Politics
USC was in a free fall. Then it turned to Rick Caruso
On the lowest level in its historical past, the College of Southern California turned to Rick Caruso.
It was 2018 and USC was reeling from revelations a couple of campus gynecologist. A whole lot of scholars and alumnae had been lining up sexual abuse fits that may finally price the college greater than $1 billion. The once-docile college was demanding the president’s resignation, and the LAPD and the U.S. Division of Schooling had been mounting investigations.
Embattled President C.L. Max Nikias summoned Caruso, an actual property developer, alumnus and college trustee, to a Could assembly and laid out extra dangerous information: The person in line to move the board, a low-profile Silicon Valley enterprise capitalist, was not suited to steer by means of the disaster.
“He wanted some stability,” recalled Caruso, who had navigated scandal as an L.A. police commissioner. “It was getting uncontrolled.”
Caruso stepped into the volunteer put up and rapidly reworked it right into a full-time place that made him at instances during the last 4 years the de facto chief government of USC, a multibillion-dollar healthcare and schooling enterprise that’s the metropolis’s largest non-public employer.
Now operating for mayor, Caruso is inviting voters to look intently at that almost all current entry on his resume. His marketing campaign has introduced him as prepared to repair L.A.’s crime, homelessness and corruption the way in which he “cleaned up the messes at USC.”
There’s broad settlement on campus that the college is in a greater place than when Caruso took over. In interviews with directors, college, college students, trustees and alumni, many credited him with the ouster of the polarizing Nikias and the compensation of former sufferers of Dr. George Tyndall, the most important intercourse abuse settlement in larger schooling historical past. Additionally they lauded Caruso for his position in putting in USC’s first feminine president, Carol Folt, and its new star soccer coach and reforming a governing board of fellow billionaires and energy gamers within the face of non-public assaults.
“He was prepared to take the bullets and the darts to do the best factor,” stated trustee Suzanne Nora Johnson, a retired Goldman Sachs government. “I do know only a few individuals in private and non-private life who’re as really brave.”
Others stated they had been upset by a scarcity of transparency on the college, together with preserving non-public the interior studies about misconduct. Some professors additionally bemoaned a “top-down” strategy that they stated discounted the views of lecturers and college students and relied on administration consultants.
“I can perceive why coming from his background as an completed mall developer man, he would see operating issues properly as the answer however a college isn’t a shopping center,” stated cinematic arts professor Howard Rodman, president of the USC chapter of the American Assn. of College Professors. “Good administration isn’t a purpose in itself.”
After he took over, Caruso turned the primary board chair in current historical past to arrange an workplace close to the president’s suite in Bovard Corridor, and he labored there with a chief of employees employed from Caltech.
Elizabeth Daley, the longest-serving USC dean who leads the College of Cinematic Arts, stated she was relieved to see Caruso taking a hands-on strategy given the “figurehead” position that trustees typically performed.
“You felt like the best individual was in cost,” Daley stated. Of his “24/7 availability” in these days, she recalled pondering, “The person doesn’t want this — he might simply stay a lifetime of luxurious.”
By that time, USC had turn out to be synonymous with corruption. There was the medical college dean who used methamphetamine and partied with addicts in his campus workplace, and his alternative who needed to step down after a sexual harassment accusation emerged. The athletic division produced extra scandals than nationwide championships: college students on the take, a soccer coach intoxicated at a pep rally, one other one fired on an airport tarmac, an athletic director amassing cash from a kids’s nonprofit.
The Day by day Trojan employees hung a “days-since-scandal” counter on the newsroom wall — and by no means received previous eight, stated alumnus Tomás Mier, the paper’s former editor-in-chief. “It turned coaching floor as a journalist, nevertheless it was actually tough to be a pupil,” Mier stated.
The college was ruled on paper by the trustees, however the board of about 60 influential enterprise leaders and donors exercised little actual oversight. No matter disturbing headlines got here, Nikias emphasised USC’s phenomenal strides in lecturers and fundraising, trustees and college officers stated.
Caruso had been a kind of who accepted Nikias’ rose-tinted view. A 1980 graduate and donor, he was elected to the board in 2007 and served for a interval on its government committee, ostensibly essentially the most highly effective group of trustees.
