major parties sign the Moncloa Pacts to stabilize the economy. An Amnesty Law releases political prisoners.

1978: Parliamentary committees draft a consensus constitution guaranteeing fundamental rights, regional autonomy, and a constitutional monarchy. In December, Spanish voters overwhelmingly approve the new Constitution in a national referendum, formally ending the Francoist State and establishing Spain as a modern parliamentary democracy. The government discovers that some security officials are plotting a coup against Suárez, including Guardia Civil Lieutenant Colonel Antonio Tejero, but the main conspirators receive minor penalties.

1979: Spain holds its first elections under the new Constitution: UCD wins again but fails to secure an absolute majority. Regional autonomy statutes pass in Catalonia and the Basque Country. Economic trouble, internal UCD infighting, and rising ETA violence create growing political instability and unrest within the military.

1980: Suárez faces worsening economic crises, mounting regional tensions, and a vote of no confidence tabled by the PSOE. Suárez survives the vote, but his authority inside the UCD collapses as cabinet ministers and faction leaders publicly break ranks, making his government increasingly untenable.

1981: Exhausted by political crisis and plots, Suárez resigns in January. During the parliamentary vote to appoint Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo as his successor on February 23, Lt. Col. Antonio Tejero leads an attempted military coup (23-F). King Juan Carlos rejects the coup on national television, securing army loyalty and saving the young democracy.

1982: Calvo-Sotelo navigates Spain into NATO despite widespread public opposition. Disintegrating from internal factionalism, the ruling UCD collapses. In the October general elections, Felipe González leads the PSOE to a historic landslide victory, marking the first peaceful transfer of power to a left-wing government and consolidating Spanish democracy.

1983: The newly inaugurated PSOE government launches major economic restructuring and industrial modernization plans to prepare Spain for European integration. Simultaneously, the State initiates decentralisation by establishing the final Autonomous Communities, completing Spain’s territorial map under the 1978 Constitution.

SACRAMENTO — Over the last week, gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton has created the exact kind of media kerfuffle he loves best by attacking his rival Xavier Becerra for Becerra’s description of his parents as “immigrants.”

Although Becerra’s mother, Maria, was born in Mexico, his father, Manuel, came into the world in Sacramento, in 1928. Soon after, Becerra’s grandparents moved their young family back to Mexico, where Manuel was raised until he returned to the U.S. as a young man to work.

As my colleague Gustavo Arellano said in a must-read column, this border back-and-forth has been more the norm than the exception for California’s Mexican American population for decades, if not centuries. Manuel Becerra’s luck at being born on U.S. soil may have given him an advantage, but it didn’t make him any less of an immigrant, Arellano explained, especially in an era when Sacramento’s Mexican population was below 2,500 and racism remained openly practiced and disturbingly accepted.

Hilton, however, has seized on Manuel Becerra’s U.S. citizenship to brand the younger Becerra a liar, allegedly falsely framing himself as the son of immigrants to gain identity-politics points in a state of immigrants. Whether one or both of Becerra’s parents qualifies as an immigrant might seem like minutiae to most voters, but Hilton’s accusation has thumped on the nerves on both the left and right — including my own, as the daughter of a South Asian immigrant.

Dog-whistle politics

Scratch the surface of Hilton’s attack and it becomes about something far more than Manuel Becerra’s citizenship — it’s a thinly veiled dog whistle about how a “good” immigrant behaves and how we should handle the “bad” ones. Here’s where all that gets messy for me: I agree with Hilton that being born in the U.S. is a big deal, and being a citizen is a point of pride. It does matter. I also agree with Arellano that Hilton’s attack is despicable.

Somewhere between those points are truths about immigration in America at this fraught and ugly moment, and just how different California is from the rest of the country when it comes to understanding the issue — and why that matters.

California’s Latinos, through numbers, history and hard work, have built political and social power on a scale that few, if any, other immigrant groups anywhere in the U.S. have managed. That unique position in the Golden State has allowed for what I call the magical realism of immigration myths to flourish, a wonderful gift to generations past and present that does not have the same widespread acceptance in other parts of this great country.

I firmly believe there is no such thing as a “true” immigration story.

Many, if not most, immigrants are leaving something painful behind — maybe it’s family, maybe it’s war or abuse. But carrying that burden forward with nothing more than hope to balance it, passing it on to future generations, explaining it to strangers, is too much. So immigration stories get softened over time, with trauma turning into adventure and hard facts blurred into entertaining myths.

That doesn’t make the tellers liars. It makes them human.

In the case of my father’s myth, he would have told you that his journey to America started with Humphrey Bogart. As a teen, he’d cut school to watch black-and-white movies like “Casablanca” in a theater in Ahmedabad in northern India, so long ago that there was an intermission to change the film reels. Enamored of white tuxedos and cool blondes, he started applying to scholarships for college in America — eventually winning a full-ride at a Utah school for his skiing acumen, a sport for which he claimed great skill but in reality had never tried.

