Tag: governors

Building affordable housing in California is pricey and slow. Newsom wants to fix it by consolidating power

Posted on by Lone Candle

“Few alphabet soups have as many letters as California’s system for financing affordable housing.

The time and headaches developers must endure when seeking funding from acronym-laden state agencies helps drive up California’s nation-high cost to build apartments for low-income residents, strangling housing production in a state badly in need of affordable places to live.

…

after six years of half-measures and stalled reforms, the governor has unveiled a proposal to streamline the system, while at the same time consolidating power in his office. In the state budget proposal he released this month, Newsom outlined a plan to move decisions over potentially billions of dollars annually in cash, tax credits and bond allocations to a new housing agency he controls, and by doing so, strip authority from State Treasurer Fiona Ma.”

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/01/21/it-costs-more-to-build-affordable-housing-in-california-than-anywhere-else-newsom-wants-to-fix-it-by-consolidating-power-00738542

Texas Governor Strips 2 Muslim Groups of the Right To Buy Land in the State by Calling Them Terrorists

Posted on by Lone Candle

“Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, an ally of President Donal Trump, has added two organizations to his state’s list of terrorist organizations—an action taken without any safeguards and which deprives the organizations of the right to buy land in the state.

…

You don’t have to like the Muslim Brotherhood or the Council on American-Islamic Relations to think the government should be required to prove accusations before punishing people.”

https://reason.com/2025/12/05/texas-governor-strips-two-muslim-groups-of-the-right-to-buy-land-in-the-state-by-calling-them-terrorists/

Miller Loses It Over Pritzker’s Plan To Hold ICE Accountable

Posted on by Lone Candle

Stephen Miller threatens the arrest of governors or anyone else who gets in the way of ICE.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j15__atsXrc

Kremlin LEAKS Footage to HUMILIATE Trump

Posted on by Lone Candle

Gavin Newsom tweets in a manner that mirrors Trump’s tweets; Fox News calls it childish for a governor to tweet in such a way while not similarly criticizing the president of the United States. Ridiculous hypocrisy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lm2g9ZddYg

Tuberville raises alarms on GOP food-aid plan as he seeks governorship

Posted on by Lone Candle

“Several former Republican governors in the Senate have sounded alarms over a controversial House GOP plan to help pay for the Trump megabill by pushing billions in federal food aid costs to states.

Now there’s a would-be governor raising similar concerns. Behind the scenes in recent days, Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama raised issues over the provision with GOP leaders and pushed for the plan to be scaled back, according to three Republicans granted anonymity to describe the conversations.”

https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/06/04/congress/tuberville-raises-alarms-on-gop-food-aid-plan-as-he-seeks-governorship-00387161

The Republican power grab in North Carolina, explained

Posted on by Lone Candle

“Democrats will hold some of North Carolina’s highest offices, including the governorship, come January. But these incoming lawmakers will be less powerful than their predecessors, after the Republican-dominated legislature stripped away several of their duties this week.
It isn’t the first time Republicans in North Carolina’s state legislature have shifted the balance of power away from Democrats and toward members of their own party. As a result, the North Carolina governorship is a weaker office than it is in many other states — and Republicans will have a remarkable degree of influence over state politics, despite Democratic victories at the ballot box in November.

North Carolina is a deeply polarized state, and was considered a battleground in the 2024 elections. Now, when Gov.-elect Josh Stein and other Democrats take office in 2025, the battle will be between them and a legislature still dominated by Republicans.”

…

“The state legislature, known as the General Assembly, didn’t just target Stein, although he’s the most high-profile official that the new law applies to. The incoming lieutenant governor, attorney general, and superintendent of public instruction (who oversees the state’s public school system) all had authority stripped from them in the new legislation.

There are two major changes to Stein’s authority. First, he loses the ability to make appointments to North Carolina’s five-person elections board. Previously, the governor appointed two Republicans and two Democrats, and a fifth member who could belong to either political party. (Typically, the governor appointed a member of their own party for that final slot.) The State Board of Elections chooses four of the five members of each county board, with the governor appointing the fifth member — again, usually a member of the governor’s party. Those powers will now be in the hands of the new state auditor, Republican Dave Boliek.

“It shifts from Democratic control to Republican control, because the auditor is now a Republican, and if they keep the same basic principle, he’ll appoint three Republicans and Democrats will appoint two,” Michael Bitzer, a political science professor at North Carolina’s Catawba College, told Vox. “Whether that will be significant in terms of what the election board does in the future, I think we’ll just have to wait and see.”

Perhaps of greater significance, Stein will also have limits around who he can appoint to vacant state supreme court and Court of Appeals seats; now, rather than appointing any qualified person, the law states he must choose from a list “recommended by the political party executive committee of the political party with which the vacating judge was affiliated when elected,” preventing him from significantly changing the balance of power in those courts.

The other significant change relates to incoming Attorney General Jeff Jackson. Under the new law, he will be required to defend the state legislature’s bills when they are challenged at any level.”

https://www.vox.com/politics/391077/north-carolina-josh-stein-roy-cooper-gemeral-assembly