California Policy and Politics Monday

California lawmakers vote to change childhood sex abuse law -- The California state Legislature voted Sunday to amend a 2019 law that extended the statute of limitations for childhood sexual abuse claims but was blamed for draining the coffers of municipalities and school districts. Dakota Smith in the Los Angeles Times$ Stephen Hobbs in the Sacramento Bee$ Maya C. Miller Calmatters -- 8/31/26

Bid to limit Thurmond’s power falls short as rumors swirl about Sac City intervention -- A statewide county superintendents association’s attempt to amend California education law and limit the state superintendent’s power to intervene in local school district finances fell short after the Legislature declined to advance the proposal Friday. Chaewon Chung in the Sacramento Bee$ John Fensterwald EdSource -- 8/30/26

California to get more power to sue big businesses under anti-monopoly bill going to Newsom -- Assembly Bill 1776, nicknamed the Compete Act, was the subject of hot debate throughout the legislative session, pitting powerful consumer groups and unions against the state’s Chamber of Commerce and biomedical companies, including drugmakers. Kate Wolffe Calmatters -- 8/31/26

Legislature approves anti-corruption crackdown on California lobbyists -- The Legislature passed late Sunday a bill that would banish lobbyists convicted of corruption from the Capitol for 12 years. It now heads to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk for his signature, three weeks before Dana Williamson, his former chief of staff and a powerful lobbyist, is set to be sentenced after she pled guilty to fraud and lying to the FBI last month. Lia Russell in the Sacramento Bee$ -- 8/31/26

A year after their promise, lawmakers again reform environmental planning. Now Newsom will weigh in -- Lawmakers this week made good on a year-old promise, passing a bill to narrow a controversial exemption from California’s environmental review law. The proposal passed both houses of the Legislature and now goes to the governor’s desk. Alejandra Reyes-Velarde Calmatters -- 8/31/26

Republican-on-Republican battle for California’s 40th Congressional District may hinge on message -- In the race for the realigned California’s 40th Congressional District, the messaging coming out of each campaign — and their supporters — may make all the difference come November. Charlie Borla in the Orange County Register$ -- 8/31/26

 

Skelton: California’s fight against Trump’s unhinged war on voting by mail -- California could have some zany theater this fall: county prosecutors charging federal postmasters with felonies for obeying President Trump’s order to withhold delivery of mail ballots to voters. George Skelton in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

Barabak: Don’t look now, but suddenly the U.S. Senate is in play -- The four-seat gain Democrats need to win control once seemed all but out of reach. Odds are looking up, though the party still faces a tough path, with toss-up races in a half dozen (mostly red) states. Mark Z. Barabak in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

Wildfire

California Dems hand Newsom rare defeat on wildfires -- Gavin Newsom scrambled to push through a major policy priority in the closing days of California’s legislative session — overhauling the rules for who pays when utility equipment sparks a catastrophic wildfire. Instead, Democratic lawmakers gutted his proposal. In a rare rebuke, they said he overreached. Noah Baustin, Jeremy B. White, Marisa Guerra Echeverria and Camille von Kaenel Politico -- 8/31/26

‘Measured in weeks, not days’: Plaskett and Timber fires near Big Sur scorch 33,000 acres -- Crews on Sunday continued to battle two wildfires in Monterey County near Big Sur that have collectively burned more than 33,000 acres and forced more than 600 people to evacuate. Hayley Smith in the Los Angeles Times$ Brooke Park, Anthony Edwards in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 8/31/26

Workplace

Tech’s biggest names embraced Trump. Their workers tell a different story -- By the time the likes of Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Tim Cook lined up for photo ops with Donald Trump at his second inauguration, a narrative had taken hold: Tech had moved firmly right. That narrative is wrong, a Chronicle analysis of federal political giving shows — except at the very pinnacle of tech’s power pyramid. Olivia Borgula in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 8/31/26

Lawmakers vote to let first responders retire earlier and with more money. Will Newsom sign on? -- California police and firefighters will be able to retire earlier and earn more generous pensions under a bill lawmakers sent to Gov. Gavin Newsom. It’s potentially expensive and government agencies are urging him to veto it. Adam Ashton and Nigel Duara Calmatters -- 8/31/26