My aunts and uncles variously dispute or embrace this tale, which my father loved to tell. I don’t know how true it is, but I do know this. My father’s journey to the U.S. did not begin with Bogart. It began in the city of Karachi, which was in India until the British drew a line on the map and created Pakistan. War broke out, with Hindus killing Muslims and Muslims killing Hindus. My father, a kid, got lost in a crowd with his grandfather. He watched as a mob killed his grandpa, then escaped by himself walking hundreds of miles to safety. He was eventually reunited with his family in a refugee camp, but his India was gone forever.

In its place, he dreamed of Bogart’s America. And when he finally got here, he buried his past under the Utah snow, became such a good skier he was on ski patrol, and didn’t mention his grandpa for nearly 35 years.

Like nearly every child of an immigrant, I love both the truth and the myth of my dad because combined they are the story of my family and of America. But my father was Indian and eventually settled in Ohio, much different than California. There was no larger Indian community back then (though it’s grown significantly, including dozens of family members who followed my father), and little tolerance for anything but assimilation. That was fine by my father. He wanted nothing more than to be American — though he would remain a green card holder for decades, until fear under the first Trump administration pushed him to get citizenship.

Hilton’s audience

Just like for Becerra’s dad, being an immigrant was a state of mind for mine, an experience, not an official status. Had my dad been in California, maybe he would have kept more of his Indian identity. Had Becerra’s dad been in Ohio, maybe he would have kept less of his past.

Neither viewpoint made either man more or less American — but the different myths these two men told about who they were define the difference between California and the rest of the country.

Hilton’s attack on Becerra’s dad was never meant for a California audience, where the Latino experience of fluidity in geography and identity holds center stage. It was always meant for places such as Ohio, and Fox News, where the expectation of assimilation still reigns supreme (just ask the Haitians of Springfield) and where Hilton’s media audience — and his future — resides after he loses in November, which he almost certainly will. Hilton, after all, was the host of his own conservative television show for years.

What seems like an out-of-touch attack by Hilton on brown immigrants in California is actually thoughtful pandering to his people — the right-wing Americans who prefer “good,” deferential, grateful immigrants (like Hilton himself) over the confident California Latinos who take pride in every part of their identity.

Sorry, California Latinos, but this MAGA moment in immigration has nothing to do with criminal records or even legal status. It’s all about attitude, and MAGA hates that you have so much of it. Hilton’s attack hits the target with his right-wing crowd because, to them, not centering his father’s U.S. citizenship is a rejection of the United States, a treachery they not-so-secretly fear all immigrants share.

And here’s the twist — MAGA is right, immigrants are complicated.

My dad may have been one of the “good” immigrants, embracing all things American and quiet about his past. But he always held deep pride in his family and his origins, and he passed that on — as do so many of the other “good” immigrants.

It’s possible, common even, to fully embrace being American while also valuing the myths and truths of immigration. It’s possible to to love this country while also keeping another one in your heart, loudly or quietly. There is no one immigrant experience, no one way to be a real American. Hilton, an immigrant and the son of immigrants, surely knows this.

But where immigrants see complexity, MAGA followers see only perfidy, disloyalty, and that makes them afraid and angry — and ripe for the exploitation of those emotions by someone who can sugarcoat it, twist it, just enough to seem reasonable.

And Hilton is excellent at seeming reasonable.

What else you should be reading:

The must-read: California wine glut sends premium bottles to Costco, Aldi and Kroger at bargain prices
The California angle: Denise Brown recalls her sister Nicole’s abuse by O.J. Simpson: ‘We were there’
The L.A. Times Special: The LAPD busted a secret network of brothels — but hasn’t arrested the owner
Stay Golden,
Anita Chabria

—
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With Temecula Valley off to a 6-0 start in high school football, the Golden Bears can thank senior kicker and punter Colin Elia for making major contributions.

He’s 13 for 13 on PATs and six for seven on field goals, including a long of 49 yards, and averaging more than 36 yards on punts.

He didn’t play football until his sophomore year when friends asked him to join the team. He finally convinced his parents to let him play. Let’s say it was a compromise. He wanted to play receiver. He got permission to be the kicker.

The rest is history.

“I’m joking with my mom she’s happy to let me play now,” Elia said.

He made a game-winning field goal as a sophomore on varsity when the other kickers were unavailable. Last season as a junior, he made 10 of 11 field-goal attempts. He continues to improve as he uses his soccer background.

One thing is certain: Pressure moments don’t bother him. In fact, he looks forward to them.

He also credits his long snapper and holder for helping him succeed.

This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.

Let’s pretend for a moment you’re a Republican running for governor in the blue, blue state of California.

Your prospect of winning is small. So small, you could peer through a microscope, blink and miss it. How, then do you draw voters to your candidacy and boost your chances?

Actually, let’s not pretend. A very real flesh-and-blood Republican, Steve Hilton, is running for California governor and if your idea for grabbing attention doesn’t involve a make-believe lesbian couple, double entendre and a soft-core porn vibe, you’re very clearly lacking in imagination.

