Latest news with #Prop47
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
California looters now face 'hard-charging' consequences after blue state abandoned soft-on-crime approach
Amid the continuing unrest and flash mob-style looting incidents in Los Angeles, California is making a significant pivot toward tougher criminal enforcement. Criminal defense attorney David Wohl told Fox News Digital that the legal consequences are no longer a slap on the wrist for looters following the reversal of Proposition 47, which notably did not criminalize theft under $950. "Now we have a very conservative, hard-charging DA in Los Angeles," Wohl said. "He's adding up what is stolen by each individual co-defendant, and if that's over $950, everybody's getting charged with felonies." In a city once known for turning a blind eye to petty theft and soft prosecution, looters who are taking advantage of protests over federal immigration operations now face stricter penalties. California's Soros-backed Progressive Experiment Collapses After A Decade In 2014, California voters approved Proposition 47, a ballot initiative that reclassified several nonviolent felonies, including shoplifting, theft and drug possession, as misdemeanors if the value involved was $950 or less. Read On The Fox News App Supporters argued the measure would reduce prison overcrowding and redirect state funds to additional programming. Critics argued that it contributed to a noticeable increase in retail theft and emboldened looters. In 2024, voters voiced their concerns and overwhelmingly chose a sharp course correction from the progressive reforms that Proposition 47 implemented and voted in favor of Proposition 36. Prop 36 restored the ability to file felony charges against repeat offenders, regardless of whether their latest crime falls under the $950 limit. It also enhances penalties for group theft and organized looting, which had previously fallen into legal gray zones under Prop 47. The shift stems from a growing rejection of the previous criminal justice model championed by former District Attorney George Gascon, who Wohl described as "more liberal than a lot of public defenders." Under Gascon's leadership, prosecution was often delayed or diminished, with an emphasis on giving offenders "second, third, fourth, fifth chances," Wohl said. Los Angeles Officials Still On 'Progressive Warpath' Despite Overwhelming Voter Rebuke Of Leftist Policies William Jacobson, a law professor at Cornell University and founder of offered a sharp critique of California's criminal justice policies in light of the emergence of looters during the ongoing L.A. protests against immigration enforcement. "Looting and violence have always been illegal, even in California," Jacobson told Fox News Digital. "Unfortunately, California's lax enforcement of the criminal laws, including the former decriminalization of shoplifting, has created a culture of criminality that has played out in numerous riots over the years." "The current riots against immigration enforcement and violence targeting both ICE and the community are part of the California political ecosystem," he said. Several stores across downtown Los Angeles were hit by looters in the early morning hours as anti-ICE riots continued. On Monday night, looters took to the streets and ransacked a series of storefronts, the Los Angeles Police Department confirmed with Fox News Digital. Apple and Adidas were among the stores hit by thieves, as well as several mom-and-pop shops. "What have they done to my business? I don't know," one local business owner shared with Fox News affiliate KKTV. "I have to go inside and see what's going on. I don't know what they have done with the business." WATCH: One video, taken by Brendan Gutenschwager, captured looters ransacking an Apple storefront on Monday night. The video captured a slew of individuals dashing up to the technology storefront and grabbing goods before dispersing as police arrived. The footage captured the store's glass windows spray-painted with "F--- ICE." Other photos showed ransackers disappearing into the night with stolen goods after a smash-and-grab in Compton, a city south of Los Angeles. It was unclear if the thieves were participating in the ongoing anti-ICE protests or if they were being opportunistic of the city's unrest. "Let me be clear: ANYONE who vandalized Downtown or looted stores does not care about our immigrant communities," Mayor Karen Bass said in a post to X. "You will be held accountable." On Tuesday and Wednesday, after continued protests, other businesses set out to protect their stores. Fox News Digital saw a T-Mobile store on the corner of 3rd Street and Broadway boarding up ahead of likely another night of protests in the city. While a security guard protected the property, a repairer worked on the CVS store on the corner of 7th and Spring streets in downtown Los Angeles after several nights of rioting. Attorney General Pam Bondi offered a blunt message to would-be robbers and looters in the deep-blue city on "Fox & Friends" Tuesday. "If you loot a business in California during this, we're charging you with robbery under the Hobbs Act. No longer are the days of non-prosecution for looting. It's a criminal act," she said. The administration is also determined to crack down on those who inflict harm on law enforcement. "We've all made over 190 arrests, [and] more [are] coming. If you hit a police officer, you assault a police officer, state or federal, we are coming after you."Original article source: California looters now face 'hard-charging' consequences after blue state abandoned soft-on-crime approach
New York Post
12-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Post
California looters now face ‘hard-charging' consequences after blue state abandoned soft-on-crime approach
