Responding to deep concerns about sexual violence at California’s college campuses, the state Legislature unanimously passed two bills in recent weeks. But Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed one of the measures, the second straight year he has surprised advocates of a crackdown on campus sexual misconduct.

Assembly Bill 1896 – introduced by Assemblywoman Sabrina Cervantes, D-Riverside – was spurred by concern that vague language in the state Education Code might have required that crisis counselors at public or private colleges disclose to law enforcement authorities their knowledge of criminal allegations.

Counselors in other settings who hear about alleged sexual violence are generally given guarantees under state law allowing them to communicate confidentially with victims. AB1896 extends that protection to campus counselors. It was supported by the American Association of University Women of California, the California Faculty Association, the California State Student Association and the California State University system.

Brown signed the bill on July 18.

In a statement, Cervantes said she was “elated” that the governor and her fellow lawmakers recognized the “strong need for sexual assault counselors to provide a safe environment and appropriate assistance for survivors.”

But a different fate awaited Assembly Bill 2070, by Assemblywoman Eloise Gomez Reyes, D-Grand Terrace, even though it had many of the same college organization supporters as AB1896 and some significant backing from such outside groups as the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and the California chapter of the National Association of Social Workers.

It would have required each CSU, UC and California Community College campus to “implement comprehensive prevention and outreach programs addressing sexual violence, domestic violence, dating violence and stalking.” The bill would have expanded what’s covered on these topics in orientation sessions for incoming students to include “intimate partner and dating violence.”

There is no evidence the measure faced any criticism in the deliberation process. But the Los Angeles Times reported that Brown vetoed AB2070 on July 18 because he considered it to be duplicative of requirements already included in state law. The governor also said he wants to see a pending report from a panel of experts on campus policies on sexual violence before changing state law.

Brown only prominent Dem to question Obama rules

That panel was appointed last year after Brown vetoed Senate Bill 169 by Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson, D-Santa Barbara.

That measure was far more sweeping than the bills Brown decided on this month. It would have written into state law some of the federal regulations on campus sexual violence created by the Obama administration. Jackson introduced the bill after reports that the Trump administration would scrap the rules, which proved correct.

The Obama administration rules were controversial in civil liberty circles. Critics said they led to limits on due process for students accused of sexual misconduct by encouraging colleges to lower their standards in determining guilt and by limiting how vigorously the accused could present a defense.

But activists said the rules, based on the federal Title 9 law requiring equal treatment of the sexes, had a positive effect on campuses – promoting an atmosphere in which victims were more likely to come forward in the belief they would be treated fairly and humanely.

Brown was not persuaded. He wrote that “thoughtful legal minds have increasingly questioned whether federal and state actions to prevent and redress sexual harassment and assault – well-intentioned as they are – have also unintentionally resulted in some colleges’ failure to uphold due process for accused students. … We have no insight into how many formal investigations result in expulsion, what circumstances lead to expulsion, or whether there is disproportionate impact on race or ethnicity.”

The Atlantic magazine reported in October that Brown appeared to be “the first prominent Democratic elected official” to raise fairness concerns about the Obama rules.

In San Jose, where classes began last week, dozens of teaching posts were vacant all summer in East Union High School District, especially in high-demand fields such as special education, math, science and speech therapy. A significant portion of the district’s 27,000 students are likely to end up being taught by job candidates who would normally be rejected because they lacked proper credentials.

Districts can use waivers of minimum requirements in emergencies. According to a San Jose Mercury-News report, the number of teachers given temporary credentials in California schools went from under 5,000 in the 2012-13 school year to 9,900 in 2015-16, the last year for which complete figures are available. That’s nearly two-thirds of the regular teacher certifications issued during the same period – a sharp change from previous eras.

Districts with deep-pockets in wealthy Silicon Valley communities have mostly been able to fill positions. But Oakland Unified has been unable to fill vacancies for special education teachers despite offering $1,000 bonuses to new hires, and has struggled to fill other teacher vacancies as well.