“It was a really passive board,” Caruso acknowledged in an interview. “Disgrace on all of us for not being extra vital.”
In March 2018, he and different members of the chief committee had been privately briefed on allegations towards Tyndall, who had been quietly pressured out of the coed well being clinic two years earlier following a long time of complaints from ladies. Caruso stated that he was shaken and advisable an impartial investigation, one thing he stated college attorneys urged towards.
It was after Tyndall’s troubled historical past turned public in The Occasions two months later that Nikias requested Caruso to turn out to be chair. The president had publicly agreed to step down, however behind closed doorways he and plenty of trustees anticipated that he would climate the storm and stay in workplace. Nikias declined to remark.
Caruso stated Nikias initially counted him as one in every of these “loyalist” trustees, however that rapidly modified as particulars about Tyndall emerged.
“We wanted to look ahead,” Caruso stated.
His personal daughter, Gianna, was amongst 1000’s of first-year college students set to reach in August and he felt it could be “a nightmare” for Nikias to welcome them and their mother and father amid protests a couple of rogue gynecologist.
Caruso met one-on-one with different trustees to attempt to persuade them that the Nikias period needed to finish and that it was value USC opening its coffers to hasten his exit. William Tierney, a professor emeritus of schooling, recalled Caruso confiding in him, “‘If Max steps down, it’s going to price us.’ And I knew what he meant.”
The profitable severance package deal Nikias negotiated has by no means been absolutely disclosed. Public tax filings reveal it has included thousands and thousands of {dollars} in compensation and a mortgage for a $4.1-million home in Manhattan Seaside.
It was not Caruso’s final conflict with trustees loyal to the outdated guard. When interim President Wanda Austin pressured out the favored enterprise college dean later that yr over the dealing with of harassment and discrimination claims, different billionaire trustees, together with entrepreneur Ming Hsieh and Lakers’ co-owner and developer Ed Roski, needed Caruso to intervene. He refused.
The dispute at one trustees assembly grew so heated that safety was referred to as and Hsieh ejected — a transfer that Roski later advised was motivated by racism on Caruso’s half. Opponents reportedly scuttled the developer’s utility to affix L.A. Nation Membership.
The discontent waned after Caruso helped lure a formidable new chief for USC’s enterprise program: the dean of the vaunted Wharton College of Enterprise.
Financier Lloyd Greif, a donor who led the try to preserve Jim Ellis as enterprise college dean, stated he didn’t discuss to Caruso for years afterward and nonetheless strongly disagreed with him on that difficulty. He credited Caruso, although, for his resolute management.
“Rightly or wrongly — and you understand my view on it — it was a troublesome determination,” he stated.
Below Caruso’s tenure, the sprawling, quarrelsome board was whittled down from greater than 57 members to 40, and by the top of this yr, 35. Its bylaws had been rewritten to set time period limits and its workings had been made extra public. The membership of the chief committee, stored secret throughout Nikias’ administration, is now listed on the college web site.
“We reworked our board to make sure these issues of the previous aren’t repeated,” stated trustee David Bohnett, a tech investor who helped lead the overhaul of the board to offer extra energetic oversight.
The school campaigned for the board adjustments, however some felt used when the reforms didn’t embrace voting seats for them or the coed physique. “As soon as the coup had been profitable, the diploma of communication dropped precipitously, which could lead on one to suppose we had served our function and now it was again to enterprise as typical,” stated communications professor Larry Gross.
Some professors had been upset that the college didn’t dip into the endowment to keep up funds to school retirement accounts throughout the pandemic. Caruso’s use of the controversial consulting agency McKinsey & Co., which has suggested Enron, an opioid producer and different problematic shoppers, additionally drew objections
To get enter on the number of new president, Caruso launched a method that had proved profitable in mollifying neighbors about his mall tasks: listening periods. Teams of trustees sat for hours as college students, college, alumni and employees aired grievances and hopes for what the following president would embody.
The board selected Carol Folt, the chancellor of College of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, pleasing those that needed a visual change from USC’s “outdated boys membership” previous. Folt declined an interview citing a coverage of not taking sides in elections. In a February letter to alumni and college students, she wrote that Caruso’s “imaginative and prescient and religion put USC on the trail to restoring belief in and integrity throughout the establishment.”
