Trump’s First 100 Days Have Shattered California’s Left-Wing Illusions
President Trump has pushed aside Governor Gavin Newsom and driven the nation’s most populous state toward something approaching sanity.
President Trump’s (second) first 100 days have generated some amount of horse excrement. It’s hard to see how it serves Trump’s interests to anger allies in advance of a trade war with China, to drive the economy into a possible recession, to glad-hand Russian strongman Putin while criticizing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and to resort to phony “national security” claims when there are perfectly legal deportation orders in place.
But those willing to dig will indeed find a pony: In California, President Trump has pushed aside Governor Gavin Newsom and has driven the nation’s most populous state toward something approaching sanity.
Earth, Wind, Fire, and Trump
Thirteen days before Trump’s inauguration, fires erupted in Pacific Palisades and the nearby cities of Altadena and Pasadena. State and local officials quickly blamed climate change and asked the federal government for nearly $40 billion in relief. It took Trump just four days after inauguration to visit the city. Greeting Newsom on the tarmac at LAX, the president motored to a fire station in the warlike burn zone for a kind of town hall with other state and local officials — but, significantly, not Newsom — and just one policy expert, Edward Ring (my colleague at California Policy Center).
Ring told the president that while wildfires are a routine feature of life in the West, the intensity and scale of more recent fires are clearly products of state policy failure and government incompetence. The president seemed to approve of that message. Within days, congressional Republicans hosted Ring (and two other California conservatives: gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton and Steven Greenhut, the dean of California columnists) in a House subcommittee to ask (rhetorically) why all Americans should continue to finance California’s disastrous climate policies.
Tying federal relief to policy change in California seems reasonable to anyone who has ever dealt with an addict appealing for pocket change from the open flap of his sidewalk tent: He’ll definitely use that money for a kale salad. But in California, the notion has triggered charges of extortion. Trump is unconcerned. He might say — reasonably — that he has all the cards.
He played one of those cards shortly after touching down at LAX. When he learned that fire hydrants in the Palisades ran dry in the first hours of the firefight — because, for environmental reasons, a key reservoir had been left empty for more than a year — Trump ordered the release of water from federal reservoirs in the Central Valley. Experts rightly noted that federal water would do nothing to make Los Angeles safer: The canals into which it was released lead directly into a dry lakebed a hundred miles north of Los Angeles. It evaporated there, more or less uselessly.
But Gavin Newsom grasped the meaning of the president’s political theater. He immediately called for water-storage practices recommended for years by the aforementioned Edward Ring. The Los Angeles Times’ headline tells the story of what happened next: “Newsom issues order to ‘maximize’ water capture during storms. Critics say it sounds just like Trump.”
Immigration
Among Trump’s greatest California achievements is this February 15 headline from the San Diego Union-Tribune: “San Diego migrant shelter hailed as national model will shut down, with 100-plus layoffs.” The reporter naturally sees this as a human catastrophe — a “national model” is gone. More than 100 people will lose their jobs.
But even a cursory read of the story reveals a very different reality. The Jewish Family Service of San Diego, which runs the shelter, “said in a statement that its transition shelter — which provided medical screenings, food, case management, legal support and travel coordination — has received no new migrants since Inauguration Day.”
No new migrants?! Since Inauguration Day?! Anybody with an ounce of common sense will know that illegal immigration produces a host of horrific outcomes that seem ripped from Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. Desperate migrants led by carteleros on a death march through Mexican and Southwestern deserts? Women and young people trafficked into the U.S.? The end of that suffering is cause for celebration.
And worry not about the Jewish Family Service of San Diego. Like every entrepreneurial nonprofit in California, the organization immediately announced its readiness to switch to another lucrative business channel: providing legal defense to undocumented immigrants.
There’s no news yet on whether that initiative will be funded by California taxpayers via Newsom’s $50 million “Trump-proofing” budget. Anticipating Trump’s November 5 win, Newsom began pushing his Trump-proof package in an October special session of the legislature. Republicans rebelled and capitol Dems — distracted by the search for their own political souls and the holidays — pushed the bill only listlessly.
