California Update: The 50-50 Proposition

- It is Tuesday, September 30th, 2025, and you are listening to Matters of Policy and Politics, a Hoover Institution podcast devoted to governance and the balance of power here in America and around the free world. I'm Jonathan Movroydis. I'm sitting in the chair of Bill Whalen, the Virginia Hobbs Carpenter, Distinguished Policy Fellow and journalism so that he can answer questions and provide commentary about California policy and politics in which he's well versed. Bill Whalen, in addition to being a Washington Post columnist, writes for Hoover's, California on Your Mind. Web Channel Whalen is joined today by Lee Ohanian Hoover Institution, Senior Fellow and Professor of Economics, and the director of the Ed Family Program in macro economic research at the University of California Los Angeles. Ohanian also writes about the policy, policy environment of the Golden State for California on your mind. Good day gentlemen. Let's talk about the latest developments in policy and politics in the Golden State. The last time we recorded gentlemen in August, the legislature was finalizing Proposition 50 for the November 4th special election. So let's pick up where we left off. The main, the main theme here being the uncertainty of it all in August, Emerson College poll shows 51% to 34% favoring the upcoming ballot measure. However, ballot measures have historically started high and finished low at the time of the election of at the time of election. Bill, do you have a prognosis for Proposition 50?

- My short and smart answer is if I do, Jonathan, I would collect all our money and hop a plane to some country where you can bet on this stuff and, and make a killing. No, it's really, it's prop 50 and it's kind of a 50 50 proposition in this regard. It's a special election and a note to California who may be getting tired of politics right now, this is our fifth statewide election. Now in the last six years, if you include this special election on November 4th, and then the recall effort against Governor Newsom back in 2021, so five outta six. So forgive California for being a little tired of politics right now, but a hard one to predict because it's a special election. So we don't know what the turnout model will be. So that makes polling a little tricky, which makes pollsters decide should we go for likely voters or registered voters, and that could change numbers. The 51 34 number you mentioned, Jonathan, is intriguing because it does show majority support, but as you mentioned, initiatives start high and tend to finish low. So maybe there is a, a sort of a skeptical rush at the end and kills the thing. And then messaging, which I want to get into here in a few minutes, both sides are making a very calculated risk here on the yes, on 50 side, the YES campaign is the one that wants to redesign California's congressional districts add five more democratic seats. Their message is pretty much entirely anti Donald Trump anti maggot, maybe a potent message in a state where Donald Trump has never received 40% of the statewide vote. The no side little complicated 'cause there is not one no campaign, but a couple of no campaigns and their messaging sort of is all over the map, if you will. So Lee and Jonathan just kind of a big roll of the dice come November 4th. Who knows? Maybe Lee knows

- Well, yeah, who knows? It's, I was gonna say I'm two minds on this. I think I've, I've changed, I'm one mind on this. I wish it wasn't happening because this biggest state in the country, and it's gonna be completely and blatantly gerrymandered with the potential to go to 48 out of 52 house seats to be Democrat, right? And this is not a partisan, this is not a partisan issue, it's just an issue about making sure people have reasonable set of representation. Last general election, I believe close to 40% voted for Trump in California. Believe it or not, those 40% should have more of a voice than 8% of the house seats. Bill, you know, I've seen, I've seen some inter, at least I believe, two interviews with Schwartzenegger. Do you see him politically? Do you see him being able to move the needle on this because the money being raised, it looks like it's much more money being raised on, on the yes side than on the no side.

- Yeah. So I do have some numbers on the, on the money. This is last week. So not, not entirely fresh, but relatively fresh. The yes side governor Newsom's side Lee, they've raised about $77 million. The no side, the two no campaigns combined, about $35 million Lee and 30 million of that comes from Charles Munger Jr. For those not in California, who don't know who Mr. Munger is, he is a physicist here at Stanford University, and he is the namesake son of Charles Munger Sr. Who is the famed investor at Berkshire Hathaway. Mr. Munger puts money into California politics on occasion. He put a lot of money into the original redistricting plan back in 2008, which created the independent Redistrict Commission, which Proposition 50 is now putting on a hold. So think about this for a second. You have this Democratic power play in California. You have Republicans who desperately wanna hold onto the House of Representatives, which is what DRI is driving this train, because what California is doing is they countered what Texas is doing, which is trying to take away five Democratic seats in their, in their mid decade gerrymander. But yet you only see $5 million outside of Charlie Munger being raised. So what's going on here? One thing that's going on, Kevin McCarthy, the former speaker of the house from Bakersfield, California, said he would raise a hundred million dollars to kill this. The last I checked, he's raised about $5 million. And so it's, you know, that just might be politics, the quid pro quo of politics. What can a former speaker or former member of Congress do for you in return for giving money? So the yes campaign has the money advantage, but money doesn't necessarily by you love to steal the line from the Be Beatles to translate into California politics. I can point you to initiatives galore that have outspent like crazy, but have also lost, as you will. The Arnold Schwarzenegger question fascinates me because he was governor, left office in 2011, has not really been deeply involved in California politics. Lee and Jonathan, he's been more involved in national politics in terms of tone and tenor of Republicans in the era of Trump. Now here he is diving into a California matter. And why is that? Because he, it was under his watch that we created the independent Redistrict Commission. It's a big, big deal in the Arnold legacy world. You know, the people versus the powerful, yada yada yada. And you see him on TV now. But if you look inside polls, when you ask Californians about Arnold, the Emerson poll, the Emerson College poll, the one that showed a 54 51 34 race, about 66% of Californias said that Arnold doesn't really move the needle for them. That doesn't speak well to his stature right now, 15 years out of office, but it's maybe not a quantity bit of quality argument. Lee and Jonathan, maybe he can move those independents who the no campaign needs, or maybe he can pull a few Democrats aside. So, yeah, so this is yet another angle on this, which Prop 50, which fascinates it's, yes, it's a, it's a question of Governor Newsom's attractiveness since he is the star of the yes ads. And it's a question of Arnold Schwarzenegger's lasting legacy in California.