A San Francisco Chronicle report detailed 10 other area districts with teacher openings. San Francisco Unified had the most with 61.

District wants to be housing developer, landlord

The severity of the problem is causing districts to consider ideas that once would have seemed unlikely for a public school system. In Alameda Unified, a proposal to have the district act as the developer and then the landlord of a 70-unit apartment complex for district employees with moderate salaries has won initial OKs. It was developed after an employee survey showed nearly one in five were considering quitting and moving because of the cost of housing.

In San Mateo County, it is county officials taking the lead.

Using $5 million in county seed money, the San Mateo County Housing Endowment and Regional Trust nonprofit plans to begin offering loans to local school districts to help them build housing that teachers can afford. The funds come from a half-cent county sales tax approved by voters last fall to help deal with housing issues.

Skeptics who note the average cost of a San Mateo County home is $1.2 million and the average starting pay of teachers is $50,000 question how much help the county grant will really bring. But some local government officeholders say it’s just the start of ambitious efforts to address a worsening crisis.

In the Legislature, the same dynamic holds for Assembly Bill 45 by Assemblyman Tony Thurmond, a Democrat from the Bay Area town of Richmond. It would establish a $25 million state program providing grants to qualified districts to help build housing for district employees, as well as provide loans up to $10 million to developers to build affordable shelter for district employees. With affordable housing units costing at least $300,000 in most urban areas, critics say Thurmond’s proposal wouldn’t change the status quo of the region’s housing crisis.

But like the San Mateo County program, it has its fans – including one far from the Bay Area. Riverside County school Superintendent Judy White told the Southern California News Group she thinks Richmond’s proposal can help “eliminate or minimize housing as a barrier to bringing qualified teachers to our area, that will help us fill needed positions.”

White believes AB45 could be a good vehicle to create her concept of “teacher villages” in Riverside County. Her proposal was the topic of a flattering March story in USA Today.

AB45 passed the Assembly in May and has won approval from two Senate committees, with all votes mostly along party lines.

California’s funding of education has gone from $50.4 billion in the fiscal year that ended in 2012 to $74.5 billion for the current fiscal year – a

Nevertheless, this summer has seen a steady stream of stories from school districts up and down the state warning of tight budgets, coming layoffs and worse. Ron Bennett, CEO of School Services of California, which advises more than 85 percent of the state’s nearly 1,000 districts, told the Bay Area News Group that one-third of districts face deficit spending in the 2018-19 school year and two-thirds do in 2019-20.

The common problem facing all districts is the phased-in cost of the 2014 bailout of the California State Teachers’ Retirement System. Gov. Jerry Brown and state lawmakers agreed to a plan in which school districts would increase their contributions by 132 percent from 2014-15 to 2020-21 – picking up 70 percent of the cost of the bailout, with the state general fund and teachers covering the rest. This is accomplished by gradually raising district’s pension contributions from 8.25 percent of teacher pay to 19.1 percent of pay, which sharply increases compensation costs that already go up annually no matter what because California teachers typically get “step” raises of 3.5 percent to 4 percent in 15 of their first 20 years in the classroom.

The next most common problem is declining enrollment. ADA – average daily attendance – is the fundamental formula determining how much money the state gives each school district. While California’s population continues to inch up, in December, its birth rate fell to a historic low. Urban, suburban and rural districts have all been buffeted as a result.

Teacher pay raises add to fiscal stress

Exacerbating these two structural problems is the fact that after the state’s 2008-2012 revenue recession ended, politically powerful local teachers unions won substantial pay raises in many districts.

The most telling example: In the state’s largest district, Los Angeles Unified, United Teachers Los Angeles was given a 10 percent pay raise in 2015.

This has added to budget and management problems that have led one prominent educator, former Long Beach Unified and San Diego Unified Superintendent Carl Cohn, to call for LAUSD to be broken up.

District officials tried to put up a happy front after its 2017-18 budget was adopted last month. But a Los Angeles Times review of long-term spending plans suggested district officials were not taking serious steps to deal with a 2019-20 deficit expected to be more than $400 million. It noted that while L.A. Unified’s enrollment, now 514,000, continues to drop, the district has more administrators than ever.

