California Politics 360 Full Episode | Prop 50 election, CalFresh cuts, federal agents in the Bay Area
See the latest discussion of top California policy issues on Oct. 26, 2025.
*** major federal immigration operation centered on the Bay Area. Reaction to the move to bring in more than 100 federal agents. We are days from the special election here in California, people decide. That’s why we put citizens in charge of redistricting. California, the whole nation is counting on you. Democracy is on ballot November 4th. The future of California’s congressional maps now in the hands of voters. It’s temporary, it’s transparent, and it’s democratic. I think gerrymandering is wrong. I think gerrymandering is *** plague on democracy. Thanks for joining us for California Politics 360. I’m Ashley Zavala. We are 9 days out from the special election in November. California voters are deciding whether to adopt new US House district maps. Democrats quickly redrew those maps this summer in what they’ve said is an effort to counteract President Donald Trump’s effort. The president earlier this summer pushed other states to add more Republican congressional seats. The campaigns are making *** final push to sway voters this week. Governor Gavin Newsom, who is spearheading the Yes on 50 campaign, was joined by former President Barack Obama. We’re fighting fire with fire. We’re not fighting with one hand tied behind our back, and we move forward in *** way that I don’t think the president or members of Congress expected. The essence of Prop 50 is to say. That if you are going to play that game. Then we are going to try to counteract that abuse of the system. And as *** consequence of California’s actions, we have *** chance at least to create *** level playing field in the upcoming midterm elections. On the no side, former governor Arnold Schwarzenegger spoke against the midterm redistricting at *** USC event last month, and I think it is very important that we turn this around. And did we show People power Because the people can turn this around. Republican Representative Kevin Kiley’s seat is targeted in the new maps. He has been outspoken against mid-decade redistricting, whether it be in California or any other state in the US. I have offered *** bill that would put all of this to an end that would say no state in the country. Should redo its map in the middle of the decade. It would ban mid-decade gerrymanders, and it is not too late to pass that bill. So I continue to urge the Speaker to bring that bill to the floor, and I believe honestly that if it, if it did receive *** vote, it would receive broad bipartisan support. And meanwhile Democratic US Senator Alex Padilla introduced *** similar bill to Kyle’s in the Senate, but both proposals are stalled in Congress. With that, some states are moving forward with approving new congressional maps. Curtis Ming shows us which ones. In August, Texas lawmakers approved *** new map of congressional districts designed to send 5 Republicans to Capitol Hill. Democrats in California quickly responded, drawing new districts here. But here in California, voters have to approve the maps, not just lawmakers. Then in September, Missouri Republicans passed new maps to give that party an edge in one. And this week, North Carolina passed *** new congressional map that could give Republicans one more seat. During *** debate, one lawmaker asked what changed that warranted new districts, and here was the response. Recent incident is that California redrew its maps to add 4 Democrats to Congress, and we do not intend to let that go unanswered. Well, late this week, Virginia Democrats announced they are planning to redraw their maps. Two states were court ordered to redraw maps. Ohio and Utah. Utah’s legislature has already approved their maps. Ohio is working on it, and there are more states now talking about potential redistricting. Democratic lawmakers in Maryland and Illinois both talking about new maps, and so are Republican lawmakers in Kansas and Indiana, all ahead of the 2026 midterm election. Ashley. Thank you Curtis. Back to California, where voters again are deciding if the new Democratic drawn map should take effect with *** yes vote on Prop 50, or if they vote no, it would keep the current maps in place which were designed by the independent California Citizens Redistricting Commission. Those maps were drawn after the 2020 census. We are joined now by two members of that independent redistricting commission. Republican Neil Fornashari, who leads the commission now, and Democrat Cynthia Dye, who is on the state’s inaugural commission in 2010, thank you both so much for being here. Thank you for having us. Neil, I want to start with you first with the current commission. What are conversations like right now among members with Prop 50 hanging in the balance? Yeah, we’ve had *** number of conversations about Prop 50. I just, I happened to be chair when this all came out. Uh, we put together *** statement, uh, by the commission, um, prior to meeting we met, you know, we’ve, we’ve had *** number of conversations. We have folks on, on both sides, um, you know, people are, are free to have their opinions and, and, uh, they have their First Amendment rights to have their different opinions. Um, I will say that, um, 7 of us have written an op ed that will be hopefully published soon. Uh, opposing Prop 50, um, so, but the commission is divided is that the commission is divided, yes, but, you know, there are 3 folks that have spoken out for yes and 7 of us at this point have spoken out against, um. But we all get along, you know, and work through things the way the same way we work through making the maps. Cynthia, as *** Democrat, what do you make of the messaging though on the yes on 50 side which the yes campaign is basically painting this as *** referendum against President Donald Trump, who has been agitating Democrats in the state? Well, you know, *** lot of my friends are confused about 50 and for good reason. 50 says that. It will protect democracy and yet it’s setting aside *** citizen drawn map that 35,000 Californians participated in, uh, and silences California communities, which is essentially undemocratic. um it says it will stop Trump yet on November 5th Trump will still be president. He will still be ruling by executive order. He will still be largely ignoring the agencies that Congress has created the. Um, appropriations that they’ve made, uh, and he will still be testing the limits of the judicial system, so it won’t do that either and the math doesn’t work out as uh your fellow reporter said, uh, there are way more red, you know, states that control map drawing than than blue states, so it won’t even accomplish that. So to you this could be *** lost cause. I don’t think it’s *** lost cause, but I think 50 is the wrong response. I mean, if the goal is to win back Congress, why would the legislature, uh, put *** proposition on that will gain 3 to 5 seats because 5 is not guaranteed, uh, when Neal’s commission put in place over *** dozen fair and competitive districts. Why cap it? For both of you this week there was *** proposed ballot initiative that entered circulation here in California that would prohibit the state lawmakers who voted to put Prop 50 on the ballot from running for elected office in California that includes Congress, that includes statewide office, that includes local offices. Is that fair to you, Neil? It’s absolutely fair to me that’s the those are the same rules that apply to us as commissioners. We we’re not allowed to run for local or local office or appointed local office for 5 years and no statewide offices for 10 years, so. The same rules should apply. Cynthia, I totally agree. I mean, we want to get rid of the self dealing that’s going on where politicians are are selecting their voters rather than the other way around, and this way they will not be able to run in the districts they just designed for themselves. The proponents of this, the yes campaign, essentially they’re saying this is temporary. How confident are you that this is temporary? I’m not confident at all. It’s, it’s temporary till the next crisis. The, uh, you know, 2030, California is gonna lose between 3 and 6 congressional seats, so that’s next crisis up. Cynthia, I think the crisis will come even sooner. The Supreme Court is actually considering potentially dismantling the Voting Rights Act, and Prop 50 already splinters black and brown brown communities and and fast growing Asian communities, and pretty soon, uh, nobody will have *** representative that they can elect. Cynthia and you know, we really appreciate your time. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for having us. Next on California Politics 360, *** major immigration operation called off in the Bay Area. What sparked President Trump to change his tune on immigration enforcement in the Golden State? *** planned immigration operation in the Bay Area has been called off. More than 100 federal agents were sent to the Coast Guard base in Alameda. It was seen as *** precursor to National Guard troops being sent to San Francisco, but President Donald Trump called that off late this week, saying the White House will continue to monitor the city. To dive into this issue at *** reporter roundtable today. We have Sophia Blag with the San Francisco Chronicle, Blake Jones with Politico, and Jeannie Kwang with Cal Matters. Thank you all three for joining us. Thanks for having us. Sophia, I want to start with you. We know Mayor Daniel Luri of San Francisco had *** productive conversation that apparently helped sway the. to go in this direction, but is there anything else that could have pushed the president to do this? Yeah, so one thing that the president actually mentioned, he posted about this conversation that he had with Laurie on his social media website Truth Social, and he also mentioned that he had had conversations with some tech leaders in San Francisco. Um, and I think another, uh, *** couple of other factors that might be at play here. One is that Laurie has been really careful, uh, during his tenure as San