Latest news with #JoeMathews
San Francisco Chronicle
6 days ago
- Politics
- San Francisco Chronicle
Dear Kamala Harris, don't run for office. There's a far more important job for you
From: Joe Mathews Please don't run for governor in 2026. Don't bother running for president in 2028. Instead, take a job more important than either of those posts. It's a job that would fit you even better than the Chloé suits you wore during last year's campaign. It's a job that doesn't exist, but one that California will need to survive this awful moment. Madame Vice President, please use your stature to convince the state to establish the California Autonomy Authority — as an independent commission or part of the executive branch — with you as its founding director. California needs a new agency with broad powers to defend itself against the existential threat of a criminal, authoritarian American nation-state. President Donald Trump's regime has effectively declared war against Californians. Trump dispatched secret police to seize Californians off the streets, deployed troops to back up the secret police, canceled our environmental laws, and illegally cut off funding for vital programs. While Trumpists attack us constantly, we Californians have no full-time body to defend ourselves in this war. Instead, our officials are forced to split their attention between governing their own jurisdictions and defending against federal attacks. In Los Angeles, the federal secret police started arresting people before local leadership, preoccupied with fire rebuilding, knew they were there. Gov. Gavin Newsom has struggled to reconcile the monumental job of managing California's housing and climate crises with the new full-time job of fighting against the federal invasion. His shifting public stances (He's fighting Trump! He's reaching out to Trump!) and presidential ambitions sow cynicism rather than trust. Attorney General Rob Bonta is in a similar bind, juggling litigation against the U.S. with serving as the state's top law enforcement official. We need our public officials to focus on their actual jobs. And we need someone else to take charge of protecting our democracy and defending California against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Your whole career has prepared you for this urgent assignment. Your deep experience in local law enforcement — as San Francisco district attorney — should help you convince local governments, especially local police, to collaborate in defense against Trump. Your six years as California attorney general, representing the entirety of the state government, gave you visibility on state vulnerabilities that Trump might exploit. Your four years in the White House as vice president taught you how intelligence agencies, departments, the military and the U.S. government respond in crises — all lessons that can be applied now in defense of California. You also built contacts across this country (from your presidential campaign) and in world capitals (from your VP travels) that could support California in this moment. In this novel role, you'd combine your public service experiences. For starters, this is a crime-fighting job. Trump is a convicted felon who is violating the law and the Constitution, and his administration, which embraces corruption, has likely been infiltrated by criminals or foreign enterprises seeking advantage. Using the authority's subpoena power, you should investigate and expose criminality — because the Trump-controlled U.S. Department of Justice won't. You also could identify and seek prosecution or civil remedies against masked federal agents who violate Californians' rights. In the process, your authority would create a record of the U.S. regime's crimes to support future federal or international prosecutions, or even a truth-and-reconciliation commission. The job would also involve policymaking. You would determine which laws or governing structures offer California and its local governments the most protection against federal attack. To do that, you might end up creating new agencies in California and possibly other allied states, to replace the federal departments Trump is dismantling. To make this work, you must commit to a term of at least five years. That way, you can serve as the bridge between Newsom, who leaves office at the end of 2026, and the next governor — thus discouraging the Trump administration from exploiting California's transfer of power. And since your term would go to 2030, two years beyond the 2028 presidential election, you'd make clear that California won't stop defending its autonomy even after Trump is gone. Yes, taking this new gig would mean not running for governor or president. But that's not a big sacrifice. Your donors are unenthusiastic about the governor's race, and polls show California voters are at best lukewarm about you. And the Trump people are already busy making sure the 2028 presidential election won't be free or fair. (Betting markets actually give Trump better odds of winning an unconstitutional third term than of any Democrat winning the election.) So, stop debating between running to serve the state (in two years) or the nation (in four). Instead, and right now, start creating and leading a new authority to serve both.