Similar problems are seen throughout the Golden State.

Once adjusted for district size, Rim of the World Unified in the Lake Arrowhead area of San Bernardino County is in among the worst binds of any district in the medium term. The 2017-18 budget is not expected to run a deficit, but huge cuts are certain in 2018-19, when the six-school district has to deal with a projected $2.1 million deficit, and schools may have to close or consolidate in 2019-20, when a $4.5 million shortfall has been forecast.

In the affluent Silicon Valley, districts are also being pinched. The San Jose Unified School District needs to cut 150 jobs before its 41 schools reopen next month. Cupertino Union School District and its 25 schools, which made $2.6 million in cuts this spring, are sure to need another round of layoffs by next spring, when a $5.6 million deficit is expected.

The Napa Valley Unified School District, facing a $12.4 million shortfall in a $167 million 2017-18 budget, laid off 50 teachers who hadn’t gained tenure yet and eliminated 60 classified positions. Trustees are already warning of even worse cuts in coming years.

Such budget bloodbaths are the norm across California.

One of the relatively few bits of good news on the school finance front comes – unexpectedly – from Washington. After Donald Trump won the White House, some Democrats expected Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress to seek huge cuts in federal education aid to states – especially liberal ones like California.

But EdSource reported in May that the Trump administration’s budget plan would reduce annual federal education funding for the state from about $4 billion to $3.64 billion – a cut of less than 10 percent. The proposed cuts would be proportional – meaning Trump didn’t single out states he lost for less generous treatment.

The clout of the California Teachers Association was on full display last week when a bill by Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, to reform a tenure law that can give lifetime job protections to teachers 18 months into their careers was abruptly

Since her election in 2012, Weber, a former school board president and college professor, has prodded her fellow Democratic lawmakers to not accept the California education status quo. Weber wants to make tenure rules more rigorous and like those in other states, to ensure the Local Control Funding Formula actually does what it was promised to do and helps English-language learners, and to seek state standards that make it easy to gauge whether schools are helping struggling minority students.

But Weber’s push for significant reforms have either been killed in the Legislature or by Gov. Jerry Brown’s veto pen.

Her latest reform measure, Assembly Bill 1220, would have delayed tenure decisions until a teacher’s third year on the job, but would have allowed marginal teachers additional time to establish their worthiness for tenure in a fourth year, and, in limited circumstances, a fifth year. Weber’s bill included a provision intended to make districts put more of an emphasis on professional development of marginal teachers.

The measure won early approvals and initially appeared relatively uncontroversial, with only five Assembly members opposing it in a preliminary June 1 vote. Weber supporters saw the provisions emphasizing helping struggling teachers as a valuable way to reassure teachers unions that the bill wasn’t an exercise in teacher or union bashing.

But later in June, the Assembly Appropriations Committee shaved off the fourth and fifth year tenure consideration provisions – without consulting Weber. Then, on July 6, Assemblyman Tony Thurmond, D-Richmond, gutted and amended AB1164, a bill he had introduced about foster care policies, so it offered an alternative to Weber’s bill. Thurmond’s version would in some cases allow struggling teachers to win tenure consideration after a third year.

The bill was knocked by reformers as unnecessarily complex and inferior to Weber’s. But the clout of its prime supporter – the CTA – led Weber last week to withdraw her bill for now in hopes it would have better chances in 2018.

Thurmond then withdrew his bill, suggesting it was only introduced as a way to block Weber and her proposal. Both are members of the California Legislative Black Caucus.

CTA expected to back lawmaker who thwarted bill

The EdSource website connected the maneuvering to Thurmond’s plan to run for state superintendent of public instruction in 2018 when incumbent Tom Torlakson is termed out. That’s because the CTA has already sent signals it will endorse Thurmond, who has established his pro-teacher union bona fides with such measures as proposing that teachers be given subsidized housing.

