Need a voting plan? Five steps to casting a ballot in California's election
Sacramento Bee's DIANA LAMBERT/DAN SMITH: "The election is on Tuesday, and you still haven't voted, or decided whether or how to vote. We're here to help."
"Step 1: Register."
READ MORE related to Primary Election: Six California election races to watch on Tuesday night -- Sacramento Bee's EMILY CADEI/TARYN LUNA/AMY CHANCE
Gavin Newsom returns money from a controversial GOP donor
Sacramento Bee's ANGELA HART: "At a "Gavin for Governor" fundraiser last summer hosted by Republican donors in Newport Beach, Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom accepted a $1,000 donation from a controversial Soviet émigré with an extensive history of misrepresenting his business dealings to investors and the U.S. Justice Department."
"Yuri Vanetik, a Southern California-based donor with ties to several California House Republicans, gave Newsom $1,000 last June, according to campaign finance records filed with the California Secretary of State's office. It appears Newsom accepted the contribution on June 6, when he was pictured sitting with Vanetik at the GOP-sponsored fundraiser. The campaign cash showed up on his campaign finance filings June 7."
"Newsom campaign spokesman Jason Kinney told The Sacramento Bee Saturday that the campaign would return the contribution, "effective immediately."
READ MORE related to State Politics: Gavin Newsom is looking out for No. 1. California Dems need to deal with it -- The Chronicle's WILLIE BROWN; Candidate, her father have spent millions to elect her California's Lt. Governor -- Sacramento Bee's Taryn Luna; Antonio Villaraigosa's chance to be California governor hinges on Latino vote -- The Chronicle's JOE GAROFOLI
With SF's slick campaign mailers, ridiculousness wins by a landslide
The Chronicle's HEATHER KNIGHT: "Good news, San Franciscans! By the time you go to bed on Tuesday, this tedious and uninspiring election will be over."
"We won’t yet know who will be the next mayor because mail-in ballots postmarked Tuesday will count, and tallying the results under the city’s ranked-choice voting system is expected to take at least several days."
Housing a defining issue in SF mayor's race
The Chronicle's JK DINEEN: "The late Mayor Ed Lee cast himself a housing champion, a tower crane-loving bureaucrat who not only put unprecedented resources into subsidized, affordable housing but also pushed more controversial market-rate towers and mid-rises that have reshaped neighborhoods from Hayes Valley to Rincon Hill to Dogpatch."
"None of the candidates running to replace Lee is such a straightforward promoter of any and all new residential development. Instead, they are taking nuanced positions to deal with a highly energized electorate that ranges from YIMBYs — the “Yes in My Backyard” movement, young newcomers who favor building the densest, tallest buildings wherever they can be squeezed in — to old-guard homeowners who blame the tech-propelled housing boom for everything from increased traffic to crowded trains, homeless encampments, and displacement of longtime residents and businesses."
California unions want to keep anti-labor activists from meeting new teachers and cops
Sacramento Bee's ADAM ASHTON: "California's public employee unions are backing a pack of bills that might help them hold on to members if the Supreme Court this summer issues a ruling that’s expected to deliver a serious blow to the finances for labor organizations."
"Two of the bills lay out standard guidelines governing how public agencies collect dues from union members. Both give unions time to call workers and try to change the minds of those who want to stop paying dues."
"One of the bills would require local governments to grant time off to union shop stewards. It requires the unions to reimburse government agencies, but local government lobbyists still have concerns about it."
OP-ED: Net Neutrality: Congress should step in
RICK BOUCHER in Capitol Weekly: "California has long been at the forefront of Internet innovation. Now California stands to be the leader in a different way, substituting litigation for innovation."
"If legislation pending in the California Senate that would impose state level network neutrality requirements passes, it will almost certainly be struck down by the courts. Net neutrality is an important principle — and it’s exclusively a federal issue. Current federal law prohibits state net neutrality regulation."
Golden State Killer suspect's DNA taken from car as he shopped at Hobby Lobby
The Chronicle's MELODY GUTIERREZ: "As police were closing in on a man they suspected of being the Golden State Killer, detectives took a DNA sample from their target’s car door handle while he shopped at a Hobby Lobby, according to arrest and search warrant records released Friday."
