Politics
Embattled manager of California water agency defends record, says complaints are unfounded
More than two months after he was placed on leave by the board of California’s largest urban water supplier, embattled General Manager Adel Hagekhalil defended his performance and insisted the accusations against him are unfounded.
The board of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California met in closed session Tuesday to discuss the status of investigations into multiple complaints and voted to extend Hagekhalil’s leave of absence until Oct. 23 as the investigation continues. The leave had been scheduled to end in September.
“We understand the desire for an expedited investigation, but as difficult as this is, we believe due process is paramount above all considerations, for all parties involved,” said Adán Ortega Jr., chair of the MWD board. “We are committed to ensuring a thorough, fair and impartial investigation.”
Hagekhalil spoke to the board publicly for the first time since the agency’s leaders announced they were placing him on leave on June 13.
“I can assure you, the board and all the Metropolitan employees, that I have not committed any misconduct,” Hagekhalil said. “Everything I’ve done has always been for the best interests of Metropolitan.”
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Some of the accusations surfaced in a letter to the board from Chief Financial Officer Katano Kasaine, who alleged Hagekhalil had harassed, demeaned and sidelined her and created a hostile work environment. Hagekhalil denied the accusations, saying he has always treated the staff with respect and professionalism.
“These complaints are nothing more than disagreements on management decisions,” Hagekhalil told board members. “Over 74 days ago, you unfairly placed me on leave, and as of today, I still have not been contacted about the investigation.”
Kerry Garvis Wright, a lawyer for Hagekhalil, said her client has been locked out of his email account and denied access to agency documents, “hampering his ability to prepare for his interviews in the investigations.”
“We have significant concerns about the investigative process, including but not limited to the lack of independence, lack of impartiality and the lack of confidentiality,” Wright said.
She urged the board to address the concerns promptly and reinstate Hagekhalil.
The sidelining of Hagekhalil has left in question the future leadership of the nation’s largest wholesale supplier of drinking water, which serves cities and agencies that supply 19 million people across Southern California.
In the more than three years that Hagekhalil has led the agency, he has sought to focus on adaptation to climate change, in part by reducing reliance on water supplies from distant sources and investing in local water supplies. His efforts to shift priorities at MWD have also included management changes that he and his supporters say have helped address problems of workplace harassment and retaliation.
“We have had many successes and accomplishments,” Hagekhalil said. “You tasked me to change this toxic culture and put the agency back on track. I’m proud to say we all did. We supported a culture of transparency and accountability.”
Hagekhalil said, however, that some within the agency have sought to undermine his reform efforts.
In a letter to the board, Hagekhalil said that “every action I took on your behalf and at your direction was faced with a frivolous complaint to undermine and stop the reform that you directed.”
He said when he was hired by MWD, he arrived “at a time of turmoil following harassment and retaliation complaints by employees, unhealthy workplace conditions” in desert outposts, and outdated human resources policies and hiring practices.
Hagekhalil noted that before he was hired, the Los Angeles Times had published an investigation about women’s complaints of harassment, discrimination and retaliation, and that some MWD board members had pushed for an independent investigation by Shaw Law Group, a Sacramento firm.
The full investigative report, which remains confidential, substantiated the women’s complaints, Hagekhalil said. A scathing state audit later determined that the district had failed to commit resources to properly investigate complaints of misconduct and had engaged in unfair hiring practices, among other problems.
“We wanted a healing and a reset to the organization. You charged me to do that,” Hagekhalil said. Those efforts, he said, included creating an independent office for discrimination complaints, creating an office of diversity, equity and inclusion, and reforming policies to address bullying and harassment, among other things.
But he said some within the agency “didn’t accept that and continued to try to undermine us by weaponizing the complaint process with bad faith claims.” He said that “a small number of people resisted change and accountability” and that “every action I took was faced with frivolous complaints.”
