| | | | |  | | By Sarah Grace Taylor | Presented by California Resources Corporation | LAST CHANCE TO WIN COOL PRIZES — Hundreds of bills are headed to the Appropriations committees on Thursday. Use your insider knowledge to guess which bills will be blocked and won't advance past the hearings. Make your prediction by today for a chance to win a shout-out in California Playbook, some extra special swag and maybe even an invite to a POLITICO coffee date. Hint: You can find the list of bills on the Assembly Appropriations agenda and on the Senate hearing agenda. Happy guessing!
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Assemblymember Evan Low | Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images for CAPE | FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: A divided California Democratic Party is set to endorse Evan Low for Congress after a slew of newly-appointed delegates gave him one more vote than he needed to earn the nod over rival Sam Liccardo. Of course, nothing can happen in the race between Low, a state lawmaker, and Liccardo, a former San Jose mayor, without one accusing the other of foul play. Low until this month was locked in a 30,249-vote tie with a third candidate until a former Liccardo employee — claiming to be acting independently of the campaign — forced a contentious recount in the primary, knocking out Joe Simitian. Low and his allies managed to add 27 pro-Low delegates to the district during the 10-day voting period, netting 58 votes, according to internal vote records obtained by Playbook and confirmed by party officials — just enough to secure the endorsement, which has yet to be finalized. Liccardo, meanwhile, had urged delegates to vote "no endorsement" — a tactic often used to block a rival's bid. Now, he's criticizing Low’s maneuver. In a letter to delegates after the vote, Liccardo said Low had “packed” the vote by subbing delegates from elsewhere in California with those from the 16th district. “The Low campaign scrambled to find ‘alternate’ delegates who would rapidly fill those slots, and vote for Evan Low’s endorsement,” Liccardo wrote. “Surely, as we consider the endorsement process, we can do better,” he added. Robin Swanson, a spokesperson for the party, said that Low’s delegate-shifting move is allowed under the party’s bylaws. Low’s campaign would not comment on its involvement in delegate appointments but said the candidate followed the party’s bylaws. A spokesperson credited the endorsement vote to Low’s service in the party as a former president of the Silicon Valley LGBT Democratic Club and longtime history as a volunteer — before taking the opportunity to bash Liccardo. “The same commitment to our Democratic Party cannot be said about Evan’s opponent, Sam Liccardo, who is sowing doubt in the Democratic process because Democrats rejected him,” Clay Volino, a spokesperson for Low, told Playbook. But some delegates were put off by the tactic, including Elsa Schafer Raval, a San Mateo County resident. She said she was originally open to voting for Low, but found the delegate shuffle “sleazy” and voted against making any endorsement. “It just sounded like the right time, with everything going on between Liccardo and Low, to have no endorsement and spend the next six months getting to know them,” Schafer Raval told Playbook. “The two of them sure are going at it.” As of this afternoon, the Liccardo campaign was not planning to challenge the results of the endorsement vote, with a deadline of 5 p.m. to do so. The campaign also thanked delegates for the process but did not comment further on Low’s involvement. IT’S WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON. This is California Playbook PM, a POLITICO newsletter that serves as an afternoon temperature check on California politics and a look at what our policy reporters are watching. Got tips or suggestions? Shoot an email to sgtaylor@politico.com.
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State Treasurer Fiona Ma | Rich Pedroncelli/AP Photo | ‘THERE WAS NO RAID’ — State Treasurer Fiona Ma gave POLITICO her most detailed response yet to rumors that the FBI visited her Sacramento office last month. “There was no raid,” Ma, a candidate for lieutenant governor, said in an interview, adding that she receives public records requests and subpoenas “all the time.” Obviously anticipating the question, Ma read from a prepared statement that her custodian of records “received a document request from a law enforcement agency,” noting her office gets those kinds of queries “on a regular basis” and saying they were assisting the unnamed law enforcement agency. A representative for the Eastern district of the U.S. attorney’s office said they had nothing to share about a potential investigation. Ma also assailed a former employee’s sexual harassment lawsuit, again reading a prepared statement calling it a “frivolous” effort to force a settlement by threatening her career. Ma defended having shared lodging with her accuser Judith Blackwell as an “accommodation” for the “very desperate, serious” Covid-19 situation in which essential employees were coming into the office but hotels were shuttered. But she conceded she could have handled things differently: “Maybe I should have just come and stayed at a hotel by myself or not rented an Airbnb with anyone.” Waukeen McCoy, the attorney representing Blackwell, said in an email that a court allowing some claims to proceed to trial established the case was not frivolous. “No one has threatened Ma's career, she is the party that wanted to resolve the matter with money, just as long as she got dismissed out of the case first, so it would not impact her career,” he said. — Jeremy B. White
