Not the Bee.

The State of Minnesota, ladies and gents.

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No one who’s kept up with U.S. politics even minimally over the last four decades should be surprised that the Democratic Party has been the launching pad for a wave of socialism. The party has long been rooted in socialist principles. It was inevitable that what the Democrats have long covered up is now out in the open and its zealots adherents are threatening our republic.

Granted, the wave is not overwhelming and our country has survived previous flirtations with socialism. But the boldness from the outright socialists, who are hiding behind the label of “democratic socialists,” cannot be waved away, and the Democratic Party will be responsible for the damage that the Democratic Socialists of America will wreak if voters don’t turn away the slate of the most radical candidates we’ve seen in some time.

There is a reason that Vermont socialist Bernie Sanders first caucused with, then ran for president as a member of, the Democratic Party. Contempt for limited government and economic freedom (which naturally begets capitalism) has long been a main chapter in the Democrats’ handbook.

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Jessica Gorman, bereaved mother of Sheridan Gorman, shot back at Democrat members of Congress who complained about having to hear her testimony about illegal immigrants during a Tuesday congressional hearing on sanctuary cities.

“No family should ever have to bury a child because public officials fail to put American lives first,” Gorman said in her opening statement before the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement. Venezuelan national Jose Medina has pleaded not guilty to murder charges involving the death of Gorman’s 18-year-old daughter.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., who serves as the subcommittee’s ranking member, began her opening statement with condolences to Gorman and Joe Abraham, whose daughter died when an illegal alien drunk driver collided with her car.

“Let me start by offering my deepest condolences to you, Mrs. Gorman, and to you, Mr. Abraham, for the loss of your children,” Jayapal said.

But then her tune changed.

“Unfortunately, this hearing is the fourth time in this committee that we’ve had a hearing on sanctuary cities. The fourth time,” Jayapal told Gorman and Abraham. “And there’s many other things we could be doing other than this.”

The Foundry.

The Democratic Party and the Democratic Socialists of America are becoming indistinguishable from one another.

That’s clearly the case in New York City, as a wave of socialist House candidates backed by openly socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani won primary elections on Tuesday against incumbent Democrats.

In some cases, both leading candidates were quite far to the Left, but Democrat primary voters simply voted for the one who was more fervently anti-Israel—which is absolutely becoming the biggest litmus test in Democratic Party primary fights.

One of Tuesday night’s victors in a House primary election, Darializa Avila Chevalier, is truly off the deep end in every way. Chevalier backs full prison abolition, which she is unable to defend coherently, though still fervently supports it. She’s opposed to deporting any illegal aliens, even rapists and murderers.

Oh, and she founded a college campus organization that’s mostly committed to rabidly hating Israel, but also in favor of “fighting for the total eradication of Western civilization.”

There ought to be a bounty on such people. $5 ought to do it.

New York Post.

California’s proposed billionaire tax may be qualified to appear on the ballot this November, but should it get placed, it will have competition with another initiative that if passed would render the tax moot.

A measure to “require audits of programs funded by new state special taxes” qualified for the ballot, the California Secretary of State announced late Tuesday, with more than 962,000 signatures and will be certified June 25th unless withdrawn.

It’s the first to qualify of the multiple ballot proposals backed by Building A Better California, a group where Google co-founder Sergey Brin and other Bay Area tycoons have poured tens of millions of dollars into to fight the billionaire tax.

You want a tax to fund programs for e.g homess people or children? Fine, then make regular audited public reports on how the money is spent. (Politicians recoil like vampires from a cross….)

The controversial billionaire tax is championed by the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW) and would levy a one-time 5% tax on the state’s ultra-rich whose assets exceed $1 billion. The goal, supporters say, is to make up for federal healthcare cuts.

Because, as we all know,  healthcare is TOTALLY the responsibility of the Federal government—and the Federal taxpayer—or maybe billionaires stupid enough to live in California, we aren’t picky about whose pocket we pick.

Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

As they do. I guess Jesse Jackson’s remarks about “Hymietown” have been forgotten.

Not the be.

I’d say Massachusetts’ Seth Moulton is a little touchy about Graham Platner, huh?

Read it.

