Much has been written and previewed regarding this weekend’s state Republican Party convention in Sacramento. Party delegates will choose a new chairperson. Three candidates pose two different points of view — former Assemblyman Travis Allen, party activist and writer Steve Frank, and the head of the California Trailblazers program, Jessica...
Budget Deal Allows Far Less Money Than Trump Wanted for Wall
WASHINGTON — Congressional negotiators reached agreement to prevent a government shutdown and finance construction of new barriers along the U.S.-Mexico border, overcoming a late-stage hang-up over immigration enforcement issues that had threatened to scuttle the talks. Republicans were desperate to avoid another bruising shutdown. They tentatively agreed Monday night to...
Political Shifts, Sales Slump Cast Shadow Over Gun Industry
When gunmakers and dealers gather this week in Las Vegas for the industry's largest annual conference, they will be grappling with slumping sales and a shift in politics that many didn't envision two years ago when gun-friendly Donald Trump and a GOP-controlled Congress took office. Some of the top priorities...
Senate Republicans Target Boycott Movement in $38B Israel Defense Funding Bill
WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans' first bill of the new Congress aims to insert the legislative branch into President Donald Trump's Middle East policy — but also tries to drive a wedge between centrist and liberal Democrats over attitudes toward Israel. Among other provisions, the bipartisan package, backed by Senate Majority...
Defying Pundits, GOP Share of Latino Vote Steady Under Trump
LITTLETON, Colo. — Pedro Gonzalez has faith in Donald Trump and his party. The 55-year-old Colombian immigrant is a pastor at an evangelical church in suburban Denver. Initially repelled by Trump in 2016, he's been heartened by the president's steps to protect religious groups and appoint judges who oppose abortion...
GOP and Democrats Trade Blame for Shutdown, No Deal in Sight
WASHINGTON — The partial government shutdown will almost certainly be handed off to a divided government to solve in the new year, as both parties traded blame Friday and President Donald Trump sought to raise the stakes in the weeklong impasse. As agreement eludes Washington in the waning days of...
Trump Prods McConnell on Sentencing Bill: 'Go for It Mitch!'
WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's reluctance to hold a vote on a popular criminal justice bill has angered top Republican senators and created an unusual rift with a longtime GOP ally, Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa. And on Friday, it also brought on a tweet from President Donald...
Commentary: New Water Deal Isn't a Political Certainty
Water supply is clearly the most important long-term issue affecting California’s future. It’s also the most politically complicated. Incremental changes in California water policy typically take years, if not decades, to work their way through seemingly infinite legal, regulatory and political processes at federal, state and local levels – and...
Whiter, Poorer, Trumpier: The New Republican California
After the shellacking that California Republicans took in this year's midterm elections, many figures within the more pragmatic wings of the party establishment had hoped that the party would turn away from the divisive politics of President Donald Trump and seek to become a more diverse coalition. But in the...
Patagonia Gives GOP Tax Windfall to Environmental Groups
VENTURA — Patagonia, the outdoor gear company, is passing along the $10 million it saved from tax cuts to nonprofit environmental groups. Corporations received a windfall from the GOP's sweeping overhaul of the U.S. tax code last year, which slashed corporate rates from 35 percent, to 21 percent. The California company...