Who will be AG? + Newsom recall signatures turned in + UC health bill clears committee
Do you have a bet on who Gov. Newsom will name as attorney general? We could find out today.
A NEW AG IS ON THE HORIZON
Via Lara Korte...
California’s Xavier Becerra is on track to receive his final confirmation as Health and Human Services secretary today. With that U.S. Senate approval, Newsom will have another high-ranking job to fill.
The governor has previously said that he would wait for Becerra to be confirmed before announcing a pick, but has otherwise been tight-lipped about the decision.
Support has accumulated behind various candidates, including Assemblyman Rob Bonta, Rep. Adam Schiff, Equality California President Rick Chavez Zbur, Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg, State Supreme Court Justice Goodwin Liu, Sen. Anna Caballero, Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, Assemblywoman Eloise Gómez Reyes and former Sen. Martha Escutia.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is reported to be backing Schiff for the job, but expect such an appointment to raise the ire of Republicans, who aren’t thrilled about Schiff’s role in impeaching Donald Trump.
Bonta, on the other hand, has raised a good deal of support from the Asian American community. API leaders on Wednesday reiterated their support for an Asian American to fill the AG role, especially in the wake of rising hate crimes against the community.
“Our API community needs an attorney general who’s going to be ready on day one,” Assemblyman David Chiu said in a press conference with other leaders Wednesday.
Newsom could also pick Steinberg for the job. The two have a history working on homelessness issues together, and the now-Sacramento mayor was a longtime state legislator, having served in both chambers.
In case you missed it yesterday, read The Bee’s breakdown of what would happen in the event of Steinberg being appointed AG.
RECALL WATCH
Programming note: Capitol Alert is launching a way to get recall news via text. You’ll get daily updates and breaking news about the effort to replace Gov. Gavin Newsom from political reporter Lara Korte. Exclusively for our newsletter subscribers, we’re offering one month of text updates free. Click here to sign up for your free month.
Via Lara Korte...
St. Patrick’s Day was the deadline for recall petitioners to turn in signatures. Organizers said they had well over 2 million, but it’ll be several weeks before county elections officials give us the final count. Officials have until April 29 to validate signatures to the state, after which there’s several more steps officials have to follow until an election would take place.
Former GOP Congressman Doug Ose late Tuesday that he would run for governor if the recall does qualify. He told The Bee that California is a “state of disarray.”
“I think we need to figure out a way where we bring clarity to people’s lives rather than make it more confusing as governor Newsom has done for the past two years,” Ose said.
In the meantime, support for Gov. Gavin Newsom is continuing to flow in. On Wednesday morning, labor icon Dolores Huerta, who co-founded United Farm Workers with Cesar Chavez nearly 60 years ago, said she was teaming up with the National Union of Healthcare Workers to fight the recall.
“We can’t forget how the last recall brought us a governor who used ballot measures to attack the rights of workers and vetoed efforts to establish universal health care for all Californians,” Huerta said in a statement.
As the recall campaign ramps up, you can expect both sides to leverage accusations against the other. The Bee’s Sophia Bollag recently followed up on a claim Newsom was touting in national interviews: that the leader of the recall was in favor of microchipping immigrants.
Read the results of Sophia’s fact check here.
NARAL TOUTS UC HEALTH BILL’S COMMITTEE PASSAGE
On Wednesday, the Senate Committee on Education voted to advance SB 379, a bill authored by Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, which would require that University of California Health System medical providers and trainees be allowed to perform a full-range of health care services, including reproductive and LGBTQ-related care.
The bill passed on a party line vote, 5-2.
The bill is co-sponsored by NARAL Pro-Choice California, Equality California and the ACLU of California.
The three groups released a joint statement upon the bill’s passage out of committee:
“Equitable access to comprehensive and inclusive healthcare is a fundamental Californian value. Students, patients, and healthcare providers depend on the UC, a public institution, to embody those same values,” they wrote.
Wiener previously told the Bee that UC Health contracts with medical facilities that prohibit abortion and gender-affirming medical care, such as Catholic-affiliated Dignity Health, leave too many people exposed to “non-science based restrictions.”
“The fact that a UC medical professional would not be able to provide that care I think, honestly, is completely outrageous,” Wiener said at the time.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“Californians deserve to have a top cop who understands our community, diversity and has experience in building community-based solutions that target hate. Our API community needs an attorney general who’s going to be ready on day one.”
-Assemblyman David Chiu in a press conference Wednesday.
Best of the Bee:
Two police officers in the Northern California town of Eureka have been placed on paid administrative leave while a third-party investigator conducts its review of demeaning and violent messages sent in a private texting group, via Jason Pohl.
California’s Board of Education is expected Thursday to pass the Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum for high schools, after nearly four years of heated debate, division and rewrites, via Michael McGough.
Fact check: Is San Francisco spending government money to give alcohol and weed to the homeless? Via Kate Irby.