Trump calls for store robbers to be shot in speech to California Republicans

Donald Trump called for shooting store robbers on Friday in a bleak speech to California Republicans – and warned “this country will die!” if Joe Biden remained president.

During the address to GOP members, Trump also railed that wealthy Beverly Hills residents smell because of water denials, and repeated election fraud lies, according to the Associated Press.

“We will immediately stop all of the pillaging and theft. Very simply: If you rob a store, you can fully expect to be shot as you are leaving that store,” Trump said, spurring applause. “Shot!”

California Has Banned Book Bans, Bucking GOP Censorship Trend

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed legislation Monday prohibiting schools from banning books because they highlight race, sexual orientation or other protected characteristics, a rebuttal to efforts in Florida and other GOP-led states to severely restrict students’ reading materials.

The legislation authored by state Assemblymember Corey Jackson (D) enacts a financial penalty against school districts that make “efforts to categorically exclude” books related to race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and other demographics that have faced discrimination.

Gavin Newsom Bolsters Protections For LGBTQ People After Controversial Veto

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed several bills Saturday aimed at strengthening the state’s protections for LGBTQ+ people, a day after issuing a controversial veto that was criticized by advocates.

The new laws include legislation that focuses on support for LGBTQ+ youth. One law sets timelines for required cultural competency training for public school teachers and staff, while another creates an advisory task force to determine the needs of LGBTQ+ students and help advance supportive initiatives.

A third requires families to show that they can and are willing to meet the needs of a child in foster care regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Elon Musk’s X sues California over new social media transparency laws

Elon Musk’s X sued California on Friday, challenging the constitutionality of a state law establishing new transparency requirements for social media companies, including how they police disinformation, hate speech and extremism.

X, the social media platform once called Twitter, said the law, known as Assembly Bill 587, violates its free speech rights under the US constitution’s first amendment and California’s state constitution.

In a complaint filed in federal court in Sacramento, California, X said the law’s “true intent” was to pressure social media companies into eliminating content the state found objectionable.

Billionaires want to build a new city in rural California. They must convince voters first.

SAN FRANCISCO — Silicon Valley billionaires behind a secretive $800 million land-buying spree in Northern California have finally released some details about their plans for a new green city, but they still must win over skeptical voters and local leaders.

After years of ducking scrutiny, Jan Sramek, the former Goldman Sachs trader spearheading the effort, launched a website Thursday about “California Forever.” The site billed the project as “a chance for a new community, good paying local jobs, solar farms, and open space” in Solano, a rural county between San Francisco and Sacramento that is now home to 450,000 people.

National California shop owner killed over Pride flag was adamant she would never take it down

LOS ANGELES — The California woman killed for apparently refusing to remove an LGBTQ+ rainbow Pride flag from outside her store was adamant that she would never take it down, a longtime friend said Wednesday.

Laura Ann Carleton was fatally shot Friday outside Mag.Pi, the clothing and home decor shop she owned in Cedar Glen, a mountain community east of Los Angeles.

The shooter, Travis Ikeguchi, was killed by deputies after he opened fire on them a short time later, San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus said Monday. Ikeguchi had frequently posted anti-LGBTQ content on social media, sheriff’s officials said.

Man fatally shoots California store owner in dispute over shop's Pride flag, police say

A dispute over an LGBTQ Pride flag at a California clothing store spiralled into deadly violence this weekend when a man shot and killed the 66-year-old business owner right in front of her shop, authorities said.

The man ran away from the store after the shooting Friday night but was later found and killed in a confrontation with officers from the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department.

Businesses want to make it harder to raise California taxes. Democrats are pushing back

A tussle over tax hikes in California is intensifying. California Democrats have answered a tax-reform push by business groups with their own proposal to undercut it.

The escalating dispute over voters’ roles in approving or rejecting tax increases is a reflection of ballot initiatives’ outsize role in Sacramento and the game of cat and mouse that often plays out between opposing interests.

California Cops Shot and Killed 162 People Last Year. This Bill Could Help Reduce the Bloodshed.

A California bill that would radically change the standard for the use of deadly force by police officers got past a key hurdle on Thursday, as the state Senate Appropriations Committee voted unanimously to send it along to the full Senate for debate.

Assembly Bill 931, the Police Accountability and Community Protection Act,  would allow officers to use lethal force only when “necessary” to “prevent imminent and serious bodily injury or death” to an officer or bystander, and when there are no “reasonable” nonlethal alternatives—a Taser, for example. The bill would also mandate that cops attempt to de-escalate potentially volatile situations using “time, distance, communications, and available resources” whenever it is “safe and reasonable” to do so. And it would bar police from using lethal force when a subject is a threat only to himself.

Californians Will Vote on a Silicon Valley Investor’s Plan to Split Up Their State

When Californians head to the polls this fall, they’ll get to vote on whether or not America’s largest and arguably most important state should be broken into three.

On Tuesday, a voter initiative known as Cal 3 qualified to be on the state’s November 6. The measure is the brainchild of Bay Area venture capitalist/Theranos investor (and Bitcoin booster) Tim Draper. As he did when he pushed a failed initiative to break the state into six states, Draper says California as it currently exists is simply too large to be governed effectively. Dividing it into three smaller Californias, he claims, would lead to “better decision making,” “a dramatically more effective education system,” and “more reliable roads.”

