john chiang

There were no air kisses this time around, as Anthony Scaramucci made his weekend television debut as White House communications director.

I’m Christina Bellantoni. Welcome to the Monday edition of Essential Politics.

The newly appointed, politically inexperienced Scaramucci — known as “The Mooch” at the White House — was slick, polished and addressed his boss directly during a round of Sunday show appearances.

But he was put to the test right away, given President Trump had raised the specter of presidential pardons Saturday. Declaring his “complete power” to grant them in a string of angry tweets that reflect his growing concern about the widening criminal investigation into potential collusion with Russia, Trump also said it’s too soon to consider pardons.

Can he even legally do so? Legal opinions are mixed.

In a statement Monday, senior White House adviser Jared Kushner denied that Trump’s campaign colluded with Russia. “I did not collude, nor know of anyone else in the campaign who colluded, with any foreign government,” Kushner said in the statement.

THE NEW FACE OF THE WHITE HOUSE

Meet Scaramucci, a Long Island native, outer-borough New Yorker without government experience who has ascended through the business world — and television media — to leap directly into the Trump administration.

In introducing himself to the nation, Scaramucci promised to above all else be loyal to the president, to aggressively try to stop leaks to the press and to help Americans understand just how awesome his boss is — no matter what he’s said previously.

Will he take that message to the state that Trump lost by millions of votes? We may soon find out. The new communications director is scheduled to appear in Southern California this weekend at the third annual Politicon in Pasadena.

And as Sean Spicer heads for the exit, we relive his greatest hits (and misses).

Get the latest about what’s happening in the nation’s capital on Essential Washington.

ABOUT CALIFORNIA’S CLIMATE DEAL

State lawmakers just voted to extend California’s cap-and-trade program, a key tool for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But how does the program work? And how would it be changed by new legislation? Chris Megerian and Joe Fox go through all the details here.

Patrick McGreevy also takes a look at the fire prevention fee levied on nearly 800,000 rural California properties that was so reviled by Republican lawmakers, landowners and taxpayer groups that they tried a referendum, a lawsuit and five pieces of legislation to repeal it during the last six years. A measure to suspend and eventually repeal the fee was finally approved by the Legislature — after Democrats offered it as a bargaining chip to entice Republicans to help pass cap-and-trade.

REPUBLICAN DRAMA UNFOLDS IN SACRAMENTO

The bipartisan vote was noticed from coast to coast. But for some Republicans it left a feeling of betrayal, despite longtime GOP leaders saying that Ronald Reagan would have been proud of the deal.

Assembly GOP leader Chad Mayes was challenged for joining Gov. Jerry Brown and Democrats on the cap-and-trade vote. Mayes seemed to maneuver through the tough position with enough support to continue leading, but got the bad news that one of his lieutenants was resigning in protest.

He defended himself and the other Republicans who voted for cap-and-trade in a Wall Street Journal piece last week.

COGDILL PASSES AWAY

Eight years ago, another Republican defied his party to work with Democrats (and then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger) on a major issue facing California’s government.

Dave Cogdill, whose bipartisan vote cost him his leadership seat, died of pancreatic cancer. He was 66.

Sacramento bureau chief John Myers details Cogdill’s role in the 2009 budget crisis, and how his legacy was honored.

A LITTLE BREAK

Legislative recess began with little fanfare after a busy start to the week with the cap-and-trade vote. Lawmakers will return to Sacramento Aug. 21.

We’ll be covering the continued fallout on this issue, along with Brown’s signing of the measure into law. Follow along with us on our Essential Politics news feed.

THAT WAS QUICK

Republican David Hadley abandoned his bid for governor two weeks after launching his campaign. Seema Mehta reports the former state lawmaker concluded that he could not win.

WHAT’S DELAINE EASTIN THINKING?

Eastin knows she’s up against some pretty major Democratic heavyweights in the 2018 governor’s race, but insists she’s not intimated. The former state schools chief jumped into the race last fall because, she says, the Democrats ruling over Sacramento weren’t doing enough for public school kids.