When the New Year came, L.A.’s wildfires presented Newsom with a political opportunity worthy of Trump himself. Tying passage of his anti-Trump package to $2.5 billion in state wildfire relief, he forced Republicans into a very public dilemma: support spending millions to fund leftist nonprofits that will haunt California for decades or appear to coldheartedly oppose aid to fire victims. (Pause here to reflect on the irony of state Democrats tying wildfire relief to policy change, supra.)
Assemblyman Carl DeMaio (R., San Diego) proposed modest amendments: one to prohibit the use of funds for defending immigrants with criminal convictions, and another to prevent state funds from being used to defend state politicians who interfere with federal law enforcement. That delayed the final vote but not the certainty of its outcome. The bill passed without DeMaio’s amendments and with no Republican support.
High Speed Rail
Speaking from the Oval Office, the president said he would launch a federal investigation into Gavin Newsom’s high-speed rail, calling it “the worst managed project I think I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen some of the worst.” California Assemblyman Kevin Kiley (R., Rocklin) reached into his coat pocket to find — how’d that get there!? – a bill that would end federal funding for the project.
See You in (Federal) Court (Part One)
Last summer, Gavin Newsom sent a white puff of smoke through the chimney of the Governor’s Mansion indicating his approval of a teachers’ union–backed bill that requires teachers to lie to parents – but only on the matter of a schoolkid’s gender identity. If little Bobby wants to be called Susie, wants to use pronouns that don’t match his biology, and/or wants access to the girl’s locker room, Newsom’s acronymically clever Support Academic Futures and Educators for Today’s Youth (“SAFETY”) bars school employees from disclosing to parents their child’s on-campus behavior — the kid’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression — without the student’s consent. The state goes further, recommending that schools keep separate/secret files to document that kid’s preferences vis-à-vis sexual identity.
The bill’s backers claim the bill is necessary because some parents might go Itchy & Scratchy upon learning that their own children are (even fleetingly) gender dysphoric. The bill’s backers — including the majority of California news organizations — refer to the law’s critics as supporting “forced outing.”
Critics make three points. First, you can’t “out” a child to his or her own parents because those parents — not government officials or employees — have ultimate authority for rearing their children. Second, teachers are already mandated reporters under state law — if they think a child faces abuse at home for any reason, they’re required to report their suspicions to child protective services or police. Third, the so-called SAFETY Act violates the Federal Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), the 1972 law that establishes parents’ absolute right to access their children’s records.
On January 31, my colleague, the attorney Julie Hamill, filed a complaint with the federal Department of Education. She asked the department to consider whether Newsom’s SAFETY Act was, in fact, a violation of FERPA. This is clearly not Joe Biden’s Department of Education: On March 27, we learned with everybody else that, citing Hamill’s complaint, “The U.S. Department of Education’s Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO) launched an investigation into the California Department of Education (CDE) for alleged violations of the Family Educational Rights Privacy Act (FERPA).”
See You in (Federal) Court (Part Two)
I’ve written about another way in which Trump has nudged California toward sense and sensibility: his appointment of Bill Essayli to run the Central District of California. A former federal prosecutor and member of the State Assembly, Essayli has had a ringside seat for the madness of California. Writing in National Review, I noted that Trump’s announcement:
sent in-state reporters to area hospitals with a severe case of the fantods. “Trump picks lightning-rod California legislator to be US attorney in Los Angeles,” trumpeted Politico. In a follow-up, Politico upgraded the modifier to “bomb-hurling,” while the Sacramento Bee preferred to describe the 39-year-old former U.S. prosecutor as “outspoken.”
Among Essayli’s perceived threats to the republic, the Los Angeles Times noted that he has “criticized COVID-19 restrictions, critical race theory and California policies aimed at protecting LGBTQ+ students. He has pushed especially hard for ‘parental rights’ measures that would mandate parents be informed whenever a child identifies as transgender or asks to change their name or pronouns at school.”