Shortly earlier than Folt was named president, federal prosecutors introduced the indictment of dozens of rich mother and father in a nationwide scheme to purchase admission to USC and different universities.
Although the conduct alleged within the “Varsity Blues” case predated Caruso’s time as chair, he was drawn into the scandal when the daughter of one couple charged, actress Lori Loughlin and her husband, J. Mossimo Giannulli, was with the developer’s daughter on his yacht within the Bahamas on the time of her mother and father’ arrest.
Requested concerning the scenario, Caruso stated he didn’t need to violate his daughter’s privateness, however stated, “I did nothing fallacious. My daughter did nothing fallacious.”
Transparency was one in every of Caruso’s guarantees when he started his time period. Lower than a month into his tenure, that dedication was examined when a whistleblower at USC’s social work college questioned the routing of a donation by the dean, Marilyn Flynn, to a nonprofit run by the son of then-Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas.
USC reported the switch to the U.S. lawyer’s workplace, and Caruso publicly introduced the transfer in a letter to the neighborhood. Final yr, a grand jury indicted Flynn and Ridley-Thomas; each have pleaded not responsible to fees of conspiracy and bribery.
The longer Caruso stayed in energy, although, the much less he appeared to be in airing the college’s soiled laundry. Early in his tenure, he stated he deliberate to launch inner studies about former medical college dean, Dr. Carmen Puliafito, and Tyndall, the gynecologist.
The Puliafito report stays confidential. Questioned not too long ago, Caruso stated it was Nikias who determined to maintain the report secret. He didn’t clarify why that call couldn’t be reversed.
As to the Tyndall report, Caruso contended that there was nothing written to launch as a result of the regulation agency employed to research had briefed trustees orally. “It was a posh, horrible case. We did the best factor. And now to launch info with explicit particulars of what occurred would simply be dangerous,” he stated. USC in the end agreed to pay greater than $1.1 billion to Tyndall’s former sufferers.
Undergraduate Sydney Brown, president of the Trojan Democrats, criticized what she stated was a sample by Caruso and different college leaders of asserting investigations however not disclosing the findings.
“All of it ties into this notion that USC is incapable of being clear and holding wrongdoers accountable,” Brown stated. The group she leads has endorsed Caruso rival Rep. Karen Bass, a USC alum.
An enormous protecting order within the gynecologist case stays in place, shielding from the general public the testimony of Caruso, college directors, clinic nurses, former sufferers who alleged abuse and Tyndall himself.
Caruso stated he had no objection to creating his deposition transcript public: “I’ve nothing to cover.”
Within the wake of the Tyndall scandal, USC employed a raft of latest directors to supervise ethics and improve the providers for sexual assault victims.
Nonetheless, when the college obtained at the very least 5 studies about alleged drugging and assault final fall at a fraternity, it took three weeks to alert the coed physique. In that point, one other pupil reported she was sexually assaulted by a member of the identical fraternity.
Although the president acknowledged a “troubling delay in appearing on this info,” Caruso maintained that “swift motion was taken,” including, “All fraternities had been shut down when it comes to social occasions.”
One rival within the mayoral race has invoked USC’s sexual assault file to say Caruso is unfit, citing a 2019 survey — taken about 9 months after Caruso took over as chair — during which one-third of USC ladies had reported being sexually assaulted throughout their faculty years.
“If he couldn’t preserve the ladies of USC protected, how is he going to maintain the ladies within the metropolis of Los Angeles protected?” mayoral candidate and Metropolis Atty. Mike Feuer stated at a current debate. Caruso referred to as Feuer’s assault “grotesque.”
Alexis Areias, president of the Undergraduate Pupil Authorities, stated the preliminary response to fraternity assault studies deserved criticism. However she stated she had studied the numbers Feuer cited, and she or he didn’t suppose it was truthful to put all of the blame on Caruso.
“I do suppose he inherited a whole lot of these statistics and people atrocities that occurred,” Areias stated. “I don’t suppose a tradition shift can happen in a single day.”
For sure alumni, Caruso’s most essential contribution to USC was lending his non-public aircraft to whisk the brand new soccer coach Lincoln Riley from Oklahoma to L.A. Caruso was one in every of 4 individuals on campus final fall who knew the Trojans had been circling the Sooners coach to steer the storied however underperforming program.