Eastin, who hasn’t held public office for almost 15 years, sat down with Phil Willon in a Sacramento coffee shop recently to talk about her odds in the race, her politics and her frustrations with the state’s leadership.

WORKING TOGETHER

Celebrating rare cooperation between California and the Trump administration, Brown and federal officials on Friday marked the start of a more than $1.3-billion project to convert the Caltrain service between San Jose and San Francisco from diesel to electric trains.

The Brown administration, which has disagreed with Trump over issues ranging from climate change to immigration, joined congressional Democrats in aggressively lobbying the White House and U.S. Department of Transportation for federal funding of the project when it appeared to be in jeopardy.

PARTY CHAIR ERIC BAUMAN SURVIVES CHALLENGE

A California Democratic Party commission on Saturday upheld the election of Eric Bauman as party chair and rejected allegations by his rival that the vote may have been tainted by ballot stuffing and other wrongdoing. Still, don’t expect Democratic activist Kimberly Ellis, who lost by just 57 votes and challenged Bauman’s election, to go away quietly, Willon reports.

Ellis already has indicated that she may take her case to the courts, saying the party panel that reviewed the election results was biased in favor of Bauman. The compliance review commission met all day on Saturday to examine 355 ballots deemed questionable out of the nearly 3,000 cast by party delegates. In the end, 47 ballots were ruled invalid. And that was not enough to change the outcome.

TO WIN THE HOUSE, DEMOCRATS MUST TOPPLE CALIFORNIA REPUBLICANS. HERE’S HOW THE MONEY RACE LOOKS TODAY

The 13 races identified by the Los Angeles Times as potentially competitive in 2018 have more than 60 candidates combined, with more people showing interest daily.

Sarah Wire and Christine Mai-Duc dug through their campaign finance reports to get a sense of the state of the race. California’s congressional races are pivotal to Democratic efforts to flip the House. Republicans have a 24-seat advantage in Congress, and Democrats’ path to a majority likely includes at least a few of the 14 California districts currently held by the GOP.

Mike Levin, taking on Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), has the biggest war chest so far of any California challenger.

Bryan Caforio, who’s looking for a rematch against Rep. Steve Knight of Palmdale, raised nearly as much money as the incumbent in the latest quarter, but despite lackluster fundraising Knight still has a cash advantage with $403,301 in the bank as of June 30.

Two other developments about the battle for House control:

A former Obama White House advisor joins a growing list of Democratic challengers to Rep. Mimi Walters of Irvine. Brian Forde, who previously served as a senior advisor on technology to President Obama, jumped into the race for the 45th Congressional District last week.

Plenty of Democrats have lined up to run against Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa), but he’s just drawn his first Republican challenger of 2018. Stelian Onufrei, a Romanian immigrant who owns a construction company, says he’s running against Rohrabacher, whom he calls a “political lightning rod.”

POLITICAL ROAD MAP: THE QUIET PART OF THE CAP-AND-TRADE DEAL

There’s one part of last week’s cap-and-trade deal that won’t play out politically until next year. And as John Myers pointed out in his Sunday column, it’s a ballot measure that Republicans hope will force lawmakers into an uncomfortable position in a few years: signing off on how climate change cash is spent, which includes Brown’s controversial high-speed rail project.

TODAY’S ESSENTIALS

— This week’s California Politics Podcast focuses entirely on the big cap-and-trade deal, and its political implications for Republicans and Democrats.

— Backers of an effort to remove state Sen. Josh Newman (D-Fullerton) from office through a recall election have gone to court to block a change to the rules pushed through the Legislature by Democrats.

— Brown signed a bill exempting Marin County from the state’s affordable housing laws.

— California’s real estate agents have written a proposed 2018 ballot initiative that could lower the property taxes of millions of homeowners who sell their current house and buy a new one.

— Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra is keeping the pressure on Trump on the DACA program for children brought to the United States illegally.

