politician

She’s a little bit country; he’s a little bit rock ‘n’ roll.

And me? I’m a little bit stunned. Two politicians have emerged, against all odds, to surprise and impress us this year: Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-Calif.) and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.).

You’d be hard-pressed to find two Americans less similar — politically, culturally, geographically, maybe even molecularly. These two occupy opposite poles. She’s NASCAR and CrossFit. He’s electric vehicles and Pinot Noir. They shouldn’t have much in common, but lately, both have done the unthinkable: They’ve taken on President Trump and lived (politically) to tell about it.

Let’s start with Greene because, honestly, she’s more fun.

For years, MTG was seen as an embarrassment. The QAnon congresswoman. The “Jewish space laser” lady. The lawmaker who, just two years prior to winning her House seat, questioned whether a plane really hit the Pentagon on 9/11.

She harassed a then-teenage Parkland survivor and coined the immortal phrase “gazpacho police,” apparently confusing the soup with Nazi secret police.

But then, something strange happened: Greene started making sense. Not “agree with her at dinner” sense, but the “wait, that’s not totally insane” kind.

She blasted Trump’s decision to bomb Iran, which — if you take the “America First” philosophy literally and not just as performance art — is consistent with her beliefs. And in a time when selling out is perceived as being shrewder than standing for something, the mere act of holding a consistent position is a virtue.

MTG also called out her own party for blocking the Epstein files, and volunteered to walk “on the House floor and say every damn name that abused these women.”

And in an act of shocking populist coherence, she ripped into Republicans for letting Obamacare subsidies expire: “Health insurance premiums will DOUBLE,” she thundered on X, adding: “Not a single Republican in leadership talked to us about this or has given us a plan to help Americans deal with their health insurance premiums DOUBLING!!!”

Trump, naturally, took all this personally. “I don’t know what happened to Marjorie,” he said, recently. “Nice woman, but she’s lost her way.” To which Greene, never one to back down, fired back: “I haven’t lost my way. I’m 100% America First and only!”

The thing I’m liking about Greene isn’t just that she’s standing up to Trump — although, I admit, it’s fun to watch. But what’s really refreshing is that she’s a true believer who got elected, got famous and yet continues to believe.

Which brings us to Gavin Newsom.

Newsom has always been the poster boy for everything people hate about California — a man who looks like he was genetically engineered by a Napa Valley venture capitalist to play a slick politician.

The “important” coiffed hair. The smug grin. The French Laundry dinner during COVID-19, while the rest of us were holed up in our houses microwaving Lean Cuisines.

Once upon a time, he and his then-wife, Kimberly Guilfoyle, posed on a rug for a Harper’s Bazaar spread where they were dubbed “The New Kennedys.”

Enough said.

If Greene is the quintessential MAGA mama, Newsom is the slick bro you want to throat punch. But somehow he has had a banner year.

Newsom stood firm against ICE raids and troop deployments in Los Angeles. Then, he trolled Trump with online memes that actually landed.

After Texas Republicans tried to grab five congressional seats for the GOP, Newsom shepherded Prop. 50 through California — an amendment to the state constitution aimed at mitigating Texas’ gerrymandering by redrawing maps to help Democrats even the score.

Then, he waltzed into Houston for a celebratory rally — some political end zone dancing on the opponents’ home turf, just to twist the knife.

Like Greene, the guy has moxie.

And here’s the thing I’m learning from the Trump era: Guts come from the most unlikely places, and looks can be deceiving.

You never know when some heroic-looking leader will fold like a cheap suit, just like you never know when some “heel” out of central casting for villains will turn “face” and rise to the occasion.

I don’t mean to sound naive. I’m not proposing a Newsom-Greene 2028 unity ticket. (Although … tell me you wouldn’t watch that convention.)

The odds are, both of these figures will disappoint me again, probably by next Thursday. Life is complicated, and it’s sometimes hard to disentangle heroism from opportunism.

Indeed, some have speculated that MTG’s sudden streak of independence is the result of Trump putting the kibosh on a “Greene for U.S. Senate” bid in Georgia. And as for Newsom — is his show of toughness an act of patriotism, or a prelude to his own presidential campaign?

Frankly, that’s a difference without a distinction.

