California delegates (mostly) back Biden + CPUC boss dodges firing + Consumer Watchdog writes Newsom
Good morning and happy Tuesday! It’s a busy week, let’s get right to the news!
CA DELEGATES MOSTLY BACK BIDEN
Via Kate Irby...
Bernie Sanders’ California delegates to the Democratic National Convention say they’re disappointed he won’t be the candidate accepting the party’s presidential nomination this week, but they’re mostly ready to back Joe Biden this fall.
Several Sanders’ California delegates said there’s too much at stake for them to sit out the November election after Sanders’ loss.
“Is it just about getting (President Donald) Trump out of office? Yes, it kind of is,” said Jewel Hurtado, a Sanders delegate who is a 21-year-old City Council member in Kingsburg. “It’s been a hard time over the past four years. Especially as a person of color, a member of the LGBTQ community and a woman.”
The Vermont senator scored a big win in California’s March 3 primary, receiving 36% of the vote to Biden’s 27.9%. That victory netted Sanders a majority of California’s 415 Democratic delegates.
Sanders won the majority of California delegates back in the March primary, receiving 36% of the vote to Biden’s 27.9%.
Delegates, unless released by their candidate, are expected to vote for their candidate, regardless of whether that candidate has suspended their campaign.
California Sanders delegates contacted by McClatchy all said they would still vote for the self-described democratic socialist at the convention, even if Sanders releases them from their obligation.
In conversations with several Sanders delegates only one, who asked not to be named, said he would not be voting for Biden in November. That one said he might reconsider if he believes Trump has a chance of winning California, but since that’s incredibly unlikely he feels it is appropriate to protest Biden by not voting for him.
The others are largely ready to vote for Biden in the fall.
“I can confidently and wholeheartedly say I will vote for Biden in November as I fully understand the dangers and troubles of having Trump and (Vice President Mike) Pence for four more years,” said Isaac Gudino, a 20-year-old Sanders delegate who is studying music education at Fresno City College.
PUC BOSS LIVES TO FIGHT ANOTHER DAY
The embattled executive director of the California Public Utilities Commission remains on the job, after the commission pulled an item regarding her termination from the agenda during Monday’s scheduled meeting.
Alice Stebbins argues that she is being pushed out because she has blown the whistle in an effort “to clean up a broken CPUC.”
She alleges that the commission has forced her to make unlawful hires and that they have held illegal closed meetings.
Meanwhile, Stebbins herself stands accused of making several “highly questionable” hires, according to a report from the State Personnel Board.
Stebbins is on administrative leave.
It’s unclear why the question Stebbins’ employment was pulled from Monday’s agenda. However, several people, including a number of disability advocates, spoke on Stebbins behalf during the public comment portion of the meeting.
CONSUMER WATCHDOG PENS LETTER TO NEWSOM
California Gov. Gavin Newsom should not give retailers any further exemptions from their duty to refund bottle and can deposits, argues the nonprofit group Consumer Watchdog.
The group penned a letter to the governor warning that the state’s bottle deposit system “is on the edge of collapse.”
“It is up to you to preserve and strengthen the bottle deposit system, not allow it to be degraded further by again exempting retail stores from taking back empties in store and refunding deposits as the law requires. By extending the retailer exemption you risk irreparable damage to the bottle deposit system,” the letter reads in part.
The group said that Newsom’s exemptions “are a disaster that unnecessarily and severely restrict access to refunds of consumer bottle deposits totaling hundreds of millions of dollars annually.”
You can read the full letter here.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“The @AOC wing of the Democratic Party is far more of the future than the ‘John Kasich’ wing and far more aligned with where Democrats are and should be and I think it would be wise of the @DNC to not forget that, especially in this must win election to take back the White House.”
- Assemblyman Ash Kalra, D-San Jose, via Twitter.
Best of the Bee:
In response to a weekend of power outages caused by a heat wave of triple-digit temperatures, and ahead of anticipated blackouts through Wednesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a stark statement during a Monday press conference in response to the crisis: this can’t happen again, via Hannah Wiley and Dale Kasler.
Inconsistent procedures and faulty equipment marred the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation efforts to screen for COVID-19 in the early weeks of the outbreak, according to a report released Monday by the prison system’s Office of the Inspector General, via Andrew Sheeler.
Facing its biggest crisis in two decades, the manager of California’s electricity grid is suspending a form of power trading that it says has made the grid more volatile and contributed to two nights of rolling blackouts, via Dale Kasler.