Amid the continuing unrest and flash mob-style looting incidents in Los Angeles, California is making a significant pivot toward tougher criminal enforcement. Criminal defense attorney David Wohl told Fox News Digital that the legal consequences are no longer a slap on the wrist for looters following the reversal of Proposition 47, which notably did not criminalize theft under $950. Advertisement 'Now we have a very conservative, hard-charging DA in Los Angeles,' Wohl said. 'He's adding up what is stolen by each individual co-defendant, and if that's over $950, everybody's getting charged with felonies.' In a city once known for turning a blind eye to petty theft and soft prosecution, looters who are taking advantage of protests over federal immigration operations now face stricter penalties. In 2014, California voters approved Proposition 47, a ballot initiative that reclassified several nonviolent felonies, including shoplifting, theft and drug possession, as misdemeanors if the value involved was $950 or less. Supporters argued the measure would reduce prison overcrowding and redirect state funds to additional programming. Advertisement 8 Vulgar graffiti was spray-painted onto an Apple store after it was looted during the riots in Los Angeles on June 10, 2025. REUTERS 8 Protesters loot a gas station convenience store in Paramount, California on June 7, 2025. Getty Images Critics argued that it contributed to a noticeable increase in retail theft and emboldened looters. In 2024, voters voiced their concerns and overwhelmingly chose a sharp course correction from the progressive reforms that Proposition 47 implemented and voted in favor of Proposition 36. Advertisement Prop 36 restored the ability to file felony charges against repeat offenders, regardless of whether their latest crime falls under the $950 limit. It also enhances penalties for group theft and organized looting, which had previously fallen into legal gray zones under Prop 47. 8 Police officers detain a group of protesters in the streets of Los Angeles on June 11, 2025. AFP via Getty Images The shift stems from a growing rejection of the previous criminal justice model championed by former District Attorney George Gascon, who Wohl described as 'more liberal than a lot of public defenders.' Advertisement Under Gascon's leadership, prosecution was often delayed or diminished, with an emphasis on giving offenders 'second, third, fourth, fifth chances,' Wohl said. William Jacobson, a law professor at Cornell University and founder of offered a sharp critique of California's criminal justice policies in light of the emergence of looters during the ongoing L.A. protests against immigration enforcement. 8 Graffiti is sprayed onto the glass windows of an Apple store hit by looters during the Anti-ICE riots in California. REUTERS 8 Apple products are scattered around a store that was looted during the Los Angeles riots on June 9, 2025. REUTERS 'Looting and violence have always been illegal, even in California,' Jacobson told Fox News Digital. 'Unfortunately, California's lax enforcement of the criminal laws, including the former decriminalization of shoplifting, has created a culture of criminality that has played out in numerous riots over the years.' 'The current riots against immigration enforcement and violence targeting both ICE and the community are part of the California political ecosystem,' he said. Looters in LA Several stores across downtown Los Angeles were hit by looters in the early morning hours as anti-ICE riots continued. On Monday night, looters took to the streets and ransacked a series of storefronts, the Los Angeles Police Department confirmed with Fox News Digital. Apple and Adidas were among the stores hit by thieves, as well as several mom-and-pop shops. Advertisement 'What have they done to my business? I don't know,' one local business owner shared with Fox News affiliate KKTV. 'I have to go inside and see what's going on. I don't know what they have done with the business.' 8 A shoe sits on the floor in an empty Adidas store attacked by looters in Los Angeles. ALLISON DINNER/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock 8 Workers board up a CVS pharmacy after it was looted by rioters in Los Angeles on June 10, 2025. REUTERS One video, taken by Brendan Gutenschwager, captured looters ransacking an Apple storefront on Monday night. Advertisement The video captured a slew of individuals dashing up to the technology storefront and grabbing goods before dispersing as police arrived. The footage captured the store's glass windows spray-painted with 'F— ICE.' Other photos showed ransackers disappearing into the night with stolen goods after a smash-and-grab in Compton, a city south of Los Angeles. It was unclear if the thieves were participating in the ongoing anti-ICE protests or if they were being opportunistic of the city's unrest. Advertisement 'Let me be clear: ANYONE who vandalized Downtown or looted stores does not care about our immigrant communities,' Mayor Karen Bass said in a post to X. 'You will be held accountable.' On Tuesday and Wednesday, after continued protests, other businesses set out to protect their stores. Fox News Digital saw a T-Mobile store on the corner of 3rd Street and Broadway boarding up ahead of likely another night of protests in the city. While a security guard protected the property, a repairer worked on the CVS store on the corner of 7th and Spring streets in downtown Los Angeles after several nights of rioting. Attorney General Pam Bondi offered a blunt message to would-be robbers and looters in the deep-blue city on 'Fox & Friends' Tuesday. Advertisement 'If you loot a business in California during this, we're charging you with robbery under the Hobbs Act. No longer are the days of non-prosecution for looting. It's a criminal act,' she said. 8 Police officers detained masked protesters after a demonstration near Los Angeles City Hall on June 11, 2025. AFP via Getty Images The administration is also determined to crack down on those who inflict harm on law enforcement. 'We've all made over 190 arrests, [and] more [are] coming. If you hit a police officer, you assault a police officer, state or federal, we are coming after you.'
