SACRAMENTO — SEIU United Healthcare Workers West President Dave Regan allegedly tried to “extort” an SEIU state council endorsement of the billionaire tax ballot measure from other California union leaders, according to an investigation commissioned by Service Employees International Union.
The investigation and a second inquiry conducted on behalf of SEIU California found that Regan allegedly threatened and intimidated women who worked for the state council, and in one instance, physically assaulted a former executive director of the labor organization.
Regan, in an interview with The Times, denied the allegations that he attempted to extort from union officials. He also denied assaulting the executive director and said he did not threaten female labor leaders. He repeated a counterclaim he made to the union: The allegations against him are retaliation for his advocacy for Proposition 40, the proposed wealth tax that will be on the Nov. 3 ballot.
“They are internally contradictory, they are fundamentally biased, and maybe most importantly, they are politically motivated,” Regan said about the probes.
The law firm hired by the national union investigated Regan’s claim of retaliation but found the allegation could not be substantiated.
David Huerta, the president of SEIU United Service Workers West, and three other labor leaders filed a rare formal union charge against Regan in February.
The national union of SEIU has ultimate authority to resolve charges filed under its constitution and hired the New York labor law firm Cohen, Weiss and Simon to independently investigate the claims. The firm interviewed 18 current and former SEIU leaders and others in the California labor movement over nearly three months, according to its report.
The law firm’s report, reviewed by The Times, supported Huerta’s claim that on Dec. 3 Regan suggested the state council could be investigated for “governance issues” if the council did not endorse the billionaire tax on the November ballot. Huerta was then president of SEIU California.
“During the investigation, Huerta reported that he left the conversation with Regan feeling ‘extorted’ and believing that Regan might report unspecified governance concerns to the U.S. Department of Labor, which is known to be unfriendly to labor unions under the Trump administration, if state council did not support the billionaire tax,” the report said.
The law firm’s investigation substantiated an allegation that on the same day, Regan threatened Tia Orr, executive director of SEIU California, over the council’s position on the ballot measure. The SEIU probe found an allegation that Regan also assaulted one of Orr’s predecessors in the job, Courtni Pugh, in 2009, to be credible.
“SEIU California leaders filed charges against Dave Regan alleging a pattern of bullying, threats, abuse, harassment, physical violence and attempted extortion,” Christopher Calhoun, a spokesperson for SEIU California, said in a statement. “Initial investigations pertaining to these charges substantiated most of SEIU California leaders’ allegations.”
State union officials have temporarily banned Regan from the offices of SEIU California, a council of union leaders that coordinates political operations for all SEIU-affliated unions in the state, to protect female employees, according to the state council’s report.
Democratic National Committee delegate Courtni Pugh speaks at the California Democratic Party breakfast in Chicago on Aug. 20, 2024.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
“Sufficient evidence was also found to substantiate that Regan has engaged in a pattern of subjecting former and current SEIU California female directors to intimidating and threatening physical behavior and verbal abuse,” the report commissioned by the state council said.
Leaders and workers within the labor movement describe Regan’s alleged behavior as an open secret at SEIU, which represents more than 2 million members nationwide and is the largest union in California.
The law firm hired by SEIU submitted its investigation report on July 28. Regan remains in his job as an administrative process moves forward with hearings. Regan will get a chance to make his case before SEIU determines any appropriate disciplinary action.
SEIU President April Verrett has the power to temporarily suspend Regan as the process plays out.
“SEIU is deeply committed to the safety and well-being of all people, including our members, staff, and the public, and takes these matters seriously,” said Dan O’Sullivan, a spokesperson for SEIU. “As soon as these concerns were raised, we initiated a deliberate and thorough process and retained independent, outside investigators to look into these allegations. Our process is active and ongoing, and the next steps include appointing a hearing officer and holding an evidentiary hearing through which all parties will be afforded due process.”
At a California Federation of Labor event on Dec. 3, Regan told Orr that “state council better endorse this measure by Jan. 1 or I’m coming for you,” she told investigators in both probes.
Regan rode to the airport with Orr and sat next to her on the plane “as part of a continued effort to intimidate her into providing state council’s support for the billionaire tax,” Orr told the investigators. As they left, Regan tapped his watch to suggest her time was running out, the report stated.