Hagekhalil said he has been subjected to other anonymous complaints that have been investigated and shown to be unfounded. In one case, he said, an anonymous complaint regarding the hiring of a chief of staff led to an investigation that ended on Aug. 15, when MWD’s ethics office notified him there was no violation and the matter was closed.
“I am very concerned about the fairness and objectivity of the investigation process. It is very clear that these are unfounded and frivolous allegations and complaints, leaks, lies being used to smear us with the goal to force the board’s hand,” Hagekhalil said in his letter, urging board members not to “fall for these tactics.”
About 20 people spoke in favor of Hagekhalil during the meeting, including employees, environmental advocates, residents and others.
Bruce Reznik, executive director of the group Los Angeles Waterkeeper, called for reinstating Hagekhalil while the investigations are completed “with as much transparency as is possible.”
“My experience with Adel has always been extremely positive,” Reznik said, calling him a “thoughtful, inclusive, transparent leader.”
Caty Wagner, water campaign manager for the Sierra Club, said that there appears to be a group at MWD “who want to take the district back in time,” and that Hagekhalil is being targeted for standing against them.
“I am shocked by what I heard from Adel’s lawyer this morning — that he has not yet been contacted by investigators and did not know what today’s meeting would be about,” Wagner said. “The public is watching and we are appalled.”
Others who voiced support included Marty Adams, the former general manager of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, who said Hagekhalil has “brought the water community together throughout the whole state.”
Some praised Hagekhalil’s efforts to have better communication with communities and tribes in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, where water is pumped to provide a portion of Southern California’s supplies.
“We need more California water leaders like Adel, not less,” Krystal Moreno of the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians said.
Others were critical of Hagekhalil and said the investigations should get to the bottom of the complaints.
“I’m here today speaking for those who cannot speak because of fear of retaliation and harassment,” said Trish Gonzales, a retired employee who worked in the human resources department. She said some employees are “fearful for speaking up and have been harmed and traumatized by Adel and his people.”
Gonzales said the general manager has engaged in “unethical practices” and urged the board to “do the right thing.”
John Vrsalovich, president of the Management and Professionals Employees Assn., which represents some MWD employees, urged the board to “continue methodically investigating the allegations and not be swayed by the clearly solicited support coming from inside and outside the agency today and over the past few months, which we believe was orchestrated to sow doubt across the various investigations.”
Vrsalovich said the serious allegations “demand a thorough investigation to fairly resolve issues for all parties so the organization can move forward.”
The board has temporarily appointed Assistant General Manager Deven Upadhyay, who has been at the agency for 29 years, as the interim general manager.
Several union members and leaders of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 1902 said employees have continued to face unfair treatment, harassment and retaliation.
Gonzalo Pantoja, an electrician, said one manager recently “felt comfortable enough to shove an employee to the ground and, to this day, has received little to no discipline for his actions.”
Alan Shanahan, president of Local 1902, said that Hagekhalil brought positive efforts toward change, but that since his removal “we have seen a complete disconnect of HR and management from collaboration.”
Ellen Mackey, a senior ecologist and leader of the MWD women’s caucus, said the attitude of the manager who shoved the employee is “indicative of the abusive attitude towards employees that Adel sought to change.”
Mackey said she believes “some middle, upper and retired managers have colluded to oust Adel.”
“We’re still unsure of the number of sides involved in this ‘Game of Thrones’ farce,” she said. “The investigation should follow the lines of evidence wherever they go.”
Politics
Mamdani ripped for claiming victory over capitalism after NYC’s multi-billion dollar taxpayer funded bailout
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New York City’s mayor is again under fire after spewing outlandish claims that his socialist policies are to credit for a balanced budget in the Big Apple, just after the city received a multi-billion dollar bailout from the state.
“In January, our administration inherited a $12 billion budget deficit — a fiscal crisis greater than the Great Recession,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a Tuesday post on X announcing that the debt had been cleared.