California’s Assembly Bill 1127 is sold as gun safety. In reality, it is the Sacramento Democrats engaging yet again in their favorite sport: punishing the law-abiding for the failures of the government.

The bill bars licensed dealers, beginning July 1, 2026, from selling so-called machinegun-convertible pistols—Glock-style handguns that criminals can illegally alter with switches. But the switch is already illegal. Converting a firearm into a machine gun is already illegal. Possessing an illegal machine gun is already illegal. So why do Sacramento Democrats answer a criminal felony by restricting a lawful purchase?

Why do they fear the pistol in the display case more than the felon in the alley?

This is not new. For decades, California Democrats have treated every criminal adaptation as an excuse to tighten the rules on citizens who were never the problem. Sacramento does not get tougher on criminals; it gets tougher on citizens. And it never works.

In 1989 came Roberti-Roos, with the promise that banning “assault weapons” would tame violence. Did gang members retire? Did criminals submit to statutory language? Of course not.

Every Democrat ought to have tattooed on his or her forhead CROOKS DON’T CARE ABOUT YOUR GUN CONTROL LAWS.

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Surprise, surprise: There really is no such thing as a free bus.

One of New York City’s socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s key campaign promises was that he would provide free bus services to everyone in the city.

Not only is that goal seemingly not even in the medium-term plans for the mayor, but one of the programs he pointed to as a successful model has gone belly up.

Bloomberg News reported Tuesday that Kansas City, Missouri, ended its experiment to provide free bus services to people in the city. It will now begin charging riders for the service.

“Kansas City reinstated bus fares this month after six years, unwinding a closely watched experiment that inspired zero-fare transit campaigns across the U.S., including New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s,” Bloomberg reported.

Kansas City’s free bus was sold as a cost-saving measure that would make ridership more “equitable.”

The city created the program with a major federal cash influx during the COVID-19 lockdowns. But it became financially untenable as the initial funds ran out in 2023 and the cost of operations reportedly climbed to $15 million a year, nearly double the initial projections.

Part of the problem is endemic to other “free” transportation services in big cities. Without the small amount of buy-in from customers and given the tendency of blue cities to tolerate mass homelessness and recidivism, these services naturally become more dangerous and more expensive.

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A federal judge in Minnesota, who has donated to an immigrant legal aid group, quashed several federal grand jury subpoenas of documents from Gov. Tim Walz and the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul over compliance with immigration enforcement.

In a 29-page opinion issued Monday, Chief U.S. District Judge Patrick Schiltz of the District of Minnesota accused the Trump administration’s Justice Department of seeking to “harass political opponents” by initiating a criminal investigation and using grand jury subpoenas to pressure state and local officials into changing their immigration policies.

The judge has acknowledged being a donor for “many years” to the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, an organization that provides free legal representation to low-income immigrants and refugees. Schiltz has also clashed with Immigration and Customs Enforcement over the agency’s alleged violation of court orders.

The grand jury subpoenas sought records related to federal immigration enforcement, including communications regarding cooperation or noncooperation with ICE and other federal immigration authorities; requests for assistance from immigration officials; communications among state and local officials concerning immigration enforcement; and training or guidance provided to employees regarding interactions with ICE.

The subpoenas were issued to the offices of Walz, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, and St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her, as well as the Ramsey County Board of Commissioners and the Hennepin County Board of Commissioners.

“Initiating a criminal investigation in order to harass political opponents or to coerce them into taking official action—particularly official action that the federal government cannot directly require those political opponents to take—is a blatantly unlawful and unethical use of the grand jury process,” Schiltz wrote.

Not the Bee.

Biden-appointed, of course.

We need to talk about name standards for federal judges.

Yes, you read that right. The judge’s name is “Sparkle Sooknanan.”

What Judge Lando Calrissian meant to say is that the Trump administration is not allowed to use updated citizenship data to check the validity of voter rolls.

Babylon Bee.

And he’s just the guy to do it.

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While some problems caused by California’s one-party government get significant press, there’s one major issue that’s virtually ignored: The state’s 911 system is dangerously outdated, and the attempt to update it has already cost taxpayers $502 million with little to show for it.

California has an analog emergency warning system from the 1970s. There is broad agreement that the current system puts Californians at risk. Gov. Gavin Newsom proudly announced in 2019 that California would update its system.