For now, here’s what is clear: These two political figures have shown a flash — a glimmer — of something like backbone.

And in the year of our Lord 2025, that’s rarer, and more valuable, than almost any commodity in politics.

Matt K. Lewis is the author of “Filthy Rich Politicians” and “Too Dumb to Fail.”

Eric Preven, one of L.A. County’s most prominent citizen watchdogs, has died at 63, according to his family.

Preven, a well-known government transparency advocate, garnered a reputation as an eagle-eyed observer of local meetings, a savvy wielder of the state’s public records act, and a reliable thorn in the sides of his government.

Relatives said Preven died Saturday in his Studio City home of a suspected heart attack.

The term “gadfly” often is bandied about local government to describe those who never miss a public meeting. But politicians and his family say the term doesn’t quite do Preven justice.

“You may not agree with him, but it wasn’t just like [he was] shooting from the hip. He would do his research,” said Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who watched Preven testify for more than a decade. “He would let the facts speak for themselves.”

In 2016, Preven and the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California took a lawsuit all the way to the California Supreme Court, which ruled in his favor, finding the public had a right to know how much the county was paying outside lawyers in closed cases. Three years later he successfully forced the city to expand its rules around public testimony after he argued he’d been unlawfully barred from weighing in on a Studio City development.

Many attendees of local public meetings tend to drift into offensive diatribes that have little to do with the matter at hand. Preven never did.

Instead he fine-tuned the art of presenting minute-long, logical arguments on everything from budget shortfalls to seemingly excessive settlements. He could be cutting but he always had a point to make.

And he never missed a meeting.

“Thank you for this exhausting dressing down of the probation department,” Preven said last Tuesday after the supervisors wrapped up rebuking officials for paltry programming inside juvenile halls. “The idea that we’re paying for these programs, these programs are scheduled, and nothing is happening is terrible.”

A New York native, Preven moved to Los Angeles to work in Hollywood, landing TV writing gigs on shows including “Popular” and “Reba.” His path into local activism began 15 years ago after his mother’s two chocolate labs were removed by the county’s animal control department following a fight with an off-leash dog, according to his family.

Preven, a canine lover known to throw parties with members of his local dog park, found the removal of the labs unjustifiable. He went to the Board of Supervisors meeting to tell them so. Then he went again. And again. And again.

Long after the dogs were returned, Preven kept going back.

“He started listening to the meeting and looking at the agenda, and he became just appalled at so many things that he saw,” said his brother, Joshua Preven. “He became so incensed by it.”

Preven became a fierce advocate for the public’s right to know what was happening in local meetings and kept close track of staff changes at City Hall. He was known to text local government reporters early on weekend mornings to ask why someone had stepped down from a city agency, or self-deprecatingly share his latest blog post on CityWatch, a local news site.

“My latest deep dive into my own navel,” he texted two weeks ago with his new article on the famed architect behind his historic home in Studio City’s foothills.

He often sent Times editors and reporters weekly emails on successes and shortcomings in their coverage. The county’s politicians and officials received similar messages about their governance.

“He could be irascible,” his brother said. “When he came and encountered the L.A. County Board of Supervisors, it became a really good use of that stubbornness.”

Preven was a dogged user of the California Public Records Act, finding gems of records buried in seldom-scrutinized agencies. He filed so many record requests to the Animal Care and Control department that the county assigned an attorney just to deal with them, according to Dawyn Harrison, the county’s top lawyer.

“Eric was the epitome of an engaged constituent and critic of local government, persistently questioning and challenging government officials,” Harrison said. “As his interest in County government grew, so did the range of his requests; so, my office decentralized the handling of his requests because no one person could cover all the subjects he looked into. He was a true watchdog.”

Supervisor Janice Hahn said Preven had been scrutinizing her and her colleagues ever since she was a councilmember at City Hall.

“Eric Preven never let those with power in government forget who we work for. … He pushed us, he challenged us, and he had an opinion on everything — from the biggest issue of the day to the more routine contract votes that too often go overlooked,” she said. “While some people wrote him off, I thought there was always truth in what he had to say.”

Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, whose district includes parts of Studio City, said he “took seriously the role of citizen, religiously participating in County meetings.”