- Oh yeah, it is interesting. Newsom is really the face of this, and Yeah, it seems obvious that this is an avenue for him to think about. 2028, there's a Ugo poll. It is recent, just four weeks ago that had, that was a national poll. The sample size was not huge. So that's, you know, so treat this statistic I'm gonna give you with some caution, but his unfavorable was at minus 10. So this is a special election, like primary special elections attract those on the extremes. You know, you can look at what happened in the New York City in the, in the mayoral race. We've got, you know, mom Donny, who in my opinion should not be on the ballot, but I think that's because the, the extremes came out to vote. So I suspect it'll be the same thing here. I, I'm curious as to what the turnout will be. This has changed in the state constitution, so I hope people do look at this carefully. But you know, the more I look at California and Bill, you know, you and I have done this over the years now, I really worry about voter engagement and just how seriously voters are considering the ballot propositions that they're looking at. But this lit, this is changing the constitution. This will blatant, this is blatant gerrymandering, right? What I, I sometimes think what would happen if, if the, if the, if the federal court who's evaluating the lawsuit in Texas, if the Texas redistricting was, was overturned, I wonder what would, I wonder what it would, what would California do? And I suspect that it would just continue to, to do this. It it was, it was, it was Arnold's baby. I think it was an, an exceptional, I think from all perspectives, whatever party you're in, I think it was the right thing to do back in the day. And I, I, I worry very much about the state and what, how this will evolve and what people will, will think about the state in terms of democratic representation. If this does get passed, I'm gonna, you know, if I was a betting man right now, I would bet against it just because it is such a major change. It's a constitutional change. And you know, the old saw, if it ain't broke, don't, you know, don't fix it. I think a lot of voters are probably in that category, but it's, it is hard for me to say, I, I hope I, I hope it doesn't pass just from the standpoint that it seems ridiculous to have a state that would be literally 92.3% democratic representation. And I would say the same thing if it was, if it, if it, if the tables were turned and, and they, and it was the other party involved, right?

- Keep, keep in mind Lee and Jonathan, when we talk about turnout in California, this is not your mom and dad's election in this regard. We have gone to all mail ballots in California. So this is not like an election of 25 years ago where you'd think, oh my gosh, this is gonna rain on election day. Or people give polls, things like that. Today is September the 30th. By October the fourth, you should be receiving a ballot in the mail. So you have in theory, a month to vote on this thing. So it's a question of civic engagement, which gets back to the, what I'm fascinated with the messaging thing. How angry or California is with Donald Trump, how do they see red like the National Democratic Party and whatever comes outta Donald Trump's master mouth has to be wrong and he's a threat to democracy. This is fascism, yada, yada yada. You guys have all heard this ad nauseum by now. So are Californians so motivated in their dislike of Donald Trump that Gavin Newsom could get 50% plus one of the people who vote on the November 4th two to go his way. Now, I wrote a column for, or a California remind a couple weeks ago and did offer this thoughtly, which gets into what you just suggested a very bad word to see in California. Ballot measures is the word temporary. And here I take you back, lead to something which you're very familiar with, which is taxation in California, you might remember back in 2012, we had a temporary tax increase on the ballot, I think it was Proposition 30 Lee, which raised the upper bracket of California. And it was a temporary tax increase to last only four years to get us through a very bad budget situation. What happened to 2016 Lee Proposition 55 goes on the ballot to extend the temporary tax increase through 2028. What's gonna happen in 2030, Lee, there'll be yet another extension of that temporary tax increase. Long story short, it's here to stay. So you look at Proposition 30 and the idea that this is only a temporary change to how we do redistricting in California, that once we get into the next decade with a new census and Donald Trump out of the way, that we'll go back to the independent commission. But Lee, what's gonna happen if this thing passes? What's gonna happen to those five Democrats who are now sitting in office? Are the democratic powers that B gonna say bye-bye. Thanks for doing this, but the independent people are gonna now drive you out of office. I'm not sure. So I'm willing to cynically bet you that come 2030 or 2032 if, especially if say JD Vance is in the White House. And so he can argue the MAGA revolution continues that California Democrats will come up with a rather flimsy argument. They'll say, well, look at redistricting is going on all over the country right now. Republicans are playing hardball. The same logic is, now we have to do this to counter what they're doing. I think you could probably wave bye-bye to the independent redistrict commission altogether. I would not be surprised at all. So buyer beware about, about the word temporary on this fix. The other thing which I would point out here, forgive the ran some of the advertising on both sides here is just really silly or outrageous. Choose your word here that no side talks about of about how voting for this is a vote for open borders. That's a really pretty wild stretch. If you're somehow suggesting that voting for this, which increases the Democrat's chance of getting in the house, is somehow gonna return us to open borders. I think not Donald Trump's still in office. So really kind of a kind of a false argument. But on the yes side, what do they talk about? This protects independent redistricting. What notice this protected, how does it fortify false add? So both, both sides are playing fast and loose here. Lee, Jonathan,

- William, when, when you look at the, the composition of voters within the state, there's still a substantial number with no party preference. And I, I hope I, I hope that those in the middle will will see through this. And I do share your concerns about the temporary aspect of this. If it does go through, I would bet that, you know, for the rest of my lifetime that we would not see the independent redistricting commission come back. You know, the, the way I look at the electorate, there's probably one out of four voters I think that probably where newsom's rants do resonate with them. And if Republicans vote Republican turn out, if they return their mail, ballots is high and those in the middle are sufficiently worried about this, that they either don't vote or, or vote no, then, then I could easily see this going down. But it really kind of boils down on to how, you know, to how many are really are gonna send those are gonna send those mail-in ballots back. The cost bill is just extraordinary. The last number I saw was 282 280 2 million. And just imagine what we could do for schools or you know, you name the public policy that we're deficient in and add in 282 million plus, you know, the over 100 million that's been spent on the campaign,

- Right? Here's what direct concern is crazy about the California Power Establishment. If you read the actual initiative, if you read the ballot argument, what does it say about the cost? A few million dollars. It doesn't get to $200 million, it just says few million dollars.