Fox News
28-03-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
STEVE HILTON: Gavin Newsom leaves an unexpected legacy in California
Everywhere I go in America, when I tell people I'm from California I get one of two reactions: "You need to get out of there -- move to somewhere less crazy!" Or: "Why do they keep voting for that (fill in your curse word of choice…)?" Well, here's the good news: the answers to those two questions are now coming together in a beautiful and positive prospect: real political change in the Golden State. My answer to the first question is typically: "Why should we leave? This is my home! I'm raising my family here; I started a business here. Yes, our terrible government has turned everything into a disaster right now, but I love California. It's not us who should leave, but the people who did this to our state! The Democrat politicians: they need to leave office." Then combine that with how I'm now answering the second question, about why people still vote for the same old you-know-what: "Actually, they're starting to vote differently." Look at the city of Huntington Beach in Orange County, the iconic 'Surf City USA.' Just over four years ago, a friend of mine, long-time California Republican Tony Strickland (now a newly-elected State Senator), put together a slate of four energetic candidates to challenge Democrat dominance of the city council. They pulled it off, taking control 4-3 in the midterm elections in 2022. They went on to implement common-sense conservative policies on crime, homelessness, and what's taught in schools. They even introduced and passed a local ballot initiative on voter ID. Guess what? In last November's elections, they pulled off a stunning clean sweep. The "MAGAnificent Seven", as they called themselves, won every seat. Huntington Beach went from 6-1 Democrat control to 7-0 Republican. There were other signs in 2024 that a political revolution may be brewing. Nearly a fifth of California's counties (10 out of 58) flipped from blue to red in 2024 including Fresno, the state's fifth largest city. Proposition 36 (which reversed some of the worst parts of former Vice President and California Attorney General Kamala Harris' disastrous pro-crime Prop 47 from a few years earlier) passed with over 70% support. Soros-backed DAs like George Gascon in L.A. were kicked out. Ballot initiatives to raise the minimum wage, impose rent control and raise taxes were defeated. And of course, President Donald Trump did better in California than any Republican presidential candidate for decades. Republican voter registration has also been increasing while Democrat registration has been falling. And all of this was happening before the catastrophic Los Angeles wildfires, which showed so many people the terrible consequences of what I call the new DEI: Democrat Extremism and Incompetence. It is Gov. Gavin Newsom who has presided over all this. He's the one that enabled years of far-left insanity that gave California the highest poverty rate in America, the most expensive housing, gas, electricity and water, the highest unemployment, lowest income growth and worst business climate. The public schools are a disaster, homelessness continues to spiral out of control, the California Dream is out of reach and the fire hydrants are out of water. On Newsom's watch, California has gone from being America's crown jewel to its worst-run state. No fair-minded person could come to any other conclusion. It's all laid out in my new book Califailure, along with the accompanying Fox Nation special. You should read the book: it's a warning not to let this happen in your state. It shows exactly how the Democrats did it -- and how to stop it. But the second part of my book is called Califuture. In it, I lay out a positive, practical plan for turning things around. Commonsense policies that will stop the insane government bloat and nanny state bossiness that is making life a misery for every small business and every family. Of course, it will only happen if we actually end the Democrats' disastrous one-party rule and elect Republicans to statewide office, like we used to before government unions and far left activists got their stranglehold on power. Thanks to the sheer scale of "Califailure," with zero sign of any concrete action from the Democrats to clean up the mess they made, Republicans, for the first time in two decades, really do have a shot at winning in 2026. A recent poll showed that 48% of Californians would vote for a Republican governor. So, there you are: this could well be Gavin Newsom's greatest legacy: flipping California red!
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Actor Frank Stallone claims he has to ‘batten down the windows' when driving through ‘scary' L.A.