Researchers Just Found a Hidden Cause of California’s Smog Problem

Despite its progressive environmental policies, the state of California actually has the worst air quality in the nation, according to a 2017 report from the American Lung Association. More specifically, California’s Central Valley, which produces one third of the country’s vegetables and two thirds of its fruits and nuts, is home to some particularly nasty air, thanks to its bathtub-like topography, which traps air pollution in the region. Just in the past month, the Central Valley saw, by some measures, its worst period of polluted air in nearly 20 years, which researchers have attributed primarily to smoke from wildfires that ravaged areas of Southern California, as well as the typical culprits—vehicle emissions and residential wood-burning.

California city arrests a dozen people for passing out food and toiletries to homeless people

A dozen people including a 14-year-old kid were given misdemeanor citations on Sunday in El Cajon, California, after they defied the city’s recently enacted ban on distributing food to the needy on public land.

Local charities intend to challenge the law in court. Sunday’s arrests will help give them standing to bring their case. A group called Break the Ban has vowed to push forward with another scheduled food distribution day near the end of the month.

Skyrocketing Rents in California Signal a Broader US Housing Crisis

In California and across the country, housing is growing increasingly expensive. Since California's housing crisis is the most acute, the fight for rent control is heating up across the state. But social housing systems in places like Singapore and Vienna, along with community land trusts provide different solutions for expensive housing.

Three of the country's most expensive cities are located in the San Francisco Bay Area. As of July, median rent for a one-bedroom in San Francisco is $3,450/month, according to Zumper. Median rent for a one-bedroom in Oakland is $2,100/month, while San Jose's median rent is $2,390/month. As usual, San Francisco remains the most expensive city in the country. San Jose is third most expensive and Oakland is sixth. Concord's median rent is $1,620/month, which is a 5 percent increase from last year. In Los Angeles, median rent for a one-bedroom is $2,100/month.

California Single-Payer Organizers Are Deceiving Their Supporters. It’s Time to Stop.

In the days since California Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon shelved for the year SB562, which intends to establish a state single-payer health care system, he’s been subject to mass protests and even death threats. The bill’s chief backers, including the California Nurses Association and the Bernie Sanders-affiliated Our Revolution, angrily point to Rendon as the main roadblock to truly universal health care.

Everything You Need to Know About the Single-Payer Fight in California

As Donald Trump and congressional Republicans struggle to repeal Obamacare, Democrats in the nation’s most populous state are pushing a very different reform proposal that would radically change the way health care is paid for. Last week, the California Senate overwhelmingly passed a bill that would demolish the state’s current insurance plans and replace them with a single-payer system that would provide comprehensive treatment to all residents free of charge. The measure is still a long way from becoming law, but progressives already see it as a model for how states can expand access to care even as Republicans at the national level try to roll back coverage.

California to Investigate Racial Discrimination in Auto Insurance Premiums

The California Department of Insurance has launched an investigation into whether eight auto insurers in the state discriminate against drivers in minority neighborhoods.

The investigation was prompted by an April 5 article, co-published by ProPublica and Consumer Reports, which found that the eight California insurers were charging more for auto premiums in minority neighborhoods, on average, than in non-minority areas with similar accident costs. California law prohibits insurers from charging rates that are excessive or unfairly discriminatory.

The people behind the Planned Parenthood videos were just charged with 15 felonies in California

California prosecutors charged two anti-abortion activists with 15 felony counts on Tuesday for invasions of privacy associated with the Center for Medical Progress’ deceptively edited Planned Parenthood videos.

The Center for Medical Progress published the videos online in 2015, triggering a wave of controversy, threats, and attacks — both political and physical — on Planned Parenthood. David Daleiden, one of the two activists being prosecuted, said that the videos show Planned Parenthood conspiring to sell “aborted baby parts” for profit.

This Democrat Just Emerged to Run Against the Richest Man in Congress

Mike Levin preempted his bid to take on the wealthiest man in Congress by trolling him. “Over the holiday season, I sent Darrell Issa a book called Climate Change for Beginners,” Levin says. “It’s a 150-page book, illustrated. It’s got pictures,” he notes, adding that he hoped it would prod Issa, a nine-term Republican congressman who represents parts of California’s Orange and San Diego counties, to correct his claim to being “unsure of the science” behind climate change.

California Nonprofit May Have Violated Tax Law By Donating to Anti-Muslim, Far-Right Dutch Candidate

The David Horowitz Freedom Center, a controversial California-based nonprofit that sponsors virulently anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant campaigns in the U.S., has quietly played a prominent role in financing Dutch far-right nationalist Geert Wilders’s People’s Party for Freedom (PVV). The PVV’s platform calls for an end to Muslim immigration and the closing down of mosques and Islamic schools in the Netherlands — and polls suggest it may win the largest number of seats in the Netherland’s parliamentary elections this month.

Big Oil’s Grip on California

On the morning of June 21, 2011, a worker named Robert David Taylor was walking through an oil field west of Taft, California, when he noticed a plume of steam coming from the darkened earth. Taylor, 54, was a Chevron supervisor who had spent three decades around Kern County’s Midway-Sunset field, the largest and most productive in the state. He and two co-workers had been dispatched to fix the “chimney” near an idled well known to spew scalding geysers of oil, water, and rocks as high as 40 feet in the air.