- Yeah, it's, it is, it is a little bit mis I mean it's technically correct, but it's mis it is in my, it is in my opinion, it's misleading,

- Completely misleading because the practice is that the state bails out local costs. So this is assuming the state will not bail out local costs. So again, a another misleading thing, the other interesting thing here is what's gonna happen to Gavin Newsom based on what happens on November the fourth, or if this is California the month after November 4th is the votes keep getting counted. 'cause you know, this thing may not get settled for a few weeks in California fashion. You keep hearing this language about how this is a make or break moment for Gavin Newsom. If he doesn't win this, somehow he is torpedoed as a presidential candidate, how horribly embarrassing, blah blah, blah. And I think I talked about this on the last podcast, baloney. He is, you mentioned polls, Lee, he is at the front of the Democratic field right now based simply on what he's been doing the past few months, just soaking up a, a lot of oxygen in the, in the democratic field fighting against Donald Trump. Now we can talk about how dignified it is, how gubernatorial it is, how statesman, like a lot of it he's doing right now. But he is singing a tune that Democrats love because they want somebody to fight Donald Trump, even if it's in the same kind of crude manner that Donald Trump likes to practice politics. So here's my theory here. If this thing passes and Gavin Newsom can deliver five seats to their house and the Democrats end up getting the house next November, yeah, he's a hero and that's a, that's a tailwind for him. If Gavin Newsom loses in California, the Democrats don't get the five seats. I think he still gets credit outside of California for trying. He may get dinged in California for losing. You'll see editorials saying, thanks for a tremendous waste of time. Now focus on your day job. He'll still be in a very powerful position in Sacramento though, even though he would be wounded. And why is that? It's the same reason why you see groups that normally would oppose Prop 50 backing off it because you have to deal with an incumbent governor regardless of the outcome. And incumbent governors carry a lot of juice in Sacramento when it comes to getting money spent, bills passed and so forth. So I, again, I just Lee, I don't see how Newsom really loses here.

- No, I I I agree Billy, it is, it's there's a sense from which it's a win-win for him.

- Yeah. - And I think that's why he's really putting all his eggs in this basket. It also illustrates another aspect of his governorship, which is what would the positive vision that he could run on he is portraying, you know, he's going to the mad saying, I'm the guy fighting Trump. I'm the guy fighting mags. I am the person who on, on Twitter, on x who is, who is mocking the president. And, and that's a hundred percent of his plan right now. He's not going on saying, here's what I've done for California. Look how many, look how much better the schools have become. Look how much better the roads are. Look how much more water conveyance on water storage we have. Look how we have made life better for the median voter in California. And there's, there's none of that. And I think it also highlights where the, where the National Democratic Party is.

- Yes.

- In terms of, you've got a guy who's, who's a 10 point unfavorable, who seems to be the leading candidate right now and you know, try to get your head around that nationally, there's the Democratic party is and Republican party are pretty evenly split at about 25 to the low thirties. No party preference again is the dominant portion of voters. I don't see anything he's doing right now that's gonna resonate with them at the national level. You just have to have, you have to have not only a vision of what you're gonna do for the country, but you have to, you have to point to a track record. 20 years ago you could point to do some track record, I think as, as mayor of San Francisco where he could say, Hey look, I did gay marriage look, I put a lot of homeless on buses and sent them home to their families and actually very few came back. That would be a track record you can point to, but I don't see those accomplishments for him now in his, in his seventh year, we we're about a year from the, the election things move here glacially. So I just don't see the potential of them being, being able to deliver on any of those previous campaign promises ranging from homelessness to housing, both of which have gotten worse under, under his watch. So interesting, interesting political times.

- He is a smart politician, Lee and Jonathan, I can tell you, having worked for a California governor back in the day, when you go from year seven to year eight, you commission a couple of people to look at the record and you look at everything you promised along the way. So you go back to your first campaign and your second campaign, you look at your state of the state addresses, you look at your budget addresses, you look at promises made and promises kept plain and simple. And you come up with a tally sheet. And so I'd argue that 2026 re Newsom will be an exercise in trying to check a few of those boxes have been checked so far. But the other thing which intrigues is Gavin Newsom has a rather chameleon-like approach to politics and what have we seen in the past year from him at various points, he has been very conciliatory with Donald Trump trying to be nice with Donald Trump. And he has gone 180 degrees and been just an, has just an absolute Trump baher. He has lately gauged in the issue of disgruntled young men just feeding off of the Charlie Kirk shooting. And before that he was doing podcasts with Charlie Cook and Steve Bannon again trying to be an open arms guy before going to this current basher form that he's in right now. So now he has discovered the plight of young men, which is very interesting because his wife, the first partner, Jennifer Siebel Newsom has quite the track record of bashing male toxicity in her documentaries and her body of work. So kind of instant contradiction there, if you will. So the point is who knows what he gloms on to next. Sure. Finger wedding, a lot of it goes on in politics. You look at when Bill Clinton ran for office in 1992, ran for the presidency, a lot of finger wetting there and kind of tasting which way the winds were blowing. But Clinton's smart enough to kind of recognize what it took to get 270 electoral votes. This is the question with Newsom, for all the attention he is getting, Lee and Jonathan, the bumps in the polls, the talk about being the 2028 Omni and so forth. Is he really putting himself in a better position to campaign in, you know, purple states, you know, battleground states across America, which Lee ties into what you just said about California. What does his record look like in California? I have this working theory that the 2028 election of Gavin Newsom is involved could look very much like the 1988 election in that you would have a vice president on one side, JD Vance playing the role of George HW Bush versus a governor or former governor Gavin Newsom in this case playing the role of Michael Dukakis. Newsom is a stronger campaigner on any day than Michael Dukakis a different personality. But Lee and Jonathan, the approach would be the same for the Republican campaign. You would just deconstruct the home state. And so whereas the Bush campaign first went after, you know, Massachusetts at Boston Harbor and, and then went after Willie Horton and things like that, you would see I think a very smart Republican campaign picker bar California with homelessness, with poverty, with, you know, just, you know, the high speed rail. Just, you know, the notion of government gone bad.

- Yeah. So, you know, I think it'd almost be like shooting fish in a barrel for the Republicans particularly advances the candidate. He's a very high IQ guy. He's quick, he sees through things, he's a really good debater. And, and some of the, you know, some of it in terms of nuisance future depends on who else, who else, who else rises in on the Democratic side. If it was somebody like Andy Becher that, that's, that's a candidate who can point to, Hey, I'm a Democrat, I'm running Kentucky and Kentucky's a red state so I can reach across the aisle. It's not, it's not even reaching across the aisle. He says, I can get stuff done. That's nonpartisan. People appreciate the way it's been money,

- He trying to present a rational argument to a party that's convinced it's 1935 redux. We're in Nazi Germany, so,

- Sure. Yeah. And, and if that's the case, then they're gonna lose again, speaking

- Speaking which, yeah. And speaking of 2020, getting back to the messaging on Prop 50, I see ads with Governor Newso, I see ads with senator, maybe gubernatorial candidate Alex Padilla. We'll get to that in a minute. I don't see a OCI don't see 20, 28 people showing up here in California. So what did the Romans say about the Mediterranean Ma Norstrom? This is kind of the ma nostrom for Gavin Newsom, my California.