— Rep. Ed Royce stopped Rohrabacher from going to Russia last spring, a senior GOP aide said. The news came on the heels of reports that Rohrabacher was encouraged by the Russian government to hold hearings on sanctions.

— John Chiang used superhero destruction to talk up infrastructure needs at Comic-Con in San Diego.

— Two California House members were sued for displaying rainbow flags outside their Capitol offices.

— Sen. Kamala Harris wants to study whether cash bail is the right way to decide if someone stays in jail pretrial.

— With Nevada suffering a shortage of legalized marijuana, California’s state pot czar said efforts are being made in her state to make sure sufficient licenses go to farmers, testers and distributors to supply retailers. Providing temporary, four-month licenses to support some businesses including growers is planned “so we don’t have a break in the supply chain,” said Lori Ajax.

— Senate Republicans aren’t even sure what they’ll be voting on when the repeal-only healthcare bill comes to the floor this week.

— The Southern California factory that makes most of Trump’s “Make America Great Again” hats — the one we stepped inside almost two years ago — was in the spotlight again during “Made in America” week. Facing questions about the continued manufacture of Trump-branded goods outside the U.S., the president’s campaign sent out a press release touting that all merchandise sold by the campaign is “made right here in America,” including the hats, which are made in the Cali-Fame factory in Carson.

— The Trump presidency is hurting his Los Angeles-area golf course.

LOGISTICS

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After Gavin Newsom was elected lieutenant governor, he repeatedly made clear his frustration with the job and its lack of responsibilities. The official portfolio for the office is thin, including sitting on boards that oversee the state’s higher education system and public lands, leading an economic council and serving as acting governor when California’s chief executive is out of state or otherwise unavailable.

Newsom, now the front-runner in the governor’s race, missed scores of meetings held by the University of California Board of Regents, the California State University Board of Trustees and the California State Lands Commission, according to a Times review of attendance records.

He attended 54% of UC Regents meeting days, 34% for Cal State and 57% for state lands, according to a Times review of attendance records between 2011 and 2018. The Times included in the tally days when Newsom was present for only part of the day, and excluded days when Newsom had no committee meetings or other official business to attend.

Membership of the three panels is the most prominent duty of a lieutenant governor, a post considered to be largely ceremonial.

“There’s no denying that the official responsibilities of the lieutenant governor are more modest than some other constitutional offices — the English call it an ‘heir and a spare,’” said former California Gov. Gray Davis, who was lieutenant governor before being elected to lead the state. “But 43 states have a lieutenant governor whose primary function is to step in if something happens to the governor.”

Newsom’s opponents have criticized him for failing to fully participate in the three panels, which set policy on tuition, athletics programs and expansion for much of the state’s higher-education system, and manage issues including oil drilling and access to some of California’s publicly owned lands.

“Californians are working harder than ever before just to stay in the middle class. It appears Gavin Newsom is hardly working — or at least not working for the people who pay his salary,” said Luis Vizcaino, a spokesman for former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

Newsom defended his record, saying it paralleled that of other elected officials on the panels.

“I’ve tried not to be the quote-unquote politician on the board. I tried to avoid being the guy who shows up just to give the press release. I tried to be constructive and I tried to be engaged,” he said in an interview. “Every tough vote, we were there — the ones that matter, the close votes.”

Observers of the UC and Cal State panels agreed that the elected officials on the boards had spottier attendance than appointees. The State Lands Commission comprises three members, so when one is absent, he or she typically sends an alternate to voice concerns and vote on the member’s behalf. Attendance on the panels has previously been raised as a campaign issue — Republican Dan Lungren poked Davis about his absences during a 1998 gubernatorial debate.

Newsom’s Democratic rivals in the race — state Treasurer John Chiang, former state schools chief Delaine Eastin and Villaraigosa — held various roles on the same three boards during prior terms in elected office. Chiang served on the State Lands Commission when he was controller, and Villaraigosa and Eastin sat on the UC and Cal State boards while serving as Assembly speaker and state superintendent of public instruction, respectively.

