California legislators propose bipartisan immigration principles amid federal tension
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PROBLEM SOLVERS CAUCUS
via Kate Wolffe
California Assemblymember Esmerelda Soria, D-Fresno, wore a black cross-body bag to the Problem Solvers Caucus news conference on Wednesday.
She keeps her passport there, she said, in case she needs to prove her citizenship.
“My own family members are scared,” she said. “Some are scared to go to the store, to the doctor, to simply live their lives.”
Soria is a member of the Problem Solvers Caucus, which includes 13 Democrats and 13 Republicans and meets bi-weekly to find common ground on contentious issues.
On Wednesday, the group announced they’d established a list of “immigration principles.” Almost all of the caucus members who spoke said the issue of immigration is personal to them, and many were disturbed by recent ICE raids throughout the state and country.
“This issue is too important for partisan games. The time for slogans is over,” said Assemblymember Jeff Gonzalez, R-Indio. “We owe it to our communities and to the next generation to come together and finally, get this right.”
The caucus’s proposed principles include calling for a path to legal status for undocumented workers as well as the preservation of due process and a secure border. The current path to legal status is very narrow, and mostly pertains to people with immediate family already in the United States, asylum-seekers and victims of crime.
The initiative is the latest effort by California lawmakers to move the needle on the federal policy of mass deportations. Last week, a coalition of Democrats asked legislative leadership to fast-track a series of protective bills, and a group of Republicans asked President Donald Trump to target violent criminals instead of immigrant workers.
Assemblymember Josh Hoover, R-Folsom, said he’s had conversations with his family members who have tried to come to California through legal means.
“The process is completely broken. It takes years and years and years to do that,” he said. “It’s absolutely not workable, and that is a large part of why we’re in the situation we’re in today.”
Hoover said they’d be delivering the five principles to the National Problem Solvers Caucus and to the California Congressional delegation.
Caucus Co-chair Assemblymember David Alvarez, D-San Diego, said the country needs to see the same leadership exemplified by former President Ronald Reagan, whose Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 opened a temporary path for many undocumented workers to get to lawful permanent residency.
According to the Library of Congress, an estimated 3 million individuals gained legal status through the action.
A recent UC Merced/Bay Area Economic Institute study found there are about 2.28 million undocumented immigrants in California.
Alvarez said the caucus is not currently advocating for pending state legislation. He said the federal administration has proven that it will take action regardless of the policies of the state.
“It all gets solved if we have legalization and immigration reform, because then you don’t have to worry about (ICE) going out into communities and picking people off the street or out of places of employment.”
NEWSOM FOLLOWS THROUGH ON TAX CREDITS
via Lia Russell
Making good on one of his biggest budget priorities, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law Wednesday a bill doubling the state film tax credit, which he said will shore up middle-class jobs and insulate the industry from economic turbulence caused by President Donald Trump’s tariffs and other economic policies.
Since October, Newsom has advocated for expanding the available amount of money from $330 million to $750 million as Hollywood has hemorrhaged jobs due to the pandemic, strikes by writers and actors, and sets being decamped to economically-friendlier states like Georgia.
He won support from entertainment industry and union leaders, and Los Angeles-area lawmakers like Mayor Karen Bass, Sen. Ben Allen, D-Los Angeles, and Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur, D-Hollywood, who joined him for the bill signing at the Warner Brothers Ranch in Burbank.
In his remarks, Newsom said the expanded tax credit could help generate funds to match the billions of dollars in revenue that California is said to have lost since Trump enacted a series of stop-and-start tariffs.
“People aren’t visiting the state like they were before. Why do I connect that dot? For obvious reasons,” he said. “You do any objective survey. The last one, we just did, four out of 10 people that visit the state of California said they visited because of the images that we produce, because of the icons that we promote, the sun-drenched Central Valley to the Golden Gate Bridge to the beautiful Hollywood sign. People want to touch that, want to connect with that. They want to be part of that.”