- Well, gentlemen, let's talk about wildfires in this state, Lee, you explained your recent column for California on your mind that the Palisades fire, the most destructive fires in Los Angeles County. History left behind a scar that is measured not only in the 50,000 acres burned and 18,000 homes incinerated, but also in the 2.6 millions tons of waste those homes became, that mountain of ash has become a nightmare for the Kardashians and every person living in Calabasas, California, about 40 miles northwest of Los Angeles, where debris and ash from the fires have been dumped into a landfill that sits within the community of 23,000 people. Lee, how did Calabasas end up as a proverbial wasteland?

- Well, you know, Johnson, it is, it is interesting. Calabasas has become, I guess, you know, the, you know, today's version of of Beverly Hills or Bel Air. A lot of the celebrities who do not want to be an LA property, but who wish to have to live in a very nice community of May Calabasas their home. Several of the Kardashians, Justin Bieber, will Smith, John Travolta, and this is a community that has a, that has a landfill. The landfill in Calabasas is open for things like ordinary trash landscape trimmings. If you wanted do, if you want to toss, use a batteries in the landfill. No can do. But one day, one day people in the Palisades woke up and they found that the landfill was being, was accepting debris from the Palisades fire, which according to New New York Times story has a lot of, I'll just say has toxic material within that. And the Calabasas Landfill was never intended to be a toxic waste dump. The closest toxic waste stump is, I believe about 175 miles away is EPA monitored EPA managed. This is an area where there aren't very many people, if any, that's where that debris should be going because there is asbestos, there's lead, there's arsenic in that debris as you'd imagine coming from the fire that melted, you know, ev batteries and houses that were built long ago that had lead paint that had other tox materials, but officials chose not to send that to toxic debris to the 175 mile away landfill. They sent it to Calabasas, they sent it to Simi Valley, they sent it to Smar because it was just much more expeditious. And what was interesting about this is that no matter who, who you were in Cal in, in Calabasas, whether you are the Kardashians, who I believe know Newsom, some people in Cal, in Calabasas, I think personally no RFK Junior, who expresses a lot of concerns about environmental issues and, and people's health. Nothing really worked for them other than to file a lawsuit. Ultimately, what they wanted to do was to test the debris because, and this is where it gets just heartbreaking, the debris from those fires was not fully tested for toxic materials. Right. And if, if you don't know that it's toxic, then you say, okay, let's, let's put it in the landfill in Simi Valley or Calabasas or Somar. Well, the people in Calabasas finally prevailed. They were allowed to test it. And voila, ris there were toxic materials in there. Now the issue becomes, well, are we gonna dig up those? You know, I, I think I can't, I can't recall whether it was, I think, I think the amount dump was in the billions of pounds over a billion pounds. So now what do people that can calabasas to you do they say, okay, well let's dig it up and, and then move it somewhere else. Well, you're gonna have all that dust flying around the Calabasas. There are people who are moving out, they're worried about Calabasas potentially becoming a cancer cluster. I would have the same worries if I'd lived there and I don't know if I would move or not. But this is, this is just heartbreaking in my opinion. And just imagine if the private sector did this, if the private sector filled put into landfill toxic materials, they sort of pretended they didn't know it was toxic. They tried to shut down any pushback from the community. It brings back memories of Aaron Brockovich. Exactly the old movie with Julia Robs, well, Aaron Brockovich is a neighbor, Calabasas, Aaron Brock Fish took a shot at this. And you might say, if Aaron Brock Fish can't do it, then no, no attorney can. So I feel for those people, Calabasas Smar, Simi Valley, it seems like their rights were abrogated and they have no, they have no recompense. And this, this is a government that doesn't seem to be able to protect us from natural disasters. And they don't seem to be able to be willing to protect us from the fallout of that. Even when there were options such as taking that debris to the EPA toxic waste dump, you know, over a hundred miles away. Yes, it would've cost more. Yes, it wouldn't have been cleaned up quite so quickly, but in my opinion, it just really was the wrong thing to do.

- Lee, can you explain how the, the power structure works here? Is this the county government deciding where the waste goes and the county government therefore trumps the local government? Is there a state government role or could the state government come in and change the decision?

- Well, you know, that's an interesting question. People were trying to figure out, well, how is Calabasas picked? It is, it is close, you know, it is close to the Palisades. It's just over, just over the hills. Some said county government picked it. County government says no. The Army Corps of Engineers picked it. The Army Corps of Engineers said one, we got a sheet of where we're supposed to take this stuff and Calabasas was on there. So, so it's, again, it's a little bit like, you know, hide the p under the walnut shell. I believe the, you know, I, I think the state could have intervened. The state government chose not to,

- I don't know if you saw it Lee, but Jonathan, but the LA County supervisors tasked the McChrystal group. This is General Stanley McChrystal's group, to do an after action report of the fires. And they found the following that their quote, outdated policies, inconsistent practice and communications vulnerabilities. And they add, quote, the process to communicate in evacuation decision of the public was slow, convoluted, and involved multiple leadership roles across county level departments. What did you say, Lee? Ris my question to you, Lee, is we don't know if Los Angeles will go up in flames. We know that at some point it will go up in flames. Why? It's in a fire zone, plain and simple, just like adventure. We'll get an earthquake, eventually we'll have mudslide problems. This is how the world treats California. But Lee, what do you think would be different about Los Angeles the next time around, other than presumably the mayor will not go off to Ghana. If there's gonna be trouble,