He described serving to the athletic director and Folt secretly pursue Riley as “in all probability a number of the greatest 30 days of my life.”
Athletic director Mike Bohn stated in an interview that Caruso’s “enterprise acumen” helped within the recruitment. USC has not revealed Riley’s wage, however he and his spouse not too long ago purchased a $17-million compound in Palos Verdes Estates.
Caruso is predicted to step down formally close to the top of the varsity yr. He has swatted down the concept he assumed the position to burnish his credentials for public workplace.
“Hear, if I used to be actually severe, and solely considered operating for mayor, I might have by no means turn out to be the chair of USC,” he stated. “I might be a typical politician the place I’d need to fear about doing every little thing that’s politically appropriate, slightly than what’s proper, and would have averted the powerful job of turning SC round.”
Politics
Trump resurrects Biden's 'devastating' 1994 crime bill as he courts Black Detroit voters: ‘Super predators'
Former President Trump courted Black voters in Detroit Saturday, when he raised President Biden’s authorship of the 1994 crime bill, which remains a sore point after three decades.
Headlining a roundtable discussion at the predominantly Black 180 Church as his campaign was announcing the launch of a Black voter coalition, Trump noted that rising crime rates hurt his audience’s community the most.
“Look, the crime is most rampant right here and in African American communities,” Trump said Saturday in Detroit. “More people see me, and they say, ‘Sir, we want protection. We want police to protect us. We don’t want to get robbed and mugged and beat up or killed because we want to walk across the street to buy a loaf of bread.’”
Trump took aim at Biden and the Biden-Harris campaign during his remarks, recalling how Biden, as a senator in 1994, authored the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which Biden has since called a “mistake.”
BIDEN CALLS SUPPORTING 1994 CRIME BILL A ‘MISTAKE’ DURING ABC TOWN HALL
Former President Trump, a Republican presidential candidate, speaks at a campaign event Saturday, June 15, 2024, in Detroit, as Itasha Dotson and Carlos Chambers listen. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
“Biden wrote the devastating 1994 crime bill, talking about ‘super predators.’ That was Biden. You know, he walks around now talking about the Black vote. He’s the king of the ‘super predators,’” Trump said during the event.
Biden authored the Senate’s version of the bill when he served as a senator from Delaware. Signed into law by President Clinton, the bill has been blamed for mass incarceration that disproportionately affected the Black community.
BIDEN’S SENATE RECORD, ADVOCACY OF 1994 CRIME BILL WILL BE USED AGAINST HIM, EX-SANDERS STAFFER SAYS
Former President Trump, a Republican presidential candidate, is presented with a birthday cookie after participating in a community roundtable at the 180 Church in Detroit June 15, 2024. (Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images)
The bill’s passage came on the heels of the crack cocaine epidemic that throttled Black communities in the 1980s and early 1990s.
BIDEN, IN 1992, TOUTED CRIME BILL DOES ‘EVERYTHING BUT HANG PEOPLE FOR JAYWALKING’
Biden had a long history of authoring legislation viewed at the time as tough on crime but now seen as controversial and contributing to the spike in America’s incarceration rates.
As the consumption of crack cocaine spiraled in the 1980s, for example, Biden co-sponsored another bill that soon became controversial, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986. That legislation, which was signed into law by President Reagan, established harsher sentencing penalties for possession of crack cocaine than the drug’s powder form. Crack cocaine and cocaine have a similar chemical makeup, but Black Americans disproportionately used crack cocaine compared to their White counterparts, leading to an outcry that the bill unfairly targeted Black Americans.
President Biden speaks during a campaign event at the Martin Luther King Recreation Center in Philadelphia April 18, 2024. (Hannah Beier/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Biden has since distanced himself from the 1986 and 1994 legislation, saying of the 1986 drug bill that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions,” The Washington Post reported in 2019. He added ahead of the 2020 election that the 1994 crime bill was a “mistake” due to its effect on the Black community.
DETROIT PASTOR WELCOMES TRUMP REACHING OUT TO BLACK VOTERS, SAYS BIDEN ‘HAS FORGOTTEN WHY HE’S IN OFFICE’
Trump in his comments suggested Biden referred to criminals in the 1990s as “super predators.” Biden did refer to criminals in that era as “predators” who were “beyond the pale,” but the specific phrase “super predators” was not used by Biden.