“We balanced the budget by taxing the rich and making government more efficient,” Mamdani continued. “We did not balance this budget on the backs of working people, and we never will.”
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a primary-night watch party for NYC Congressional candidate Claire Valdez at 99 Scott Studio on June 23, 2026 in the East Williamsburg neighborhood of the Brooklyn borough in New York City. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
MAMDANI ALLOCATES $500K FOR REPARATIONS TALKS AS NYC FACES $5.4B DEFICIT
But the real reason the budget it balanced is because the city was handed $1.5 billion by the state of New York in January — funded by working class taxpayers across the state — as part of a multi-year plan to bail out the fiscally-challenged city. In late May, the city received another $4 billion.
Of the combined $8 billion provided to the city’s bailout fund under former Mayor Eric Adams’ tenure and now Mamdani’s mayorship, $5 billion was directly earmarked for the city to address fiscal measures. This includes allowing city government to defer pension contributions to close the budgetary gap.
Mamdani’s claims about socialist policies producing results — and his failure to mention the massive bailouts provided by taxpayer dollars — did not fly on social media.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul holds media availability press conference and makes an announcement on abortion rights at the office on 633 3rd Avenue. (Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)
MAMDANI ALLOCATES $500K FOR REPARATIONS TALKS AS NYC FACES $5.4B DEFICIT
“This is a lie,” independent journalist Nick Shirley said in a reply to the mayor.
“You balanced the budget by borrowing billions from the NY state government which pushed back pension payments, so you literally took money from ‘the backs of hardworking people.’ Don’t get it twisted,” he added.
Commentator and journalist Nick Sortor also flamed the mayor over the loan and his classification of the bailout.
“Are you saying New Yorkers can ‘balance their budgets’ by taking out massive credit card loans?” he asked sarcastically.
Independent journalist Nick Shirley sat down for an interview with Riley Gaines as part of the launch of Outkick’s “The Riley Gaines Show.” (OutKick)
BROADCAST NETWORKS TOUT MAMDANI’S VICTORIES, PROCLAIM SOCIALISM IS ‘RESONATING’
“Mamdani balanced the budget by taking money from Albany, who in turn taxed Rochester and Buffalo” another social media user said. “That’s who is paying for all of Mamdani’s free crap.”
In a press conference earlier in the day, Mamdani claimed victory over capitalism.
“Throughout this process I have been reminded of the words of the Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek: ‘if socialists understood economics, they wouldn’t be socialists.’”
A man sleeps on the E train, one of the subway lines most utilized by homeless New Yorkers for shelter, in Queens, New York, on Monday, April 7, 2025. (Victor J. Blue for The Washington Post/Getty Images)
After the Republican National Convention (RNC) posted that clip, Mamdani also faced ridicule for that.
“It always looks good at first until the chickens come home to roost,” one person replied.
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“He’ll soon ‘deliver’ bread lines instead,” said another.
Mamdani’s office did not return Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
In 1913, Antonino Alati left southern Italy to find a better life in a land where many people regarded him as little better than scum.
He joined millions of his fellow countrymen in the United States, where the press vilified Italians as poor, swarthy, violent Catholics who had too many babies, refused to assimilate and could never possibly be considered “white.”
Politicians were already working to shut the door on them. A congressional report released two years before Alati’s arrival cited southern Italians as evidence that “the new immigration as a class is far less intelligent than the old.” They came to the U.S., the report asserted, “with the intention of profiting, in a pecuniary way, by the superior advantages of the new world and then returning to the old country.”
Alati wouldn’t let bigotry win. He soon sent for his wife and children, including his infant son Salvatore. Alati turned to Alito, Salvatore became Samuel. A generation later, the family had a Supreme Court justice in Samuel A. Alito Jr. — the second Italian American, after Antonin Scalia, to sit on the highest court in the land.
During his 2005 confirmation hearings, Alito praised his father as an “extraordinary man who came to the United States as a young child and overcame many difficulties” to ensure a better life for him and his sister. By then, Italian Americans were established as an essential part of this country’s fabric, from music to politics to food.
