California’s mental health system is at risk of instability due to a $14 billion budget gap and potential cuts to Medicaid, which could impact local programs and services for vulnerable individuals.
A coalition of California and national civil rights leaders called on Governor Gavin Newsom to commute the death sentences of all 574 individuals currently on California’s death row, citing systemic injustice, racial bias, and irreparable harm.
The Trump administration has threatened to revoke federal education funding to California if the state does not ban transgender girls from participating in girls’ high school sports, sparking a clash with the state’s existing law that allows students to participate in school programs consistent with their gender identity.
California State Senator Sasha Renée Pérez has introduced the No Vigilantes Act, which aims to strengthen the state’s laws against police impersonation and require law enforcement officers to display clear identification.
California’s death penalty system has been shown to be racially discriminatory, with Black and Latino defendants up to 8.7 and 6.2 times more likely to be sentenced to death respectively, and victims of white victims being nearly 9 times more likely to result in a death sentence.
The Department of Justice filed a statement of interest in support of Huntington Beach’s lawsuit challenging the California Values Act, which restricts local law enforcement from assisting federal immigration officials, and cited the newly enacted Laken Riley Act as evidence of its unconstitutionality.
Seventeen California Senate members and fourteen State Assembly members wrote a letter to the nine California Republican Congressional Delegation members, urging them to ask the president to stop targeting taxpaying immigrants in the state.
The housing crisis is a growing problem in the US, with millions of middle-class people struggling to afford homes, and it is not just a free market issue, but a systemic one caused by decades of artificial scarcity and artificial barriers to home ownership.
The Sacramento Area Council of Governments has released a draft plan for the 2025 Blueprint, which aims to accommodate 580,000 new residents, 278,000 new homes, and 263,000 jobs by 2050, while promoting equity, transportation efficiency, and climate resilience, and is open for public comment until August 8.
A new report from the Gender Equity Policy Institute found that women, especially Black women, single mothers, senior women, and women living alone, are disproportionately affected by California’s housing affordability crisis, and recommends increasing state investment in affordable housing, streamlining the permitting process, preserving existing affordable units, and integrating gender equality perspectives into housing policy.
SB 61, authored by Sen. Dave Cortese, aims to ease financial strain on contractors by reducing the amount of money withheld from construction contractors and subcontractors on private projects from 10 percent to 5 percent, bringing private-sector rules in line with public works standards.
Protests erupted in Los Angeles and across the country as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids intensified in California, a self-declared sanctuary state, while the federal government’s authority over state and local criminal justice systems was questioned.
Governor Gavin Newsom responded to Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ claims of California’s governance problems by pointing out that the highest murder rates in the country are in red states, and that California’s homicide rate is lower than Arkansas’ and other red states.
The Trump administration is actively undermining the Emergency Housing Voucher program, which helps thousands of vulnerable Californians secure housing, in order to push them back onto the streets, and is also using bureaucratic means to punish organizations that serve marginalized communities.
California lawmakers are focusing on increasing housing supply, but neglecting the people suffering most from the housing crisis, and the powerful landlord lobby is preventing meaningful tenant protections.
California’s joint budget plan for fiscal year 2025–26 does not include funding for the state’s primary program to address homelessness, HHAP, and instead only includes $50 million for the Department of Housing and Community Development’s operations.
The House reconciliation bill claims to promote affordable housing but is actually a massive assault on social services, Medicaid, SNAP, and immigration protections, ultimately exacerbating California’s housing crisis and pushing more people into homelessness.
California Governor Gavin Newsom has issued a strong rebuke to President Trump’s unauthorized use of federal military power in Los Angeles, calling it authoritarianism and warning of the dangers of a country sliding into tyranny.
California’s housing crisis remains a major challenge, with cities struggling to meet production targets and state leaders failing to invest in solutions, despite promising local models and political will.
California is seeing a shift in the politics of housing, with new state legislation and a shift in the balance of power tilting towards reform, and while there are still challenges to overcome, the fight is no longer on the same old terrain.