In addition to his brother, Preven is survived by his sister, Anne Preven, his mother, Ruth Preven, his father, David Preven, and two children, 28-year-old Isaac Rooks Preven and 26-year-old Reva Jay Preven.

Preven ran several times for public office, launching idiosyncratic campaigns for mayor, city council and county supervisor. He barely fundraised and wasn’t allowed in many of the debates, said his brother, who helped out as his campaign manager.

“We didn’t know what the hell we were doing at all,” Joshua Preven said. “But he kept showing up.”

Times reporters Dakota Smith and David Zahniser contributed to this report.

A week before California’s special election, Gavin Newsom made news by doing something practically unheard of. He told donors to stop sending money to pass Proposition 50.

It was a man-bites-piranha moment — a politician turning away campaign cash?!? — and amounted to a victory lap by California’s governor even as the balloting was still underway.

On Wednesday, less than 12 hours after the polls closed, Newsom sent another email. This one thanked backers for helping push the gerrymander measure to landslide approval — and asked them to open their wallets back up.

“Please make a contribution,” he pleaded, “to help us continue to go on the offense and take the fight to Trump.”

One campaign ended. Another seamlessly continued.

Though he’s been publicly coy, Newsom has been effectively running for president for the better part of a year, something even the most nearsighted observer can see. One envisions the restless governor, facing the end of his term, sitting in the Capitol and crossing days off his official calendar as he longingly gazes toward 2028.

Setting aside its dubious merits, Proposition 50 was an unequivocal triumph for Newsom.

He took a risk that an esoteric subject — congressional map-making — could be turned into a heartfelt issue. He gambled that voters would overlook the cost of a special election — close to $300 million — and agree to hand back the line-drawing powers they seized from Sacramento insiders and politicians who put their own interests first. In doing so, he further raised his national profile and bulked up an already formidable fundraising base.

None of which makes Newsom’s quest for the White House much more likely to succeed.

His biggest problem — and there’s no way to fix it — is that he comes from California, which, to many around the country, reads as far left, nutty and badly off track. Or, less harshly, a place that’s more secular, permissive and tax-happy than some middle-of-the-roaders are really comfortable with.

Take it from a Republican strategist.

“He’s obviously a talented politician,” said Q. Whitfield Ayres, a GOP pollster with extensive campaign experience in Georgia and other presidential swing states. “But if I were trying to paint a Democratic nominee as too liberal for the country, having the governor of California be the nominee would be an easy task … Too coastal. Too dismissive of ‘flyover’ country. Too much like the elites on both coasts that [President] Trump has run so successfully against for years now.”

That’s not just a partisan perspective.

The Democratic desire to win in 2028 “is very, very strong,” said Charlie Cook, a campaign handicapper who has spent decades impartially analyzing state and national politics. The presidential contest “will be determined by winning in purple states and purple counties and purple precincts,” Cook said, in places such as central Pennsylvania, rural Wisconsin and Georgia, where issues play differently than within California’s deeply blue borders.

(Newsom’s support for free healthcare for undocumented immigrants — to name but one issue — is an attack ad just waiting to be written.)

For many primary voters, Cook suggested, ideology and purity testing will yield to a more cold-eyed and pragmatic calculation: a candidate’s perceived electability. He minimized Newsom’s smashing Proposition 50 victory. “He’s got to impress people on the road,” Cook said. “Not just a home game in a state that’s really tilted one way.”

For what it’s worth, Newsom should savor his Proposition 50 afterglow as long as he can. (On Saturday, the governor was in Texas, basking.) Because it won’t last.

As Democratic strategist David Axelrod noted, “the nature of presidential politics is the bar gets raised constantly.” Once the race truly begins, Newsom will be probed and prodded in ways he hasn’t experienced since his last physical exam, all in full public view.

“There is an army of opposition researchers, Republican and Democrat, who are going to scour every word he’s spoken as a public official in California since his days as San Francisco mayor and every official action he’s taken and not taken,” said Axelrod, who helped steer Barack Obama to the White House. “Who knows what they will yield and how he’ll respond to that.”

At the moment, Newsom is giving off a very strong Avenatti energy.