Actor Frank Stallone is lamenting what he sees as the downfall of California, claiming that the state has since become a 'scary' and 'filthy' place since he moved in the 1970s. The 74-year-old New York native and younger brother of Rocky star Sylvester Stallone recalled moving to the Golden State in 1979 when he said it was 'sunny' with little crime. 'I came to California in '79 and it was totally — it was California Dreamin', and I wasn't even in the best time,' Stallone told Fox News Digital. 'No, it was a lot better it was real California sunny, you know? Cool. Not much crime,' he said. Recalling his recent drive through downtown Los Angeles, Stallone claimed the 'filth, the graffiti and the homelessness is almost like that movie Escape from New York.' Released in 1981 and starring Kurt Russel, Escape from New York is about a former soldier turned criminal tasked with rescuing the president, who's been taken hostage by inmates on the island of Manhattan after it's been turned into a maximum security prison amid a war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. 'I mean, it's that scary. I mean, I batten down the window, talking trash piled four feet high. Just filth,' Stallone continued. 'You've just got to move them out,' he said of homeless encampments. 'No more of these Winnebagos parked for months on the curb. You know, we got to move. No more pitching tents on sidewalks where people can't walk. No more pitching tents in front of people's houses. I mean, when I was going down to the gym, it was so compacted with homeless people. The stench — also that that type of unsanitariness breeds you know... All kinds of bad stuff… There's a lot of human excrement. It's just terrible.' He further blamed the current state of California on 'really bad' leadership. Of California Governor Gavin Newsom, Stallone said: 'I think this guy is so transparent. He's so phony. He's a terrible speaker. The hands and the hair and everything. He's just set up to be made fun of, you know what I mean? And he's a bad governor.' He added: 'I mean, this is such a beautiful state. Beautiful. We got the mountains, we got snow, we got the ocean. We've got everything. It's just run wrong…. I mean, the crime. It's just ridiculous. You know, $900 you can steal and nothing happens. But that, to me, is I'm lost on that one. You know, when I was a kid, you stole a candy bar, you get a kick in the butt.' To reduce prison overcrowding, California in 2014 passed Prop 47, which reclassified certain felonies to misdemeanors, including theft of property valued under $950. The Independent has contacted Newsom's representative for comment.
The Independent
13-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Actor Frank Stallone claims he has to ‘batten down the windows' when driving through ‘scary' L.A.
Actor Frank Stallone is lamenting what he sees as the downfall of California, claiming that the state has since become a 'scary' and 'filthy' place since he moved in the 1970s. The 74-year-old New York native and younger brother of Rocky star Sylvester Stallone recalled moving to the Golden State in 1979 when he said it was 'sunny' with little crime. 'I came to California in '79 and it was totally — it was California Dreamin', and I wasn't even in the best time,' Stallone told . 'No, it was a lot better it was real California sunny, you know? Cool. Not much crime,' he said. Recalling his recent drive through downtown Los Angeles, Stallone claimed the 'filth, the graffiti and the homelessness is almost like that movie Escape from New York. ' Released in 1981 and starring Kurt Russel, Escape from New York is about a former soldier turned criminal tasked with rescuing the president, who's been taken hostage by inmates on the island of Manhattan after it's been turned into a maximum security prison amid a war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. 'I mean, it's that scary. I mean, I batten down the window, talking trash piled four feet high. Just filth,' Stallone continued. 'You've just got to move them out,' he said of homeless encampments. 'No more of these Winnebagos parked for months on the curb. You know, we got to move. No more pitching tents on sidewalks where people can't walk. No more pitching tents in front of people's houses. I mean, when I was going down to the gym, it was so compacted with homeless people. The stench — also that that type of unsanitariness breeds you know... All kinds of bad stuff… There's a lot of human excrement. It's just terrible.' He further blamed the current state of California on 'really bad' leadership. Of California Governor Gavin Newsom, Stallone said: 'I think this guy is so transparent. He's so phony. He's a terrible speaker. The hands and the hair and everything. He's just set up to be made fun of, you know what I mean? And he's a bad governor.' He added: 'I mean, this is such a beautiful state. Beautiful. We got the mountains, we got snow, we got the ocean. We've got everything. It's just run wrong…. I mean, the crime. It's just ridiculous. You know, $900 you can steal and nothing happens. But that, to me, is I'm lost on that one. You know, when I was a kid, you stole a candy bar, you get a kick in the butt.' To reduce prison overcrowding, California in 2014 passed Prop 47, which reclassified certain felonies to misdemeanors, including theft of property valued under $950.