Regan told investigators that he learned last year that Orr was working behind the scenes to undermine his billionaire tax proposal. If approved by voters, the measure will retroactively apply a one-time 5% tax on the net worth of billionaires who were residing in California as of Jan. 1, 2026.
Regan denied that he threatened Orr, calling the claims “completely fabricated.”
“And again, the source of that is somebody who is not in favor of Proposition 40, and somebody who has not been leading the state council with practices of good governance,” Regan said in an interview.
Regan also denied intimidating Orr to investigators hired by the national union, but offered a different perspective on the SEIU California executive director. He said he traveled with Orr as a friend that day, had previously supported her professionally and offered her a job, according to the report.
The law firm said Orr believed that Regan was a “bully” who mistreated women of color and made it difficult for them to do their jobs at SEIU and had even “fought someone” when he didn’t “get his way.” Regan denied those allegations, including that he mistreated women of color.
“Orr therefore took Regan’s statement that he was ‘coming for’ her as a threat to her job security and her physical safety. She contemporaneously shared this fear with a colleague. Moreover, her response to Regan’s statement is reasonable because three interviewees — both current and former employees of state council — corroborated that Regan has verbally berated and at times physically intimidated or assaulted former state council executive directors,” the report stated.
The investigation commissioned by the national union concluded that UHW then launched a “fishing expedition” into the state council’s finances under Orr’s leadership, but did not substantiate a claim that Regan defamed her to allies of the labor movement.
The SEIU investigators also wrote that the claim that Regan assaulted Pugh was substantiated.
Pugh told investigators that Regan kicked open her office door and “jacked” her against the wall, according to the investigative report. While she was “pinned,” Regan pressed his finger into her chest and screamed that she was a “dumb ass,” the report said.
When he left her office, Pugh fell to the ground and began to hyperventilate, according to the report. Two colleagues found her, helped her breathe into a paper bag and walked her home, the report said.
Regan denied the allegation.
“It is a complete fabrication and a fiction made by somebody who has all of the incentive possible to critique or trash or criticize UHW generally, and me specifically, and no, there was no mention of it for 17 years,” he said.
The report also concluded that Regan recently threatened to sue SEIU Local 221 President Crystal Irving in an attempt to silence her from warning others about the alleged assault against Pugh.
Regan said the national union’s investigation was “fundamentally flawed” because it stated that Pugh “had nothing to gain from sharing her story” with Irving. Pugh, now a political consultant, has worked against the billionaire tax ballot measure, something Regan said gave her a reason to lie about him.
Pugh called Regan’s response “offensive to the women” who she said objected to his behavior. She said she detailed the alleged incident at the time to board members who oversaw her work and SEIU leadership. The encounter, she said, was well-known.
“I told my colleagues and organization leaders when it occurred,” Pugh said in a statement. “I was asked to participate in the later investigation because so many people had heard about the 2009 incident over the years. I chose to participate in the investigation because I saw that his behavior had continued and in hopes that no one else would have to endure this kind of treatment from him.”
Regan, in his interview with The Times, also denied the allegation that he attempted to force the state council to support the billionaire tax.
David Huerta, president of SEIU-USWW, speaks during a Memorial Day action in Los Angeles on May 21.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
“Huerta then asked Regan if it was his intention to initiate an investigation,” according to the report. “Regan replied, ‘I don’t have to; there are others who would.’ In that conversation, Regan demanded a full endorsement of the billionaire’s tax initiative measure by the state council by Jan. 1.”
Regan told investigators he raised governance issues with Huerta and could not remember if he demanded the council’s support for the billionaire tax during the conversation, though he said he had been seeking the endorsement for months, according to the national union’s report.
“The investigation found that Regan likely suggested he would cause the DOL to investigate state council,” the report said. “According to Regan, he did discuss with Huerta that an investigation was possible.”
The executive board of SEIU California later voted in July to remain neutral on Proposition 40, marking a blow to Regan’s efforts to overcome an onslaught of opposition from California Gov. Gavin Newsom, billionaires and liberal groups concerned that the measure could backfire and reduce state tax revenue collected from the ultra wealthy.
