Observers of California's dysfunctional legislature are all too familiar with the "gut-and-amend" move, a tactic Democrats use to bypass the state constitution and ram controversial legislation through without the opportunity for public comment, or even for members who weren't in the smoke-filled back hallway making deals to read or analyze it.

So it's not surprising that's the tactic being used by Gavin Newsom to get his three bills constituting the "Election Rigging Act" legislative package passed.

California's constitution requires a 30-day waiting period after a bill is introduced before any action can be taken. That amendment to the state constitution was passed by the voters in 1958, and when legislators attempted to decrease that waiting period to 20 days, voters overwhelmingly said no. The only way the waiting period can be waived is by a three-fourths vote of the legislature. Democrats don't have that many votes, so what they've been doing is claiming that a complete gut-and-amend meets the waiting period requirement, even though the only thing that was in print for 30 days was the bill number - and that's exactly what they argued Monday night when Republicans in both the Assembly and Senate objected to taking any action on the bill.

So, Republican legislators Sen. Tony Strickland, Sen. Suzette Valladares, Asm. Kate Sanchez and Asm. Tri Ta filed suit late Monday night, seeking an emergency injunction from the California Supreme Court to block the legislature from taking any action on the three bills for 30 days.

The legislators are represented by Michael Colombo, Mark Meuser, and Jesse Franklin-Murdock of the Dhillon Law Group, a firm that's had great success in fighting the Democrats' election law shenanigans. 

"To circumvent the public’s rights under the Constitution’s thirty-day rule, the Legislature deleted the contents of two wholly unrelated old bills, Assembly Bill 604 (“AB 604”) and Senate Bill 280 (“SB 280”), and simply inserted the contents of the entirely new legislative package into those bills.

...

"The Legislature claims that this self-serving tactic, known as “gut and amend,” satisfies the public’s right under the constitution to review proposed legislation for thirty days, even though the only information available to the public about AB 604 and SB 280 for more than thirty days has been their Assembly and Senate bill numbers.

"The stark issue for this court to decide in this case is whether this constitutional right is merely the right to publication of a bill number rather than publication of the proposed legislation in that bill."

Meanwhile, the Assembly and Senate Elections Committees are holding hearings on the bills as I write this, to allegedly debate the bills and hear public comment, though the Assembly Elections Committee chair repeatedly cut the mics of Republicans on the committee during debate. Democrats also voted to exclude 16,000 public comments from the record and against allowing a recess for committee members to read those comments.

Prior to those hearings, attorney Colombo and the plaintiff legislators held a spicy news conference announcing the lawsuit. Not surprisingly, the reporters there, with few exceptions, worked on behalf of Newsom in grilling the legislators - and the Republicans didn't hold back.

Sen. Valladares swatted down repeated questions related to Texas redistricting, repeating that this is about California and abiding by its Constitution, saying, "What happened yesterday is that political elitists spit on the will of the people." 

Sen. Strickland was much more pointed, saying that "Gavin Newsom is a modern-day Marie-Antoinette," listing numerous examples of Newsom dismissing the will of the people and enacting "rules for thee, and not for me."

In addition to this issue and the question of constitutionality, another key legal and political point brought up by Strickland and DeMaio is whether or not any California state legislators participated in the map-drawing process. Under the California Constitution, state legislators are prohibited from participating in the redistricting process. The proposed maps, drawn by Paul Mitchell's Redistricting Partners, were submitted by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) on Friday, and California's legislative Democrats publicly claim they had nothing to do with it.

However, there are reports that Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire, who terms out in 2026, "had one of the new, targeted districts drawn specifically for him in exchange for his support of the redistricting plan." Republican Rep. Doug LaMalfa's inland northern California district was redrawn to stretch the entirety of the state's northern border, then down the coast to San Francisco. 

Republicans in the current district represent 45 percent of the voters, while only 27 percent are Democrats. In the new district, Democrats constitute 41 percent of the registered voters and Republicans 27 percent.

Then we have language in one of the bills stating that members of the Elections Committee drew the maps. Assembly Bill 604 states (emphasis added):

In the event that a census tract or census block is not listed, is listed more than once, or is only partially accounted for, and, as a result, an ambiguity or dispute arises regarding the location of a boundary line, the Secretary of State and the elections official of each county shall rely on the detailed maps prepared by the Assembly Committee on Elections and the Senate Committee on Elections and Constitutional Amendments.

Read the entire petition to the California Supreme Court below.

 Strickland v Weber  by  Jennifer Van Laar 

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