DOJ CRIME REPORTS SPARK RENEWED PROP 36 CRITICISM
via Rebecca-Ann Jattan
Criminal justice reform groups Californians for Safety and Justice and the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice are once again condemning Proposition 36 following the findings of a new Department of Justice report showing property crime and larceny rates decreased in 2024 compared to the year before.
Attorney General Rob Bonta and the DOJ released 2024 Criminal Justice Statistical Reports on Tuesday, which included the Crime in California report.
The report shows that property crime and larceny or theft rates decreased by 8.4% and 5.6%, respectively, in 2024 compared to 2023. According to an analysis of the DOJ’s data by CJCJ, property crime rates are at the lowest statewide levels since reporting began in 1985.
In a release, the CSJ said these findings “eviscerate the rationale for Prop 36,” a successful measure on the 2024 ballot that increased punishment for some theft and drug crimes, and created a jail-or-treatment ultimatum for certain drug offenders.
“Proposition 36 was a solution in search of a problem, and these numbers offer incontrovertible evidence of that,” Tinisch Hollins, executive director of Californians for Safety and Justice, said.
“A temporary spike in property crime during the pandemic was weaponized to push a carceral agenda.”
Hollins said Prop. 36 rolled back progress from Proposition 47, a 2014 measure that changed some theft and drug-possession offenses from felonies to misdemeanors and used the financial savings to fund programs proven to reduce crime.
“With crime already on the decline and reaching historic lows, Proposition 36 has done little more than throw courts into chaos, cost the state and counties millions, and undermine the effective crime prevention programs being funded through Proposition 47,” the CJCJ said in its report.
Groups like CSJ and CJCJ strongly opposed Proposition 36 and continue to criticize the lack of funding towards drug treatment services for repeat offenders, one component of the law. The budget deal signed Monday by Gov. Gavin Newsom would put roughly $50 million toward behavioral health grants, and $20 million toward county courts to deal with an increased workload.
“A temporary dip in reported thefts doesn’t change the fact that far too many theft crimes go unsolved and unpunished, which is precisely why voters demanded change through Proposition 36,” Greg Totten, chief executive officer of the California District Attorneys Association, said in an email.
He said the report confirms the viewpoint of Proposition 36 proponents, that “larceny arrest rates remain abysmally low” and that Proposition 47 led to repeated thefts, which caused retailers to reduce reporting to law enforcement. The new data from the DOJ shows arrest rates for property offenses decreased by 5.1% between 2023 and 2024.
Totten reaffirmed support for Proposition 36, as a tool for “rebuilding accountability and restoring the credibility of our laws.” He noted that, “unfortunately, the governor’s just-passed budget fails to provide the resources necessary to implement Proposition 36 effectively, undermining the very reforms Californians overwhelmingly supported.”
HARRIS AT THE TOP IN ANOTHER POLL
via Nicole Nixon
Kamala Harris still hasn’t decided whether she will run for governor next year, but another poll shows she would be a top contender if she jumps in.
While many voters are undecided, a UC Irvine poll found that given the choice between Harris and an unnamed Republican candidate, 41% of respondents said they would vote for the former vice president while 29% would pick the Republican. Another 16% said they don’t know who they would pick and 14% said they would not vote.
“The path to governor seems well-paved for Vice President Harris if she decides to run,” said Jon Gould, dean of the Irvine School of Social Ecology. “Although she lacks majority support at the moment, people know her better than the other candidates and generally view her favorably.”
In an open-ended question about the race, 40% said they were undecided and 24% said they would vote for Harris, who has said she’ll make her decision by the end of the summer. The next-closest choice with 9% was L.A. businessman Rick Caruso, who has also not declared in the race.
The poll tracks with other surveys that have shown Harris far outpacing other Democratic candidates who have declared in the open 2026 governor’s race.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“We want immigrants to come to this country, to work hard for the betterment of themselves and of this nation, but the current process for making that a reality is broken, and it is incumbent upon Congress to act to fix that broken system.”
- Assemblymember Josh Hoover, R-Folsom
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