Free Republic

California Governor Gavin Newsom sits down with CNN's Dana Bash to talk about the future of the Democratic Party. He says the party should be "less prone to spending disproportionate amount of time on pronouns, identity politics. More focused on tabletop issues, things that really matter — the stacking of stress in terms of the electricity bills and childcare costs and health care and obviously housing costs."

Gavin Newsom is reflecting on the long-term grief he dealt with after witnessing his mother end her life through assisted death, also referred to as death with dignity. Newsom was a 34-year-old rising politician at the time and told the outlet that he felt guilty that his busy schedule kept him distant as his mom suffered from the disease. But when the day arrived, he and his sister Hilary were by Tessa’s side. “I hated her for it — to be there for the last breath — for years,” he said. “I want to say it was a beautiful experience....

70 hospice and home health providers in Los Angeles were cut off from federal funding in one week after being flagged for fraud by Vice President JD Vance’s anti-fraud task force, with officials indicating that additional providers are likely to be flagged as the review widens. Early findings point to a broader network of activity than the initial suspensions suggest. “As the task force to root out waste, fraud and abuse ramps up, we expect this number to grow exponentially.” As RedState previously reported, the GOP-led House Oversight Committee has now opened an investigation into what they describe as “rampant”...

Federal prosecutors have charged a former Bay Area resident with carrying out a massive health care fraud scheme that allegedly sought to steal more than $90 million from government programs. A federal grand jury indicted Anar Rustamov, a 38-year-old Azerbaijani national who previously lived in Sunnyvale, on multiple counts tied to health care fraud and money laundering. The Justice Department said he is currently at large and could face significant prison time and fines if convicted. According to prosecutors, Rustamov, who entered the U.S. illegally, played a main role in submitting thousands of fraudulent claims through the Medicare Advantage program....

David Spade is calling out California’s leadership for the collapse of Hollywood. During a recent episode of his podcast, “Fly on the Wall,” which he co-hosts with Dana Carvey, the 61-year-old actor and comedian said “the Hollywood industry is dying” and that he’s “just trying to put the blame somewhere.” “Dude, I’m so old,” he said. “I was on the lot at, uh, CBS Radford when we were doing ‘Just Shoot Me’… And also they were doing ‘Seinfeld,’ and I’d see him on his bike. “It was the greatest lot. Of course, just filed for bankruptcy, the lot. Terrifying in...

California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s disgraced former chief of staff Dana Williamson has broken her silence as she prepares for court on criminal charges involving alleged tax fraud and a plot to steal hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign funds. “I’m recovering,” Williamson told the California Post from her home on Friday, referencing a liver transplant she underwent earlier this year that has caused delays in her case. She declined to comment further before closing the door. Federal prosecutors alleged in a 23-count indictment filed in November that Williamson was part of a scheme to steal roughly $225,000 from a...

A California sheriff and top Republican candidate for governor seized over 650,000 votes from the state’s November elections this weekend. Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco launched an investigation into the state’s November 2025 special election on Proposition 50 after a third-party organization, the Riverside Election Integrity Team, claimed it found roughly 45,000 excess votes. California elections officials have dismissed the team’s findings, but Bianco says his office will conduct another count. “This investigation is simple: Physically count the ballots and compare that result with the total votes recorded,” Bianco told reporters at a Friday press conference. Proposition 50 was a...

The new White House task force will withhold government funding for state and local benefits programs if their anti-fraud controls are viewed as lacking. IT MODERNIZATION The White House is kicking off President Donald Trump’s “war on fraud” with a focus on federally-funded benefits like housing, food and cash assistance programs. Among the tactics that a new anti-fraud task force will be pursuing is withholding government funding to state and local jurisdictions whose anti-fraud controls for benefits are deemed inadequate and increasing data-sharing between states and the federal government, according to the Monday executive order establishing the task force. Both...

In 2022, California Gov. Gavin Newsom broke ground on the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing (WAWC), a project featuring an overpass for animals atop ten lanes of the 101 Freeway in Southern California. At the ceremony, Newsom boasted that the state had committed $54 million. He promised to “complete the job within another $10 million,” before seeming to hedge on whether that final sum would do the trick. Officials projected a 2025 completion date for the overpass, and estimated that the entire project — which includes the bridge and other ancillary developments — would cost $92 million, some of it coming...

