California
California regulator proposes cutting power bills 5% after doubling rates since 2014 – Washington Examiner
(The Center Square) – Following an executive order from California Gov. Gavin Newsom to explore how to reduce energy prices that have doubled since 2014, California’s energy regulator issued proposals it said would cut rates by 4% to 5% in the first year but grow significantly over time.
These proposals include reforming the program that will pay homeowners $8.5 billion this year for solar panel energy, phasing out funding of non-energy related social programs such as “food deserts” assistance from energy budgets, and reducing capital expenditures.
Under current regulations, utilities’ profits are capped relative to the value of their capital investments, which the report says incentivizes utilities to spend and borrow as much money as possible to increase their profit allowance – at ratepayers’ and taxpayers’ expense.
According to the California Public Utilities Commission’s latest electricity rate report, rates for the state’s three largest utilities have increased by an average of 96% since January 2014 and 42% since January 2021.
“California’s electricity rates have surged beyond inflation, straining households and businesses hindering decarbonization efforts,” wrote the CPUC. “Wildfire mitigation measures, costly infrastructure investments, and rooftop solar subsidies all contribute to rising costs. Without changes in how utilities recover expenses, rates will continue to climb.”
The governor’s order put significant constraints on the CPUC’s scope of recommendations, requiring the recommendations “reduce costs to electric ratepayers without compromising public health and safety, electric grid reliability, or the achievement of the State’s 2045 clean electricity goal and the State’s 2045 economywide carbon neutrality goal.”
Within these constraints, the CPUC made four recommendations on how to reduce rates by 4-5% within the first year, with future rate reductions growing over time.
First, CPUC recommended minimizing “expensive construction projects,” explaining how current regulations encourage utilities to choose expensive options that allow them to raise their CPUC-regulated profit allowance.
“There is a profit motive for utilities to pursue capital-intensive projects, as they earn a ‘return on equity’ on these investments which increases overall costs for ratepayers,” wrote the CPUC, which must approve utility projects. “Without proper oversight, this profit motive can lead to prioritizing expensive projects over more efficient alternatives.”
In addition to recommending choosing lower cost options, the CPUC also suggested securitizing some higher cost projects, which would require bonds to be issued, and paid back by ratepayers — which would not come with ROE provisions. CPUC estimates this change on just undergrounding of power lines could save customers $41 million per year in 2025, and $310 million per year by 2026.
CPUC suggests significantly reforming the rooftop solar subsidy plan that will issue $8.5 billion per year by the end of 2024 — up from $3.5 billion per year in 2021 — to energy customers with solar panels installed.
Under the existing plan, solar-equipped customers “receive payments at retail electricity rates for their exported energy, often exceeding its actual market value.”
Utilities often must pay other operators to take excess solar energy, on top of paying solar customers the retail rate for the negative-value solar energy, leaving non-solar customers with the bill.
“These growing subsidies, paid for by non-rooftop solar customers, contribute to higher electricity rates and result in a higher cost burden to non-[solar] customers,” wrote the CPUC. “Additionally, rooftop solar customers do not contribute their fair share of fixed grid costs, such as maintaining power lines and ensuring grid reliability.”
An earlier CPUC report found 15% of non-solar customers’ energy bills went towards payments to solar customers.
The CPUC recommends reducing the solar compensation rates and transitioning buyers of property with high-reimbursement agreements to the current lower rate.
CPUC further recommended that utilities “phase out non-cost-effective programs from electricity rates,” that it says often have “very little to do with reducing energy consumption,” which means “funding them through customers’ energy bills effectively acts as a regressive tax.”
The CPUC said “programs addressing food deserts or supporting high school and community college courses, while socially beneficial, are better suited for taxpayer funding than ratepayer funding.”
It also pointed to a “state-administered grant program for school infrastructure improvements,” and energy efficiency programs, finding, “Despite increasing investment, many of the programs funded today are not cost-effective and do not primarily focus on cutting energy use.”
The recommendations align with concerns raised by some state lawmakers — especially Republicans, about inequitable energy costs.