- What will be different? Yeah, there'll, there'll be, there'll be another awful fire. I mean, you just look down the list every five years or so, there's an awful fire in Los Angeles and you know, sometimes the Malibu this time in Palisades and the heat and fire in Altadena. And what will be different depends on who's in the mayor's office. If, if Rick Caruso, who ran as a Democrat, if he'd been elected over bass and the polls were getting close when bass, when the election occurred a couple years ago, you know, bill, interestingly, Obama, Clinton, Biden Harris all came to strongly support bass. And they're, and they came out, several of them came out. Hillary Clinton came out to do campaign event with, with Karen Bass, Rick Caruso's, the Democrat was persona non gRED to them. He was waiting for the fire. He was not in Ghana, he was waiting for the fire at his new Palisades development. He had commissioned private firefighters who had enough time to drive out from Arizona to be in the Palisades when the fire broke out. It all really boils down to leadership. And I think people have not fully appreciated just how awful this was. And the McChrystal report bill, which you cite is damning county officials are trying to, you know, wallpaper it over. It's obvious. There's just a lack of a lack of prioritization and there's a real issue of competence. You know, bill on this, on the, I think among the county supervisors, there's one fellow about a year ago who was on tech, either Tech talk or Twitter, talking about Ho Chi Minh and the communist leaders. And you know, no, you don't have time in your hands to, to do that. We have inadequate protection, just grossly inadequate protection. So yeah, it'll happen again, bill. And if the same kind of people are elected, it'll be the same type of, same type of response. And I was looking at the Palisades dashboard, the housing dashboard of, of about 7,500, about 7500, 7400 structures were destroyed or damaged. Out of those, do you wanna take a guess at, at how many single family homes have been rebuilt for, let me rephrase it. At the rate we're permitting at the rate we're permitting rebuilds. Do you wanna take a guess at how many months it'll take before all of those 7,400, 7,500 homes will be, will be completed.

- Go, go for it Jonathan. Take a guess.

- At at at the rate we've seen so far in the nine months, you wanna take a guess of how many months, Jonathan, you not to put you on the spot, man, but

- I can't even, I can't even begin to guess.

- Okay. 25. 25%.

- Okay, well if you said 25%, then that would be about four years. Okay. You wanna take, you wanna take another guess? Okay.

- Four. Okay. 12 and half. 12 point half percent. Is it over 10%?

- If we, if, if, if the permitting continued at the rate it has now there's some good reasons to believe that it will speed up. But if it did continue at the rate it has, I think it would take something like 15 to 20 years.

- Oh well,

- Yeah. So one thing the county has become very aggressive with is brush clearance and brush clearance citations. And this story caught my eye the other day 'cause I gets kind of a window into the crazy post-fire world that is Los Angeles. So brush clearance citations through Los Angeles is a reor story have increased by 37% to 14,840 compared to almost 11,000 in 2024. And Reuters goes on the increase in citations after news reports of 16,000 acres in high fire severity zones that required inspection and proposed budget cuts that would lead to the loss of three people in the lad's brush inspections unit. So here we have, we have these terrible fires and this Los Angeles decides we're gonna cut our budget for checking on in inspecting on people's brush. 'cause part of the problem is you have brush around your, around your home, the brush catches fire makes a bad situation worse. So the county decides to cut back on on its inspection units and then once it's caught cutting back on it, it overcompensates. And what caught my attention was this wonderfully dry quote by somebody who says very upset local homeowner who said quote, sorry, your house burned down, but go clear your brush, you're gonna be fined $750. So you've lost your home, you're trying to recover, you're trying to go through the chart remains of your home. And along comes Los Angeles is gonna nail you with $750. Fine if they find brush and they don't like it. Kind of reminds me back when I lived in Washington DC Lee and Jonathan and occasionally get blasted with a terrible snowstorm. And then the city of Washington, DC the, the, the district government would be slow to respond. About a day or two later, the plows would finally come through and what would the plows do? The plows would plow the roads and bury cars on the side of the road in snow. And then the cops would come along after that. They'd issue a ticket on your car, which is buried under three feet of snow. So this, this kind of reminds me of that getting a $750 love note from the city on top of that. And I think now Mayor Bass has apologized to that and said that they won't find people center $50. But you know, Lee, it's just a portrait of a, of a, of a local government that just the right hand doesn't even know what the left hand is doing.

- Yeah, I mean it's almost, you know, Saturday night live level silliness. Yeah. There and, and you know, ironically the LA fire department wanted to wanted within their budget to staff two full-time, two full-time units for brush removal in the Palisades. There's a lot of Chaparral there, which has a lot of, which has substantial oil in, in the within it. And therefore it's, it's just, it is, it's an infer waiting to happen that was declined, that was denied within LA within LA City, you know, 14 billion or whatever it is, budget. And you know who was clearing the brush? It was team volunteers were clearing the brush. And again, this just all goes back to priorities. Government's first priority is to protect and just within LA is just whether is protecting from the national disaster or dumping toxic filled debris in your backyard. The government I think is just failing ally.

- Yeah, words not said often on this podcast, but maybe Los Angeles needs to look to Sacramento for wisdom in this regard. The state government has the Office of Emergency Services. I know from when I worked in government many, many years ago, OES was always very busy because they're the people like fema, the federal government who have to respond to natural disasters. But our OES was always very quick to respond. We had good people running it. And I think if you're the mayor of Los Angeles, that's probably one of the first things you wanna do. If you wanna change it around, look at what your emergency structure is in la, maybe you need to create an OES if there's not one there. And you have to think long and hard about hiring somebody who just can really kind of kick fanny and take names at the top of that because clearly you're gonna be banging a lot of heads around Los Angeles to make the city work.

- And Bill your calling this week covers the governor's race in which there are 18 declared candidates. You examined the chances of former state assemblyman Ian Calderon, a millennial just shy, just a month shy of his 40th birth birthday, who is running as a millennial. You also mentioned Tony Atkins, former pro tem of the state Senate who dropped out of the race yesterday. And you also raised the prospect of a wild card and US Senator Alex Padilla. Bill, what does it take to separate yourself and assume position as dominant front runner for statewide office?