Former President Trump, a Republican presidential candidate, arrives to participate in a community roundtable at the 180 Church in Detroit June 15, 2024. (Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images)
Instead, first lady Hillary Clinton used the phrase in 1996 while speaking favorably of the legislation signed into law by her husband in 1994 and has since apologized for the phrase.
”Just as in a previous generation, we had an organized effort against the mob. We need to take these people on,” she said at the time. “They are often connected to big drug cartels; they are not just gangs of kids anymore. They are often the kinds of kids that are called super predators. No conscience, no empathy. We can talk about why they ended up that way, but first we have to bring them to heel.”
NEW POLL REVEALS DEMS ARE LOSING SIGNIFICANT SUPPORT FROM THESE 2 KEY DEMOGRAPHICS: ‘ESPECIALLY CONCERNING’
Former President Trump, a Republican presidential candidate, speaks at a campaign event at 180 Church Saturday, June 15, 2024, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio)
Amid Clinton’s failed bid for the White House against Trump in 2016, a Black Lives Matter activist confronted her about the phrase, prompting the former secretary of state to walk back the comment.
“Looking back, I shouldn’t have used those words, and I wouldn’t use them today,” Clinton told The Washington Post in 2016.
TRUMP ENLISTS PROMINENT BLACK REPUBLICANS TO APPEAL TO THEIR PEERS: ‘FISHING WHERE THE FISH ARE’
Trump’s pitch to Black voters in Detroit comes as polling indicates Trump is gaining popularity among the voting bloc. Last month on CNN, a data analyst appeared stunned as the network explained Trump’s support among Black voters more than doubled to 22% compared to 2020, while Biden saw a 12% drop. Overall, Biden still holds a strong lead over Trump among Black voters.
President Biden speaking in Los Angeles (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Biden won Michigan by three points in the 2020 election, but recent New York Times polling conducted in six battleground states last month found Trump leading in a handful of key states, including Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia and Nevada. The poll, published last month, found Biden holds more favorability in one battleground state — Wisconsin.
BIDEN CAMPAIGN ‘RATTLED’ AS PRESIDENT ‘HEMORRHAGES VOTES’ IN BLACK COMMUNITY TO TRUMP, SAYS REP. HUNT
Following the roundtable discussion, the Biden-Harris campaign hit back that the 45th president’s audience at the church was “noticeably empty and white” and that his “eleventh hour” outreach to Black voters “isn’t fooling anyone.”
Guests pray at the close of a roundtable discussion with community leaders and former President Trump, a presidential candidate, at the 180 Church June 15, 2024, in Detroit. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)
“Donald Trump thinks the fact that he has ‘many Black friends’ excuses an entire lifetime of denigrating and disrespecting Black Americans, but Black voters know better — and Trump’s eleventh hour attempt at Black ‘outreach’ isn’t fooling anyone,” Biden-Harris 2024 Director of Black Media Jasmine Harris said in a press release.
“Black voters haven’t forgotten that this man entered public life calling for the death penalty for the innocent Central Park 5 and entered political life spreading racist conspiracy theories about Barack Obama. We haven’t forgotten that Black unemployment and uninsured rates skyrocketed when Trump was in the White House. And we sure haven’t forgotten Trump repeatedly cozying up to white supremacists and demonizing Black communities to his political benefit — because that’s exactly what he’ll do if he wins a second term. Black voters sent Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to the White House in 2020, and they’re ready to make Donald Trump a two-time loser in 2024.”
Former President Trump headlines a Republican National Committee spring donor retreat in Palm Beach, Fla., May 4, 2024 (Donald Trump 2024 campaign)
Trump’s newly-formed Black coalition, Black Americans for Trump, was launched just days ahead of Juneteenth, which commemorates the end to slavery in the U.S. and is celebrated June 19 each year.