“It’s no secret that the benefits of wind and solar energy are not equally enjoyed in some communities,” said California Senate Utility, Energy and Communications Vice Chair Brian Dahle, R-Bieber, in an earlier interview with The Center Square on solar payments. “It’s time for energy resources, renewable or not, to stand independently without offsetting costs by adding more fees and relying heavily on taxpayers’ support.”
LOS ANGELES (AP) — In the wide-open race for California governor, billionaire Tom Steyer is on a spending binge.
The hedge fund manager-turned-liberal activist is using his personal fortune to saturate TV screens and mobile phones with advertising, while his competitors accuse him of trying to use his vast wealth to buy the state’s most powerful job.
Steyer’s ads — in which he promises to bring down household costs or rails against federal immigration raids — appear inescapable at times in heavily Democratic Los Angeles, the state’s largest media market. Data compiled by advertising tracker AdImpact show Steyer has spent or booked over $115 million in ads for broadcast TV, cable and radio — nearly 30 times the amount of his nearest Democratic rival.
If he makes it through the June 2 primary election, Steyer could easily eclipse the 2010 record set by Republican Meg Whitman, who spent $178.5 million in a losing bid for governor, much of it her own money. At the time, it was the costliest campaign for statewide office in the nation’s history.
Even when ad buys from all his major competitors are combined, along with ad purchases by independent committees supporting candidates, Steyer is outspending the field by tens of millions of dollars.
“Billionaire money is flooding our state in an attempt to buy this election,” former U.S. Rep. Katie Porter, one of Steyer’s chief rivals, warned her supporters this month.
Mail-in ballots are set to go out to voters next month. Steyer is among a crowd of candidates hoping to seize a spotlight after former Democratic U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell’s dramatic departure from the race following sexual assault allegations that he denies.
But while Steyer has ticked up in polling amid his spending splurge, he has not broken away from the field, leaving some wondering if he’s getting value for his dollars.
“If your first round of ads doesn’t move you dramatically (in the polls), the third, fourth, fifth, six, seventh and eighth rounds won’t either,” said veteran Democratic strategist Bill Carrick, who for years advised the late Democratic U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein. “There is something inherently holding Steyer back.”
In recent prior campaigns for governor, at this stage a leading candidate was taking control of the race. This year, voters appear to be shrugging at a contest that lacks a star candidate among seven leading Democrats and two Republicans.
“Somehow the campaign is frozen,” Carrick added.
History shows that money doesn’t always translate into votes.
Billionaire developer Rick Caruso spent over $100 million in 2022 in his bid to become Los Angeles mayor, much of it his own money, but he was handily defeated by Mayor Karen Bass, who spent a fraction of Caruso’s total. Billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg spent more than $1 billion of his own money on his 2020 presidential bid before dropping out. And Steyer’s money was unable to lift him into contention in the 2020 presidential contest, when he dropped out early in the year after a poor finish in the South Carolina primary.
Steyer has never held elected office.
In a 2019 interview with The Associated Press, Steyer was asked what he would say to people who think he’s trying to buy the presidency.
“I don’t think that’s possible,” Steyer said at the time, before adding, “I’m never going to apologize for succeeding in business. That’s America, right?”
His campaign did not respond directly when asked about similar criticism facing his run for governor.
“Tom now stands as the only Democrat with the grassroots energy, institutional backing and resources to advance to the general election,” spokesperson Kevin Liao said in a statement.
The governor’s race was recently reordered by two developments: Swalwell, a leading Democrat, abruptly withdrew from the race then resigned from Congress, following sexual assault allegations. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump endorsed conservative commentator Steve Hilton.
Still, there is no clear leader.
Polling in late March and early April by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found a cluster of candidates in close competition: Democrats Steyer and Porter, Republicans Hilton and Chad Bianco, and Swalwell. Other candidates were trailing. The polling was conducted before Swalwell withdrew.
Democrats have feared the party’s large number of candidates could lead to them getting shut out of the general election in November. That’s because California has a primary system in which only the top two vote-getters advance to the general election, regardless of party.