- Well, 18 people in this race, that's not county Kamala Harris and a lady Kuna Lakas who dropped out of the race. So Lenny Kuna Lakas is our lieutenant governor and it's not counting Senator Padilla who may or may not get in, but he should be making a decision soon. It's the clown car of America's gubernatorial races. Not to insult hardworking clowns everywhere by luck them into politicians. But it's how many more people could run in this race. My angle with Tony Atkins was this, for those not familiar she hails from the San Diego area. She is a former assembly speaker and state senate President Pro Tim. She has a very compelling life story. She grew up very poor in Appalachia. They didn't have indoor plumbing. She was the first person in her family to graduate from college. It's a real kinda like Arnold Schwarzenegger who grew up under very impoverished conditions in Austria. There's a real kind of bootstraps message here. And she is openly gay. She is the first lesbian president of the Senate and I think the second lesbian speaker of the assembly. Yet, if you look at the polls right now in the clown car raced, she is sitting anywhere from one to 2%. So the question is, what's going on here? I started thinking about this after I read Kamala Harris' book, or I read the ex Arizona Under of the Stomach to read the whole thing. 107 days is the name of the book. And by the way, and the big news out of that was that she agonized over whether or not to put Pete Judi, Pete Bodi on the ticket last year, the transportation secretary who's also openly gay, but she decided against it why she didn't think that America had stomach a woman of mixed race married to a Jewish man and then bringing along a gay candidate. On top of that, she thought it was too much for America to stomach. So my first thought was, is Tony Atkins problem that California is just a bastion of homophobia and she can't get anywhere 'cause she's gay? And the answer is no. If you look at where California is on the topic of sexuality right now, we have changed a lot over the last 15 to 20 years. Back in 2008, we had a very contentious ballot measure, proposition eight, the definition of marriage. It said very simply, marriage is between a man and a woman. And it went on the ballot, a huge fight over it. And it passed a very bad moment. Lee, Jonathan for Gavin Newsom, because he was the star in the ads, the star in the no campaign, the yes campaign ads. Because remember Newsom famously came out after a a state supreme court decision and said it's kind on whether you like it or not, it was kind of newsom and full throttle obnoxiousness. And it really helped push that thing over the, over the finishing line. You fast forward now to 2024 and the ballot measure proposition three, which strikes the Prop eight language and just says that everyone has a rec to be married if they so choose other words, it's both hetero and, and, and same sex at the same time. And it passes overwhelmingly, California is moving just as politicians are moving. Barack Obama was against gay marriage when he ran in 2008. Switched his, changed his mind in 2012. Donald Trump for the whole conservative MAGA agenda. Donald Trump doesn't have any problems, same sex marriage. He's always kind of dodged. If you look at his administration, he has a gay treasury secretary, I think they call them the, a gays in the administration. Just gay men and gay women, A powerful positions. So getting back to Tony Atkins, is she stuck in that position because of her sexuality? No, she's stuck in that position because of the nature of California Governor's races, which are very muscular affairs leader, Jonathan, if you have name recognition and if you have special interest money and you also have special interests, it can turn out the vote. You're in the catbirds position and right now she lacks the money and that she has one labor endorsement, not much in that way. So she's stuck in that one to 2% position. And getting back to Alex Padilla, if he jumps in the race, I think like in 2024 when Nancy Pelosi pushed money in Adam Schiff's way in the Senate race, you'll see money pushed in Alex Padilla's race. Why is that? National Democrats hate Katie Porter. Why she went to Congress and trashed earmarks most the general pain in the butt to Nancy Pelosi and the powers that be. They don't want her to be California governor. They will back Padilla and Padilla's buddies with Governor Newsom who will put his muscle behind that and probably get special interest. So even though Padilla is not very strong in polls right now, I imagine once he got in, you would see that take off as well. So anyway, it's a lot of rambling on about Tony Atkins, but I'm just very fascinated by the idea that somebody who has a very compelling life story, who would've a very interesting narrative if she became a serious contender. First the state's first gay governor, she's not getting anywhere. Lee,

- No, Tony Atkins has just never had any traction. And it really does boil down to name recognition. She, she's not known outside district. I mean, no, literally no one knows her. And I think she had about, I think she had about $4.2 million per campaign. That's not gonna be enough to go where she needs to go. And I, I think voters want somebody who's gonna, who's gonna do a good job. At the end of the day, they, they don't care about their sexuality or their political preferences. They just wanna know they can get the job done. And that really, I think, highlights just the, what it seems to me is really just a patriot system. Now, within the Democratic party within California, it's who gets anointed? I mean, years ago, Gavin Newsom was anointed. Kamala Harris was anointed. It began with Willie Brown. And once you get into the Democratic party machine within a one party state, a lot of doors open up. And Kamala Harris went into the Senate and Gamon Newsom, he tried run for governor after Schwarzenegger, Jerry Brown decided that he wanted a second shot at Newsom, invited his time as Lieutenant governor. So now we're in a situation where you have a lot of names with almost no recognition other than there's a little bit of recognition for Katie Porter. And one reason is because she lost in the US Senate race where Adam Schiff won. So people at least know, know her name, they don't know the names, essentially of several of the other candidates via OSA is, is running and yet via OSA is long removed from his days and is as an LA politician, you know, bill, what, what what what makes me just so disappointed is that, is that I would think that, you know, if you want that, if you wanted to win, you need to take a chance, you need to separate yourself from the other Democrats. None of 'em have done that. You know, they all do Reger pledge to take on Donald Trump. They all do Reger pledge to make the state more affordable. But then they also talk about, well, we're gonna preserve the state's bullet train, which again is just is in my opinion, throwing good money after bad. They want to provide undocumented immigrants Medi-Cal healthcare benefits. And without going into the social cultural immigration aspects of that, that is dollars that is gonna strain the budget. You have a budget that is risen over 60% since Gavin Newsom entered office, and yet the essentials are not getting, are not getting done. There's a sense in which they're trying to kinda out immigrant EE each other. Yeah, Tony Thurman talked about that. I think he's probably also, and I'm guessing the three to 4% range bill. Yep. Yes. And Zary er has talked about the importance of immigrants. So I didn't, you know, I haven't seen anything from, from the candidates that makes me think that California would fare better under them than they have under, under Governor Newsom. They all talk about, well, we're gonna build more housing. Well, Gavin Newsom said he was gonna make housing a Marshall plan. He, he's roughly 20, 25% below what his, what his goal was to put it differently. You look at California housing starts, it really doesn't look any different now than before when Newsom Newsom took office, despite all these new laws being passed. Bill, I agree totally with you about Porter. She's not well liked in DC She has a difficult personality. She is, she te she taught law at uc, Irvine, she comes across, I would say she has a personality of, of a consumer advocate. Let's fight big business, let's fight corporations. Let's try to represent the little person when they're getting, you know, messed over by big business interests. That's not what California needs right now. There's nothing wrong with being a consumer advocate, but there's just so many other issues and she's pledged, she would sign a SB 79, which is, in my opinion, a terrible housing bill. It would destroy local zoning laws and permit high density housing within a half a mile of transit stop. So people who, who invested their life savings in a single family home, you, you know, if SB 79 is signed by Newsom, you might have, you might have a house, you might have a multi-story housing unit right next to you. And that's not gonna say, that's not gonna make move the needle whatsoever in terms of California housing. It's, it is, I dunno, it is depressing when you look at the dance card on the Democratic side, it is depressing. Bill there, was there what, there was a recent debate between, between the candidates, but I don't believe either either Republican was part of that, were they?