Regan filed a counterclaim with SEIU in April, alleging that the state council initiated the complaint and launched its own investigation into him as a retaliatory “character assassination” for his advocacy for the billionaire tax, something the SEIU report said was not substantiated.
The investigative report submitted to the national union raised questions about Regan’s tactics to earn support for his causes.
Investigators said their probe “revealed that Regan has been associated with similar extreme efforts to secure political endorsements in the recent past.”
The firm reported that it reviewed text and email messages in which a representative for Regan offered to drop part of his counterclaim “in exchange for the state council’s endorsement of Tom Steyer for governor.”
“In an email response to that offer, a State Council representative stated they have ‘no interest in a behind-the-scenes trade involving dropping internal charges of misconduct in exchange for the making of a political endorsement.’”
The person working with Regan who sent the offer denied to the law firm that the conversation constituted extortion.
“This denial is not credible,” the firm wrote in the report. “The Regan Offeror stated that they were ‘extremely careful’ with their language when conveying Regan’s offer, as they were aware that what they said could be misconstrued as extortion. That the Regan Offeror took such care suggests that the offer was likely extortion.”
Regan also denied the claim, which he called a “complete fabrication.”
A second investigation by the Los Angeles law firm Barboza & Associates, which was hired by SEIU California, found sufficient evidence to substantiate a complaint that Regan bullied Jessica Bartholow, the council’s government relations director.
Bartholow reported to her superiors at SEIU California that Regan stood uncomfortably close and hovered over her at the bar at a fundraiser for the state Senate leader in San Diego in March as tensions flared over the billionaire tax. He then screamed an expletive at her in front of a crowd of lawmakers and lobbyists when she walked away from him, according to the state council’s report.
“Bartholow was scared and her heart was pounding,” investigators wrote in the report for the state council that was reviewed by The Times. “Bartholow had heard that Regan could be violent, and she did not know what he was going to do.”
Regan told investigators and The Times that he swore at Bartholow but denied that he physically intimidated her. Regan said he was upset with her over an allegation that she previously threw “four staff members of UHW out of the state council office.” The report commissioned by the state council discredited his claim and said “Bartholow did not throw UHW staff out of the SEIU California office or treat them rudely or disrespectfully.”
Lawyers hired by the state council said Regan intimidated another woman within the union during their investigation.
The state council investigation included an allegation that Regan physically and verbally intimidated Susan Li, an assistant director of external organizing for SEIU Local 721, on April 30 after a meeting with the Assembly Speaker’s Office and the California Primary Care Assn. Regan was allegedly upset with David Green, president of SEIU Local 721 who had just left for the airport, and began randomly screaming at Li, according to the investigative report on the probe commissioned by the state council.
Regan described the encounter as a conversation and said he did not scream at Li.
The state report said Regan “attacks female staff members instead of taking his concerns to the individuals who had the authority to make decisions.”
“Time and again, Regan unleashed his hostility toward the women who worked for SEIU California, and one from Local 721, in a physically intimidating and verbally abusive manner,” the report concludes.
Regan vigorously denied this assertion.
The state council report said Regan often berated Pugh when she worked at SEIU.
“Every week it was, ‘What the f— were you doing in this meeting? Why did you say that? You dumb ass bitch,’” the SEIU state report said. “Every time Regan called Pugh, she put him on speaker phone so everyone could hear him call her a f—up and tell her to f— off. Not one person said anything.”
Pugh told investigators hired by the national union that Regan continued to belittle her in meetings until she eventually resigned from the state council. She said she believed he formed a coalition to force her out of her job and that she would have been fired if she had not stepped down.
Terry Brennand, director of pensions, revenue and budget at SEIU California, told investigators that he and Mary Gutierrez, now deceased, heard Pugh sobbing in her office after Regan allegedly assaulted her.
“Brennand believed Pugh was in shock and traumatized,” the state SEIU report stated. “Pugh seemed frozen, terrified and not quite clear-headed. It was not the usual Pugh, who was direct, thoughtful and expressive. She was shaking and clearly traumatized.”
Three current and former SEIU California executive directors, all women of color, told Brennand that Regan had bullied them, the report said.
“That’s his forte,” Brennand said to investigators. “That’s his wheelhouse.”
Regan denied that he has a problem with women, or women of color.
“It is 100% false,” he said.