Marketplace

Meta whistleblower says $17B settlement doesn’t do enough to save kids’ lives -- Arturo Bejar, a former safety employee at Facebook, said in an interview that the agreement overrelies on time limits and other ways Meta can try to reduce harm, without doing enough to hold the company accountable for whether those methods succeed. Christine Mui Politico -- 8/31/26

Saving Hollywood? California to restore access to tax break for independent films -- Gov. Gavin Newsom’s new corporate tax credit cap, signed into law this summer, threatened to diminish Hollywood’s tax breaks. State leaders want to fix that by exempting independent film productions from that cap. Yue Stella Yu Calmatters -- 8/31/26

California lawmakers greenlight a new San Diego sports arena, bypassing environmental hurdles -- Lawmakers approved a last-minute deal for a controversial sports arena and housing project in San Diego, allowing the city to use an existing environmental review. Nadia Lathan Calmatters -- 8/31/26

UCLA

UCLA disciplined a pro-Palestinian protester behind closed doors. Now he’s suing -- In a prolonged case that offers a rare look into the fiercely private student discipline process, a UCLA computer science doctoral student is suing the University of California, asking a judge to reverse his two-quarter suspension and release a master’s degree withheld for more than 600 days. Jaweed Kaleem in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

AI

After rogue AI hack, regulating the industry takes on urgency in race to succeed Pelosi -- Since news broke last month that OpenAI agents colluded to cheat and launch a cyberattack in defiance of company safeguards, AI safety activists have been ringing the alarm. The incident underscored the reality that the AI industry has already lost control of its technology and has renewed calls for stringent regulations. Ko Lyn Cheang, Olivia Borgula in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 8/31/26

AI is watching your spending and setting your prices accordingly. Lawmakers want to stop it -- California lawmakers are weighing a ban on “surveillance pricing,” as states and federal regulators move to curb data-driven price discrimination they say undermines basic expectations of fairness. Audrey McGlinchy in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

Hollywood studios have sued over AI. Now Google is courting them to use its tools -- Google is quietly courting Disney, Universal, Warner Bros. Discovery and other studios to license characters and film libraries for its AI tools, but complex legal and union concerns have stalled deals. The talks mark a dramatic shift from Google’s piracy-era clashes over YouTube. Wendy Lee in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

California lawmakers crack down on AI used in public comment -- California lawmakers have passed legislation that will make it easier for government agencies to protect themselves from the rising use of artificial intelligence for public comment, records requests and other forms of civic engagement. Hayley Smith in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

Your boss, tech companies and police can read your chatbot conversations -- Americans ask AI chatbots about almost everything, from health to relationships to big existential questions. While those conversations might feel enlightening or intimate, they are not always one thing: private. Miriam Waldvogel in the Washington Post$ -- 8/31/26

Climate

California’s beaches are being eaten away. El Niño could redraw the coast as we know it -- Hotter ocean waters are pushing tide lines higher. Powerful Pacific hurricanes are lashing the shoreline with series of strong waves, leaving teetering infrastructure and blotted-out beaches in their wake. Rong-Gong Lin II and Robert Gauthier in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

A hotter planet is pushing older adults beyond the human body’s limits -- As the planet gets hotter, the human body can only do so much to keep itself cool. For older adults — defined in the study as people 60 and older — the limit may arrive much sooner than previously understood. Panashe Matemba-Mutasa in the San Jose Mercury$ -- 8/31/26

Housing

This Bay Area housing project has sat half-finished for nearly a decade. What went wrong? -- A concrete skeleton has sat rusting above Interstate 680 in Fremont for nearly two decades. Graffiti covers some of its columns. People dump trash around the structure. Back in 2007, city officials had a different plan for the site: 158 luxury condos and retail space. Sarah Ravani in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 8/31/26

Proposed S.F. apartment tower more than doubles in size, sparking fears of backlash -- A development team that earlier this year proposed the largest housing development ever in San Francisco’s West Portal neighborhood is more than doubling the number of homes it’s planning at the site and adding three stories to the project. J.K. Dineen in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 8/31/26

