Politics
$10-billion climate bond will go before voters in November
California voters will get to decide in November if they want the state to borrow $10 billion to pay for climate and environmental projects — including some that were axed from the budget because of an unprecedented deficit.
The 28-page bill to put the Safe Drinking Water, Wildfire Prevention, Drought Preparedness, and Clean Air Bond Act of 2024on the ballot was approved by both the Senate and Assembly late Wednesday.
This was the last day lawmakers had to approve the climate bond proposal to get the measure on the Nov. 5 ballot.
Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire (D-Healdsburg) was acting as governor Wednesday because Gov. Gavin Newsom was in Washington. McGuire is a supporter of the proposed climate bond and was expected to sign the legislation Wednesday night.
“Ensuring that our communities have the resources to protect themselves from wildfires, drought and floods is critical to the long-term success of the Golden State,” McGuire said in a press release Monday.
The language of the bill had been negotiated in secret over the last several months but did not become public until 9:57 p.m. Saturday.
California taxpayers would pay the bond back with interest. An analyst for the Assembly estimated that the $10 billion bond would cost the state $650 million a year for the next 30 years or more than $19 billion.
Scott Kaufman, legislative director at the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn., said the cost could be much higher if the interest rate on the bonds turns out to be higher than the 5% rate the analyst used.
“These bonds will be paid by people decades from now that didn’t even get to vote for their authorization,” Kaufman wrote to the bill’s author in a letter opposing the measure.
Earlier this year, Sacramento legislators had proposals to place tens of billions of dollars of bonds on the November ballot for efforts as varied as stopping fentanyl overdoses and building affordable housing.
But those plans were deflated in March when a $6.4-billion bond measure promoted by Newsom to help homeless and mentally ill people got 50.18% of the vote, barely enough to win approval.
In a recent survey by the Public Policy Institute of California, 64% of likely voters said it was a “bad time” for the state to issue bonds to pay for state projects and programs.
Dozens of environmental groups, renewable energy companies, labor unions, water agencies and social justice advocates have been lobbying state lawmakers to place the climate bond on the ballot.
The lobbying intensified after Newsom proposed spending $54 billion on climate efforts in 2022 but then cut that funding to close recent massive budget deficits.
According to the bill, $3.8 billion would be allocated to water projects, including those that provide safe drinking water, recycle wastewater, store groundwater and control floods.
An additional $1.5 billion would be spent on wildfire protection, while $1.2 billion would go toward protecting the coast from sea level rise.
Other money would be used to create parks, protect wildlife and habitats and address extreme heat events.
The language requires that at least 40% of the money go to projects that provide benefits to disadvantaged communities, defined as populations where the median household income is less than 80% of the area average or less than 80% of the statewide median.
Some legislators pulled their support of the bond, saying this provision had recently been weakened so that more money would go to people who were not financially disadvantaged.
Jasmeet Bains (D-Delano) said before the Assembly vote that the definition of vulnerable populations had been diluted. “It’s fundamentally unjust,” she said.
Hundreds of millions of dollars from the bond would benefit private industry. For example, it would provide $850 million to clean energy projects, including the proposed offshore wind farms. Those planned wind projects are already benefiting from subsidies in President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.
Governments often take out long-term debt to pay for infrastructure projects that are expensive to build but will last for decades. Yet some of the planned climate bond spending would go to operate programs that could long be over by the time the bonds are paid off. For instance, a portion will go to “workforce development” or the training of workers.
And up to 7% of the money or $700 million can go to administration costs.
“We are already seeing the devastating effects of climate change — more extreme heat waves, catastrophic fires and floods, coastal erosion, and severe droughts,” Sen. Ben Allen (D-Santa Monica) said in a press release. “Every part of our state is affected, and unless we take action now, the cost to address these impacts will become increasingly overwhelming.”
Politics
Phony rabbi prankster fishes in 'empty suit antisemite' Squad member
A parody social media account named the “Chief Rabbi of Gaza” claimed another victim from the progressive “Squad,” duping Rep. Cori Bush’s, D-Mo., team into boasting about a potential event with the fake rabbi.
Bush’s re-election campaign was considering a possible fundraiser with “Fabbi Linda Goldstein,” a parody X account that posts anti-Israel rhetoric in an attempt to catfish progressives, according to a report from the New York Post.
The parody account reached out to Bush’s team on June 23 with the idea of partnering on a fundraiser, with the account telling the lawmaker’s office that their “congregation was displaced from Gaza after Israel’s invasion on October 7.”
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“Also – would [Bush] travel to the Gaza border for the fundraiser? The optics could be incredible,” the account told Ronika Moody, Bush’s finance and engagement director, according to emails reviewed by the Post.
“Cori is interested in hosting in Gaza, and it’s something she has been trying to plan. Unfortunately, we have not been successful with that opportunity as of yet,” Moody responded four days later, asking whether the “theme” of the fundraiser would be Gaza.
Goldstein responded with a suggestion that the fundraiser’s theme could be “the morality” of intifada, according to the report.
