Newsom goes to Mexico border to counter Trump

From CalMatters’ Wendy Fry at the U.S.-Mexico border:

Gov. Gavin Newsom visited the U.S.-Mexico border Thursday, railing against President-elect Donald Trump’s tariff threats and the economic damage a 25% tax on goods coming from Mexico would likely have on the binational region and the state. 

“Is the president-elect embarrassed by his own leadership as it relates to what he often describes as his USMCA?” Newsom asked, referring to the free trade agreement among the U.S., Mexico and Canada. “Did he do something wrong with that agreement that now he wants to throw it out completely and impose a 25% tax increase on the American people?” 

Newsom said no state nor any region would be more impacted by tariffs than California and CaliBaja, but he stressed that the national economy would also suffer. “Don’t think for a second this won’t impact you,” he warned.

“Forgive me, I didn’t want to make this too political,” he later added, though leading the resistance against Trump could boost his own political ambitions.

The governor also spoke about immigration, fentanyl and highlighted the ongoing expansion of the Otay Mesa East Port of Entry in San Diego. Newsom’s visit comes as the nation prepares for a dramatic shift in federal leadership next month, and as Trump promises mass deportations of undocumented immigrants. This weekend, Newsom is hosting the Democratic Governors Association in Los Angeles.

Otay Mesa East offers a border narrative that challenges Trump’s philosophy, Newsom said. Trump often paints a picture of the border as a dangerous, lawless place that should be shut down and walled off. But the new port of entry can increase trade and improve security, the governor said.

Significantly delayed in construction, the $1.1 billion project is now slated for completion in December 2027. “We’ve been talking about this Otay East Port of Entry since quite literally the late 1990s,” Newsom said, adding that Trump supported the project in 2018. 

Otay Mesa East was planned to alleviate congestion at the border, reduce wait times and bolster economic ties with Mexico, California’s largest trading partner. Mexico purchases approximately 19% of all California exports. In 2023, California exported to Mexico approximately $33.3 billion worth of goods, such as computer and electronic equipment, transportation equipment and processed foods, according to the California Chamber of Commerce. 

As much as crossing the border needs to be fast, California’s governor also acknowledged it needs to be secure, calling attention to the counternarcotics work done by the California National Guard. In 2023, it seized 62,000 pounds of fentanyl, he said. The state is increasing that operation with a focus on contraband flowing southbound. The State Department is considering an application for National Guard members to help train and support Mexican military personnel.

• Newsom: “A big part of what happens on the other side of the border, as it relates to violence, is happening with American-made weapons that come south to Mexico from America. And we need to do a better job to attach a focus, responsibility and energy in that space.”

For about an hour Thursday, it seemed possible that California’s coast, including San Francisco, would be struck by a significant tsunami.

Authorities issued tsunami warnings (with “extraordinary threat to life or property”) and even evacuation orders after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit about 30 miles offshore in the Pacific Ocean or 45 miles southwest of Eureka. BART stopped all trains temporarily, including the nearly 4-mile Transbay Tube that runs underwater from San Francisco to Oakland.

But about 15 minutes before the tsunami was set to reach the coastline, authorities canceled the warning. While the sudden change may have confused residents, officials say they followed protocol to give enough advance notice.

Still, the earthquake and aftershocks caused some damage, particularly in Humboldt County, close to the epicenter. There were reports of homes in Eel River Valley coming off their foundations, some schools evacuated or closed for the day and thousands of homes lost power.

The state sent emergency assistance to Humboldt and Del Norte counties to help with emergency operations, and Gov. Newsom issued an emergency declaration to provide additional resources, including the California National Guard.

Thursday’s main earthquake happened near the Mendocino triple junction in the Pacific Ocean where three tectonic plates meet. In the past century, there have been at least 40 magnitude 6 tremors (including five magnitude 7 or stronger) within 155 miles of Thursday’s earthquake, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The quake could mean an active period in California, some scientists warn.

The agency said that because the earthquake involved two plates sliding past one another — what’s known as a strike-slip — a tsunami was less likely since there was “minimal vertical movement of the ocean floor.”

The last time a tsunami hit California was in 2022, when an undersea volcano erupted and sent waves that flooded parts of Northern California. In 1964, the worst tsunami in U.S. history, caused by a 9.2 magnitude earthquake in Alaska, killed at least 11 people in Crescent City and caused millions of dollars in damage.

Laphonza Butler is the rare politician who, granted power and status, willingly gave it up. Gov. Newsom appointed her to the U.S. Senate after the death of Dianne Feinstein in September 2023 — and Butler quickly announced that she wouldn’t seek election to the seat. 

Thursday, after 14 months in office, she gave her final floor speech before Sen.-elect Adam Schiff (who on Friday submitted his resignation from his House seat effective Sunday) is sworn in Monday. Butler — who grew up in Magnolia, Miss. and entered politics through her work with labor groups and EMILY’s List — thanked Newsom, her staff, her family (including her wife and daughter) and her colleagues.

But it was her message to future, aspiring young leaders that was the focus of her final remarks. Bringing up the popularity of rapper Kendrick Lamar’s song “Not Like Us” — a searing diss track targeting another rapper, Drake — Butler said that while the song brings great entertainment, its lyrics are not words to build “the future of our country — because indeed, they are exactly like us.”

Instead, Butler pointed to her time as a five-year-old attending an early childhood education center, where she had to learn the song “We Are the World” for her school’s graduation. Learning the lyrics, she said, helped plant seeds about ideas of unity and community.

• Butler: “When we choose to do hard things together — the people of this nation, all of its elected leaders, our community advocates — when we see each other’s humanity … we truly are doing and being the best country in the world.” 

Butler also received praise from her colleagues, including Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith and California Sen. Alex Padilla, who said of Butler: “It takes a trailblazer to fill the seat of a trailblazer.”

Feinstein was first elected in 1992, along with Barbara Boxer, as the first women to represent California in the U.S. Senate. Butler became only the third African American woman in the U.S. Senate and the first openly gay senator representing California. When Schiff is sworn in, California will not have a female U.S. senator for the first time in three decades.

From CalMatters economy reporter Levi Sumagaysay:

California’s Insurance Department will soon implement new regulations to address the home insurance crisis that the state’s residents have been facing for the past couple of years. Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara has said his plan will address low availability of fire and home insurance by encouraging insurance companies to resume offering or writing more policies, especially in areas of high wildfire risk.

One part of Lara’s plan will allow insurance companies to incorporate reinsurance costs — what they pay to insure their risk — into their rates. But consumers and advocates are concerned about how much insurance premiums will rise as a result, and the department has no official estimates to offer. 

One estimate by an actuary, offered before state lawmakers in 2020 and cited in public testimony to the department on Thursday, says premiums could go up as much as 40%. 

Douglas Heller, director of insurance for the Consumer Federation of America, said during public comments Thursday that other states have long allowed insurers to factor in reinsurance costs, but that “we’re still seeing consumers who cannot find insurance or afford it in many states.”

Michael Soller, spokesperson for the department, said the regulations will cap how much in reinsurance costs insurers can pass along to consumers.

• Soller: “We expect this regulation to provide greater stability in rates along with increased availability and affordability as more companies compete for business.”

The department expects to finalize and implement all parts of the plan by the end of the year or the beginning of 2025.