Street

California may restrict undercover police operations targeting youth -- The Legislature this week passed a bill that would prohibit law enforcement agencies from targeting certain people under age 26 in so-called Perkins operations, which involve undercover agents posing as incarcerated people to elicit incriminating information from suspects. Cayla Mihalovich Calmatters -- 8/31/26

Also

A rare cancer stalks children in this wealthy O.C. suburb. Parents desperate to unlock mystery -- Seventeen-year-old Brody Matteson went through hell in the last year of his life. Feeding tubes, blood transfusions, ambulance rides, intense nausea and bone-deep pain. Clara Harter in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

Bay Area couple recount escape from Nepal flood: ‘I knew I was going to die’ -- A Bay Area couple on a pilgrimage to Mount Kailash said they thought they would die when a towering wall of water, mud and debris rushed toward their tour bus in Nepal. Aidin Vaziri in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 8/31/26

Killion: Kaepernick inspired era of athlete activism, then MAGA helped silence it. Here’s how it comes back -- A decade after Colin Kaepernick took a knee, athletes’ drive to stand up for the oppressed has quieted. Now the loudest voices in sports are opposing marginalized groups. What happened? Ann Killion in the San Francisco Chronicle$ -- 8/31/26

POTUS 47

US strikes Iranian rocket launchers on the Strait of Hormuz in first military action in weeks -- U.S. forces struck Iranian rocket launchers on the Strait of Hormuz in their first military action in a month on Sunday, breaking a lull in fighting during an intermittent war that has lasted more than six months. Vowing to retaliate for what it called a deadly attack, Iran later said it had launched missiles at U.S. sites in Jordan. Konstantin Toropin, Cara Anna, Ben Finley Associated Press Michael R. Gordon, Robbie Gramer and Saleh al-Batati in the Wall Street Journal$ -- 8/31/26

Millions of Dollars in Secret Spending Could Upend the 2026 Midterms -- A New York Times review of advertising data, campaign-finance filings and tax records revealed that about $1 billion in anonymous money is sloshing through the political landscape in 2026, a staggering sum and yet almost certainly a low-end estimate, given how difficult this money is to trace. Shane Goldmacher and Theodore Schleifer in the New York Times$ -- 8/31/26

A conservative California upbringing paved Natalie Harp’s way to Trump -- Harp and her brother were home-schooled in San Diego by their mother, who used educational materials written from a biblical worldview. In her mid-20s, Harp moved with her parents to Irvine to be closer to their father’s work at Biola University. Ana Ceballos and Hannah Fry in the Los Angeles Times$ -- 8/31/26

'Like something out of 'Saturday Night Live': Ontario premier laughs off ‘Lake America’ executive order -- In a wide-ranging interview with ABC’s “This Week,” Ford denounced Trump’s tariff plans; said many were feeling “bullied” by the president; and appeared to laugh off an executive order renaming Lake Ontario to Lake America. Cheyanne M. Daniels Politico -- 8/31/26

Untested in court, Trump’s new tariffs on Canada raise legal questions -- In firing up a trade war with Canada, President Donald Trump turned to a 96-year-old statute so obscure that many trade lawyers didn’t even know it was still on the books. Paul Wiseman Associated Press -- 8/31/26

Pentagon secretly installs military influencers in civilian roles -- Conservative veterans with large social media followings have been hired by the Defense Department and are amplifying Pete Hegseth’s culture-war fights. Dan Lamothe and Tara Copp in the Washington Post$ -- 8/31/26

USDA cyclospora research projects shelved amid funding cuts and relocations -- The shuttering of three projects is expected to hinder vital research at a time when consumers are increasingly worried about the safety of the food supply. Marcia Brown and Rachel Shin Politico -- 8/31/26

Venezuela vowed not to ‘hand over’ its oil. Trump aims to grab a windfall. -- The deal cements the United States’ long-term dominance over Venezuela, which has become a neo-colony since the U.S. military’s capture of then-President Nicolás Maduro in January. Samantha Schmidt and Helena Carpio in the Washington Post$ -- 8/31/26

Trump: Communities that reject data centers will end up ‘backwards and poor’ -- President Donald Trump on Monday again championed the spread of data centers despite growing bipartisan backlash ahead of the midterms in November. Cheyanne M. Daniels Politico -- 8/31/26