- No, it was a Democratic roadshow. You know, it's interestingly, if you, getting back to Ian Calderon in his campaign, as Jonathan mentioned, he is, he turns 40 in October and he's pushing very hard the whole millennial vibe because he's running against an older field. And actually, if you look up the average age average of California governors, Jerry Brown was 36 when he was elected in 1974. He was the oldest elected governor as well. But the average age in recent times is about mid fifties. So it was kind of a sweet spot there. So Conone is ahead of that. He was ahead of that when he was at the legislature. You know, think he was the youngest majority leader in the assembly as well. If when he first got in, he put out a video and pushed very hard on the notion that, you know, I'm young and I get it, people are getting squeezed and they're getting squeezed by bad decisions in Sacramento. That's kind of thumbing the machine. But here's the problem. He's a product of the machine. His father was in the legislature. He has two uncles who are in the legislature. His stepmother is occupying the seat he wants occupied. So he is a Colorado slash Kennedy in that regard. And so he's not really an outsider either. So if you're looking for diese, if you're looking for somebody who's gonna hold up the candle and let you down the capitol and show you what's wrong, I don't think that creature, at least on the democratic side, is in the field.

- You know, Billy, it's interesting when you mentioned Padilla, he is California se senior senator. He's made, you know, he's moved the needle a bit. He is, had some bills. Bills he introduced and passed into law that would seem to be a really politically risky move for him to become governor of California when it's not obvious that he would win. I suspect he would if he entered, but oh my God, talk about a thankless job right now.

- Well, but figure it this way, Lee. He's in the United States Senate, he's on the minority side. The Democrats are not gonna get back the Senate in 2026. The numbers just don't add up. If you look at 2028, it's not much better. And so it's Republican senate for the time being. So there he is on the minority side, which means he can't really investigate, he can't really have any showboat moments. What's his big moment as a senator was getting put down on the ground and, and and handcuffed when he was trying to crash a what? A what was it? A, a fema No, it was A-A-D-H-S press conference with Kirsty. That's his moment. As a senator, you can't really point to any legislative accomplishments. He's kind of a nothing burger in that regard. So why not get out of that job and go become governor for eight years and see what happens. So I, you know, I do the move to, I worked for Pete Wilson who made the same move in 1990. It's part of a larger trend in politics, by the way, where you're seeing senators on both persuasions bailing out early. Jodi Ernst in Iowa, she's leaving after two terms. If you know the Senate historically, what happens after, as a senate senator wraps up his, his or her second term, they go back and figure how to break their campaign pledge, promising not to serve more than two terms, some phony listening to her and so far, but she's had it after 12 years in Washington, Marshall Blackburn, you're seeing her going back to run for governor of Tennessee. So the Senate is not what it used to be, which was centris and collegial and a bunch of guys hanging out and playing squash and sitting in the sauna talking about the world problems. It's angry, it's partisan. There's a lot of vendetta politics going on back and forth. And so if Ira Padilla, I'd probably think about coming back here and running too. The problem though, Lee, is that I'm not sure if the guy really will be a good governor or not, because again, you gotta show me what's he accomplished.

- Yeah, the what surprises me is that, is that there's no one on that slate as far as I can tell, that has absorbed and absorbed the message from November of last year that maybe has read Ezra Klein's book and has said, you know what? I, we do need some new ideas. The status quo has failed miserably, and I'm gonna be the guy or the gal to move the needle

- Now. But, but again, Lee, the, the, the angry beating pulse of the Democratic party is now turning on Ezra Klein. If you, if you look at what's happening to him in social media, he's getting flanked by Democrats

- As well. Is that right? Is that right? Yeah. You know, it's interesting, I haven't read the book. I read a review of the book written by a guy who knows some economics and it liter, you know, it literally is some prominent Democrats in 2025 rediscovered what Adam Smith had to say about how an economy works back in 1776 in his famous book, the Wealth of Nations,

- In a previous incarnation, Gavin Newsom was embracing the abundance agenda. So too, I think it sounds like Lee and Jonathan at Lee's gonna miss Gavin Newsom when he leaves office.

- I really hope we don't, because that means we're in, we're gonna be in bad shape.

- Gentlemen, let's cap off this podcast by talking about UCLA football, which I'm sorry to say Lee is oh four. They fired their, their coach Deshaun Foster, and they're in danger of going entirely winless this see season a couple weeks ago in an empty Rose Bowl, they lost by 15 to a New Mexico team. It paid $1.5 million to come to Pasadena schools have enlisted accomplished sports and business executives and UCLA grades to find a new coach. Should have follow the Stanford model. It could bring in Andrew Luck, someone like Andrew Luck to serve as the football's game manager. But, but the bigger question is, can California public universities play the same game as current powerhouses deal with, with NIL money? You know, you see current state, state schools like the Tech University of Texas, Ohio State, Texas a and m, and the Oregon, Oregon Ducks and LSU are all state schools that, you know, play a, play a bigger game with in the NIL Ali. Why does UCLA have a spending problem?

