-- JFK Assassination Records -- final file dump scheduled for release today --
Is Donald Trump fighting the delta tunnels? No. But he won't pay for them, either
Sacramento Bee's DALE KASLER: "Is the Trump administration opposed to the Delta tunnels, Gov. Jerry Brown’s plan to remake the troubled estuary and improve water deliveries to the southern half of the state?"
"For a while Wednesday, it certainly looked that way. A top spokesman for the U.S. Interior Department, Russell Newell, told The Associated Press that “the Trump administration did not fund the project and chose to not move forward with it."
"Although officials have been downplaying the U.S. government’s potential involvement in the project for months, outright opposition from President Donald Trump could have been fatal to Brown’s $17.1 billion tunnels plan. The Interior Department needs to sign off on environmental reviews before the project can go forward."
UC, roiled by 1st Amendment controversies, to launch national free speech center
LA Times' TERESA WATANABE: "The University of California, where the free speech movement started and students now argue over how far unrestricted expression should go, announced plans Thursday to launch a national center to study 1st Amendment issues and step up education about them."
"There have been more serious issues about the 1st Amendment on campuses today than perhaps at any time since the free speech movement,” UC President Janet Napolitano said in an interview. “The students themselves are raising questions about free speech and does it apply to homophobic speech, does it apply to racist speech? We have to consider the student concerns but return to basic principles about what free speech means and how do we better educate students about the extent of the 1st Amendment."
"The National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement will be based at UC’s Washington, D.C., center, and will sponsor as many as eight fellows a year to research such issues as whether student views on free speech are changing and what role social media and political polarization play in shaping perspectives on the 1st Amendment."
Pelosi: Vote for the budget would make Republicans 'accomplices' in a California tax hike
McClatchy DC's EMILY CADEI: "After weeks of silence, California’s 14 Republican members of Congress will have to weigh in for the first time this week on a tax plan that could hit millions of Californians."
"Republicans vote Thursday on their budget, which paves the way for the party to advance its tax overhaul. As it’s currently framed, the overhaul would eliminate the state and local tax deduction, a write-off that disproportionately benefits taxpayers in high-tax, high-cost states like California. While the state’s Republicans have avoided taking a position on that proposal, Democrats are prepared to paint any Republicans voting for the budget as “accomplices” in the push to eliminate the deduction, warns House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi."
"It is really an urgent time for the state of California,” the powerful San Francisco-area congresswoman told McClatchy, noting that the state’s residents saved more than $100 billion in taxes by taking the deduction in 2015."
Weinstein Co. loses financial lifeline from Colony Capital
LA Times' RYAN FAUGHNDER: "Colony Capital is no longer providing a much-needed cash infusion for Weinstein Co., the latest sign that the beleaguered mini-studio may be headed for bankruptcy in the wake of sexual misconduct allegations against Harvey Weinstein."
"Thomas Barrack’s private equity firm last week entered an agreement with the New York-based film and television company to give capital that would stabilize the studio’s operations while Colony considered buying the company."
"The plan to supply cash to Weinstein Co. has been scrapped, said people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to comment. Colony may still buy some or all of the company, but the collapse of the deal leaves Weinstein Co. in need of another lifeline."
Suit tossed in Bay Area law enforcement misconduct scandal
The Chronicle's JENNA LYONS: "The young woman at the heart of a sprawling misconduct scandal involving multiple Bay Area law enforcement officers has dropped a lawsuit against Contra Costa County sheriff’s officials, weeks after a criminal case against a former deputy she said sexually exploited her was dismissed."
"U.S. District Judge Susan Illston dismissed the suit and ordered each party to bear its cost and fees, according to documents filed Monday in San Francisco federal court."
"The 20-year-old woman, who prefers to go by the name Jasmine and previously used the pseudonym Celeste Guap, filed the civil suit in August against Contra Costa County, naming Sheriff David Livingston and former sheriff’s Deputy Ricardo Perez as defendants."
The quiet crisis among African Americans: Pregnancy and childbirth are killing women at inexplicable rates
LA Times' ANN SIMMONS: "Three weeks after Cassaundra Lynn Perkins gave birth to premature twins, she returned to the hospital, feeling unwell. She phoned her mother from her hospital bed at 3:30 in the morning."
"I’m just not feeling good,” she said."
"Surely it was just another bout of the mysterious illness her daughter had been suffering from for most of her pregnancy, Cheryl Givens-Perkins thought as she rushed over to San Antonio’s North Central Baptist Hospital."
LAPD union joins national push for ban on gun accessories, better community relations
LA Times' KATE MATHER: "The Los Angeles Police Protective League has thrown its support behind a national effort to ban certain gun accessories and encourage police and professional sports teams to work together to improve encounters between officers and residents."
"The union that represents thousands of rank-and-file LAPD officers has joined several other big-city police unions and the San Francisco 49ers in the effort, which will formally be unveiled at a news conference Thursday morning."
"The organizations have pledged to work with lawmakers to ban armor-piercing ammunition, gun silencers and “bump stocks” — devices that landed on the national radar after a gunman used them in the Las Vegas massacre this month."
The Trump wing of the GOP is winning battles. But will it lose the war to keep the Senate in Republican hands?
LA Times' MARK Z. BARABAK/MICHAEL FINNEGAN: "Sen. Jeff Flake’s surprise decision against seeking reelection marked a major victory for Stephen K. Bannon and his pirate band of Republicans. But the larger question Wednesday was whether the insurgency will cost the GOP its thin majority on Capitol Hill."
"The fratricide that Bannon, a former White House advisor, is waging against President Trump’s critics threatens to undermine the party’s Senate hopefuls and has already lifted Democratic prospects, boosting the possibility of shaving the GOP’s 52-48 majority or eliminating it altogether."
"“It’s causing Republicans to spend money defending their own rather than focusing on the big target, which should be expanding the size of their governing majority,” said Scott Reed, chief political strategist for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, one of the citadels targeted by Bannon and his anti-establishment forces."