Hilton ran an ad featuring just such elements, garnering coast-to-coast notice, millions of views and ensuring the tagline — “Now lick it” — while not as resonant as, say, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” will forever live in political infamy.

What the spot tries to do, convince folks in this left-leaning redoubt to be venturesome and vote for Hilton, is not the least offensive, though your friendly political columnist, hardly a prude, found the execution a bit, well, icky.

Being a cis white male of a certain age, however, means perhaps we shouldn’t be the one to judge. We’re certainly not the target audience. So we turned to two of the youngish, hippest people we know, Daughters No. 1 & 2, who are both well-accomplished 30-somethings and truly upstanding citizens.

What follows is their spontaneous reaction.

Daughter No. 1: “Stupid, infantilizing.”

Daughter No. 2: “Wtf is this fake woke AI ad? Ew.”

(For the record, Hilton said the ad was not AI generated. He apologized, sort of, to those who took offense.)

We also asked the Fabulous Mrs Z. — who has impeccable judgment, notwithstanding all the years she’s stayed married to your friendly political columnist — for her response. “It’s just so strange and stupid,” she said. “Why would he approve this ad? It makes me question his judgment.”

What do the pros say?

Of course, that’s just four people — one of whom doesn’t even live in California — so it’s not much of a sample.

For more insight, we turned to some political professionals.

And who better to weigh in than Fred Davis, the madcap genius behind another infamous California campaign spot, the so-called Demon Sheep ad he concocted for Carly Fiorina’s 2010 U.S. Senate campaign. The Felliniesque production included lightning bolts, a Roman column and a man covered in sheepskin crawling on all fours and leering with a glowing red eye — the point being that Fiorina’s rival, Tom Campbell, was supposedly a profligate wolf in fiscal-conservative sheep clothing.

Strange, yes, but definitely more memorable than an accountant in green eyeshade laboring over the books.

Anyway, Davis — who’s featured Paris Hilton, bad hair and a giant rat in a crown as part of his out-there oeuvre — loved the new Hilton campaign spot, calling it “super attention-getting, super interesting.” (Which is not the least surprising from a man whose chosen epitaph is, “If you don’t notice it, why bother?”)

“I think it’s a brilliantly done ad,” Davis said, “wonderfully written.” And, he added, “I can’t imagine it gaining him one vote.”

Which was sort of the point, no?

Kevin Spillane also appreciates Hilton’s effort, given his own Sisyphean struggles as a Republican strategist in California.

A screen grab from Steve Hilton’s “Just Try It” ad. Columnist Mark Z. Barabak found execution of the spot a bit, well, icky.

(Steve Hilton for Governor)

“They’re doing something out there and on the edge. I don’t fault them for that,” said Spillane, who supports Hilton and has contributed to his campaign. “It’s a clever concept of trying to get people to do something that they’re not used to doing.”

Which is to say vote for a Republican for statewide office in California.

But Spillane, too, questioned the execution. “I actually was fine with the ad until they got to the ‘lick it’ line,” he said, insisting he is also no prude. “That’s just a little too explicitly sexual.”

Running, not advancing

To his credit, Hilton has been running hard for governor. Much harder than his Democratic rival and the prohibitive front-runner, Xavier Becerra. Hilton has issued an abundance of policy proposals and spoken before pretty much any group or microphone-wielding reporter or podcaster who’ll have him.

None of which has garnered Hilton anywhere near the publicity captured by his racy “Just Try It, California” ad.

Even before the spot aired, Hilton broke new ground during last week’s gubernatorial debate when he noted a former member of the Biden administration had referred to Becerra as a “bitch-ass” — apparently the first time that compound adjective had been used in such a high-falutin’ setting. Hilton shortly followed with a website, “Bitch-Ass” Becerra,” that outlines the alleged failures of the Democrat as President Biden’s Health secretary and during his time as California’s attorney general.

(For the record, Susan Rice, who used the epithet and was accused of creating an “abusive and dehumanizing workplace” as head of Biden’s Domestic Policy Council, responded by stating her support for Becerra’s gubernatorial candidacy.)

It’s hard to see Hilton’s name-calling winning him a great many votes, any more than his risque campaign commercial, but maybe that’s beside the point. Maybe, as my columnizing colleague Gustavo Arellano suggested in his debate review, Hilton is merely auditioning for a return to his old commentator position on Fox News.

Hilton’s edgy attitude and pugnacious put-downs would place him right at home among the network’s collection of trolls, provocateurs and Democrat-bashing gargoyles.

But Hilton should leave the advertising to someone else.

What else you should be reading

Get smart: Meet the Fox News correspondent leading the fight for press freedom at the White House
The deep dive: Trump calls it a war, then a ‘military conflict.’ Why the Iran fighting keeps changing names
The L.A. Times Special: What’s going to happen in the midterm election? Find out here. (Maybe)

Until next time,
mzb
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