The CTA’s strong and early support of Torlakson was key to the low-profile Bay Area state lawmaker winning the superintendent’s job in 2010 after finishing second in the primary, and to his narrow 2014 win over fellow Democrat Marshall Tuck, a Los Angeles charter school advocate with backing from school reform groups.

Tuck has already announced he will seek the job again in 2018.

The issue involves the contentious matter of teacher job protections, which the union says are necessary to counter unfair and politically motivated firings. Education reformers believe such protections – tenure, a seniority-based layoff system, and the long and costly dismissal statutes – deprive some students of a quality education.

The main dismissal-related measure this year is Assembly Bill 1220, which extends the time period before teachers are eligible for tenure, at which point they can only be fired for certain types of misbehavior. The bill would extend the probationary period to three years for districts with more than 250 students and mandates an individualized improvement plan for teachers in their third year.

Currently, teachers are eligible for tenure after just two years, and they must be told whether they will receive tenure after only 18 months. That forces school districts to make tenure decisions rather quickly. The bill’s sponsor, Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, and other backers argue that “districts would make wiser hiring decisions with more time,” according to EdSource, which recently analyzed 10 education-related bills that have passed the Assembly or Senate but still must be approved by the other house.

This is the latest bill that responds to issues raised in a much-publicized California legal tussle. In the Vergara case, nine public-school students filed suit against the State of California and the California Teachers’ Association claiming these policies violate the California Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause. As Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Rolf Treu explained in his June 2014 decision, the plaintiffs argued that these protections “result in grossly ineffective teachers obtaining and retaining permanent employment, and that these teachers are disproportionately situated in schools serving predominantly low-income and minority students.”

Treu agreed with the plaintiffs. “The evidence is compelling. Indeed, it shocks the conscience,” the judge ruled as he tossed out as unconstitutional teacher tenure and other job protections, including the “last in, first out” seniority system under which younger teachers are the first to go whenever districts must implement layoffs. The appeals court overturned the ruling in 2016, pinning most of the problems on poor decisions by the school district rather than the job-protection statutes.

Later that year, the state Supreme Court declined to review the case on a 4-3 vote, thus letting the appeals court’s decision stand. But the controversy didn’t subside. In direct response to the appeal court ruling, reformers introduced Assembly Bill 934 last year to extend the tenure process to three years and allow districts to negotiate an “alternative teacher dismissal process,” according to the bill analysis. The CTA opposed the bill, which died in committee.

The union likewise opposes this year’s bill. “AB1220 is the wrong solution to support good teaching and learning, and it’s disappointing that leaders in the Assembly refused to work with educators to improve the bill,” said CTA President Eric Heins in a June 2 statement. “Forty-six other states provide due process rights to teachers on day one. California is taking a step back by adding another year without any rights for our newest educators.”

Reformers argue that including new rights for probationary teachers from “day one” would make it even harder to get rid of those teachers who don’t make the grade. They note that 42 other states have probationary periods ranging from three to five years.

“California has one of the shortest times for a teacher to demonstrate classroom readiness and achieve permanent status,” according to a statement from Weber’s office. “A statewide survey of 506 teachers in traditional California schools found that 85 percent of teachers think that tenure decisions should be made after at least three years of classroom instruction. Only 15 percent of teachers found California’s current two-year timeline was sufficient.”

Backers of extending the probationary period point to statistics raised in Treu’s decision. The judge pointed to testimony suggesting that 1 to 3 percent of California public-school teachers are “grossly ineffective,” which amounts to 2,750 to 8,250 such teachers statewide. That’s a large enough number to have “a direct, real, appreciable and negative impact on a significant number of California students,” he wrote.

While AB1220 will be heard July 12 in the Senate Education Committee, another high-profile education bill this year has reformers concerned. It would ban for-profit charter schools, beginning in 2019. Backers argue that it’s a misuse of tax dollars to fund charters that have the goal of maximizing profits. Opponents argue the bill is part of a broader attack on charter schools and note that for-profit online charters provide needed services for a small segment of students with special needs or who are bullied in traditional schools.