| | | | NEW! AN EXCLUSIVE CALIFORNIA BALLOT-MEASURES COVERAGE TEAM: The impact that ballot measures have on California residents, industries, and Legislature is enormous. From settling broad cultural questions to changing obscure governance rules, ballot measures in essence, have become the fourth branch of government in the most influential state capital in the U.S. As your go-to source for reporting on Golden State politics, policy, power, POLITICO has formed a new ballot measure team in California that will deliver in-depth insights into the strategies, policy ideas, personalities, money and influence driving ballot measures. LEARN MORE. | | | | | | | ON THE BEATS | | KOUNALAKIS TALKS TOUGH — Lt. Gov. Kounalakis had harsh words for the University of California and its handling of campus protests at a meeting of the Jewish Public Affairs Committee of California this morning. Speaking to a crowded ballroom in downtown Sacramento, the lieutenant governor and University of California regent (who is running for governor in 2026) said the UC system was unprepared for the protests that disrupted classes in the final weeks of the spring semester. She also said the system’s campus-by-campus approach resulted in troubling inconsistencies in its response. “We’re in the summer now and, largely, it’s been deescalated,” she said. “But we have a lot of work to do now.” Kounalakis spoke passionately about the need to clearly define what speech and behavior is prohibited for students and faculty. She recounted a tweet from a UC Davis professor threatening Jewish journalists as an example of what shouldn’t be tolerated. “If that does not cross a line of a code of conduct, my God, what does?” she said to uproarious applause. She spoke against the movement calling for divestment from Israel, saying students have been swept up in a “wave of misinformation” and that they need to be reeducated. “We have the summer to really clarify how we are going to go about taking control of our campuses back for all of our students,” Kounalakis said in closing, earning her a standing ovation. — Lara Korte HEALTHY DEBATE: Newsom and his administration are on the defensive as lawmakers and health groups excoriate its latest proposed cuts to health care programs. At a budget subcommittee hearing today, lawmakers repeatedly asked state agency representatives how they expected the state’s poorest patients to get access to care when the May budget revision would cut planned payments to many safety-net providers and hospitals. Lawmakers also objected to reductions to Indian health grants, public health and youth behavioral health programs. “This is a really deep cut,” said Jim Wood, the former Assembly Health committee chair. “It feels like this population doesn’t matter anymore, like our hospitals don’t matter anymore. I’m shocked, I’m almost beyond words.” Throughout the hearing, the administration reiterated that it was a difficult year and that every decision to cut was a hard one. “I understand your concerns, they do not fall on deaf ears,” said a budget analyst from the Department of Finance. “We are facing a very serious budget shortfall, and it was very difficult to find money to solve for that.” Newsom himself defended his budget decisions on Tuesday, arguing the state was still providing “unprecedented support” to Medi-Cal in response to a question from POLITICO. “There's no administration that we know of in the United States that has done more work to address the provider payments,” he said. — Rachel Bluth PROBING QUESTIONS: The House education committee announced an investigation of UCLA’s handling of antisemitism and protests today, demanding a broad swath of documents a week before embattled Chancellor Gene Block is set to appear before the panel. Chair Virginia Foxx previously summoned Block and the presidents of Rutgers and Northwestern universities to be questioned on campus antisemitism, after her committee grilled four other college leaders over the issue. The North Carolina Republican has opened probes and sent documents requests to presidents who’ve already been questioned, and she formally launched an inquiry into Northwestern’s handling of campus antisemitism on May 10. Foxx’s directive to UCLA cited reports of pro-Palestinian protesters setting up checkpoints around campus that prevented self-identifying Zionists from moving freely about the campus. It also criticized the delayed campus police response to a violent attack on a pro-Palestinian encampment last month. The committee requested records of university officials’ communications on the encampment and on antisemitism — not just at UCLA, but at the UC Office of the President — as well as video surveillance of protests. — Blake Jones
| | | | A message from California Resources Corporation:   | | | | | WHAT WE'RE READING TODAY | | — Tesla’s fourth straight week of layoff announcements is hitting the Bay Area hard. The latest wave will lay off 378 employees in Fremont and 223 in Palo Alto. (Los Angeles Times) — Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo sent Newsom a letter warning him against capping profits for oil refineries that could hike his own state’s gas prices. Newsom says it’s a stunt. (POLITICO) — Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is backing two California ballot measures: one on rent control and one on restricting oil drilling. (Los Angeles Times)
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— Jane Fonda Day could be rescheduled after an outcry from LA County’s Vietnamese community.County leaders initially chose a date coinciding with “Black April,” commemorating the fall of Saigon. (East Bay Times)
— General Motors’ autonomous taxi unit reached a settlement for over $8 million with a pedestrian who was dragged by one of its self-driving vehicles in San Francisco. (Orange County Register) — A committee of California lawmakers voted to audit a multi-million dollar settlement between an airshow operator and Huntington Beach over damages caused by an oil spill in 2021. (Los Angeles Times)
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