Lorena Gonzalez, president of California Labor Federation, said Regan’s union is overwhelmingly composed of women and women of color, who just reelected him to a position he’s held for 16 years.
“Ultimately they have the ability to make this determination of whether he’s an appropriate leader, which they just made again,” she said. “I think what’s most important is that we have to keep our eyes on the fact that Medi-Cal is being cut and we have no solution but the billionaire’s tax to fill that cut.”
Times staff writer Kevin Rector contributed to this report.
SACRAMENTO — If artificial intelligence doesn’t destroy humanity and there are actually future generations that look back, Sept. 8, 2026, may come to be known as “Coxon Day.”
That would be a reference to 27-year-old Jacob Coxon, an AI researcher and whistleblower at Anthropic (and previously OpenAI) who resigned in protest of the unchecked danger his work poses to us all. He posted a warning to the world on X that has gone viral.
“The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade,” Coxon wrote. “No other human activity poses this level of danger.”
Within minutes, replies starting pouring in, including one from Evan Hubinger, another guy at Anthropic charged with making sure AI doesn’t destroy everyone.
“Jacob is correct here — we really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans!” Hubinger wrote. “I personally think it is >10% within the next decade.”
Coxon’s post has racked up more than 150 million views — including from legislators who until now have largely sidestepped the issue of regulating AI, and those within the industry who have long warned allowing it to move forward with no oversight is downright dumb.
That included Eliezer Yudkowsky, a founder of the Berkeley-based Machine Intelligence Research Institute and the co-author of “If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies,” which, as far as book titles go, really cuts to the chase.
Yudkowsky has tried with little luck to publicize the urgency of this technological moment for years, and he was the one who named Tuesday in honor of the tech whistleblower for breaking through to our consciousness with one bold act of defiance.
“Happy Coxon Day to all who will one day celebrate it,” he wrote, highlighting that as as bad as things are, it’s not too late to change course.
What exactly is the risk here?
“The Matrix,” “Terminator,” “War Games,” take your pick — the notion of a superintelligent machine taking over humanity is well-established in our psyches.
Current AI systems aren’t there yet, but they are on track to become smarter than humans in the next few years — if not sooner. This is mostly because AI companies are trying to create AI systems that make AI systems.
Right now, humans are in charge of creating what they have dubbed large language models. Whatever sanitizing term the industry slaps on them, the truth is, even those making them don’t understand exactly what they are.
“We know what data we put into them, but we already have very little ability to understand and control what AIs are after,” Rob Bensinger, research communications manager at the Machine Intelligence Research Institute and a colleague of Yudkowsky, told me.
That’s because, as ChatGPT explained to me, “the inner mathematical reasoning and neural pathways are so vast and complex that how it arrived at a specific conclusion is hidden and poorly understood.”
But companies are hoping that these poorly understood but powerful machines can take over creating newer, even less understood but even more powerful AI systems — leaving humans largely in the dark about what they are creating and even what these beasts can and want to do.
The idea is that, because AI systems even right now are so fast and powerful, they can do the job of creating new versions of themselves at a pace and scale humans simply can’t.
Why, you ask, would this speed-without-understanding be a good thing? Isn’t it a bit like driving a race car while blindfolded?
Yes, yes it is.
But for-profit companies like making profit, and to do that, they want the most powerful product to sell.
Many in the industry are framing this recklessness as a necessity to prevent another country, China in particular, from creating a superintelligent AI system first. The Trump administration has so far grasped on to this greedy bit of misdirection like, well, oligarchs clinging to money.
Those who would prefer not to destroy humanity have urged international cooperation in the form of a slowdown while we figure out how to proceed safely.
We have no reason to believe China would not go along with this — in fact, China has more national-level AI regulation than the U.S. And humans have successfully controlled other technologies with catastrophic power, such as biological and nuclear weapons, through cooperation.
Does it matter which country creates the AI that kills humanity? The logic here seems to be that if anyone is going to cause a mass extinction event, it had better be an English-speaking AI, because it would be a huge loss to America if the planet were destroyed by one speaking a foreign language.
Is 10% really so bad?
In truth, 10% is an arbitrary number. Some put the chance of AI destroying everyone, everywhere, all at once at around 50%. Some go all the way to 90%.