Francisco mayor not to antagonize the president. He’s really gone out of his way not to mention the president really at all, which has been in pretty stark contrast with other Democratic officials, including, for example, uh Barbara Lee, who is the mayor of Oakland. You know, very close to San Francisco, she’s been very critical. Another thing that the president did not mention in his true social posts, I do not know if this was on his mind, but if he had, you know, called for *** big surge in immigration enforcement, and had *** lot of federal agents on the ground, it could have played into, uh, this argument that Gavin Newsom has been making about Prop 50. Uh, you know, and this election that’s coming up that the president is trying to interfere. That’s what the governor keeps saying. And if you have *** bunch of federal agents in California, maybe that plays into the governor’s messaging and coupled with Laurie’s non-combative stance, Blake, I mean. That’s *** contrast from several other Democratic leaders in this state. I mean, how likely do you see other Democrats taking *** cue from Laurie, not poking the bear in essence with President Donald Trump? I’m not sure I see *** lot of Democrats in California following this mold. I mean, we’ve already seen that Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass took *** very different approach when the National Guard was deployed to her city. She was extremely pointed in her criticisms of the president at the time. And you know we’ve also seen Governor Gavin Newsom has not let up in his criticism whatsoever, uh, in *** recent piece that um some of my colleagues worked on Newsom’s communications advisor Bob Saaday, you know, um, talked about the idea of this obsession among. Democrats that they might be able to kiss up to Trump and the governor’s administration just doesn’t believe that that is an effective way to deal with him. Jeannie, sticking with that, Governor Newsom, do you see him changing his approach to the president at any point? You know, I think in the short term I don’t see that really happening. I mean he’s in fight mode right now. We saw the way that he tried to play nice with the president at the beginning of this year, you know, at the start of the presidency, and it’s only deteriorated since then, um, starting, you know, in June when immigration raids were rattling Los Angeles at that point, Newsom started really getting back into that fighting spirit. He was, you know, begging, uh, threatening to to get arrested by. The federal administration and and now that Prop 50 is on the ballot, you know, I’m really glad Sofia brought that up. I think that is *** way for for him to give voters something actionable to fight back against the Trump administration and so I think everything is kind of framed around that right now. You saw him this week as the deployment of the federal agents was still imminent. He was out there saying like this is *** way to intimidate people going into the election. He wasn’t even saying it was necessarily about. enforcement, um, so I think I, I don’t see him backing down at the moment. I think he’s really taken this uh fighting stance and stride and and I think that’s that’s his kind of way forward for now. Whoever wants to take this, we have about *** minute left, but I do want to talk about the news in San Francisco also this week that state senator Scott Weiner, one who is known for provoking the president publicly announced that he’s running for Nancy Pelosi’s seat. Uh, what do you make of this in the city like? Yeah, I mean this is *** long time coming. Senator Weiner has been preparing for this for many years, um, but it does show that um some of the, you know, maybe um momentum that younger Democrats are feeling, uh, to oust older incumbents has finally come to *** head, and this has been um *** pretty momentous year for Senator Weiner. He’s passed some major housing legislation and as other primary challengers were getting into the race, I think that that. him in the direction of finally moving and doing something he previously said he wouldn’t do, which is potentially running against Nancy Pelosi, although she hasn’t announced her plans for 2026. OK, Jeannie, Sophia Blake, we appreciate you all so much for being here. Thank you. Thank you. Well, next on California Politics 360, as the government shutdown continues, so does uncertainty around the future of CalFresh. What’s at risk for the millions of Californians who depend on those benefits? The impacts of the government shutdown are being felt across the country. Millions of Californians are at risk of not getting their federally funded food assistance. The executive director for the County Welfare Directors Association of California joins me now. Carlos Marcos III, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you. Carlos, with 5.5 million Californians relying On these food assistance benefits, what can they expect this upcoming month? Well, we are usually in the role of reassuring people about the continuity and accuracy of their benefits. These are