For those who’ve forgotten, celebrity attorney Michael Avenatti was seen for a time as the Democratic beau ideal, a brawler who could get under Trump’s skin and take the fight to the president like few others could or would. He traveled to Iowa, New Hampshire, Florida and other states in a quasi-campaign before his extensive personal and financial troubles caught up with him. (Avenatti is currently residing in federal prison.)

Newsom, of course, is vastly more qualified than the Los Angeles attorney ever was. But the political vibe — and especially the governor’s self-styled role as Trump-troller-in-chief — is very similar.

Exit poll interviews in Virginia, New Jersey, New York and even California showed that economic concerns and, specifically, affordability were the main ingredient of Democrats’ success Tuesday. Not Trump’s egregious misconduct or fears for democracy, which was the grounding of the pro-Proposition 50 campaign.

“If you’re talking about democracy over the dinner table, it’s because you don’t have to worry about the cost of food on the table,” Axelrod said. “If you have to worry about the cost of food on the table or your rent or your mortgage, insurance, electricity and all these things, you’re thinking about that.”

To stand any shot at winning his party’s nomination, much less the White House, Newsom will have to build support beyond his fan base with a message showing he understands voters’ day-to-day concerns and offers ways to improve their lives. Success will require more than passing a Democratic ballot measure in a Democratic state, or cracking wise on social media.

Because all those snarky memes and cheeky presidential put-downs won’t seem so funny if JD Vance is inaugurated in January 2029.

Prominent members of Tunisia’s political opposition have announced they will be joining a collective hunger strike in solidarity with jailed politician Jawhar Ben Mbarek, whose health they say has severely deteriorated after nine days without food.

Ben Mbarek, the cofounder of Tunisia’s main opposition alliance, the National Salvation Front, launched a hunger strike last week to protest his detention since February 2023.

Ben Mbarek’s father, veteran activist Ezzeddine Hazgui, said during a news conference in the capital Tunis on Friday that his son is in a “worrisome condition, and his health is deteriorating”.

Hazgui said his family would launch a hunger strike in solidarity with his jailed son.

“We will not forgive [Tunisian President] Kais Saied,” he added.

The leaders of Tunisia’s major opposition parties also declared on Friday that they would go on hunger strike in solidarity with Ben Mbarek.

Among them is Issam Chebbi, the leader of the centrist Al Joumhouri (Republican) Party, who is also behind bars after being convicted in the same mass trial as Ben Mbarek earlier this year. Wissam Sghaier, another Al Joumhouri leader, said some party members would follow suit.

Rached Ghannouchi, the 84-year-old leader of the Ennahdha party, who is also serving a hefty prison sentence, announced he was joining the hunger protest.

Ghannouchi was convicted in July of “conspiring against state security”, adding to previous convictions, including money laundering, for which he has been sentenced to more than 20 years in prison and for which he claims innocence.

A post on his official Facebook page said Ghannouchi’s hunger strike sought to support Ben Mbarek, but he was also taking a stand to defend “the independence of justice and freedom in the country”.

Ben Mbarek was sentenced in April to 18 years behind bars on charges of “conspiracy against state security” and “belonging to a terrorist group”, in a mass trial slammed by human rights groups as politically motivated.

Rights groups have warned of a sharp decline in civil liberties in the North African country since Saied won the presidency in 2019.

A sweeping power grab in July 2021, when he dissolved parliament and expanded executive power so he could rule by decree, saw Saied jail many of his critics. That decree was later enshrined in a new constitution – ratified by a widely boycotted 2022 referendum – while media figures and lawyers critical of Saied have also been prosecuted and detained under a harsh “fake news” law enacted the same year.

Most recently, lawyer and outspoken Saied critic Ahmed Souab was sentenced to five years in prison on October 31 under Decree Law 54, as the legislation is known.

The Tunisian League for Human Rights said there have been “numerous attempts” to persuade Ben Mbarek to suspend his hunger strike, but he has refused, saying he is “committed to maintain it until the injustice inflicted upon him is lifted”.

Prison authorities denied on Wednesday that the health of any of its prisoners had deteriorated because of a hunger strike.