It’s the most American of tales — which is why it’s so surprising, yet not, to read Alito’s blistering dissent in the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision rejecting President Trump’s effort to end birthright citizenship.
If there’s one constant in this country besides death and taxes, it’s how quickly descendants of immigrants, and sometimes immigrants themselves, forget how loathed their ethnic group was and how they proved the haters wrong. Too many become uncharitable to the policies that helped them and the immigrants who followed.
But Alito’s stance against birthright citizenship goes beyond just forgetting his roots. His 39-page opinion describes the supposed impact of undocumented migrants on the U.S., using words — “overran,” “soared,” “exploded,” “massive,” “a stream,” “huge” — that read like the same invective used against Italians in his grandfather and father’s time.
The justice channels anti-Italian conspiracies of the past by casting doubt on the national allegiances of the U.S.-born children of Mexican, Guatemalan and Salvadoran immigrants — the same patriotism test that Italian Americans faced generations ago when xenophobes questioned their Catholicism. Alito claims without evidence that millions of agricultural workers were able to apply for American citizenship after President Reagan’s 1986 amnesty “at least in part because of fraud” — a charge also leveled against Italians who sought to naturalize back in the day.
And so it goes, each passage a jumbled argument dressed up in judicial interpretations largely rejected by his fellow Catholic Supreme Court justices John Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh. Coney Barrett signed on to the majority opinion that Roberts wrote, and Kavanaugh concurred.
Rev. William Barber II speaks during a rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court on April 1 while justices heard oral arguments on birthright citizenship.
(Al Drago / Getty Images)
I know how quickly families forget their own immigrant histories. Yet I look at people like Alito and wonder how they ended up thinking the way they do, because I could never imagine doing the same.
My maternal grandmother was born in Arizona to parents who fled their home country during the Mexican Revolution, becoming an American citizen by birthright. My father, who crossed the border in the trunk of a Chevy, legalized his status in an era when it was far easier to do so.
Like Alito’s paisanes, my Mexican family was also demonized for supposedly being insufficiently American and posing a threat to national unity. They also sacrificed their own dreams so their children and grandchildren could achieve theirs.
And just like Alito, some members of my family have forgotten our history and support Trump or favor some of his immigration policies, dismissing new arrivals as criminals or lazy. That’s why I will always side with undocumented people and welcome anyone who gives birth in this country with the hope that their newborn finds a better life.
It seems from his dissent that Alito somewhat agrees with me. He posits that millions of Americans who were born in this country to parents without papers “have a strong moral claim to be able to remain in the land where they grew up.” Congress “can and should address their situation,” he writes.
The justice blasts birth tourism, where women from China and other countries travel to the U.S. to have a baby, then return home, benefiting from our generosity and offering nothing in return.
I agree that’s a mockery of what being an American should be and ruins it for people who want to contribute to building a better nation. But Alito throws out the baby with the bathwater by failing to recognize that Trump’s attempt to erase birthright citizenship via executive order is presidential overreach based on bigotry, not rule of law. He’d rather cut up the Constitution to spite something he doesn’t like. Thank God his side lost, yet it’s sad that Trump’s pathetic attempt to define who can be an American went as far as it did.
Alito concludes by stating that the court’s decision to uphold the 14th Amendment is “a mistake that will seriously affect the country’s future.”
What new immigrants might inflict on this country is the perpetual worry of immigration restrictionists — and yet history keeps proving them wrong. Alito’s family did; so did mine. Only in these United States can the progeny of people once portrayed as parasites and invaders side with those making the same argument about the latest batch of newcomers.
History will see Alito’s vote for what it is: a forsaking of the promise his family once fulfilled, to support the people who never wanted them here in the first place.
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Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., a 30-year incumbent, lost to a Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)-backed challenger in a high-profile primary on Tuesday evening.