“Nobody knows how to estimate it,” Geoffrey Hinton, a Nobel Prize winner and the so-called godfather of AI, said on the BBC, calling 10% a not unreasonable estimate.
But remember, 10% was Coxon talking about the chance that AI wipes out all humans in a decade.
What about some humans next week?
The odds that a rogue AI causes something unfortunate and unexpected to happen in the near future aren’t bad, either.
There have been multiple examples recently of AI breaking free of safety restraints and doing things — like hacking into other companies and stealing stuff — that, if done by a human, would be a felony.
This shouldn’t be taken as proof they are conscious or have nefarious intent, researchers have told me. It’s more that they have been trained to be relentless in pursuing the goals we give them, but aren’t great at sticking to rules. Like their makers, they too often pursue winning at all costs.
“Which means the AIs will just get more and more kind of relentless and creative and adaptive at working around obstacles,” Bensinger said. “And unless we get exactly the right goals into the AIs, eventually humans will be obstacles.”
So if successfully completing a mission involves, say, shutting down the electrical grid or even doing something obviously deadly, like attempting to manipulate someone into suicide or releasing a bio-weapon, we can’t with any certainty say an AI system wouldn’t do it.
That might not wipe out the whole planet, but it is certainly worth avoiding.
The bright side
Which brings us back to Coxon Day, our collective chance right now to change this grim future. Bensinger said we overcomplicate regulation. Simply control the resources AI companies need — water, power, data centers — and suddenly we have leverage.
Since Coxon’s post, there has been enormous political and social momentum behind the demand for meaningful regulation. Anthropic and OpenAI, among other AI companies, have vowed to do better with safety.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.), the most MAGA of MAGA legislators, called on House Speaker Mike Johnson to call a special session on AI. Other Republicans, including Rep. Nathaniel Moran of Texas, a longtime proponent of AI regulation, have also spoken out.
“Innovation and safety are not mutually exclusive,” Moran wrote online. “We can achieve both through deliberate, thoughtful, and prudent policymaking.”
KABUL: The head of the Norwegian Refugee Council aid group, Jan Egeland, criticised on Thursday what he called the “hypocrisy” of countries demanding rights for Afghan women while cutting humanitarian assistance.
In an interview with AFP in Kabul, Egeland said that “I think it’s right of them to demand, like we do, education for Afghan girls, work rights for Afghan women… but it is hypocrisy when one does that from abroad in a seminar in some capital in Europe and cut aid for food to Afghan girls and even for primary education for Afghan girls.”
The ITV show returned to screens this week following a lengthy break due to the changes made by the broadcaster this year.
Kaye Adams announced the show was going to take another break(Image: ITV)
Loose Women has been replaced in another schedule shake-up.
On Monday, the Loose Women panel members were thrilled when they returned to the ITV show after a lengthy break, due to the show being cut to 30 weeks of the year.
Presenter Ruth Langsford told viewers they were happy to be back, adding that they had ‘missed’ the show. However, after three days back, Loose Women has had another schedule change.
At the end of Wednesday’s show, Kaye Adams explained they weren’t going to be on for the rest of the week. She commented: “That is it for today and this week, we are off tomorrow and Friday for the racing.”
Although she told viewers that when the show returns, they’ll be joined by some familiar faces. Kaye continued: “We are back to normal, whatever that is, next week with two guest panellists joining us.
“Dragons’ Den star Emma Grede and Corrie’s Maria, Samia Longchambon. They’ll be here on the panel, we’ll see you at 12:30 on Monday.”
The show is taking a two-day hiatus as ITV covers the racing live from Doncaster, when viewers will see Ed Chamberlin and Francesca Cumani present coverage.
Before September, Loose Women was last on-air back in July as the presenters confirmed their lengthy break at the time, as Kaye told their fans: “We’re done for the summer.”
It comes after the Managing Director of ITV’s Media and Entertainment Division, Kevin Lygo, confirmed the broadcaster will see major changes in 2026 to its daytime scheduling.
Lorraine Kelly’s programme was cut back to 30 minutes as opposed to a full hour, and was also reduced to airing for 30 weeks on a seasonal schedule, similar to Loose Women.
During the weeks Lorraine isn’t on, fans have seen Good Morning Britain extended for an extra 30 minutes.