- Yeah, UCLA has a spending problem and, and that's on top of our $1.2 billion bill that the Trump administration is, has, has delivered to us. You know what, we've just, we, meaning UCLA, I've been there, you know, 25 years, we have just made a lot of bad spending decisions. We've, I believe the athletics department is in deficit to the university by over a hundred million dollars. I don't know if that's the exact number, but we have hired many coaches and we have fired many coaches. And when you fire 'em, there's a buyout contract or there's a buy clause within the contract that says, okay, you get fired and we've gotta write you a million, you know, several million dollar check. So that's, you know, that's happened for a number of years. UCLA football, you know, probably hasn't been systematically relevant since that, since going back to maybe the 1980s or 1990s. Believe it or not. We did have a ten two season about 10 or 12 years ago. But, but that was a little bit of an anomaly. Yeah. So we've, yeah, we've hired football coaches, we fired football coaches, we've hired basketball coaches, we fired basketball coaches. We, we owe them a lot of money. And by gosh, you know, when you pay somebody a million and a half dollars to come to your home stadium, they're supposed to, I'm saying this ally, they're supposed to lay down the loops. I suspect that, you know, if you go on, if you go on StubHub or one of the ticket, one of the ticket platforms, the day of the UCLA game, I, you, you can probably buy tickets for $10. You look at those drone videos of the Rose Bowl, which can hold over 90,000. And I wonder if full paying customers, if there are more than 15,000, we, we are, we are, we are done in, and Jonathan y we can definitely, you know, state school can definitely play the anal game. Most of, most of the top football schools now, as you mentioned, you can put Oklahoma in their Alabama, Georgia, Florida, they've, these are all schools that, that are state schools and there's no reason why they, you can't play the game. But when your athletics department is in deficit over a hundred million dollars and the university's saying a one is facing a $1.2 billion bill from the, from the administration, it's hard to, it is hard to write checks. So I suspect, yeah, I suspect we very well could go winless. That would be, that would be very grim for, for us. But that's very, that's certainly, that's certainly possible.

- Now in fairness, UCLA, there could be a bigger Los Angeles story here. UFC lost its first game of the year over the weekend to Illinois. And now the, the, the powers that be are already looking at Lincoln Riley, they're kind of embattled head coach and thinking if they're gonna get rid of him, those from Miller College football note, Lincoln and Riley was very successful in Oklahoma. USC backed up the truck, dumped 'em in a pile of money and brought 'em out to California. But if they were to can him Lee and Jonathan, they're looking at about a $70 million buyout. Some people say 60, but FC 70 as well. So, ouch, welcome to that. There's my question for you, Lee. And that's one of the culture of UCLA. One way that you could improve the UCLA's football existence is to put a stadium closer to the students. You know, good luck getting students to go all the way out to Pasadena, to, to, you know, go to a game. Part of the college experience is tailgating and then staggering your way in and outta the stadium. Not so at Pasadena. In fact, there's been talk, I think about moving UCLA football games to the SoFi Stadium in, in Inglewood, but this'll still be the same transportation problem. Question for you, Lee. Is there any, is there enough space in that very crowded UCLA campus to build a football stadium? Maybe something like what? Stanford has a modest stadium, 50,000 people, but Lee, the culture of UCLA and sports, I don't think it's a football mad school, maybe not a sports mad school. What would happen, how would your fellow faculty members, how would the powers that be react if somebody said, well, you know, we're gonna build a football stadium here on the campus.

- Yeah, you know what, there's a, there's a practice facility on campus for football.

- Yeah, - I think it is different now, but for years. Do you know how long that, that practice field was?

- No.

- 80 yards. Oh gosh. We didn't even have a practice field that was regulated. That was regulation. Yeah. UCLA has to figure out what it wants to be from a sports standpoint. Way, way back in the day, in the day of, you know, John Wooden and NCAA championship after NCAA championship and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bill Walton and Foot, and at the same time football with, I mean, I'll take people way back. There's a phone named Tommy Prothro. We had a Heisman Trophy winner named Gary bein. I've had the pleasure to to meet

- Jackie Robinson.

- Jackie Robinson. So, and it was good for UCLA because USC was very strong in sports. UCLA was very strong in sports. They would play each other in football. I mean, as a kid, as a kid growing up, growing up up la I mean the city literally would shut down on, on Saturdays and everybody was tuned into S-A-U-C-L-A. That's, you know, that's kind of an afterthought. Now, as I mentioned, you probably have to go back to the days of when Terry Donahue was coaching UCLA or the days of, I was gonna say Bob Talia, but you know, Troy Aikman, when Troy Aikman transferred from Oklahoma to be quarterback and, you know, mul multi, multiple times Super Bowl winner for the Cowboys. That was 35 years ago. So the students aren't engaged. There needs to be, there needs to be a stadium that you can walk to. In my opinion, that's what is needed for a successful interaction between, between students and, and, and the team. And, and if you don't have that, I think it becomes somewhat of a sterile, sterile experiment. 'cause you know, you look at Alabama, Oklahoma, or Texas and you see the colors, you see the kids are so fired up, you know, you, again, you look at those drum video footages of UCLA and it's just something totally different. We have no, we have no room for the 80 yard practice practice field. But yeah, there wouldn't be much if it could be done and, you know, if you could build it, you know, in less than 25 years with all the environmental regulations you have to go through. Yeah, I don't think faculty would be particularly, particularly excited about this. The faculty sentiment. Now, I think the UCLA is, is one that's, yeah, football is not the top. Football's not in the top of their minds. Says it might be at Alabama, Georgia. Oklahoma, Texas.

- So we'll leave the listeners with two questions. We'll, prop 50 pass or fail on November 4th, and will the Bruins have a win by then?

- The Bruins having a win, I believe is much less than the probability of prop 50 passing. I'm gonna, I'm, I'm, I I'm saying no on prop 50 passing. I think, I think Republicans will turn out in on mass to vote against it. I think there, I think enough, no party preference will vote against it or simply not engage. I'm kind of thinking it's gonna be kind of a 52, 48 type of type of outcome. But yeah, the Bruin, we could do zero, zero, and zero and 12. I hate to say it, but that's just the way it is.

- But the Bruins will still be winless and I think Prop 50 will pass, but narrowly after a couple weeks of vote counting, which will add to the general frustration of the California public water, is it takes so long to count votes,

- You know, where the most technologically advanced state in the most technologically advanced country. And somehow, somehow it takes two weeks to count votes. Go figure.

- As always, gentlemen, this has been an interesting hour of timely analysis. Thank you for your time.

- Thank you guys. Fun fellows, we never, we never run out of topic, savvy to talk about California.

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