Politics
Daniel Lurie inaugurated as San Francisco's new mayor: 'This is where our comeback begins'
SAN FRANCISCO — Four hours before he took the oath of office Wednesday to become San Francisco’s 46th mayor, Daniel Lurie started his day walking through the bleak confines of the Tenderloin district with the city police chief and passing out coffee to people at a homeless community center.
It was a deliberately symbolic move by Lurie, a nonprofit executive and heir to the Levi Strauss family fortune, who won office in November largely by appealing to disillusioned voters weary of the public drug use, brazen retail theft and sprawling homelessness that during the pandemic became commonplace in the Tenderloin and spilled into the downtown financial district.
Mayor-elect Daniel Lurie and his wife, Becca Prowda, take part in Wednesday’s inaugural festivities.
(Gabrielle Lurie / San Francisco Chronicle)
In his inaugural speech shortly before noon in front of San Francisco City Hall, Lurie pledged to crack down on the street anarchy that has plagued some areas of the city in recent years, feeding a “doom loop” scenario endorsed by conservative pundits.
“This is where our comeback begins,” Lurie said to a crowd of thousands that included his wife, Becca Prowda, daughter Taya, 13, and son Sawyer, 10, along with outgoing Mayor London Breed and a host of local and statewide political figures.
“I’m asking all of you, every single one of you, to join me in reclaiming our place as the greatest city in the world with a new era of accountability, service and change,” Lurie said.
Daniel Lurie is sworn in as San Francisco’s 46th mayor.
(Gabrielle Lurie / San Francisco Chronicle)
Lurie, a moderate Democrat who had never held elected office, entered the mayoral race as an underdog against Breed and three other City Hall veterans. In an election seen as a referendum on the city’s post-pandemic struggles with homelessness and street crime, Lurie pitched himself as a change agent who could lead San Francisco into an era of recovery.
His campaign gained momentum as he promised to end open-air drug markets and arrest fentanyl dealers, push homeless people into drug and mental health treatment and reinvigorate a downtown economy drained by the exodus of tech workers after COVID-19 shutdowns made remote work an easy option.
Lurie was able to spread his message broadly by drawing on personal wealth. He funneled nearly $9 million of his own money into his campaign, while his mother, Miriam Haas, widow of deceased Levi’s executive and heir Peter Haas, contributed an additional $1 million to an independent expenditure committee backing his election.
Lurie’s inaugural speech, though light on policy details, offered a glimpse into how he planned to accomplish the bold goals he laid out on the campaign trail.
“San Francisco has long been known for its values of tolerance and inclusion, but nothing about those values instructs us to allow nearly 8,000 people to experience homelessness in our city,” he said. “Widespread drug-dealing, public drug use and constantly seeing people in crisis has robbed us of our sense of decency and security.”
At the top of his to-do list: introducing a package of ordinances declaring a fentanyl state of emergency. Lurie said he would ask the Board of Supervisors, an 11-member body that acts as the legislative branch for the city and county, to quickly approve the ordinances, directed at curbing use of the deadly opioid and allowing the city to “bypass the bureaucratic hurdles standing in the way of tackling this crisis.”
The board gained five new members in the November election, a turnover expected to bring a more moderate tone to a board that for years was seen as ultra-liberal and often tussled with Breed — also a moderate — over tough-on-crime policy proposals.
Lurie said he would work to embed more behavioral health specialists in first-responder units to address the overlapping crises of homelessness, addiction and untreated mental illness, and announced plans to open a 24/7 center as an alternative to jail for police to bring people in need of treatment and other services.
He also said he wants to expand a city program that provides funding and assistance for bus tickets and other transportation to send homeless people who aren’t from San Francisco back to their home communities.
And in the face of a projected $876-million budget deficit, Lurie promised “zero cuts” to sworn police officers, 911 operators, EMTs, firefighters and nurses on the front lines of public health emergencies.