They also failed to attend many meetings.

Chiang attended 46% of Lands Commission meeting days between 2007 and 2014 when he was state controller. Villaraigosa and Eastin each attended less than 10% of the Cal State meetings during their time on that board. Though they both routinely skipped UC meetings, the full picture of their attendance is unclear due to a lack of available records documenting their time on the boards in the 1990s.

But their jobs at the time were more demanding than the role of lieutenant governor. The speaker must be in Sacramento during the legislative session, and the state schools chief oversees curriculum, testing and finances for the 6.3 million students in the state’s schools. As controller, Chiang was California’s chief bookkeeper, administering the state’s payroll and serving on more than 70 boards and commissions.

Newsom’s responsibilities as lieutenant governor are much more limited in scope, a point he has frequently drawn attention to.

Before he ran for lieutenant governor in 2010, he derided the role as having “no real authority and no real portfolio.”

After he was elected, he drafted legislation to put the office of lieutenant governor on the gubernatorial ticket — similar to how a president and vice president are elected together — but couldn’t find a legislator to carry the bill. If elected governor, Newsom said he hopes to revisit the proposal.

Two years into the job, during a break in filming his Current TV show, Newsom was asked by friend and hotelier Chip Conley how frequently he went to Sacramento.

“Like one day a week, tops,” Newsom said. “There’s no reason.… It’s just so dull.”

A few months later, as a Times reporter trailed Newsom in the Capitol, he stopped when a woman asked him to pose for a picture with her son. The boy asked him what a lieutenant governor does.

“I ask myself that every day,” Newsom replied.

He has repeatedly joked about the post over the years, including in an interview with The Times during his 2014 reelection campaign when he paraphrased a line from then-Secretary of State John F. Kerry, himself a former lieutenant governor: “Wake up every morning, pick up the paper, read the obituaries, and if the governor’s name doesn’t appear in there, go back to sleep.”

Garry South, a former advisor to Newsom who is not publicly backing a candidate in the governor’s race, recalled urging him to knock it off.

“I did convey to him on a couple of occasions … that I didn’t think it was a good idea to tell voters they had elected you to a worthless position,” South said. “To his credit, I think he’s done much less of that in the last few years.”

Newsom said that the transition from mayor of San Francisco — when he worked on issues including same-sex marriage, universal healthcare and homelessness — to lieutenant governor was difficult.

“In honesty, I totally get it. I’m not even going to be defensive about it. There was absolutely early frustration. That’s all it represented years and years ago,” he said, noting that his time in Sacramento has been much slower than his life as mayor, a change he described as a “major cultural transition.” “It’s a different pace. That was reflected in those lazy comments of mine [that] I by definition regret because we wouldn’t be having this conversation. But it expressed a sentiment at the time.”

Newsom said he grew into his job and realized he could use his bully pulpit to promote issues he cared about, including successful 2016 ballot measures to legalize recreational marijuana and implement stricter gun controls.

Still, Newsom’s statements about his job have provided plenty of fodder for his rivals.

“If he was so bored, why did he refuse to show up for his job on the UC Board of Regents, or on the CSU Board of Trustees or at the State Lands Commission? Where was Gavin when he was supposed to be working on behalf of all the Californians who actually show up for their jobs?” said Fabien Levy, a spokesman for Chiang. “California needs a serious leader, not someone who’s in it just for show.”

But parties with business before the panels and fellow members said Newsom has been active and attentive when present.

“He has been engaged and thoughtful, and particularly interested in the financial structures and financial stability and financial accountability,” said Shane White, chairman of UC’s Academic Senate and a dentistry professor at UCLA.

A fellow UC regent, who asked to remain anonymous to speak freely about Newsom’s tenure on the board, agreed.

“He’s been substantially more engaged than the vast majority of elected officials who have served on the board,” said the regent, who is unaligned in the race. “He does his homework.”

Former Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez, a Villaraigosa backer who sits on the UC Regents board, said Newsom’s attendance is not that different from other elected officials who sit on the panel.