TRUMP CAMPAIGN SETS UP SHOP IN BLUE PHILADELPHIA IN FIGHT FOR KEY BATTLEGROUND STATE
“Never has it been more clear that Joe Biden’s reckless reversal of President Trump’s America First policies is the very reason why Black communities have been utterly decimated under his Administration with sky-high grocery and gas prices, untenable housing costs, an invasion of illegal migrants and rampant violent crime,” Team Trump Senior Advisor Lynne Patton said in a statement in the campaign’s press release.
“On day one, Donald Trump will reinstate all his proven policies on immigration, law and order, energy and the economy and put Black America First.”
The Detroit skyline May 12, 2020 (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, File)
Trump was joined by Black leaders and supporters during the roundtable discussion Saturday, including former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson, Republican Michigan Rep. John James and former Detroit Police Chief James Craig.
The pastor of 180 Church, Lorenzo Sewell, joined “Fox & Friends First” Friday ahead of the roundtable, lauding Trump’s visit as one that “means so much” to the community.
“Sometimes we forget about the Black vote. Sometimes we forget about the power of what it means to vote for those who are in office and, in urban America, our voice matters. That’s why it means so much to us that the former president will come and value our voice,” Sewell said.
You may have heard the extraordinary story of Charlotte Figi, the little Colorado girl who was dying from unrelenting, violent seizures until her parents decided to try cannabidiol, or CBD, a non-psychoactive ingredient of cannabis and hemp that helped other ailing children.
CBD, it turned out, did for Charlotte what all the pharmaceuticals in the world could not: It saved her life.
For nine years, until she died at 13 in 2020, Charlotte was virtually seizure-free. Her story was chronicled by CNN’s Sanjay Gupta, who said Charlotte’s experience had completely changed his view of cannabis and its medical potential.
Gupta’s 2013 special on the subject, “Weed,” gave much-needed hope to Beth Sahyoun, a Reseda nursery school teacher whose son Armand, then 20, had suffered relentless seizures for six years.
“I was totally reluctant,” Sahyoun told me. “I am not familiar with cannabis. We had been part of the medical establishment, and this felt very, very uncomfortable, but when you are desperate, you go into uncharted territory. You have to.”
She soon found Dr. Bonni Goldstein, a Los Angeles pediatrician and leading cannabis doctor who has helped Armand use CBD to stay nearly seizure-free for nine years.
I met Goldstein years ago while writing about Proposition 64, the 2016 ballot measure that legalized recreational marijuana in California. She reached out to me recently, distressed that the California Legislature appears to be on the verge of making it impossible for her patients to obtain the CBD products they need to lead normal lives.
The legislation at issue, Assembly Bill 2223, is a well-intentioned attempt to close a loophole in the state’s cannabis laws that has allowed unregulated, intoxicating, hemp-derived products to flood the market. It has already passed the Assembly with bipartisan support and is now before the Senate.
The federal government legalized commercial production of hemp, a form of cannabis typically cultivated for non-intoxicating uses, in 2018. Under federal law, hemp can contain no more than 0.3% tetrahydrocannabinol, the psychoactive ingredient of marijuana known as THC, by weight. If that percentage is exceeded, the plant is considered cannabis, which, unlike hemp, is highly regulated, tested and taxed and can be legally sold only by dispensaries.
Here’s the loophole: A synthetic form of THC can be extracted from hemp-derived CBD. That substance, called delta-8 THC, is psychoactive. Because it is said to pack a softer punch than the THC in cannabis, delta-8 products are often called “weed lite” or “diet weed.” And because hemp is not regulated the way cannabis is, delta-8 products can be purchased by anyone online or in gas stations and convenience stores. A distressing number of teenagers report having used the product, which hasn’t undergone any systematic evaluation of its safety.
“During the conversion of CBD,” Goldstein said, “you get unintended byproducts. When you buy an unregulated, untested delta product, you are taking your health into your own hands.”
Dr. Bonni Goldstein, a pioneer in the use of CBD for pediatric patients, at Hesse Community Park in Los Angeles last week.
(Zoe Cranfill / Los Angeles Times)
Legal cannabis dispensaries, whose owners have jumped through almost unthinkable bureaucratic and financial hoops, are understandably unhappy about a product that seems to both undercut their business and endanger the public.
Assembly Majority Leader Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, a Yolo County Democrat, is the author of AB 2223, which would outlaw these “weed lite” products. The bill would ban any hemp products that contain more than 1 milligram of THC per container.