San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott said he was encouraged by Lurie’s plans and his recognition of the need for “around-the-clock resources” not just for police, but also for city workers across departments working to solve San Francisco’s public safety and health challenges.
“The Police Department is 24/7 … but a lot of the departments that we rely upon to help solve some of these problems aren’t 24/7,” he said. “It’s not all about enforcement. It’s not all about policing.”
Scott said he would like to see Lurie continue recent efforts by Breed’s administration to more aggressively clear sprawling tent encampments that have fanned out across the city, as well as public health efforts credited for a sharp decline in drug overdose deaths in the city last year.
The chief medical examiner’s office recorded 586 fatal overdoses in San Francisco in the first 11 months of 2024 — a nearly 23% decrease, or 174 fewer deaths, compared with the first 11 months of 2023. San Francisco public health experts attributed the decline to the widespread availability of naloxone, a medication that can rapidly reverse the effects of opioid overdoses, as well as more emphasis on prescribing buprenorphine and methadone, medications that treat opioid addiction long-term.
On Tuesday, Breed’s last full day in office, her administration noted that crime rates had also fallen in 2024, with reports of car break-ins dropping 54%, property crime down 31% and violent crime down 14%.
Though San Francisco’s struggles have made national headlines in recent years, particularly in right-wing media promoted by President-elect Donald Trump, Lurie largely left national politics out of his messaging, nodding only once during his speech to the “great sense of fear and loss about the state of our country right now.”
“San Francisco must be a city where every individual feels safe, valued and empowered,” he said. “That means standing firm against discrimination and fighting for the dignity of all communities, no matter what comes our way.”
Lurie said the city is showing progress and maintained that “hope is alive and well in San Francisco.” But he warned that “lasting change doesn’t happen overnight.”
Still, “if we are consistent, if we have vision, if we aren’t afraid to make tough decisions,” he said, “San Francisco will rise to new heights.”
Politics
Federal judge blocks Trump from cutting childcare funds to Democratic states over fraud concerns
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A federal judge Friday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from stopping subsidies on childcare programs in five states, including Minnesota, amid allegations of fraud.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian, a Biden appointee, didn’t rule on the legality of the funding freeze, but said the states had met the legal threshold to maintain the “status quo” on funding for at least two weeks while arguments continue.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said it would withhold funds for programs in five Democratic states over fraud concerns.
The programs include the Child Care and Development Fund, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, and the Social Services Block Grant, all of which help needy families.
USDA IMMEDIATELY SUSPENDS ALL FEDERAL FUNDING TO MINNESOTA AMID FRAUD INVESTIGATION
On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said it would withhold funds for programs in five Democratic states over fraud concerns. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
“Families who rely on childcare and family assistance programs deserve confidence that these resources are used lawfully and for their intended purpose,” HHS Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill said in a statement on Tuesday.
The states, which include California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota and New York, argued in court filings that the federal government didn’t have the legal right to end the funds and that the new policy is creating “operational chaos” in the states.
U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian at his nomination hearing in 2022. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
In total, the states said they receive more than $10 billion in federal funding for the programs.
HHS said it had “reason to believe” that the programs were offering funds to people in the country illegally.
‘TIP OF THE ICEBERG’: SENATE REPUBLICANS PRESS GOV WALZ OVER MINNESOTA FRAUD SCANDAL
The table above shows the five states and their social safety net funding for various programs which are being withheld by the Trump administration over allegations of fraud. (AP Digital Embed)
New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is leading the lawsuit, called the ruling a “critical victory for families whose lives have been upended by this administration’s cruelty.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is leading the lawsuit, called the ruling a “critical victory for families whose lives have been upended by this administration’s cruelty.” (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
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Fox News Digital has reached out to HHS for comment.
In what might be the most decisive critique yet of President Trump’s remake of the Kennedy Center, the Washington National Opera’s board approved a resolution on Friday to leave the venue it has occupied since 1971.
“Today, the Washington National Opera announced its decision to seek an amicable early termination of its affiliation agreement with the Kennedy Center and resume operations as a fully independent nonprofit entity,” the company said in a statement to the Associated Press.