In a 2019 press release, Newsom’s office explained some of the failures of the current system. At the time, there were 13 system outages a month on average. Newsom’s office said federal regulators estimated that speeding up average emergency response times by a single minute could save 10,000 lives each year.

The project is clearly necessary, but its cost has been astronomical, and progress has been sluggish. In 2019, Newsom asserted that the project would be completed by 2022 and cost approximately $132 million. He also explained that the project would be managed by a little-known governmental entity called the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES). With a name like that, Newsom cannot duck responsibility for the failure that has followed.

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One of Baltimore City’s premier bar and restaurant districts was transformed into a warzone over the weekend, with roaming gangs of underage kids, large unruly crowds, fights, and even a shootout that seemed like a scene from the crime drama The Wire. Urban decay in Baltimore is rampant and is a symptom of failed left-wing leadership, which seems more focused on city-killing progressive politics, DEI, illegal aliens, and climate change than actually providing basic law and order to taxpayers.

Fox Baltimore reports that Fells Point was flooded with hundreds of young people, mostly underage teens, overwhelming parts of the nightlife district known for its local shops, bars, and restaurants.

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The Obama Presidential Center is set to open Friday in Chicago, but several subcontractors who helped build the project say they are still struggling to recover millions of dollars in alleged unpaid costs.

Among them is Adamson Plumbing owner Mike Owen, who said his company is nearly $4 million in the red after years of work on the project.

“That is a hole that no subcontractor, small business can survive,” Owen said. He said the losses have drained company reserves, created uncertainty for employees, and could lead to layoffs.

“Flounder, you fucked up! You trusted us!” — Eric Stratton, Rush Chairman, damned glad to meet you.

Read it.

It seems impossible — or just too revolting — to keep up with the financial hanky-panky of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and First Partner (gag) Jennifer Siebel Newsom. But thanks to a couple of investigative reporters with stronger stomachs than I have, let’s see if I can’t put everything you need to know into one easily digestible column.

I love it when other people do my dirty work for me, so let’s get started.

Read it.

For generations, Democrats have portrayed themselves as the party of ordinary Americans – factory workers, waitresses, truck drivers, police officers, construction workers, and middle-class families trying to get ahead. Yet one of the most striking features of modern American politics is how often Democrat leaders, activists, and media allies seem genuinely baffled by the very people they claim to represent.

The latest example comes from Washington Post columnist Monica Hesse, whose reaction to President Trump’s appearance at a packed UFC event on the White House lawn last weekend revealed a familiar pattern among America’s cultural elites. To tens of millions of Americans, UFC is simply entertainment. It is competitive, exciting, patriotic, and increasingly mainstream.

To Hesse and myriad other journalists and political commentators, however, its popularity seems to require explanation – as though they are studying the customs of a distant tribe.

That reaction says far more about elite America than it does about UFC fans, and few institutions better embody elite opinion than the modern Democrat Party.

Read it.

Democrats are far more likely to say they’re “ashamed” to be Americans than are other U.S. adult citizens, results of a new national survey by The Economist/YouGov reveal.

With the nation’s 250th anniversary less than a month away, the survey conducted June 13-15 polled Americans’ views on their country.

When asked to rate how “proud” they were to be an American, 60% of U.S. adult citizens said they were either “very proud” (42%) or “somewhat proud” (18%).

While 20% of all adults said they were either somewhat (12%) or very (8%) “ashamed,” nearly twice as many Democrat citizens (38%) said they were ashamed, including 12% who reported that they were “very ashamed.” Only 40% of Democrats said they were at least somewhat proud to be Americans.

Another 22% of Democrats said they were “neither” proud nor ashamed to be Americans, on par with the 20% of all U.S. adults who voiced no opinion, one way or the other.

Democrats were also much less likely to think that America has been “a force for good in the world.”

I know how they feel—I’m ashamed that Democrats are Americans too.

Not the Bee.

They want to make sure Spencer Pratt never happens again.

Not the Bee.

He was even worse than we thught.

Babylon Bee.

While commemorating the film’s 20th anniversary, former Vice President Al Gore explained that while An Inconvenient Truth did not prove to be accurate, it did make him incredibly rich.