There are other education measures that are still alive in the Legislature. As EdSource explained, they would “require more accounting for spending under the Local Control Funding Formula, mandate a later start time for middle and high schools and further restrict student suspensions.” But the teacher tenure and for-profit charter measures promise to be the most contentious matters for this legislative session, and the ones most important to track.

Steven Greenhut is Western region director for the R Street Institute. Write to him at sgreenhut@rstreet.org.

University of California President Janet Napolitano has been under siege since March 2016, when state Auditor Elaine Howle released a

At least initially, Napolitano and some regents dismissed the criticism before finally giving in and capping nonresident admissions last week. But the Golden State’s other giant higher education system – California State University – got the message loud and clear: In-state students must be the highest priority. Last week, CSU formally guaranteed that a qualified California high school graduate will be offered admission to at least one of CSU’s 23 campuses.

The policy change was part of negotiations by CSU leaders, the Brown administration and state lawmakers over CSU’s 2017-18 budget. The $5.4 billion allocated is up $344 million over the previous budget, with the state general fund paying for $3.2 billion and student tuition and fees expected to generate $2.2 billion.

The admissions guarantee comes after many years of CSU denying admission to tens of thousands of qualified California high school graduates – most recently, 31,000 in fall 2016. CSU officials previously said they didn’t have the space.

But last week in a prepared statement, CSU Chancellor Timothy White said the policy change will “better serve Californians.”

The decision was lauded by one of Napolitano’s and UC’s harshest critics – Assemblyman Phil Ting, D-San Francisco. “The most important thing is this gives California’s students more options,”  the Assembly budget chairman told the Bay Area News Group.

Student trustee worries about adequate funding

But the 2017-18 president for the California State Student Association – CSU student trustee Maggie White – had a more mixed reaction. While she welcomed the new policy, she told the Southern California News Group that CSU needed more funding. The $344 million budget hike represents a nearly 7 percent increase, but CSU’s executive budget summary suggests much of that amount will be eaten up by higher salary and benefit costs and some new mandatory expenditures.

The CSU policy is modeled on one adopted by UC in which students who graduate in the top 9 percent of their class are supposed to gain admission to a UC campus.

The CSU guarantee will take effect for spring 2018 California high school graduates. The final details will be worked out, but the minimum standard for admission is likely to be similar to CSU’s present requirement that in-state college applicants have at least a 3.0. Students who have stronger SAT and ACT scores can win admission with GPAs less than 3.0.

The policy change will be a relief to many students and parents, but there’s frustration still ahead for high school graduates in parts of the state where CSU campuses are much more selective than the systemwide norm. According to a website which tracks the most recent college admissions statistic at every U.S. degree-granting institution, seven CSU campuses reject more than half of all applicants. The acceptance rate was lowest at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo (31 percent), followed by San Diego State and Long Beach State (both 34 percent), Cal Poly Pomona (39 percent), Cal State Fullerton (42 percent), Cal State Northridge (46 percent) and CSU Monterey (49 percent).

The most expensive contest on the 2014 California ballot is set to return next year. 

“Marshall Tuck, who unsuccessfully challenged incumbent schools chief Tom Torlakson in a contentious 2014 race that became a proxy fight over a lawsuit on teacher job protections, will run again for state superintendent of public instruction,” the Sacramento Bee reported. “The former Los Angeles schools executive on Monday announced his candidacy for the 2018 election, citing a desire to bring ‘big change’ to a public education system that has ‘settled for mediocrity.'”

The two tangled last time on opposite sides of many Californians’ sense that teachers unions had often become an obstacle to improving education quality statewide. “They split over the Vergara court decision that held teacher-tenure protections discriminated against poor and minority students,” as CalWatchdog recalled previously. “Torlakson took the side of the unions and supported the appeal; Tuck made sustaining the decision a keystone of his campaign.”

“After Torlakson beat Tuck in a close election, 52 percent to 48 percent, Democrats hoped to unite on education and put their divisiveness behind them. But UC’s tuition hikes reopened the wound, putting officeholders in an awkward political position and pushing instinctively liberal students to oppose policies set by Democrats.”