Melat Kiros, a 29-year-old socialist, defeated DeGette in a Democratic primary for a deep-blue House seat anchored in Denver, according to The Associated Press, scoring a major victory for the socialist left on Tuesday evening.
The DSA had been aiming to cast DeGette’s loss as evidence of its growing momentum after a slate of socialist candidates won Democratic primaries in New York City last week.
“Today, the East Coast, next week the Mountain West,” the DSA wrote in a social media post last week.
Rep. Diana DeGette speaks during a press conference outside the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 10, 2024. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
SOCIALISTS CHEER ‘SHOCKWAVE’ PRIMARY NIGHT AS DSA-BACKED CANDIDATES WIN, ADVANCE ACROSS THE MAP
If elected in November, Kiros, who was born in Ethiopia, will likely join the ranks of the far-left group known as the Squad and become one of a handful of the House chamber’s outspoken socialists.
The millennial challenger was endorsed by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and the anti-incumbent leftist organization Justice Democrats. Controversial socialist streamer Hasan Piker, who has said Hamas is “a thousand times better” than Israel and praised the Chinese Communist Party, also backed Kiros’ insurgent primary run.
DeGette, a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus who supports abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), sought to win a 16th House term by flexing her leftist bona fides. She argued her seniority on an influential House committee would allow her to push for Medicare-for-All legislation — a longtime priority of the party’s far-left flank.
DeGette, who was endorsed by former CPC Chairwoman Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., also spotlighted her experience as an impeachment manager during Trump’s second impeachment trial in 2021.
Though DeGette and Kiros shared few policy disagreements, they diverged sharply over Israel and antisemitism. Kiros also sharply criticized DeGette for accepting corporate PAC contributions.
Kiros, a PhD student and lawyer, was fired from a New York firm in 2023 after publishing an open letter, arguing that pro-Palestinian student protesters calling for the elimination of Israel were not antisemitic and appearing to defend Hamas.
Melat Kiros participated in a League of Women Voters Congressional District 1 candidate forum at Montview Presbyterian Church in Denver on May 28, 2026. (RJ Sangosti/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post)
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She has also described the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks against the Jewish state as the “inevitable consequence of apartheid” and declined to characterize the deadly firebombing of protesters in Boulder last year who were urging the release of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza as antisemitic.
“I don’t know what was in the heart of the perpetrator,” Kiros told Colorado’s 9News in a recent television interview. “All I know is that he went and attacked innocent people because of what they might have believed.”
A June 2025 bipartisan resolution condemning the attack as part of a “rise in ideologically motivated attacks on Jewish individuals” won every present lawmaker’s support, except for Reps. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., and Thomas Massie, R-Ky., who voted present.
Kiros has also suggested the United States deserved 9/11.
“Inevitable in the sense that we destabilized a lot of the Middle East that forced people to believe that another act of violence was the only response,” Kiros told 9News when asked if she thought the terror attack was “the inevitable consequence of American foreign policy.”
“And again, just like I said before, our responsibility is to get rid of those conditions that lead to violence in the first place,” Kiros continued.
DeGette argued that Kiros’ embrace of Piker and her comments about antisemitism and 9/11 were disqualifying.
“I’m shocked and disgusted that Kiros is doubling down on excusing terrorism and the murder of innocent people,” the 30-year incumbent wrote on Facebook earlier this month.
Streamer and creator Hasan Piker speaks at a press conference during day two of Web Summit Vancouver at the Vancouver Convention Centre in Vancouver, Canada, on May 13, 2026. (Sam Barnes/Web Summit via Sportsfile via Getty Images)
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Colorado’s 1st Congressional District is the most liberal seat in the state and voted for former Vice President Kamala Harris by 56 points in 2024.
The primary fight was further scrambled by University of Colorado Regent Wanda James, also running for DeGette’s seat. Though James did not pose the same threat as Kiros, her vote share could ultimately have swayed the contest.
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