Gore, who wrote and starred in the Oscar-winning documentary, was happy to sit down for an interview with ABC News’ Ginger Zee this week to discuss how successful the film was at building his wealth.

“I think the film was a great success, actually,” Gore said, speaking of the film’s numerous failed predictions. “For me, that is. It may not have been true in any way, but I sure enjoyed it. After all, I am now very, very rich.”

AlGore is one of those people who ages like bread,  not like wine.

No surprises here.

Read it.

She is,  of course, a Woman of Color.,

Not the Bee.

Meet Kiana Sears:

The entitled we have always with us.

Read it.

Gov. Abigail Spanberger and whatever members of the Virginia Democratic Party that aren’t in a war of words with her still speak of fulfilling their affordability agenda, which we have debunked in earlier columns as nothing more than more taxpayer-funded subsidies or draconian controls on providers like landlords.

However, the news that Rideout Arsenal, a firearms designer and manufacturer, will be moving from Fredericksburg to a new, $22 million manufacturing facility in Thomasville, Georgia, brings new questions about their real commitment to affordability.

According to surveys developed by Robert Half, a human resources consulting firm, and conducted by independent research firms, 62 percent of Americans would relocate if their job moved and 75 percent of 18- to 35-year-olds would.

So, let’s say that 50 percent of the 100 jobs Gov. Brian Kemp announced this week in telling the Georgia press about Rideout’s move are ex-pat Virginians. That means 50 people in one of the most expensive places to live in the United States are now unemployed.

Read it.

Alaska’s election officials may have just saved a U.S. Senate seat from one of the more brazen ballot schemes in recent memory. The state’s Division of Elections issued a preliminary ruling this week that Dan J. Sullivan of Petersburg is ineligible to appear on the 2026 Senate ballot, dealing a significant blow to Democrats – in what Republicans have characterized as a coordinated Democratic effort to siphon votes from incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan through deliberate name confusion.

Dan J. Sullivan is a 69-year-old retired teacher who filed to run as a Republican for the U.S. Senate mere days before the late-May filing deadline. Not only is his name virtually identical to the incumbent senator’s, but he’s also recycled the incumbent’s former campaign slogan, and is using a logo similar to the senator’s own branding. The attempt to deceive voters is obvious, and under Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system, where ballot position and name recognition carry outsized weight, the potential for voter confusion was significant and consequential.

According to a report from the Anchorage Daily News, Carol Beecher, director of the Division of Elections, made the state’s position clear in a letter to Dan J. Sullivan on Wednesday. “Based on a review of the evidence presented and in the Division’s possession, the Division has determined that the preponderance of evidence does not support your eligibility for the office of United States Senator,” Beecher wrote.

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Virginia is on the verge of its first shutdown in modern history, and it all comes down to data centers and Democratic Party infighting. Democrats control the governor’s mansion, the state Senate, and the House, yet the party can’t get on the same page.

“Virginia has to have a budget by June 30,” Republican Virginia state Sen. Glen Sturtevant told The Daily Signal. After fighting for “several months” on the budget, state leaders are locking horns over data centers and increasing taxes.

“If there’s an actual shutdown and there’s no money appropriated, you know teachers aren’t getting paid, cops aren’t getting paid,” Sturtevant continued.

Sturtevant explained that the Senate, including many Democrats, wants to eliminate the 20-year-old tax break for data centers that currently costs Virginia $2 billion a year that has to be made up for by taxing Virginians. House Democrats and Democrat Gov. Abigail Spanberger want to keep that tax break in place, protecting the data centers.

And their payoffs to Democrat politicians.

New York Post.

Don’t hold your breath waiting for itl.

Watch it.

Actions have consequences. Democrats never seem to understand that.

Read it.

t least seven states have withdrawn from participating in the Great American State Fair, a 16-day celebration tied to the festivities on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., surrounding the nation’s 250th anniversary.

The governors of the seven states — Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Oregon and Washington — are all Democrats.

Massachusetts and North Carolina said they declined to participate in the fair, set to begin June 25, because of budget constraints, The New York Times reported. Some states are instead holding celebrations of their own, many years in the making.

Sure. I believe that.

Read it.

Angelenos are still very upset about the Palisades Fire and the city’s horrible response to the disaster (although if you believe the election results, it doesn’t seem that way) and a new lawsuit is being filed against the city by one Kenneth Bass.

