IN THE NEWS

Governor Newsom News - Governor Newsom signs bills curbing billionaire influence on elections and protecting elections from interference

Governor Newsom signed two new laws to strengthen California’s democracy — giving local communities the power to create publicly financed elections and cracking down on schemes that try to buy or manipulate voter participation.




CBS News - California Gov. Newsom signs bills aimed at protecting elections from interference

Democrat California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a pair of bills into law aimed at protecting the state's elections from interference from what he calls "sweepstakes from billionaires seeking to buy elections."




LA Times - Loud TV commercials drive viewers crazy. California wants to quiet them down

A new law that could prohibit exceedingly loud commercials on streaming services is awaiting Gov. Newsom’s approval.




KCRW - Are care courts working? CA’s mental health initiative lags behind

Only a few hundred petitions have been filed for California care courts, compared to the thousands the state initially projected. In response, Sen. Tom Umberg has introduced legislation to expand the number of applicants.




Exclusive: DHS secretary sought military arrests and drones in Los Angeles in leaked letter

One day before the Trump administration deployed U.S. Marines to confront protesters in Los Angeles, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem asked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to direct the military to detain or arrest “lawbreakers,” a move one expert called “a grave escalation.”




Girardi Sentenced to 7 Years in Prison for $15M in Client Fraud

One of California's most powerful lawyers, Tom Girardi, was sentenced Tuesday to 87 months in federal prison -- a stunning downfall for the disbarred attorney who built his name fighting for the injured but spent the twilight of his career stealing from them.




An OC Senator Pushes to Fund Drug Court Programs Across California

State Senator Tom Umberg (D-Santa Ana) is looking to help fund drug treatment courts and make them available for residents across California under two bills as local law enforcement agencies and courts start to arrest and convict people under a new state law.




After exam fiasco, State Bar of California faces deeper financial crisis

Leah T. Wilson, executive director of the State Bar, told state lawmakers at a Senate Judiciary hearing Tuesday that the agency expects to pay around $3 million to offer free exams to test takers, an additional $2 million to book in-person testing sites in July, and $620,000 to return the test to its traditional system of multiple-choice questions in July.




Artificial intelligence, pending lawsuits, and frustrated future lawyers: A look at February's California Bar Exam

California state lawmakers are calling for an audit of the state's February bar exam that was plagued with technical issues, concerns over AI-generated questions, and now, one of the highest pass rates of any spring exam since 1965.




Pressure grows on California State Bar to revert to national exam format

An influential California legislator is pressuring the State Bar of California to ditch its new multiple-choice questions after a February bar exam debacle and revert to the traditional test format in July.