Leading Democrats are all claiming to have picked up support since Swalwell’s exit. Steyer nabbed one plum endorsement, when the influential California Teachers Association, which previously backed Swalwell, recommended him.
In his ads, Steyer promises to “abolish” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has been staging raids across California. In another, he laments the state’s punishing cost of housing, “Everybody needs an affordable place to live,” he says.
Rapper was stabbed 16 times by fellow inmate in May 2025 while 10-year sentence in Megan Thee Stallion shooting case
Tory Lanez has filed a $100 million lawsuit against the California Department of Corrections stemming from a May 2025 incident where the rapper was stabbed in prison.
Lanez — born Daystar Peterson and currently serving a 10-year sentence after being found guilty in the Megan Thee Stallion shooting case — also sued the warden and guards at the California Correctional Institute in Tehachapi, where the rapper was stabbed 16 times in an “unprovoked life-threatening attack” by another inmate, the lawsuit states.
Peterson was hospitalized following the May 2025 incident, suffering a collapsed lung among stab wounds to his back, torso, and head.
According to the Associated Press, the lawsuit criticized the Department of Corrections for housing Peterson with fellow inmate and alleged attacker Santino Casio, who was serving a life sentence for second-degree murder. “The choice to house Casio with Peterson was known or should have been a known danger,” the lawsuit said, adding that Tory Lanez’ “high-profile celebrity status” made him a target.
The lawsuit also said that prison guards were slow to respond to the shanking, and didn’t employ flash grenades or other measures to halt Casio’s attack.; Casio was not charged for stabbing Peterson, the Associated Press notes.
Lanez, who following his hospitalization was transferred to San Luis Obispo County’s California Men’s Colony, also alleges in the lawsuit that he never received his possessions from the California Correctional Institute in Tehachapi, including songbooks filled with lyrics to his unreleased music.
Lanez is serving a 10-year prison sentence for shooting Megan Thee Stallion in the foot during a confrontation in the summer of 2020. He was eventually convicted on several firearms charges, including assault with a firearm, in December 2022. In November 2025, his appeal was denied by a three-judge panel, and the 10-year sentence was upheld.
From one crackdown on hospice fraud to another.
A few weeks ago, the FBI arrested multiple people in Southern California that were accused of defrauding the government for millions of dollars.
In a more recent announcement last Thursday, California’s State Attorney General Rob Bonta held a press conference to announce a fraud bust of their own.
“Operation Skip Trace uncovered and ended a hospice fraud scheme that defrauded Medi-Cal of $267 million,” Bonta said. “So just to be clear, a quarter billion dollars over funds that are paid for by California taxpayers, funds that are meant to provide care to Californians in need. It is unacceptable. It is illegal and we will not stand for it.”
The operation saw a total of 21 suspects charged as a result and dismantled a major hospice fraud scheme, with two handguns and over $750 thousand in cash seized as well.
According to the state’s attorney general, this is just one of the many cases over the years the state has cracked down on.
“This is just the latest example of the California DOJ’s longstanding ongoing and successful efforts to combat hospice and medical fraud,” Bonta said. “We have been doing this work for years. We’ve been doing it successfully before certain people in this country decided to think about it for the first time. We will continue to do this work. Heads down, sleeves rolled up, important investigative work, prosecutorial work.”
He added to that by taking a shot at the Trump Administration’s latest fraud operations.
“While healthcare fraud might be President Trump’s shiny new political talking point, the California DOJ has been going after healthcare fraud since 1979,” Bonta said. “For decades, Trump is late to the party. Protecting taxpayer dollars and protecting programs sick and vulnerable Californians rely on have been our priority for nearly five decades.”
Governor Gavin Newsom also spoke out about this latest crackdown while taking a shot of his own at President Trump.
In a post to “X” the Governor’s Press Office wrote in part quote…
“California has been cracking down on hospice fraud long before Trump gutted oversight and pardoned the architect of the biggest health care fraud scheme in U.S. history.”
State Republicans have responded to this latest announcement from Attorney General Bonta, calling for a special session to demand accountability from the Governor on widespread fraud.
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