Speaking about the changes at the time, Kevin commented: “Daytime is a really important part of what we do, and these scheduling and production changes will enable us to continue to deliver a schedule providing viewers with the news, debate and discussion they love from the presenters they know and trust as well generating savingswhich will allow us to reinvest across the programme budget in other genres.
“These changes also allow us to consolidate our news operations and expand our national, international and regional news output and to build upon our proud history of trusted journalism at a time when our viewers need accurate, unbiased news coverage more than ever.”
Speaking on a podcast, JoJo Siwa discussed whether she’d date women againCredit: TiktokThe singer and dancer discussed her relationship with Love Island alum Chris HughesCredit: Instagram
JoJo and Chris met and struck up a bond on last year’s Celebrity Big BrotherCredit: ITVBefore Chris, JoJo had been dating Kath EbbsCredit: Getty
“Once realised I wasn’t grossed out by the thought of him being a boy, I was like “whoa.”
JoJo continued: “It was definitely… it was weird, because I’d never thought that before.”
The star explained while she had attractive male friends, she never thought of them romantically – joking her bridal party would be “all dudes.”
JoJo went on: “With Chris… it actually was fascinating because I physically thought I would never be with a dude, ever. I just never thought it was possible.
“And people always go, “What if something happened with Chris, who would you date? – boys or would you go for girls?
“At this point, I have no right to say. You can find interviews on me where I’ve sworn how gross dudes are and I’ll never be with one.
“And now I’m head over heels in love with one.
“People always ask that and it’s always just like, “I have no right to say”, but I really do think that Chris is very much so a special dude.”
There was also no small amount of political opportunism at play.
The recall gave Newsom’s critics, mainly on the right, a chance to try to chase the Democrat from an office that Republicans, under normal circumstances, stood little chance of winning.
In the end, the recall effort amounted to scarcely more than a partisan tantrum. The result — 61.9% voting no, 38.1% voting yes — matched the outcome of the 2018 gubernatorial race down to the decimal. All that money and effort wasted on an election in which voters said pretty much, yep, we meant what we said. Not too long after, they gave Newsom a second term.
The plebiscite, and its pointlessness, underscored the many flaws inherent in California’s recall system. In November, voters will get a chance to remedy at least one of them, eliminating the chance a candidate could take office with just marginal support from voters.
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Trigger warning: What follows is a somewhat wonky explanation of election rules and procedures.
One choice, not two
Currently, a recall election is conducted in two parts. Voters are asked whether a lawmaker should be removed and, if so, who their replacement should be. If the incumbent is ousted, whoever gets the most votes takes their place, even if they fall well shy of attaining majority support. (Which is not out of the question in a large multi-candidate field; in 2003, 135 people were on the ballot, vying to replace Gov. Gray Davis.)
Among its provisions, Proposition 5 would amend the state Constitution so that voters would be asked a simple yes-or-no question: Do you wish to recall the incumbent? If so, the lieutenant governor would serve as governor for the rest of the ousted executive’s term — unless the recall occurred during the first two years a governor was in office and before the filing deadline for the next statewide election.
In that case, a special election would be held on the same date as the next primary and a candidate receiving a majority of votes would serve out the governor’s term. If no candidate received a majority, the top-two finishers would face each other in a November runoff, with the winner taking over as governor.
Still there?
Proposition 5 has two benefits. It would save taxpayer dollars by consolidating elections and it would enhance the legitimacy and political standing of a replacement governor by ensuring he or she assumed office with at least 50% support.
California makes it way too easy to qualify a gubernatorial recall measure.
Of the 19 states that allow their governor to be booted, California is by far the most permissive. Forcing an election requires signatures reflecting just 12% of the ballots cast in the prior gubernatorial contest. In Newsom’s case, proponents needed just under 1.5 million signatures in a state with more than 22 million voters and nearly 40 million residents.
Not exactly a thundering roar.
The threshold should be higher and the reasons for kicking a governor out of office should be more serious, such as corruption, official malfeasance or conviction for a serious crime. Not just because a governor is a member of the opposite party, or people on the losing end of an election are unhappy with the result.