Shifting agendas

Now, Tuck’s plans have focused around budget oversight and teacher quality. In his campaign announcement, “Tuck said his campaign will focus on ensuring that Gov. Jerry Brown’s new school funding formula – which provides additional money to districts with large numbers of poor children, English learners and foster youth – is really funneling money to the neediest students and that its accountability measures are more understandable for parents and the public,” the Bee noted.

“He also said California’s efforts to address its teacher shortage ‘so far have been way too small.’ He would consider raising compensation and changing training programs to get more potential teachers into the profession.”

More conciliatory

The rhetoric reflected a desire to stake out reform territory that would not prove as bitterly divisive as in 2014. “Tuck, 43, said he continues to favor revising the state’s tenure law, granting due process rights in less than two years, and revising the state’s teacher evaluation system,” according to EdSource. “But the issues of overriding importance, he said, are the need to establish ‘phenomenal’ training and mentoring programs for principals and new teachers and ‘for more support for students with the greatest needs.’ There was an overemphasis in the last campaign on the 10 percent of the issues that were divisive and less on the other 90 percent, he said.”

Tuck’s words also worked to calibrate expectations to the reality of the superintendency. “The position has little direct authority over California’s schools, but Tuck said he would use it to set a direction for the governor, State Board of Education and Legislature,” the Los Angeles Times reported. “Tuck previously led Green Dot Public Schools, a Los Angeles-based independent charter school chain that operates with a teachers union contract, and the Partnership for Los Angeles Schools, a school turnaround organization. He has spent the last two years working as an educator in residence at the New Teacher Center.”

Torlakson’s own time has been consumed of late with education issues affecting undocumented residents. He recently “urged the state’s immigrant students not to be fearful of applying for the California Dream Act, a college financial aid program dedicated to helping undocumented students attend state universities and community colleges,” according to the San Jose Mercury News. “As of last Friday, the number of California Dream Act applications has declined by 42 percent this year, due to President Trump-spurred unease over possible deportations, according to the California Student Aid Commission, which receives applications from students.”

In a shock critics had warned against, Golden State schools discovered that their nation’s largest pension system, CalPERS, was on track to force substantial budgetary cutbacks on core education spending. 

“Public schools around California are bracing for a crisis driven by skyrocketing worker pension costs that are expected to force districts to divert billions of dollars from classrooms into retirement accounts, education officials said,” the San Francisco Chronicle reported. “The depth of the funding gap became clear to district leaders when they returned from the holiday break: What they contribute to the California Public Employees’ Retirement System, known as CalPERS, will likely double within six years, according to state estimates.”

Bad grades

The controversy hit as a fresh study brought unwelcome news about California’s nationwide education standing. The report, by Education Week, “looked at multiple ways that states are educating and preparing children for school,” the San Jose Mercury News reported. “For pupil achievement, for instance, the magazine considered 18 measures such as graduation rates, reading and math tests, Advanced Placement exam results, equity and achievement gaps.”

“In academic performance — as measured by the 2015 National Assessment of Educational Progress test and by poverty figures — California earned a D-plus. But in improvement over time, the state posted a C. In equity, California scored a relatively high B-minus — but that was still 41st in the nation, and below the national average of a B.”

A spokesman for California Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson called the data behind the survey “outdated,” the Mercury News added, although it was no older in California’s case than any other state. “California is moving in a positive direction,” the spokesman insisted. “We’ve dramatically increased our investment in education.”

Underperformance

But that investment, according to new estimates, has been placed at risk of being consumed by pension costs. “There is a predicted shortfall among all state retirement accounts of at least $230 billion based on what’s owed to current and future retirees. The pension funds, including CalPERS, haven’t made as much money from the stock market and other investments as they had hoped,” the Chronicle noted. “CalPERS officials had hoped to gain a 7.5 percent annual return on investments, but they didn’t come close in either of the last two years.”