The Arab Organisation for Human Rights in the UK said questions have been raised regarding the prison administration’s compliance with laws governing medical care for detainees on hunger strike and the “safeguarding of their right to physical safety and human dignity”.

“Tunisian law explicitly stipulates the state’s responsibility to protect the life of any prisoner, even if that person chooses hunger strike as a form of protest,” the rights group said in a statement on Friday.

“The prison administration is therefore obliged to ensure appropriate medical care and regular monitoring,” it said, adding that Ben Mbarek’s protest reflects “a broader climate of political and social tension that transcends his personal situation”.

“His action represents a form of protest against detention conditions and judicial processes that many view as influenced by current political polarisation,” the group said.

“Ultimately, the case of Jawhar Ben Mbarek exposes a deeper crisis concerning respect for the rule of law and the principle of accountability,” it added.

يواصل أستاذ القانون الدستوري جوهر بن مبارك إضرابه المفتوح عن الطعام في محبسه منذ 29 أكتوبر الماضي داخل السجن المدني ببلي (ولاية نابل)، احتجاجاً على اعتقاله فيما يُعرف بقضية “التآمر على أمن الدولة”.

وتظهر المعطيات المتوفرة أن الحالة الصحية لبن مبارك تزداد هشاشة مع استمرار… pic.twitter.com/HrHwe14juE

— المنظمة العربية لحقوق الإنسان (@AohrUk_ar) November 7, 2025

Translation: Constitutional law professor Jawhar Ben Mbarek continues his open-ended hunger strike in his place of detention since October 29 inside the civil prison of Belli (Nabeul Governorate), in protest against his arrest in what is known as the “conspiracy against state security” case.

Available data show that Ben Mbarek’s health condition is becoming increasingly fragile with the continued complete abstention from food, which places his physical state in a critical phase requiring precise and constant medical monitoring.

California’s tech companies, the epicenter of the state’s economy, sent politicians a loud message this year: Back down from restrictive artificial intelligence regulation or they’ll leave.

The tactic appeared to have worked, activists said, because some politicians weakened or scrapped guardrails to mitigate AI’s biggest risks.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom rejected a bill aimed at making companion chatbots safer for children after the tech industry fought it. In his veto message, the governor raised concerns about placing broad limits on AI, which has sparked a massive investment spree and created new billionaires overnight around the San Francisco Bay Area.

Assembly Bill 1064 would have barred companion chatbot operators from making these AI systems available to minors unless the chatbots weren’t “foreseeably capable” of certain conduct, including encouraging a child to engage in self-harm. Newsom said he supported the goal, but feared it would unintentionally bar minors from using AI tools and learning how to use technology safely.

“We cannot prepare our youth for a future where AI is ubiquitous by preventing their use of these tools altogether,” he wrote in his veto message.

The bill’s veto was a blow to child safety advocates who had pushed it through the state Legislature and a win for tech industry groups that fought it. In social media ads, groups such as TechNet had urged the public to tell the governor to veto the bill because it would harm innovation and lead to students falling behind in school.

Organizations trying to rein in the world’s largest tech companies as they advance the powerful technology say the tech industry has become more empowered at the national and state levels.

Meta, Google, OpenAI, Apple and other major tech companies have strengthened their relationships with the Trump administration. Companies are funding new organizations and political action committees to push back against state AI policy while pouring money into lobbying.

In Sacramento, AI companies have lobbied behind the scenes for more freedom. California’s massive pool of engineering talent, tech investors and companies make it an attractive place for the tech industry, but companies are letting policymakers know that other states are also interested in attracting those investments and jobs. Big Tech is particularly sensitive to regulations in the Golden State because so many companies are headquartered there and must abide by its rules.

“We believe California can strike a better balance between protecting consumers and enabling responsible technological growth,” Robert Boykin, TechNet’s executive director for California and the Southwest, said in a statement.

Common Sense Media founder and Chief Executive Jim Steyer said tech lobbyists put tremendous pressure on Newsom to veto AB 1064. Common Sense Media, a nonprofit that rates and reviews technology and entertainment for families, sponsored the bill.

“They threaten to hurt the economy of California,” he said. “That’s the basic message from the tech companies.”

Advertising is among the tactics tech companies with deep pockets use to convince politicians to kill or weaken legislation. Even if the governor signs a bill, companies have at times sued to block new laws from taking effect.