“The bottom line,” Aguiar-Curry said in a statement, “is that if it gets you high, it should not be sold outside a dispensary.”
In a statement emailed to me Friday morning, she added, “We are trying to strike the delicate balance between helping kids with health needs and keeping illegal drugs from being accessible to other kids.” Her bill, she said, “makes sure that CBD can be sold in the state as long as it has a non-intoxicating, trace amount of THC. Products containing higher levels of THC would be available in dispensaries, where they can’t fall into the hands of youth.”
The problem is that Goldstein’s patients would run afoul of the legislation. They are typically treated with a CBD-to-THC ratio of about 20 to 1 or more, but they take enough to exceed the proposed THC limit.
“If my patient takes 20 milligrams of CBD, they get 1 milligram of THC as well,” she said. “But if they are getting 200 milligrams of CBD, this same ratio then delivers 10 milligrams of THC. If they are taking 1,200 milligrams of CBD, they are getting 60 milligrams of THC. There is no intoxication because we first start with a low dose and titrate up, which minimizes any impairing effect. Second, the much higher amount of CBD dampens down the THC effects since CBD antagonizes the effects of THC.”
Armand Sahyoun, 29, is on a 25-to-1 formulation; he takes 1,600 milligrams of CBD per day, with 64 milligrams of THC.
“There is no impairment because it took months to work up to this dose,” Goldstein said. “He functions beautifully.”
In dispensaries, she added, “you are lucky if you can find a bottle that contains more than 600 milligrams of CBD. Meaning a child using these high doses would go through an $80 bottle per day.” Beth Sahyoun told me her son’s medicine costs $900 a month.
Paige Figi, Charlotte’s mother, founded the nonprofit Coalition for Access Now, which educates the public and lawmakers about the health benefits of CBD.
“We are collateral damage of these hastily written state bills that are trying to fix the delta-8 problem,” Figi told me. “Forty-five million Americans take a daily dose of CBD for their health — first responders, grandparents, kids with epilepsy, veterans, people with pain. These people are happily using this product.”
If there is no accommodation for families like the Sahyouns, the state Senate shouldn’t pass AB 2223. And if it does pass both houses in its current form, Gov. Gavin Newsom should not sign it.
“You have your child who is sick as a dog, you have no hope, you find CBD hemp, non-impairing, non-intoxicating,” Goldstein said. “Your child is thriving, and now the government says you can’t have it anymore? It’s almost too cruel and too stupid to comprehend.”
A sliver of hope emerged at the end of last week: After trying in vain to reach Aguiar-Curry for some time, Goldstein finally heard from her office. The physician expects to meet with the legislator to discuss her concerns this week.
Politics
Americans believe US should focus more on domestic issues, but support leadership on world stage: poll
A majority of Americans believe the U.S. should focus more on issues at home and withdraw from foreign affairs, despite an increasing number of Americans believing the U.S. should be more engaged and take the lead when it comes to international events.
Just under two-thirds of Americans, 62%, believe the U.S. would be “better served by withdrawing from international affairs and focusing more attention on problems here at home,” according to the results of the Ronald Reagan Institute’s 2024 summer survey, which was shared exclusively with Fox News Sunday.
Despite that finding, the percentage of Americans who believe it’s important for the U.S. to be more engaged and take the lead in international events is on the rise, up 12 points in the last six months.
A majority, 54%, expressed support for a more engaged U.S. foreign policy, up from 42% in November. The latest figure includes 66% of Democrats and 49% of Republicans.
ZELENSKYY APPEALS FOR AID, INVESTMENT IN ENERGY SECTOR AT UKRAINE RECOVERY CONFERENCE IN BERLIN
Ukrainian servicemen search a target with a U.S. Stinger air defense missile launcher on the front line in Zaporizhzhia region, Ukraine, on May 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Andriy Andriyenko)
“From this year’s Reagan Institute summer survey, we’re seeing an uptick in the numbers of Americans who really want to see and are seeking policies that reflect American leadership in the world, that reflects President Reagan’s principles of leadership, of strength on the global stage when it comes to the chaos and conflict that we’re seeing around the world,” Rachel Hoff, the policy director at the Ronald Reagan Institute, told Fox News Digital.