He’s the biological brother of LA Mayor Karen Bass.

Read it.

Well, Banana People’s Republic.

Historically, a “banana republic” is a derisive term for small, unstable nations in Latin America dominated by a corrupt ruling clique. These regimes maintained power through manipulated elections, suppression of opposition, crony capitalism, and the systematic looting of public resources, all while projecting a thin veneer of democratic legitimacy. The people suffered in poverty while the elite lived in ostentatious luxury.

Tragically, that archetype no longer belongs solely to distant tropics. It now describes California—the wealthiest subnational economy on the planet and America’s clearest example of institutional decay.

California’s gross domestic product exceeds that of all but a handful of sovereign countries. The state is the birthplace of transformative technologies and the global capital of entertainment. Yet beneath the glossy surface of Silicon Valley valuations and Hollywood glamour lies a political order that has grown increasingly authoritarian, opaque, and self-serving.

The state is no longer governed by competing visions of the public good. It is controlled by a single party that has captured every lever of institutional power.

Read it.

All they had to do was find a Democrat man who is somewhat masculine but doesn’t have a Nazi tattoo and never said he would rape home intruders but “not in a gay way.”

They couldn’t do it. They ignored the bad stuff and decided he was the manly man that Democrats needed.

There is something very Bernie-esque about the whole thing.

Read it.

My, what a surprise.

Read it.

My, what a surprise.

Read it.

Tim Walz, a Democrat, to the Justice Department for a criminal investigation.

A report of the House Oversight Committee released Monday alleges Walz and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison were “aware of widespread taxpayer fraud in federally funded social programs for years” but did not attempt to stop it.

“Minnesota state officials are not above the law, and if they facilitated fraud, lied under oath about what they knew, or harassed and intimidated whistleblowers, they must face justice,” Vance said Monday on X.

Read it.

James Talarico, the most insanely leftist candidate to ever run in a statewide election in Texas, has decided that it’s important to pretend to be a moderate Democrat in his face-off against Ken Paxton.

I would encourage every vegetarian in Texas to run for public office if it means that they have to eat barbecue in public.

ATQUE: Playskool Introduces ‘My First Hobo Camp’ For California Children (Babylon Bee)

Read it.

The current problems for the Democrats can be summarized in four words.

You won’t lose you favorite doctor due to Obamacare.

We don’t believe you.

Trump supporters are a “Basket of Deplorables”.

We don’t believe you.

There was nothing scandalous in Hillary’s 30,000 deleted emails.

We don’t believe you.

The Clinton Family Charity raising money from foreign interests while Hillary was Secretary of State had nothing to do with Hillary’s decision to use a private server for all her emails.

We don’t believe you.

The Foundry.

Delayed vote tallies in Calfornia are attributable to the vote-by-mail system and weeklong deadlines for receiving ballots, which undermines confidence in results, election experts say.

Tuesday is the deadline for the last of California’s ballots to arrive, where about 80% vote by mail and about 40% of ballots arrive after Election Day in the nation’s most populous state. These are among the factors that contribute to repeatedly delayed results.

On Sunday, it appeared that Republican mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt would fall out of contention for the general election after several days of appearing in the top two vote recipients along with L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, a Democrat. Another Democratic candidate, Nithya Raman, appeared to overtake Pratt for second place to face Bass in the general election. The state’s primaries allow the top two vote-getters, rather than party nominees, to advance to the general election.

California also doesn’t allow local jurisdictions to require voter ID, and allows 22 days for “curing” ballots. Curing is when a voter’s ballot needs to be corrected or clarified to count, such as fixing illegible marks on the ballot or inserting a missing signature on the ballot envelope.

Tim Pool explains it all to you.

Similar apparent flips have occured in previous elections in the state, including in races for the U.S. House of Representatives. On election night in 2024, Republican incumbent Rep. Michelle Steel was leading, but that lead turned into a loss days later as Democrat Derek Tran won the seat 22 days after the election.

That’s not suspicious at all. Perish the thought.

ATQUE: On the LA vote-counting process that is giving LA two leftist Democrats to choose from for mayor (The New Neo).

Read it.

But only among the reality-based community.