“If you’re really trying to do something bold with tech policy, you have to jump over a lot of hurdles,” said David Evan Harris, senior policy advisor at the California Initiative for Technology and Democracy, which supported AB 1064. The group focuses on finding state-level solutions to threats that AI, disinformation and emerging technologies pose to democracy.

Tech companies have threatened to move their headquarters and jobs to other states or countries, a risk looming over politicians and regulators.

The California Chamber of Commerce, a broad-based business advocacy group that includes tech giants, launched a campaign this year that warned over-regulation could stifle innovation and hinder California.

“Making competition harder could cause California companies to expand elsewhere, costing the state’s economy billions,” the group said on its website.

From January to September, the California Chamber of Commerce spent $11.48 million lobbying California lawmakers and regulators on a variety of bills, filings to the California secretary of state show. During that period, Meta spent $4.13 million. A lobbying disclosure report shows that Meta paid the California Chamber of Commerce $3.1 million, making up the bulk of their spending. Google, which also paid TechNet and the California Chamber of Commerce, spent $2.39 million.

Amazon, Uber, DoorDash and other tech companies spent more than $1 million each. TechNet spent around $800,000.

The threat that California companies could move away has caught the attention of some politicians.

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, who has investigated tech companies over child safety concerns, indicated that despite initial concern, his office wouldn’t oppose ChatGPT maker OpenAI’s restructuring plans. The new structure gives OpenAI’s nonprofit parent a stake in its for-profit public benefit corporation and clears the way for OpenAI to list its shares.

Bonta blessed the restructuring partly because of OpenAI’s pledge to stay in the state.

“Safety will be prioritized, as well as a commitment that OpenAI will remain right here in California,” he said in a statement last week. The AG’s office, which supervises charitable trusts and ensures these assets are used for public benefit, had been investigating OpenAI’s restructuring plan over the last year and a half.

OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman said he’s glad to stay in California.

“California is my home, and I love it here, and when I talked to Attorney General Bonta two weeks ago I made clear that we were not going to do what those other companies do and threaten to leave if sued,” he posted on X.

Critics — which included some tech leaders such as Elon Musk, Meta and former OpenAI executives as well as nonprofits and foundations — have raised concerns about OpenAI’s restructuring plan. Some warned it would allow startups to exploit charitable tax exemptions and let OpenAI prioritize financial gain over public good.

Lawmakers and advocacy groups say it’s been a mixed year for tech regulation. The governor signed Assembly Bill 56, which requires platforms to display labels for minors that warn about social media’s mental health harms. Another piece of signed legislation, Senate Bill 53, aims to make AI developers more transparent about safety risks and offers more whistleblower protections.

The governor also signed a bill that requires chatbot operators to have procedures to prevent the production of suicide or self-harm content. But advocacy groups, including Common Sense Media, removed their support for Senate Bill 243 because they said the tech industry pushed for changes that weakened its protections.

Newsom vetoed other legislation that the tech industry opposed, including Senate Bill 7, which requires employers to notify workers before deploying an “automated decision system” in hiring, promotions and other employment decisions.

Called the “No Robo Bosses Act,” the legislation didn’t clear the governor, who thought it was too broad.

“A lot of nuance was demonstrated in the lawmaking process about the balance between ensuring meaningful protections while also encouraging innovation,” said Julia Powles, a professor and executive director of the UCLA Institute for Technology, Law & Policy.

The battle over AI safety is far from over. Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan (D-Orinda), who co-wrote AB 1064, said she plans to revive the legislation.

Child safety is an issue that both Democrats and Republicans are examining after parents sued AI companies such as OpenAI and Character.AI for allegedly contributing to their children’s suicides.

“The harm that these chatbots are causing feels so fast and furious, public and real that I thought we would have a different outcome,” Bauer-Kahan said. “It’s always fascinating to me when the outcome of policy feels to be disconnected from what I believe the public wants.”

Steyer from Common Sense Media said a new ballot initiative includes the AI safety protections that Newsom vetoed.

“That was a setback, but not an overall defeat,” he said about the veto of AB 1064. “This is a David and Goliath situation, and we are David.”