Roma Daravi, Kennedy Center’s vice president of public relations, described the relationship with Washington National Opera as “financially challenging.”
“After careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision to part ways with the WNO due to a financially challenging relationship,” Daravi said in a statement. “We believe this represents the best path forward for both organizations and enables us to make responsible choices that support the financial stability and long-term future of the Trump Kennedy Center.”
Kennedy Center President Ambassador Richard Grenell tweeted that the call was made by the Kennedy Center, writing that its leadership had “approached the Opera leadership last year with this idea and they began to be open to it.”
“Having an exclusive relationship has been extremely expensive and limiting in choice and variety,” Grenell wrote. “We have spent millions of dollars to support the Washington Opera’s exclusivity and yet they were still millions of dollars in the hole – and getting worse.”
WNO’s decision to vacate the Kennedy Center’s 2,364-seat Opera House comes amid a wave of artist cancellations that came after the venue’s board voted to rename the center the Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. New signage featuring Trump’s name went up on the building’s exterior just days after the vote while debate raged over whether an official name change could be made without congressional approval.
That same day, Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio) — an ex officio member of the board — wrote on social media that the vote was not unanimous and that she and others who might have voiced their dissent were muted on the call.
Grenell countered that ex officio members don’t get a vote.
Cancellations soon began to mount — as did Kennedy Center‘s rebukes against the artists who chose not to appear. Jazz drummer Chuck Redd pulled out of his annual Christmas Eve concert; jazz supergroup the Cookers nixed New Year’s Eve shows; New York-based Doug Varone and Dancers dropped out of April performances; and Grammy Award-winning banjo player Béla Fleck wrote on social media that he would no longer play at the venue in February.
WNO’s departure, however, represents a new level of artist defection. The company’s name is synonymous with the Kennedy Center and it has served as an artistic center of gravity for the complex since the building first opened.
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Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is leveling a stunning accusation at Vice President JD Vance amid the national furor over this week’s fatal shooting in Minnesota involving an ICE agent.
“I understand that Vice President Vance believes that shooting a young mother of three in the face three times is an acceptable America that he wants to live in, and I do not,” the four-term federal lawmaker from New York and progressive champion argued as she answered questions on Friday on Capitol Hill from Fox News and other news organizations.
Ocasio-Cortez spoke in the wake of Wednesday’s shooting death of 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good after she confronted ICE agents from inside her car in Minneapolis.
RENEE NICOLE GOOD PART OF ‘ICE WATCH’ GROUP, DHS SOURCES SAY
Members of law enforcement work the scene following a suspected shooting by an ICE agent during federal operations on January 7, 2026, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
Video of the incident instantly went viral, and while Democrats have heavily criticized the shooting, the Trump administration is vocally defending the actions of the ICE agent.
HEAD HERE FOR LIVE FOX NEWS UPDATES ON THE ICE SHOOTING IN MINNESOTA
Vance, at a White House briefing on Thursday, charged that “this was an attack on federal law enforcement. This was an attack on law and order.”
“That woman was there to interfere with a legitimate law enforcement operation,” the vice president added. “The president stands with ICE, I stand with ICE, we stand with all of our law enforcement officers.”
And Vance claimed Good was “brainwashed” and suggested she was connected to a “broader, left-wing network.”
Federal sources told Fox News on Friday that Good, who was a mother of three, worked as a Minneapolis-based immigration activist serving as a member of “ICE Watch.”
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Ocasio-Cortez, in responding to Vance’s comments, said, “That is a fundamental difference between Vice President Vance and I. I do not believe that the American people should be assassinated in the street.”
But a spokesperson for the vice president, responding to Ocasio-Cortez’s accusation, told Fox News Digital, “On National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day, AOC made it clear she thinks that radical leftists should be able to mow down ICE officials in broad daylight. She should be ashamed of herself. The Vice President stands with ICE and the brave men and women of law enforcement, and so do the American people.”
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