“It’s not the people who vote that count, it’s the people who count the votes.” – Stalin

Read it.

On the 82nd anniversary of D-Day, the leader of the Virginia Senate budget conference decided to start firing on her political opponents from her fortified bunkers on the hill she has occupied, while the governor tries to take the political beach from her and her allies with covert operations.

Here’s where the fun begins.

Saturday, rather than spend time sharing stories of locals who were part of the landing operation in France 82 years ago, Senate conference leader Louise Lucas took out her social media flamethrower.

In response to a post by Sen. Scott Surovell decrying the suggestion of a “DC-style continuing resolution,” the Senate president pro tempore wrote, “we had a meeting with ‘Data Center Diva’ [Gov. Abigail Spanberger] and she agrees with ‘Amazon Don’ (House Speaker Don Scott) who doesn’t want to impact the richest corporations in America!”

Read it.

Jacob Soboroff is an anchor on MSNBC/MSNOW, one of the chosen media outlets for Democrat propaganda.

He says everything is totally fine and there’s nothing to see here. DEMOCRACY IN ACTION!

Meanwhile:

Nithya Raman is the Zohran Mamdani of Los Angeles. She is an extremely wealthy champagne socialist who wants Los Angeles to become even more “progressive” than it has under current Democratic Mayor Karen Bass.

She was a solid 8 points behind Republican reality star Spencer Pratt on Election Day.

As many people anticipated, over the last week, the distant 3rd-place Raman has managed to overcome her deficit despite her dismal polling and debate performance.

You can see how Raman SURGED in the mail-in count.

My, what a surprise. Aren’t you surprised? I’m sure surprised.

UPDATE: California Reminds Voters There Are Just 30 Days Left To Vote In Last Tuesday’s Election  (Babylon Bee)

Read it.

It’s amazing what can happen when attorneys get desperate enough. In the case of Cook County Circuit Judge James R. Brown, they got pretty desperate.

The controversy erupted when Judge Brown wrote a caustic piece, after he had retired from his position, protesting the kinds of misbehaviors he saw in government when he wrote a column for John Kass in Chicago:

Please note that he was a retired judge when he wrote this column. After he had been retired for five years, the Illinois Supreme Court called on him to serve a temporary assignment in Cook County’s traffic courts due to an overload of cases.

Of course, the Democrats were enraged. When the Cook County Bar Association and the Chicago Council of Lawyers demanded that the Illinois Supreme Court rescind Brown’s appointment, they did. They claimed that he had “clearly violated” the code of conduct (even though he had written the column earlier during his retirement).

Judge Brown was not going to take his removal lying down, and filed suit in federal court, seeking a court order to reverse the state high court’s decision to abruptly toss him from the bench:

Read it.

California’s punishing cost of living isn’t inevitable—it’s policy-driven. Burdensome regulations have sent housing and energy prices soaring, crushing incomes and deepening poverty. Smarter deregulation could bring back the Golden State’s long-lost affordability and historic role as a “land of opportunity.”

In 2024, California had a poverty rate of 17.7%, meaning about 7 million people were unable to afford basic necessities, well above the national rate of 10.6%. Child poverty nearly tripled from 7.5% in 2021 to 18.6% in 2024. The state also reports the nation’s largest homeless population of 187,084 individuals in 2024.

These outcomes stem from an economy burdened by regulations, particularly those governing housing supply and energy production, which inflate costs and trap Californians in cycles of poverty.

Read it.

When the next governor—Democrat Gavin Newsom—was sworn into office in January 2019, it seemed almost a certainty that during his tenure, the state’s population would exceed 40 million. But, according to the Census Bureau’s latest estimates, California’s population has not increased under Newsom, it has decreased.

In Newsom’s first two years, California’s population made miniscule gains. From 2018 to 2019, it grew from 39,437,463 to 39,437,610—an increase of a mere 147. In 2020, it hit 39,527,808—an increase of 90,198. Then in 2021 and 2022, it dropped—first to 39,152,927 and then to 39,125,347. In 2023, it moved up again slightly, but in the two years after that it dropped again, hitting 39,355,309 in 2025.

That was down 82,301 from the 39,437,610 who inhabited the state in 2019, the year Newsom took office.

What has happened under Newsom to reverse California’s long-term trend in population growth?