“The system in its current form offers bad actors an incentive to target an elected official with whom they disagree and to have the official replaced by someone who otherwise would not enjoy the support of a majority of voters,” Josh Newman of Fullerton and Isaac Bryan of Los Angeles said in advocating change. The two Democratic lawmakers authored the constitutional amendment, which was placed on November’s ballot by the Legislature.
If you think overhauling the process is simply about protecting partisan interests, consider: Should Republican Steve Hilton pull off an epic upset and become California’s next governor, is there any doubt a recall effort would be underway before he and Mrs. Hilton even had the chance to start boxing their belongings for the move to Sacramento?
The recall is a vestige of the Progressive-era good-government movement. But the process needs to be revamped to reflect today’s bad-faith political environment.
The Little Hoover Commission, California’s independent oversight agency, has recommended several changes, including raising the signature requirement and prohibiting recalls undertaken during the first 90 days and the last six months of an officeholder’s term.
Elections, it’s said, have consequences. They also have — or should have — end dates and final results that are respected, not re-litigated until the losing side gets its way.
Proposition 5 is a step in the right direction. More should follow.
About 2,300 women and children from dozens of countries are being held at Roj camp in Syria, many of them linked to ISIL. The Syrian government wants to close the camp, but there are currently no formal plans for what will happen to those being held there. Al Jazeera’s Bernard Smith has an exclusive report from inside the camp.
The Eiffel Tower was shut on Monday after staff went on strike claiming women were asked to step out of sight during a visit by a Hindu group. Around 100 people from the BAPS Hindu movement were among the delegation as France inaugurated its first major Hindu temple.
SACRAMENTO — It was unprecedented and stunning: California’s governor and top two legislative leaders negotiated a compromise on a big bill — and one house rebelled, refusing to bring it to a vote.
The issue: who gets hit the hardest financially when a for-profit utility’s electrical equipment ignites a blaze. The utility’s investors? Its ratepayers? The insurers? Their premium payers?
At stake, depending on who you talk to, is whether the electricity providers can afford to stay in business and keep our lights on. Will some utility — Southern California Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric or San Diego Gas & Election — be forced into bankruptcy when the next powerline-caused wildfire explodes?
Alternatively, there’s another unacceptable potential outcome: Property insurance companies completely stop issuing policies — not just in obvious fire-prone areas, but in tree-lined urban neighborhoods — and basically pull out of California. Or their premiums become flat-out unaffordable.
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Politically, the wildfire legislation’s flameout called into question Gov. Gavin Newsom’s seeming weakness as a lame duck chief executive who will be termed-out of office in January.
Newsom stuck out his neck and took it on the chin from fellow Democrats — showing that even with lopsided one-party rule, unity and success aren’t always guaranteed.
But the episode also raised doubts about Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas’ leadership capability. The Hollister Democrat signed off on the deal with Newsom and Senate President Pro Tem Monique Limon (D-Santa Barbara), but reneged at the last minute under pressure from the Assembly Democratic Caucus. They killed the bill without a floor vote.
I’m in my seventh decade of covering California governors and legislatures and never have seen — or heard of — anything like this: a legislative leader backing out of a deal agreed to with the governor and the other house’s leader.
But in truth, Newsom didn’t really like the agreement much anyway. He was on the utilities’ side, and they were out-lobbied by the insurers and ratepayers.
“I know we all hate utilities, so no one wants to defend a utility. But you’ve got to deal with reality. This thing’s not going to get better on its own,” Newsom told reporters at the Capitol on the night before the deal collapsed, referring to the utilities’ worsening financial liability.
Personally, I think it’s an overreach to conclude that Newsom’s power has been severely weakened — or that Rivas necessarily showed lack of leadership. One can question their reasons for doing what they did, but that doesn’t mean it was because of political debility.
“Newsom’s still a powerful lame duck because he could be a presidential nominee,” Republican consultant Rob Stutzman says.
“One of the better things he has done all year is taking on this issue. It would have been very easy for him to just pass it on to the next governor.”
Leaving aside whether this governor could become a president, there are hundreds of bills piling up on his desk that he must sign or veto by Sept. 30. That gives him tremendous clout. It’s good politics — and human nature — for a governor to lean more favorably toward a measure if it’s authored by a legislator who has voted with him.