“If you want to hit him for attendance, it’s a valid hit. If you want to hit him for only being involved in the most high-profile issues, it’s a valid hit. But it’s not inconsistent with other ex officio board members,” Pérez said, adding that he personally liked Newsom and the two men frequently voted on controversial issues the same way. “The difference is he made such a big deal about [how] the office doesn’t do anything, and then he doesn’t go to the things it does.”

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Reporting from San Francisco and Fresno — Candidates for California governor barnstormed the state on Tuesday, launching their final outreach to voters in the run-up to the June 5 primary.

Front-runner Gavin Newsom, who has led the polls and fundraising since entering the race more than three years ago, urged supporters gathered on the steps of San Francisco’s City Hall not to be complacent.

“Let’s get this done and take nothing for granted over the next seven days,” Newsom said before launching a bus tour that will take him to about two-dozen events over the next week.

Democrat Antonio Villaraigosa and Republican John Cox are battling it out for the second spot in the primary, and on Tuesday they courted voters within miles of each other in Fresno.

Villaraigosa vowed that, if elected, he wouldn’t be a big-city politician who flies over the interior of the state, rarely stopping to hear voters’ concerns. He noted he had been to the Central Valley dozens of times since exploring a bid for governor.

“I’ve been here again and again and again. I need the [Central] valley to get out of the primary,” Villaraigosa told business leaders and union members at a Teamsters local headquarters.

When asked earlier in the day why Republicans in the Central Valley should vote for him over Cox, Villaraigosa gave a pointed response.

“A vote for John Cox is a vote for Gavin Newsom,” he said, effectively saying that Cox had no chance of beating Newsom in the general election.

Cox, campaigning at the Fresno County GOP headquarters later in the day, scoffed when asked about Villaraigosa’s comment.

“A vote for me is a vote to make sure that people have better schools, they have better roads, that we don’t waste money in government, that we have a lower tax burden. A vote for me is a lower gasoline tax as well,” Cox said. “So I think Villaraigosa has it all wrong.”

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Cox, who was endorsed by President Trump in mid-May, added another $500,000 of his own money to his campaign since Saturday, bringing his total spending on his campaign to $4.9 million.

Newsom has taken heat from some liberals who argue that his campaign’s effort to boost Cox’s candidacy to ensure an easier general election could harm Democratic efforts to regain control of Congress.

He pushed back at the narrative that having a Republican at the top of the ticket on the November ballot would increase GOP voter turnout, which could help vulnerable Republican members of Congress hold onto their seats.

Newsom argued that having Democrats consolidate behind one candidate in the general election would do more to unite voters than a bitter Democrat-on-Democrat battle.

“If you have a governor’s race where you can line up the Democratic agenda and support the down-ballot ticket and unite the party, and instead of spending resources attacking one another spend those very sizable resources building a war chest … I think that’s a lot more powerful than, with all due respect, John Cox driving huge turnout,” he said. “Forgive me, I don’t see that.”

Newsom predicted $100 million would be spent against him if he and Villaraigosa emerge as the top two winners on June 5, and said the general election contest would be so ugly it would depress voter turnout among Democrats.

“We always win when our base shows up. The reason we don’t show up is often because of the negativity and the divisiveness — and the internecine warfare,” he said.

Major GOP donor Bill Oberndorf contributed $1.5 million and philanthropist Eli Broad on Tuesday donated $1,025,000 to an independent expenditure group supporting Villaraigosa’s bid, bringing the group’s total raised to nearly $20.2 million. The group has spent most of its money boosting Villaraigosa but has also aired ads attacking Newsom.

Villaraigosa was the focus of a new negative ad in the race. State Treasurer John Chiang, another Democrat running for governor, released an ad on Tuesday criticizing Villaraigosa’s work for Herbalife and Ameriquest, arguing that the companies harmed vulnerable communities.

Mehta reported from San Francisco and Willon reported from Fresno.

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