Supreme Court rules Trump will stay on Colorado ballot despite Jan. 6 attack
The Chronicle's DAVID G. SAVAGE: "The Supreme Court ruled Monday that former President Trump may not be disqualified from appearing on state ballots despite allegations he “engaged in insurrection” after losing the 2020 election and thereby should be barred under the Constitution from holding office.
Reversing a ruling by Colorado judges, the high court said states do not have the authority to interpret the post-Civil War 14th Amendment or use it to remove from the state ballot a presidential candidate."
READ MORE -- Read: Supreme Court’s opinion keeping Trump on Colorado ballot -- CNN
California storm: Here’s how long rain and snow remain in the forecast
The Chronicle's ANTHONY EDWARDS: "The worst of a multiday blizzard is finally over in the Sierra Nevada in Lake Tahoe, but another storm on its heels is expected to drop more rain and snow in Northern California the next few days.
Far Northern California is expected to be hit hardest by the next storm, with an additional 1 to 2 feet of snow possible around Mount Shasta through Tuesday night. At the coast, 1 to 3 inches of rain is expected in Eureka, Crescent City and Mendocino County."
READ MORE -- Persistent Sierra blizzard forces Bay Area visitors into a waiting game -- BANG*Mercury News's WILL MCCARTHY and ETHAN BARON
Porter, Schiff and Lee make final Senate pitch across California, with Garvey nowhere to be seen
LAT's JULIA WICK, LAURA J. NELSON and BENJAMIN ORESKES: "With her signature minivan ensconced in the parking lot and an “I Voted” sticker freshly affixed to her magenta dress, Rep. Katie Porter stared down the scrum of reporters and TV cameras crowded into her Irvine polling place.
“Wait,” she paused, turning back toward the woman running the vote center. “Am I able to answer these questions here, or do you want me to step outside if they’re campaign-related?”"
CALMatters's JUSTO ROBLES: "California lawmakers are considering a bill that would expand language assistance and election services to immigrants who don’t speak English fluently, but a group representing voter registrars throughout the state says it will cost counties too much money.
California has the nation’s highest proportion of households that speak languages other than English. Nearly 3 million voting age Californians have limited English knowledge."
Exclusive: Groups seeking ouster of Alameda DA Pamela Price to submit recall signatures
The Chronicle's LAURA WAXMANN and RACHEL SWAN: "Groups seeking to remove Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price from office said they intend to submit 123,000 signatures to election officials Monday in an effort to set a recall election in motion after months of rancorous debate about crime and criminal justice in the East Bay.
Save Alameda for Everyone, one of two groups behind the recall effort, said its members collected more than the 73,000 signatures of Alameda County residents required to initiate a recall in case some are invalidated. The group described itself in a statement to the Chronicle as a “broad” group of concerned citizens “who have come together in the face of rising crime and a failure by DA Price to hold perpetrators accountable.”"
Lawmaker wants longer state hospital stays for violent offenders following Chinatown stabbing
The Chronicle's SOPHIA BOLLAG: "People with severe mental illness who commit violent crimes could be kept in state mental hospitals longer to allow the state to better plan for continued treatment after their release under a bill by a San Francisco lawmaker.
Assembly Member Matt Haney, a Democrat, said he introduced the legislation in response to a Chronicle column published last year that detailed the circumstances leading up to a Chinatown bakery stabbing. Haney said Mayor London Breed’s office and the San Francisco Department of Public Health sent him the column and asked him to introduce a bill to address the problems it revealed.
Why California election workers are returning after COVID and conspiracy theories
CALMatters's SAMEEA KAMAL: "Between COVID-19 and election fraud conspiracy theories since 2020, it has been a tumultuous time for California’s election workers.
The state lost 15% of its election officials between the November 2020 election and July 2021, according to the California Voter Foundation, which documented incidents of threats, harassment and stress. While not all left due to safety concerns, more than half of California counties have a new registrar of voters since 2020, compared to 17% turnover between 2016 and 2020."
Time to end the top two primary (OP-ED)
Capitol Weekly's STEVEN MAVIGLIO: " There will be another primary election on Tuesday, and the result will be another indictment of this state’s failed top-two primary experiment.
Voter turnout will be abysmal, there will likely be a quirky result somewhere in which the party that holds a plurality of voters in a given political district will not advance a candidate to the general election, and the biggest question to be answered will be whether reverse psychology has again proven to be an effective campaign strategy."
Voter Guide 2024: California and S.F. Bay Area primary election
The Chronicle's STAFF: "Election season is here, as Californians prepare to cast their votes in the March 2024 primary. Beyond the presidential primary, which may not present too many surprises for California, there are numerous state and local races down the ballot on which voters will need to read up and make a decision.
California is facing a once-in-a-generation U.S. Senate race, with several prominent candidates."
California’s most reliable source for telework data could soon vanish as program loses funding
Sacramento Bee's MAYA MILLER: "The future of California’s telework compliance office is murky as many state employees — for many, much to their dismay — begin returning to their offices this month.
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s 2024-25 budget includes no funding for the state’s Telework Compliance Office, housed within the Department of General Services. The office oversaw the rollout of telework during the COVID-19 pandemic and is best known for publishing state telework data on an online portal."
Addressing the opioid crisis: a call to action for California’s veterans (OP-ED)
Capitol Weekly's NICK BUSSE: "The opioid epidemic in California is an urgent matter that requires immediate action, particularly with regards to its effects on veterans and their families.