core safety net programs after all. They are some of the greatest tools that we have as *** state to fight and reduce poverty. But we need to sound the alarm as the administrators of these programs at this moment in time because the consequences are significant, not just for recipients but for the broader economy and so there are really I think 3 things we want to share with your viewers and those who rely on benefits number 1. That they are entitled to back benefits even if there is *** disruption or delay in November benefits which looks imminent at this point given the inaction of the federal government to that throughout the month of November if they have *** remaining balance on their EBT cards, they should feel free to use those benefits, use that card in November if they have anything carried over. From October and then 3, if folks are looking to still apply for CalFresh benefits, we are encouraging people to continue to apply and if they’re eligible, those benefits will eventually be issued to them and to their families when the federal government reopens. We really want to make sure folks understand what’s at stake here for those who don’t directly benefit off of this program. What are the ripple effects outside of this essentially? They’re significant, and for folks, for individuals, for families who’ve never had to rely on public assistance, they may not realize the incredible sort of impact on the economy. That the loss in benefits actually triggers 25,000 retailers in California are authorized as SNAP authorizers. These are, you know, grocery stores and sometimes even restaurants that are going to lose revenue. 175,000 jobs are generated based on Snap and CalFresh revenue on an annual basis. $23 billion in economic activity, and that’s because for every dollar that. *** recipient spends on their EBT card on food, it’s um $1.50 that it produces for economic impacts, um, so, so the impacts are significant and go beyond these individuals, but you know these folks, these are folks who are seniors, these are people who have disabilities, these are children. 60% of folks who rely on CalFresh are working. Um, and so, um, these folks may very well be your neighbors, and we want to make sure people understand they can go to, um, CA foodbanks.org and identify *** food bank in their community to donate to at this time. All right, Carlos Marquez III, we really appreciate you coming in. Thank you. Thank you. Next on California Politics 360, *** look back at the history of special elections in California. Special elections in California are rare. Proposition 50 will be only the eighth since 1910. 1 of the oldest in the record books was the special election Governor Ronald Reagan called in November of 1973. That proposition failed. This is *** news clipping from the day after the election. The Public Policy Institute of California says the initiative would have cut property and income taxes and placed spending limits. Less than 50% of registered voters participated in that election. In the special elections since, voter turnout generally is lower than 50%. The two exceptions, the two efforts to recall *** California governor Gray Davis was recalled in 2003, and Gavin Newsom in 2021, who voters ended up keeping in office. In this election, voter turnout so far is at 17%. That is as of October 23rd. Voters still have more than *** week to turn their ballot in. Thank you for joining us for this week’s California Politics 360. We’ll see you right back here next Sunday.
California Politics 360 Full Episode | Prop 50 election, CalFresh cuts, federal agents in the Bay Area
See the latest discussion of top California policy issues on Oct. 26, 2025.
Updated: 12:23 PM PDT Oct 27, 2025
This week’s episode of California Politics 360 featured interviews with the Republican leader of California’s citizen-led Redistricting Commission, along with a Democrat who served on the state’s first commission, on Proposition 50. Political Director Ashley Zavala also spoke to the executive director of the County Welfare Directors Association of California about government shutdown impacts on food assistance programs like CalFresh. And a reporter roundtable focused on developments related to federal immigration agents’ arrival in the San Francisco Bay Area. Watch the full episode in the video above. See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel
This week’s episode of California Politics 360 featured interviews with the Republican leader of California’s citizen-led Redistricting Commission, along with a Democrat who served on the state’s first commission, on Proposition 50.
Political Director Ashley Zavala also spoke to the executive director of the County Welfare Directors Association of California about government shutdown impacts on food assistance programs like CalFresh.
And a reporter roundtable focused on developments related to federal immigration agents’ arrival in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Watch the full episode in the video above.
See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel