Capitol Weekly Podcast

These days, Sami Gallegos is the Communications Director for Lorena Gonzalez, the high-visibility Democratic Assemblywoman representing AD80; but before she went to work inside the building Sami covered the capitol as a journalist. Full disclosure - Sami was a Capitol Weekly intern and later worked as a full time reporter for Capitol Weekly before leaving nonprofit journalism for the glamour and g...

Lenny Mendonca, newly-appointed as Governor Newsom's Chief Economic and Business Advisor, wears a lot of hats: he is also Chair of California's High Speed Rail Commission, Senior Partner Emeritus of McKinsey & Company, and one of the founders and owners of the Half Moon Bay Brewing Company. We caught up with Lenny in his 18th floor office on J Street to chat about High Speed Rail, taxes - and...

California state senator Tom Umberg is one of the most prominent Democrats to break with Governor Gavin Newsom on his decision this week to put the death penalty on hold in the Golden State. A former federal prosecutor, Umberg argues that some crimes are so heinous that they deserve the ultimate penalty. We spoke with Senator Umberg about his stance on the issue and what to expect next from propon...

Sacramento lobby firm Capitol Advocacy celebrates 20 years this month - founder John Latimer sat down with the Capitol Weekly Podcast to talk about the nuts and bolts of the of lobbying business, the impact - or not - of term limits, and what's changed since he launched the firm two decades ago. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and...

With the new administration, the capitol has seen an influx of fresh staffers, many of whom are new to the Sacramento area. Where, they ask, does one go to eat, drink and be merry in this burg? If this describes you - no worries, Becky Grunewald has you covered. The longtime Sacto food critic offered a short list of favorites in a recent Capitol Weekly article (http://capitolweekly.net/newbies-eat...

Bob Wieckowski is more than just the Senator from California's 10th Senate District - he's also a bankruptcy lawyer, giving him unique insight into utility giant PG&E's recent bankruptcy declaration. John Howard and Tim Foster visited the Senator in his office to chat about the difference between federal and state bankruptcy laws, what happens to the companies with existing or pending contract...

Pacific Gas and Electric filed for bankruptcy protection on January 29, citing billions of dollars in potential liabilities from the utility giant's likely role in sparking a series of devastating California wildfires. San Francisco Chronicle reporter JD Morris has been covering the case and joins John Howard and Tim Foster to discuss the ramifications of bankruptcy including the possibility that...

Longtime California environmentalist Paul Mason sits down with Capitol Weekly's John Howard and Tim Foster for a wide-ranging discussion covering wildfires, the status of California's forests, Julia Butterfly Hill, John's 1980 Volkswagen Scirocco and the shifting focus of the state's environmental movement in the face of global climate change crisis. Also: a shameless plug for Capitol Weekly's int...

Columnist and reporter Dan Walters has been covering the career of Governor Jerry Brown since 1975, first in the pages of the Sacramento Union, then the Sacramento Bee, and currently for CALmatters. A frequent critic of the quixotic governor, Oakland Mayor and near-perennial presidential candidate, Walters has had a unique vantage point on Brown's many ups and downs - tracking his peripatetic care...

Here it is, December 11 and the final count of ballots cast in California's November 6 election was certified less than a week ago. And, as Jim Brulte and Kevin McCarthy have sadly noted, many GOP Election Night "wins" fell to Democrats as the final votes were tallied. Why? How? Nooner publisher and all-around politics expert Scott Lay joins us to talk about California's vote-counting pr...

In the wake of declining registration numbers and a devastating election in November, California Republicans are searching for a path back to relevance in the Golden State. Many Latino Republicans have voiced strong opposition to the GOP's current direction, decrying the Nationalist-leaning "Trump Wing" of the Party that has embraced loaded racial rhetoric and calls for a wall between Ca...

Former Assemblyman Dennis Mangers was elected to represent Orange County's AD73 in 1976 - swept to power in the Democratic wave that followed Watergate. The district reverted to form four years later when Mangers lost his seat to Republican Nolan Frizzelle. The district voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 - the first Dem presidential candidate to capture Orange County since FDR - and this month elec...

Assemblymember Ian Calderon's "Straw Law," AB1884, seeks to lessen the number of single-use plastic straws that end up in the ocean and other waterways. The bill, which has passed both Senate and Assembly and is now awaiting concurrence before heading to the governor's desk, would require sit-down restaurants in California to forgo automatically placing a straw in every drink, and instea...

Mindy Romero of the California Civic Engagement Project joins John Howard and Tim Foster of Capitol Weekly to talk about California's primary election turnout and what we -might- expect to see in November. We also ask about CCEP's recent move from UC Davis to USC. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for adverti...

On the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy we are joined by Steve Swatt, a veteran political analyst and former news reporter who at the age of 23 covered RFK's murder and the trial of the assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, for United Press International. Swatt shares memories of the intense days following the assassination and the three month trial that ended in a guilty verdict. Dur...

California political data guru Paul Mitchell joins John Howard of Capitol Weekly to talk about the early voting returns as we head into next week's primary, as well as new numbers from the Secretary of State that show the California Republican Party slipping into third place in California voter preference, behind the Democrats and No Party Preference. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See...

Those on all sides of the healthcare debate agree on one thing: healthcare costs continue to rise in California and across the country. We sat down with Carmela Coyle, President and CEO of the California Hospital Association, to talk about strategies for increasing the affordability of healthcare, including a new experiment in Maryland that seeks to replace per-patient payments with a single annua...

A package of over 20 healthcare bills and budget asks - called "Care For All California" - is now making its way through the legislature. Backed by a consortium of over 50 healthcare organizations, unions and nonprofits, the package would significantly reshape California's healthcare landscape and could bring the state's uninsured rate below 3%. Anthony Wright of Health Access California...

Assemblyman Jim Cooper was on hand at yesterday's press conference that announced that a suspect in the notorious East Area Rapist / Original Night Stalker / Golden State Killer case had been arrested. Cooper, a former Captain in the Elk Grove Sheriff's Department, spoke about the importance of DNA collection in the solution of cold case crimes and noted that an unforeseen outcome of Proposition 4...

Senate Bill 827, an ambitious and sweeping bill aimed at addressing California's housing crisis, died in its first committee hearing this week. The legislation, by Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, would have overridden local controls, forcing California cities to allow apartment buildings of up to five stories to be built near existing transit stops. SB 827 was sponsored by a new organization,...

Twenty two years ago this week, federal authorities arrested Ted Kaczynski - known as the Unabomber - in his remote Montana cabin, ending a 17 year reign of terror. While the Unabomber had no strong ties to the Sacramento region, both his first and final murders occurred here. It was 23 years ago this month that Kaczynski claimed his final victim, Sacramento timber lobbyist Gil Murray, who was kil...

Mark DiCamillo, director of the Berkeley IGS Poll at the Institute of Governmental Studies, U.C. Berkeley, recently penned a CA120 column about big changes in polling as online queries supplant traditional telephone calls - he joins us this week to talk about the latest trends in opinion surveying. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection a...

Political consultant turned author Joe Rodota sits down with Capitol Weekly to talk about his new book: The Watergate - Inside America's Most Infamous Address. The story of the Watergate break-in has been well-told, but in this "biography of a building," Rodota weaves a fascinating history that includes more than just the events of June 17, 1972. The Watergate was home to myriad players...

Political Data Inc. head honcho Paul Mitchell joins us to talk about the political environment as we move toward the midterms. This week's upset special election in PA 18 - where Democrat Conor Lamb won in a GOP-leaning district that went for Trump by about 20 points - is being cited by many as further evidence that a Democratic wave is building. But what happens in California, where the national...

For today's episode of the Capitol Weekly Podcast we are joined by Sacramento political consultant Wayne Johnson, a veteran of well over 200 campaigns - on multiple continents. These days he's working on Republican John Cox' campaign for California Governor, which got a boost moments before we recorded the show when former congressman Doug Ose abruptly exited the race. Wayne has served as Presiden...