“Essayli has been a strong supporter of Trump over the years,” the Times further noted. Following Trump’s conviction on charges “tied to a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election, Essayli posted on Facebook that he looked forward to electing Trump as president ‘to restore the rule of law and our constitutional principles.’”
Imagine what a guy like that might do to rein in the madness of California electeds, prosecuting political corruption and enforcing presidential orders.
We don’t have to imagine. Appointed by Trump, Essayli unsurprisingly said that he’d look immediately into state and local sanctuary programs that violate federal law. But he has also offered a real nonpartisan crowd pleaser. He says he’ll hunt for the unaccounted billions of dollars that have disappeared into homelessness programs that run flush with cash but produce no discernible wins. He says he has established a task force that includes “FBI, IRS, OIG [federal Office of Inspector General] for housing and urban development and it’s going to have prosecutors from my public corruption and major fraud section.”
With Essayli ensconced at the Central District, attorney Hamill says, “The hammer of justice is finally falling on California. Girls, women, and all sane Californians: Rejoice!”
Speaking of Women and Girls . . .
Whilst talking with activist Charlie Kirk for his own This Is Gavin Newsom podcast, Newsom said he agreed that men should not compete in women’s sports.
“Well, I think it’s an issue of fairness,” Newsom said during the March podcast. “I completely agree with you on that. . . . It’s easy to call out the unfairness of that. It’s deeply unfair.”
The comment made international news — just as Newsom intended. His ambition to run for the White House in 2028 requires this sort of genuflection to the super-majority of American voters who, if they know anything, know basic biology. Yes, his allies expressed shock: “The path to 2028 isn’t paved with the betrayal of vulnerable communities,” the Human Rights Coalition declared. “It’s built on the courage to stand up for what’s right and do the hard work to actually help the American people.” But in the weeks since that early March eruption of truth, Newsom has done precisely nothing to change the state policies that permit male athletes to compete against women.
Fortunately, Trump’s acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor eliminated Biden administration rules that extended Title IX protections to students on the basis of gender (rather than actual biological) identity. That’s a direct shot at California laws that order schools to hide student files from their own parents, allow men to compete in women’s sports, and allow adult men who identify as women to accompany girls on overnight field trips. Trainor’s decision opened the door for a March 3 federal complaint to end such practices.
We could go on like this. Trump unleashes Elon Musk’s DOGE to tear through bureaucracies, and Newsom announces his own anemic version. Trump orders federal workers to return to their offices, and Newsom echoes that with his own order. On April 8, Trump declares war on California’s war on oil, and two weeks later Newsom (who has targeted oil producers with lawsuits, unsupportable regulation, and comms campaigns alleging they’re responsible for “price gouging” and climate change) reverses course and asks his top oil regulator to send those same very same “predatory” oil companies the equivalent of a muffin basket — a plea to continue producing gasoline for Californians.
But in at least one respect, it’s Trump who’s following Newsom. What are tariffs, after all, but centralized planning of the sort that California’s political leaders indulge in daily? Similarly, Trump’s affection for unions would fit comfortably in the political monoculture of Sacramento.
Those tariffs, however, are already creating big fractures in organized labor. While UAW President Shawn Fain and Teamsters President Sean O’Brien may love the idea of Fortress America, there’s panic among California’s powerful port workers.
“The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) unequivocally condemns the recent tariffs that the Trump administration has imposed,” the union said in a statement last Monday. “Tariffs are taxes. These and other reckless, shortsighted policies have begun to devastate American workers, harm critical sectors of the economy, and line the pockets of the ultra-wealthy at the expense of hardworking families. The tariffs have also sown distrust among our allies and inflamed geopolitical tensions. These tariffs are nothing more than a direct attack on the working class and should be opposed outright.”
Except for the clumsy attempt to frame the tariffs as evidence of class conflict, even this might be considered a Trump victory. The president’s tariffs have revealed that at least some California Democrats are beginning to understand the limits of government planning and the virtues of classical liberalism. So maybe that’s a pony.
Will Swaim is president of the California Policy Center and co-host with David Bahnsen of National Review’s “Radio Free California” podcast.
This article originally appeared in NRO.