Plus, one of the Legislature’s last acts last week was to send Newsom a bloated supplemental budget bill containing more than $3 billion in spending, including countless stacks of pork sought by lawmakers for their districts. Newsom easily and gleefully could discard any or all of it.
So Newsom has awesome power, lame duck or not.
But he’s vulnerable to criticism for his style. He has had an annoying habit of waiting until the very end of a legislative session to spring a hefty proposal on the lawmakers. It’s called “jamming.”
In the past, this pressure tactic mostly worked, although it ticked off lawmakers. This time Assembly members rebelled.
It’s not clear whether his jamming is mainly strategy, or just lack of focus and a tendency to push too many projects at once. Or is he preoccupied with positioning himself to run for president in 2028? Probably all of the above.
“If we had more time, we could have had a different outcome,” Rivas told me.
With only a few days remaining in the legislative session, Newsom initially proposed an ambitious plan that would have shifted more cost for utility-sparked wildfires to property insurers, sharply raising premiums across California. Utilities would have gotten some relief.
It became a titanic fight between two powerful special interests. And insurers — teamed with consumer advocates — triumphed, forcing Newsom to back down.
After hard bargaining, the governor and legislative leaders finally agreed on a post-midnight deal to help wildfire victims receive compensation more quickly — a so-called fast-pay program — and to step up fire preventative efforts.
But utilities’ financial risks weren’t significantly reduced, and they quickly mounted an opposition campaign. That resulted in Assembly Democrats scuttling all of it on the session’s last day.
“It’s unfortunate that [bill] was not given a vote,” Limon said, adding that the Senate was prepared to pass it.
“I don’t want us to do the easy stuff and call it a day,” Rivas told me. “I wanted to see real utility accountability. This bill did not go nearly far enough.”
It went a fair distance, however, in helping future fire victims get their insurance payouts faster. And it probably should have been passed.
Half a loaf. Bird in hand. Incremental change. Next year more incrementalism. Ultimately it can add to massive reform.
Some problems are just too tough to resolve in one sitting.
“It’s back to school for me on Monday. Loose Women is back on air and I’ve really missed it and can’t wait to see everyone,” she penned in her recent newsletter for the Mirror. “We’ll be missing two of our longest-serving Loose Women – Nadia and Denise – which I’m a bit devastated about.
“I love Nadia and she’ll be a big loss to the team. I’m so pleased for Denise, who left to focus on acting, which is her first love and she’s brilliant at it. At 66 she’s had a whole new lease of life and has never looked better.
“But it’ll be exciting to welcome new people in. One of the things I love most about the show is that it incorporates every age group, from women in their 20s to Gloria Hunniford, who’s 86. I think a show that offers that when women still have to battle ageism and having an opinion is something to be celebrated and cherished.”
Hitting back at scrutiny of a feud behind the scenes, she insisted: “I’m always reading stories about us not getting on, but it’s just not true – unless I’m missing something! I’ve never seen it and never felt it.
“So, thanks to those of you who’ve stuck by us through thick and thin for all these years, and hopefully we’ll be sticking around for years to come.”
There has been a shake-up on the panel in recent months, with Denise, 68, confirming her departure in a video in August, explaining that she would be focusing her attention on her acting career.
Nadia had been away from the show for a while before speaking out over her absence, telling the Mirror that she threatened legal action, claiming that ITV bullied her out of her job.
Discussing her exit, the 61-year-old previously said that she feared she was being targeted over speaking out for Palestinian rights.
It was recently claimed that singer Anastacia and entrepreneur Emma Grede – who recently stole the show on Dragons’ Den – were being lined up to join the panel, following the high-profile departures.
According to the Sun, they have been offered short two-month contracts with those behind the scenes hoping they will ‘bring in new perspectives’.
“If we are honest, Loose Women has become a bit of a train wreck. The past 12 months have seen scandal after scandal. Mix that with the cuts and it’s been a perfect storm,” a source told the Sun.
“ITV have offered both Emma and Anastacia contracts that will see them appear on the show as panellists. Both have been on as guests so they know the set up.”
The insider added: “Emma was a huge hit on Dragons’ Den and it’s hoped she would bring in a younger demographic to the show. Anastacia is a household name and brings in a new perspective and isn’t shy when it comes to speaking her mind.”