Yahoo
09-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'Newsom has effectively assumed the presidency'
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Joe Mathews at the San Francisco Chronicle Gavin Newsom is the "chief executive of America's richest and most populous state," and in "this peculiar moment, that makes him the real president, by default," says Joe Mathews. There's a "guy living in the White House who some people call president. But real presidents swear an oath to execute the laws and to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution." Newsom is "acting like the president, not a governor, because the country needs someone to act like a president." Read more Chicago Tribune editorial board In the 1980s, Congress "lost its collective mind over the idea that its members' rental histories could undergo public scrutiny," but now the "same law is being invoked to attack Weigel Broadcasting," says the Chicago Tribune editorial board. Americans "should be aware that practically every keystroke on every website could potentially be tracked." But "most Americans are still surprised to learn how much of their personal information is being collected. And once it's given away, there's no getting it back." Read more Spencer Neale at The American Conservative Alex Ovechkin scored his "895th goal, a new record in the NHL," and Wayne Gretzky "provided a fitting bridge from past to present," says Spencer Neale. It's "not easy to watch your greatest successes pass by, but Gretzky has done so with great honor and respect." Gretzky's "goal record has long stood as one of the most insurmountable achievements," but "instead of dismay, Gretzky displayed humility, honor, and dignity as his lofty achievement was torn from the record books." Read more Liam Karr at The Hill The Democratic Republic of the Congo has "presented U.S. officials and the American people with a proposal: help bring security to the embattled central African country and, in return, receive access to valuable mineral deposits," says Liam Karr. But "American leaders should ask if it is worth the risk it poses to U.S. service members." The U.S. "should develop a comprehensive critical minerals strategy and seek out partnerships that best suit this strategy, not build a strategy around external offers." Read more
USA Today
30-01-2025
- Politics
- USA Today
Mathews: California to Uncle Sam — shut up and do your job
Joe Mathews Zócalo Public Square Shut up, Uncle Sam. Or put up. Yes, I'm talking to you, my federal government. I don't care if you don't like my tone. Because, while falsely blaming California and its politicians for devastating fires, you never acknowledge your own culpability: You are the arsonist, and not just politically. Because half of California is yours. Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle. In fact, more than 47% of the land in this state belongs to the federal government. Just 3% is managed by the state. The flames that leveled Pacific Palisades and Malibu are believed to have started in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area (italics mine), managed by the National Park Service. (That's you!). The blaze that turned Altadena to ash burned through the Angeles National Forest, managed by the U.S. Forest Service, which is part of the United States (you again!) Department of Agriculture. Let's be clear: Our firelands are actually your firelands. And you've managed your California land so poorly for so long — suppressing fire instead of managing it, letting fuels accumulate, providing insufficient personnel to handle our national parks, forests, wilderness, and recreation areas — that you've helped turn California into a tinderbox. When President Trump, House Speaker Mike Johnson, and Republicans blame California's land management for our fires, you aren't just lying. You're trying to shift blame. Now, if you had any honor — which you don't, but let's just say you did for argument's sake — you wouldn't just provide us with all the disaster aid we need. You'd announce major new investments in federal land management in California and elsewhere. After all, you own a quarter of all the land in the United States. Instead, you are shamelessly working to make your land management even worse. Project 2025, the governing blueprint for the new administration, outlines deep cuts to the already-diminished number of federal workers, which would exacerbate understaffing and poor management on federal lands. The cuts are now starting, with federal hiring and funding freezes leaving positions open and stopping wildlands projects. You propose to do all this, while your administration, run by climate deniers, rolls back green investment, and encourages burning more fossil fuels. Your current regime better hope hell isn't hotter than our mega-fires. Even saying that, I want to make clear that I'm not like you. I don't want to shift blame. I want to solve problems. Our state and its leaders must press you — for disaster aid and massive investments in public lands. If you won't make those investments, then we must insist that you surrender ownership of all federal lands in California to state and local governments and institutions, immediately. That surrender should come with money to cover all the deferred maintenance from the last century. I'm thinking $500 billion, but let's negotiate. If you refuse these terms, California's elected leaders should use every trick in the Congressional toolbox to force you to fork over. That should include attaching this transfer of public lands to every must-pass piece of Congressional legislation, including the debt limit. California's state and local governments can apply pressure by y ceasing the collection of federal withholding tax dollars from their employees. If you're going to stiff us on funding, we shouldn't collect taxes for you. If you won't manage or turn over your land, you and California could be headed toward divorce. A new YouGov poll commissioned by the think tank Independent California Institute found 61% support among Californians for peaceful secession from the United States. Or maybe you can trade us to Denmark in exchange for Greenland, which you actually seem to care about. I don't know why the Danes would trust you to manage one of the world's wildest places, but I guess that would be Greenland's problem. Like I said, Uncle Sam, the choice is yours. Either do your job, or turn over your land so we can. But, either way, shut up. Joe Mathews writes the Connecting California column for Zócalo Public Square.