Despite optimistic predictions, underperformance has been a constant for the fund: “Over the last 20 years investment returns averaged only 6.9 percent, with the current annual return bringing in only 2.3 percent,” Pepperdine professor Joel Fox observed in the Orange County Register. “Facing market realities, the board lowered the estimate to 7 percent, a mark that still may be unattainable.”

“For taxpayers, the number change likely means more dollars from state and local government budgets will be directed to cover pension liabilities and less will be available to meet services supplied by government. The city of Los Angeles already dedicates 20 percent of its budget for pension obligations, Anaheim 13 percent, Long Beach 11 percent and San Jose as high as 27 percent.”

Double burden

At the same time, school districts have howled over the additional adverse impact of the state’s other pension liabilities. “In 2014, the Legislature adopted Assembly Bill 1469, which seeks to pay down CalSTRS underfunding over about 30 years by relatively small increases in contributions from teachers and the state, and by increasing school districts’ contributions over seven years by 10.85 percent,” former Piedmont USD Board of Education member Richard Raushenbush wrote in the East Bay Times. “In 2020, school districts’ CalSTRS contributions will be 19.1 percent of teacher payroll!”

“This is not sustainable. School districts are funded by the public to provide free public education; they do not make profits that can be devoted to paying off the Legislature’s CalSTRS debt. The Legislature did not provide any new funds to pay the significant CalSTRS’ increases.”

The extent to which Russia interfered is still being investigated, but reports suggest there’s consensus among U.S. intelligence officials that Russia hacked emails of Democratic officials and operatives in an effort to influence the election. The hacked emails were distributed to the news media, including CalWatchdog, throughout the election through the site WikiLeaks. 

Assemblyman Marc Levine, D-Marin County, has introduced legislation to require state educators to develop curriculum for students to learn about Russia’s involvement in the election. 

“This is a threat to our democracy and must be treated with appropriate significance in American history,” Levine said of the Russian hacking in a statement. “California is the largest textbook market in the nation. Textbooks approved in our state are used throughout the country. Through this legislation, we can make sure students in California and across the United States receive accurate information about the 2016 presidential election.”

The move by Levine is not unprecedented. Recent laws modifying curriculum included subjects like the Armenian genocide, civics, the environment and Barack Obama and the importance of the first African American president. 

The Costa Mesa Republican denounced a recent announcement from UC that campus police would not be cooperating with federal officials in deportation efforts of undocumented immigrants.

“Your commitment to spending scarce resources to finance people illegally present in the United States is unacceptable and a flagrant misuse of taxpayer money,” Rohrabacher wrote. “This is an insult to Americans and legal immigrants who pay your salary.”

While sanctuary policies align with the state’s liberal lean, one of the main policy reasons supporters turn to is that by creating a space where deportation is off the table, undocumented immigrants are more likely to cooperate with police in other investigations. 

“It is in the best interest of all members of the UC community to encourage cooperation with the investigation of criminal activity,” according to the UC statement. “To encourage such cooperation, all individuals, regardless of their immigration status, must feel secure that contacting or being addressed by UC police officers will not automatically lead to an immigration inquiry and/or a risk of removal.”

The UC system gets more than half of its research funding from the federal government, which Rohrabacher claimed is jeopardized by resistance to the upcoming administration. 

“I assure you that, in the next session of Congress, those who receive and spend federal dollars in a manner that includes people illegally present in our country will find it difficult to obtain those funds,” Rohrabacher wrote. 

The issue of sanctuary campuses is a small part of a bigger showdown between California and President-elect Donald Trump. While Trump campaigned heavily on a tough stance on immigration — which included mass deportation and the construction of a wall along the country’s southern border — California Democrats have since announced their intention to fight those efforts at every turn. 

Though Rohrabacher initially supported a different candidate in the Republican primary, he eventually came around to Trump with a full-throated endorsement, even going so far as to call other Republicans “gutless” who backed away from Trump at times of turmoil. His name was even floated as a potential candidate for secretary of state, although he was not chosen.