As a military veteran myself, I understand firsthand the challenges and struggles that many of our servicemen and women face, both on the battlefield and upon returning home. It is imperative that we address this crisis head-on and ensure that our veterans are adequately supported and protected from the devastating effects of opioid addiction."
Rural California schools are desperate for state help, from special education to construction
CALMatters's CAROLYN JONES: "When Denise Massey’s daughter was 6 years old, she put the girl, who has Down Syndrome, on a van every morning for speech therapy in El Centro: 100 miles round trip, sometimes braving 120-degree heat, monsoons and severe dust storms known in the desert as haboobs.
Thirteen years later she’s still making that daily trek, because her Imperial County school district is so small it can’t offer a full gamut of special education services, and so remote that there’s nothing closer."
Despite college aspirations, Native American students find it hard to leave home
CALMatters's CAROLYN JONES: "Dasan Lynch, a junior at San Pasqual Valley High, clearly envisions his future: He wants to go to college, play sports and pursue a career in law enforcement, like his great-grandfather.
That’ll be the easy part. The hard part will be saying goodbye."
California’s fast food workers are getting a raise. But the labor-industry truce is fraying
CALMatters's JEANNE KUANG: "Both sides billed the high-profile California fast food deal last year as a resolution to two years of escalating political tensions.
One of workers’ biggest wins in the Legislature during “hot labor summer,” the agreement in the session’s final week resulted in a minimum wage hike for employees and some guarantees for companies. In exchange, the industry agreed to stop fighting the issue at the ballot box and lawmakers backed off on even stricter regulations."
After years of rapid growth, California’s almond industry struggles amid low prices
LAT's IAN JAMES: "For much of the last decade, almonds have been such a lucrative crop that growers and investment firms have poured money into planting new orchards across vast stretches of California farmland.
Now, the almond boom has fizzled and the industry has entered a slump. Prices have dropped over the last several years, and the state’s total almond acreage has started to decrease as growers have begun to tear out orchards and plant other crops."
Cute sheep are everywhere in Wine Country. Some say the trend has gone too far
The Chronicle's ESTHER MOBLEY: "Driving around Napa and Sonoma this time of year, you’re bound to see some adorable visitors roaming among the grapevines.
Sheep have become an inescapable fixture of Wine Country in the winter, prized for their natural mowing and fertilizing abilities. Instead of running a diesel-fueled tractor through the vineyard or spraying herbicide on sprouting weeds, a vintner can simply let loose a hungry herd. The ecological advantage, compared to these mechanical and chemical methods, is clear."
Why the CEO of the world’s biggest PR firm is optimistic about S.F. and AI
The Chronicle's ROLAND LI: "The head of the world’s biggest public relations firm is seeing a positive shift in San Francisco.
Major challenges around remote work, homelessness and a slow pandemic recovery remain, but Richard Edelman, CEO of Edelman, is noticing a more upbeat narrative."
A heated custody battle over a transgender child in California stokes a viral debate
LAT's KEVIN RECTOR and BRITTNY MEJIA: "Conservative social media influencer Chris Elston — who goes by the handle “Billboard Chris” and travels the country denouncing medical treatment for transgender youth — posted a video to his hundreds of thousands of followers in late 2023.
Elston was in Phoenix at AmericaFest, a conservative conference hosted by the right-wing group Turning Point USA, and wearing a sign across his chest that read: “Children Cannot Consent to Puberty Blockers.”"
The return to office has stagnated. Here’s what that means for the future of Bay Area housing prices
The Chronicle's CHRISTIAN LEONARD: "Bay Area offices aren’t getting any fuller.
While record-high vacancies are already causing San Francisco’s office prices to drop, they’re also reshaping where workers look for homes — and the cost of buying one."
Here’s a first look at California’s massive high-speed rail stations
The Chronicle's RICARDO CANO: "California’s high-speed rail stations in the Central Valley will be massive, with wide station platforms and concourses, and surrounded by spacious outdoor plazas and parking lots, according to new project renderings.
Up until now, it has been difficult to visualize the bullet train stations planned in Merced, Fresno, Bakersfield and near Hanford under the decades-long rail project. But new renderings and schematic designs unveiled by the California High-Speed Rail Authority give, for the first time, a sense of the stations’ sheer scale, as well as how future patrons will interact with the facilities."
S.F.’s most dangerous intersections are concentrated in one part of the city
The Chronicle's DANIELLE ECHEVERRIA and SRIHARSHA DEVULAPALLI: "Despite a 10-year, citywide push to reduce traffic deaths through an initiative called Vision Zero, San Francisco streets in general haven’t gotten that much safer, city data shows, and intersections where streets converge are hot spots for crashes.
The Chronicle analyzed city data on traffic collisions involving vehicles, bikes and pedestrians resulting in injuries or death for the past 10 years. Busy downtown streets and those near freeway on- and off-ramps tended to have a higher volume of crashes than the city’s smaller, more residential streets. Data also showed most collisions are caused by speeding, which came as no surprise to street safety advocates."
Former Trump accountant Allen Weisselberg surrenders on possible new charges after fraud trial
USA Today's BART JANSEN: "Allen Weisselberg, the former chief financial officer for the Trump Organization, surrendered Monday at the Manhattan district attorney's office. Weisselberg was under investigation for possible perjury charges for lying at former President Donald Trump's civil fraud trial, according to the prosecutor's office.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office didn't immediately disclose the potential new charges against Weisselberg."