“The topics are built around finding a final solution to the problem of Zionism,” Goldstein said in the email, garnering no response from Bush’s team.
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Bush, who is in a tight primary battle to keep her seat, has been one of the most vocal critics of Israel and the war in Congress.
The account, which has in the past made claims that it had dug terror tunnels into American universities, has previously fooled another member of the so-called Squad, duping Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y. and his campaign with a similar exchange in April.
“Cori Bush is the perfect example of an ’empty suit’ antisemite – completely clueless about how the Israel-Palestine conflict works, but eager to speak up, because it gives her cover to publicly hate Jews,” said Michael, the man behind the account, who declined to give his last name to the New York Post.
Bowman would later lose his primary race against Westchester County Executive George Latimer.
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Meanwhile, the exchange didn’t go unnoticed by a genuine rabbi in Bush’s district, who told the New York Post that the Democratic lawmaker should know better.
“Cori has not done her homework about anything to do with Israel and Palestine, and it’s very sad,” Rabbi Susan Talve, the founding rabbi of the Central Reform Congregation, told the New York Post.
The Bush campaign did not immediately respond to a Fox News Digital request for comment.
Politics
Your guide to Proposition 34: Effort to limit major healthcare group's non-patient spending
The measure is sponsored by the California Apartment Assn., which has tangled with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation for years over its efforts to enable stricter rent control laws through ballot initiatives.
The AIDS Healthcare Foundation takes in $2 billion a year, mostly from its chain of pharmacies and clinics. It’s foray into housing has drawn criticism that it has strayed from its mission of helping those living with HIV or AIDS.
In recent years, the healthcare foundation has spent more than $300 million to fund rent control initiatives and buy apartment buildings across the country, including in and around Skid Row, saying it could address chronic homelessness where others failed.
The foundation says it’s taken nearly 1,000 people off the streets and put them into permanent housing at its Skid Row-area properties, but those buildings have also been beset with heating, plumbing, elevator and electricity failures and vermin infestations, The Times found in an investigation published last fall.
Other supporters of Proposition 34 include health organizations like the ALS Assn. and the California Chronic Care Coalition.
Politics
House Republicans say they aren't sweating Kamala as possible Biden replacement
House Republicans are already sharpening their attacks against Vice President Kamala Harris as public discussions swell over whether she will replace President Biden at the top of Democrats’ 2024 ticket.
GOP lawmakers — in both safe red seats and swing districts being targeted by the left — dismissed Harris as a political threat to their chances in November, arguing she’s still tied to the same progressive Biden policies they believe are unpopular with voters.
Rep. Nick Langworthy, R-N.Y., who served as longtime chair of the New York Republican Party before coming to Congress, told Fox News Digital, “Kamala Harris is just as responsible for this administration’s failures, but she’s more incompetent.”
“She will make no difference to the outcome. President Trump will be our 47th,” he said.
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A swing-seat Republican who asked not to be named told Fox News Digital they were skeptical Harris would do better on the debate stage than Biden.
“I would say she’s the weakest part of the ticket right now, as bad as Biden is,” that GOP lawmaker said.
“Whether it’s Joe Biden or [Harris] at the top of the ticket, they’ll have to defend their abysmal, tax-and-spend record,” said Rep. Carlos Gimenez, R-Fla. “We’re already seeing significant Republican advantages across the board in swing states, especially increase in support from Hispanic voters.”
Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., a Trump ally from a deep red district, told Fox News Digital that Biden and Harris “both own the same disastrous policies.”
It comes as conversations swirl around Harris as one of the most likely successors to Biden if he chooses to withdraw from the race ahead of his November rematch with former President Trump.
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Biden and his campaign have insisted he will not bow out of the race, but his weak performance in last month’s presidential debate has left many on the left wondering if he’s the best positioned candidate to beat Trump. Multiple polls have shown Biden modestly trailing Trump since the debate aired.
Harris has maintained that she is standing by Biden on multiple occasions when asked about the speculation by reporters.
But if she were to take over, Harris would be the only Democratic candidate who could inherit the $240 million Biden-Harris campaign war chest.
The House GOP campaign arm, the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), is also aiming its fire at Harris as well, in a telling sign that it sees her as the next top Democratic target.
A new advertisement released by the NRCC this week cast Harris as Biden’s “enabler-in-chief” and hits her for her role as Biden’s “border czar.”
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A spokesperson for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) told Axios of the ad, “Republicans are fooling themselves if they think the American public will blame anyone besides Donald Trump and his feckless band of Republican extremists and phony moderates who killed a bipartisan border deal.”
A recent CNN/SSRS poll shows Harris performing slightly better than Biden in a matchup against Trump.
But when asked about her impact on the November races, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn. — a past NRCC chair — would not speak to the vice president specifically, though he was confident in the GOP’s chances to secure the White House.
“It doesn’t matter which incompetent failure Democrats have on the ballot in November — voters are ready to abandon the sinking ship that is the Biden-Harris administration,” Emmer said.
Fox News Digital reached out to the Biden campaign and to Harris’ office for comment.
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