“The number of Americans seeking American leadership and engagement is at a five-year high,” she added.
Most Americans also said they believe U.S. involvement in international events is beneficial for both the United States (57%) and the world (61%).
Over three-fourths, 78%, of respondents indicated they agree that U.S. leadership and engagement in international affairs is “essential” for boosting the economy and securing favorable trade arrangements.
A similar amount of Americans, 77%, indicated they believe it is important for the U.S. to stand up for human rights and democracy around the world, while 86% indicated it was important for the U.S. to maintain a strong military that can maintain peace and prosperity both at home and around the world.
The poll comes amid continued debate over how involved the U.S. should be in defending Ukraine amid its war with Russia, with some arguing that the billions of dollars spent equipping the Ukrainian military would be better spent on domestic issues.
Down two percent since the same Reagan Institute survey last summer, 57% of Americans said they support sending military aid to Ukraine, compared to 32% who oppose it. Another 11% indicated they were unsure.
Americans also believe it is in the best interest of the U.S. that Ukraine win its conflict against Russia, with 75% saying it is important Ukraine win compared to 17% who indicated it was unimportant. There was no change in those percentages compared to last year’s survey.
Hoffman said the Reagan Institute’s data on Ukraine has stayed “remarkably consistent over time.”
“So we started asking questions about Ukraine, about American support and military aid for Ukraine’s efforts in their war against the Russian invasion, and those numbers have not shifted at all since 2022,” she said.
“Even with all the debate and discussion that we’re seeing in the media and on Capitol Hill about aid to Ukraine and the really important conversations that policy leaders are having, it’s really important to remember and recognize that the American people, in the middle of all those conversations, have made clear that they want to continue supporting America’s allies and our friends around the world that are standing up against aggression… and they want to do that by sending U.S. military aid to Ukraine.”
ISRAELI-DEPLOYED AI IN GAZA LIKELY HELPS IDF REDUCE CIVILIAN CASUALTIES, EXPERT SAYS
An Israeli soldier attaches an Israeli flag on top of an armored personnel carrier (APC) near Israel’s border with Gaza on April 15, 2024.
The survey also found that Americans believe Israel — a war-torn country that responded forcefully to the October 7, 2023, invasion by Hamas militants — should be supported by the U.S.
“Both Republicans and Democrats, in large numbers, want to support Israel in its fight against the Hamas terrorists in the Middle East,” Hoff said.
A majority of Americans, 56%, said they support sending aid to Israel, compared to 35% who said they oppose the effort. Another 68% said they support the U.S. sending missile defense systems to Israel to “help it defend against” drone or missile attacks.
“I think the more we drill down into what the American people want our government to be doing to support our allies and friends around the world, to push back on tyranny and terrorism and to support those fighting for freedom and democracy, those numbers only rise,” Hoff said.
Fifty-five percent of those surveyed also said they would support an Israeli counterattack against continued Iranian aggression, while 31% said they would oppose it.
Three-quarters of Americans, 75%, said they were concerned about humanitarian conditions in Gaza.
Seventy-four percent said they believe Israel’s war with Hamas matters to U.S. security and prosperity, compared to 73% who said the same for Ukraine’s war with Russia.
Americans also indicated concern over Chinese military build-up, with 82% saying they are “extremely” or “somewhat” concerned.
Other findings related to China included concern over the communist nation’s human rights violations (83%), technology theft (83%), overtaking the U.S. as the world’s superpower (75%), and the isolation of Taiwan (68%).
Based off previous Reagan Institute surveys, Hoff said public opinion on China “has been moving and shifting significantly over time” and that there’s an increasing number of Americans who are “seeing China as an adversary.”
“They’re concerned about, technology theft, economic practices, human rights abuses, abuses of the Chinese Communist Party, and they’re concerned about the Chinese military buildup,” she said.
President Biden meets with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G20 leaders’ summit in Bali, Indonesia, November 14, 2022. (REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo)
A slim majority, 51%, said they believe the social media app TikTok, which is owned by a Chinese company that is closely connected to the Chinese government, should be banned in the U.S. Another 39% percent said they oppose a ban of the app, while 10% said they were unsure.
The survey, which was conducted from May 20 to May 27, sampled 1,257 U.S. adults.
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