Buffy Wicks

California legislators quietly inserted $1.3 billion in earmarks into this year's state budget, funding projects from a Santa Barbara college gym renovation to a Marin County farmers market and a minor league baseball stadium in San Jose. The money, allocated through Assembly Bill 113, was added just days before the legislative session ended, with lawmakers keeping their individual requests confidential until after passage.

An analysis found more than 40% of the funds went to nonprofits, with Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties—home to top Democratic leaders—receiving outsized shares, while many Republican-represented rural counties got little or nothing. Beneficiaries ranged from arts groups and museums to a mixed martial arts fighters' retirement fund and nonprofits with ties to Governor Gavin Newsom. Critics, including nonprofit advocates and taxpayer groups, say the closed-door process rewards political relationships over need, especially as the state confronts federal healthcare funding cuts. Legislative leaders defend the practice as a way to address urgent local needs efficiently, though even some lawmakers acknowledge the lack of transparency is problematic.

California's Democratic-led Legislature approved a package of bills aimed at limiting federal immigration enforcement tactics in the state. One measure, authored by Assembly member Mark Gonzalez and dubbed the "Get the Feds Out" Act, would bar agents and contractors involved in immigration enforcement from future employment with state and local government agencies, including police departments, with limited exceptions. A related bill from Assemblymember Isaac Bryan would prohibit law enforcement officers from moonlighting as federal immigration contractors. Lawmakers also passed AB 2760, the nation's first law banning law enforcement from using electric-shock gloves, a response to a Trump administration plan to buy the devices for ICE agents; the Department of Homeland Security has said it won't comply, calling the measure unconstitutional.

Additional bills would bar arrests near courthouses, impose a 25% tax on private immigration detention operators' income to fund immigration services, and let individuals sue federal agents over alleged civil rights violations. Republicans and immigration-restriction groups criticized the measures as legally vulnerable and politically motivated. Gov. Gavin Newsom has until Sept. 30 to sign or veto the bills.