When wildfires meet a spending freeze

Jan 28, 2025

Rob Bonta speaks behind a microphone.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta discusses the California Department of Justice's efforts to protect rights of the state's immigrant communities at a news conference at the San Francisco Public Library's Bernal Heights branch in San Francisco, Wednesday, Dec. 4, 2024. | Jeff Chiu/AP

A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE: California Attorney General Rob Bonta assailed the Trump administration’s edict to halt federal funding today as imprecise, ambiguous and frustratingly vague. But among the dozens of programs that could be cut, the state’s top law enforcement official pointed to one with certainty: money to help fire-scorched Los Angeles rebuild.

“We need it now. We needed it yesterday and without conditions,” Bonta said at a virtual news conference today with five other Democratic attorneys general, where they announced their legal challenge to Trump’s sweeping order. “And it's unfortunate that it's being put at risk, not just from potential conditions being imposed by the president, but also by this memo.”

The order was temporarily halted by a federal judge just minutes before it was supposed to take effect, handing a win to nonprofit and public health groups who said even a brief implementation of Trump’s freeze could cause devastating outcomes for people who rely on federal funds for services, as well as the workers who provide them.

Trump’s freeze, which Democrats estimate puts billions of dollars to the state — and up to $3 trillion nationwide — in jeopardy, comes as the president and congressional Republicans voice support for attaching strings to disaster assistance. Aid to the state has been a top priority for California’s leaders in the wake of the calamitous fires that tore through Los Angeles this month.

“Donald Trump is illegally blocking hundreds of billions of dollars for essential federal programs to support families recovering after catastrophic fires,” Sen. Alex Padilla of California said in a statement, which called for the Senate to withhold confirmation of Russell Vought, Trump’s pick to run the Office of Management and Budget, until the memo is rescinded.

That memo, issued by OMB last night, calls for a temporary spending freeze on all federal programs “including, but not limited to, financial assistance for foreign aid, nongovernmental organizations, DEI, woke gender ideology, and the green new deal.”

Though White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt contended that the order doesn’t apply to individuals who get money from programs like Social Security or SNAP, Bonta and other blue state AGs said they aren’t buying it. The lawsuit they previewed seeks to stop the memo from taking effect. And while Leavitt insisted the memo was perfectly clear, she couldn’t say how long the freeze would last or exactly which programs would be spared.

The confusion, Bonta said, is the point.

“They could have written a more specific memo, that was tight and specific about what was included and what was not,” Bonta told Playbook. “It is vague and unclear and they use a bunch of buzzwords.”

Minutes before the freeze was supposed to take effect, California officials were still scrambling to unpack which programs might be affected. The state was set to receive around $168 billion in federal grants and other funding this fiscal year — including $108 billion that runs through the Department of Health Care Services to support Medi-Cal and other programs, according to state Assembly budget adviser Jason Sisney.

California also gets $7.9 billion for public schools, $7.4 billion for higher education and $6.8 billion for transportation, according to a report the California Budget and Policy Center issued after the November election.

Leavitt was pressed on specific cuts in her debut White House press briefing and dismissed reports of widespread confusion over the scope and impact of the order.

“There’s only uncertainty in this room amongst the media, there’s no uncertainty in this building,” said Leavitt, just ahead of Bonta’s briefing with the other AGs. “The president signed an executive order directing OMB to do just this.”

— with help from Blake Jones and Kyle Cheney

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WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

NOT SWEATING: Gov. Gavin Newsom told reporters the federal funding freeze was “unsurprising” and “consistent with Project 2025.” But he harkened back to the Covid era when asked how the freeze would play into Los Angeles’ recovery, saying he had “all the confidence in the world” in Trump.

“To the extent situationally there are some issues today, to me all those issues get worked out and we’ll work through them as it relates to our recovery, and I’m firmly focused on building that partnership and strengthening our collaborative spirit,” Newsom told reporters at a press conference.

The comment reflected an apparent thaw in Newsom and Trump’s relationship since the two met in Los Angeles last week, when Trump visited to survey damage from the fires. The governor also said he has been in contact with the White House and will continue to follow up with it on the issue of federal aid.

ON THE BEATS

ROBOT FIXERS: Assemblymember Cecilia Aguiar-Curry introduced a bill last night that seeks to drive down consumer costs by outlawing companies from using controversial “price-fixing” algorithms powered by artificial intelligence.

Such algorithms, best known for being used by landlords to set rent prices by factoring in other monthly leases near their properties, have been criticized by local officials in California and federal prosecutors as legally dubious information-sharing schemes. San Francisco became the first U.S. city to ban the practice last summer.

Aguiar-Curry’s bill would impose a similar rule at the state level and broaden its scope to ban companies in any industry from using pricing algorithms that rely on nonpublic data from their competitors.

“AI is becoming an important part of our daily lives, but it can’t come at the expense of people’s ability to afford to live their lives,” Aguiar-Curry said in a statement to Playbook.

But don’t expect her bill to sail through the Legislature: A similar measure introduced last year in the Senate died before receiving a floor vote.

"There's no evidence that a law like this is needed to go after bad actors who collude to raise prices,” said Adam Kovacevich, founder of liberal pro-tech group Chamber of Progress, which opposed last year’s bill.

DOGE DELUGE: The Department of Government Efficiency paid California’s water-delivery infrastructure a visit on Monday following Trump’s withering criticism of the system, reports our Debra Kahn. DOGE officials visited the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s water pumps in Northern California and said they’d worked with the agency to increase water deliveries south, as Trump has been pushing California to do.

“Congratulations to the Administration and DOI’s Bureau of Reclamation for more than doubling the Federally pumped water flowing toward Southern California in < 72 hours,” the agency posted on X on Tuesday morning. Was an honor for the DOGE team to work with you. Great job!”

The pumps, which move water south from California’s wetter northern region, are federally owned and operated. California officials said late Monday that they had been down for maintenance. They also said Trump did not send the military into the state to “turn on the water,” as Trump claimed in a social media post.

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What We're Reading

— Assemblymember Carl DeMaio is making enemies as he tries to reform his own party, which never accepted him in the first place. Be sure to read down for the “Mean Girls” reference. (CalMatters)

— As California’s congressional influence declines, Democrats are struggling to work across the aisle and get things done. (Los Angeles Times)

— Bonta accepted more than $16,000 in campaign donations from The Bicycle Casino, a business under investigation by a division of his office. (San Francisco Chronicle)

AROUND THE STATE

— Trump’s immigration agenda poses a potentially devastating threat to the heart of California’s wine industry as immigrants make up 73% of the agriculture industry in Napa Valley. (San Francisco Chronicle)

— El Cajon residents are protesting a resolution that would make clear the city’s intention to comply with the federal government. (San Diego Union-Tribune)

— OC Sheriff Don Barnes says his department will continue to focus on state and local laws, leaving immigration enforcement up to the feds. (Orange County Register)

— compiled by Nicole Norman

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