"A second DNA sample, from a tissue found in trash that Joseph James DeAngelo had put out for garbage pickup, confirmed for police that they had the right suspect, leading to his arrest in a case that had haunted law enforcement agencies around the state for more than three decades."
"The information in the arrest and search warrants was previously kept under seal, but Judge Michael Sweet of Sacramento County Superior Court sided with media outlets, including The Chronicle, that argued the documents should be released in the public interest."
Parkland shooting survivors to reveal 'super big' surprise announcement
Miami Herald's MONIQUE O MADAN: "Parkland shooting survivors are getting ready to reveal a "super big" secret announcement Monday morning."
"Though student leaders from the March For Our Lives movement have referred to the impromptu briefing online, they're remaining tight-lipped on what exactly they'll be unveiling."
"The event will be held at 10 a.m. at the Parkland Amphitheater in Florida."
Why LA Unified may face financial crisis even with a giant surplus this year
LA Times's JESSICA CALEFATI: "With more than half a billion dollars socked away for next school year, the Los Angeles Unified School District hardly seems just two years from financial ruin. It’s a scenario that is especially tough to swallow if you’re a low-wage worker seeking a raise or a teacher who wants smaller classes."
"But budget documents show that today’s $548-million surplus cannot be sustained — and that even basic services face steep, seemingly unavoidable cuts because of massive problems barreling the district’s way."
“There’s a disconnect between the rosy short-term picture and what we know is coming,” said board member Kelly Gonez."
Zoot Suit Riots: After 75 years, LA looks back on a violent summer
LA Times's MARISA GERBER: "The lights flickered on inside the California Theatre and a band of sailors tore up and down the aisles yanking young people from their seats by the lapels of their suit jackets."
"Inside the Spanish-language theater in downtown Los Angeles, the terrified crowd watched as uniformed men dragged people outside, beat them and stripped them down to their underwear."
"It was June of 1943 — the start of the Zoot Suit Riots — and Victor Silva was 12 years old. He’s 87 now but still clearly remembers what if felt like to sit in that theater. He can still feel the fear of watching a truck full of men in uniform barrel down 1st Street, searching for their next victim. The police didn’t seem to care, Silva noticed. Sometimes a black-and-white cruiser drove in front of sailors, as if to escort them."
Hunters Point shipyard soil scandal widens as analysis spots suspect parcels
The Chronicle's JASON FAGONE/CYNTHIA DIZIKES: "Land deemed free of harmful radioactivity and safe for the city to occupy has now come under question as the scandal over the purported cleanup of San Francisco’s biggest redevelopment site continues to grow."
"On four portions of the former Hunters Point Naval Shipyard — an EPA Superfund waste site — almost all of the radioactivity measurements that were used to confirm the soil’s safety are “suspect,” according to a newly released analysis by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and two state agencies."
"The measurements were collected by the Navy contractor Tetra Tech. The EPA discovered “a widespread pattern of practices that appear to show deliberate falsification.” The Navy earlier flagged signs of fraud in the same data."
READ MORE related to Energy & Environment: Proposition 68: Money for parks, water, environment -- JESSICA HICE in Capitol Weekly
Giuliani says Trump 'probably' has self-pardon but wouldn't use it
LA Times's LAURA KING: "President Trump probably has authority under the Constitution to pardon himself, his lawyer Rudy Giuliani asserted Sunday, but he said the president will not do so as he fights a special counsel investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election and whether Trump obstructed justice."
"Questions about the scope of Trump’s executive powers have intensified with the disclosure this weekend of a 20-page letter that the president’s former legal team sent to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III in January."
"The letter, which was first disclosed by the New York Times, claims the president has unchecked authority over federal investigations and could legally act to end them or “even exercise his power to pardon."
The assassination of RFK, as told 50 years later
LA Times's COLLEEN SHALBY/VANESSA MARTINEZ: "Robert F. Kennedy beamed."
“Now it’s on to Chicago and let’s win there!” The senator had won the California primary, a crucial step before the Democratic National Convention just two months away in Chicago. In the early morning hours of June 5, 1968, Kennedy held up his index and middle finger, flashing a “V” for victory sign at the crowd, and departed the stage of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles to the sound of chants."
"Within minutes, cheers gave way to screams."