Investigative journalist Nick Shirley released his latest video on Monday, uncovering $170 million in fraud in California. And this is just the tip of the iceberg in Democrat-run California. “We uncovered over $170,000,000 in fraud as these fraudsters live in luxury with no consequences,” Nick Shirley said. “California’s version of Medicaid called ‘Medi-Cal’ has more than doubled since 2022 from $108 billion to a proposed $222 billion in 2026. Their population, however, has not grown exponentially. However, their spending has,” Nick Shirley said. “There has been a 1,000 percent increase in hospice care in Los Angeles County,” Nick Shirley said....

WASHINGTON — President Trump will sign an executive order Monday afternoon formally creating a benefits fraud task force chaired by Vice President JD Vance — the president’s designee to lead a nationwide “war on fraud.” Vance will join Trump in the Oval Office for the signing, underscoring the president’s continued emphasis on the project after highlighting a social-services scam scandal in Minnesota that has led to dozens of indictments, including for phony nutrition and autism care programs. A document describing the looming order says “there is strong reason to believe similar vulnerabilities exist in California, Illinois, New York, Maine, and...

Investigators say that on the morning of Aug. 5, 2025, Vincent Wolf, a construction worker who lived in a Sylmar apartment complex with his mother and aunt, parked his black Toyota Corolla alongside an RV outside of his building. He exited his vehicle, walked up to 29-year-old Travis Harker, who had been homeless for years, and fatally shot him once in the chest, the search warrant affidavit alleges. Surveillance footage of Wolf’s vehicle led investigators to identify him as a suspect in the deadly shooting. Instagram records revealed a series of irate posts about homelessness in the city. ‘They piss...

Longtime journalist Katie Couric asked if Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., had a problem with being "ridiculously good-looking." During an interview on Couric's "Next Question" podcast released Thursday, the former "Today" co-host remarked on how Newsom has been described as "slick" and whether that was a reference to his hairstyle. Newsom acknowledged that the comments had caused him to play into a "character." "Do you have a 'Zoolander' problem?" Couric asked, referencing the 2001 Ben Stiller comedy. After Newsom began laughing at the comment, she followed, "Are you just ridiculously good-looking, as Vogue said? No, seriously. What do you do about...

Gov. Gavin Newsom grinned like Cheshire at civil rights icon Jesse Jackson’s public memorial service Friday – treating it as a campaign event as the rumored 2028 presidential hopeful schmoozed with Democratic heavyweights including Presidents Obama and Clinton. The California governor was pictured working the room and snapping selfies with Democratic party elites, as thousands of people gathered at a church on Chicago’s South Side to pay a final public tribute to Jackson. In one telling moment, Obama, who was front row at the event, turned around and pointed directly at Newsom, who’s also been on the publicity trail for...

In 2008, Californians voted on what they were told would be a modern transportation system — a sleek, high-speed rail line connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco in under three hours, financed in part by private investment, delivered at a defined cost, and built within a reasonable timeframe. Eighteen years later, all that has been delivered is one of the largest eminent domain land grabs in modern history. No serious person disputes that infrastructure requires land. But the power of eminent domain is not merely an administrative tool. It is among the most formidable powers government possesses: the authority to...

The California governor made the remarks at an event to promote his new memoir, 'Young Man in a Hurry: A Memoir of Discovery.'California Governor Gavin Newsom compared Israel to an “apartheid state” and questioned future U.S. military support for the country. Speaking on stage at an event to promote his new memoir, Young Man in a Hurry: A Memoir of Discovery, Newsom, who is widely expected to enter the 2028 presidential race, was asked by Pod Save America host Jon Favreau about the U.S.-Israel relationship and whether it should be reconsidered. “It breaks my heart, because the current leadership in...

The majority approved language that would replace the elected Controller’s role with an appointed CFO, potentially stripping away independent oversightIn a move that has ignited fierce backlash, the Los Angeles Charter Reform Commission voted 9-2 on Thursday to advance a proposal that would effectively eliminate the independent City Controller’s office, shifting its core functions—including audits, accounting, payments, revenue forecasting, and fraud investigations—to a new Chief Financial Officer (CFO) appointed by Mayor Karen Bass and accountable to the City Council. This reform, framed by supporters as a consolidation of financial operations to address the city’s ongoing budget crisis, comes just weeks...

A federal lawmaker introduced legislation Thursday aimed at cracking down on alleged fraud within a federal program that paid for dead people’s phone and internet service. Iowa Republican Sen. Joni Ernst is targeting the federal Lifeline program, which subsidizes the services for low-income Americans, after California was accused of taking in $3.8 million between 2020 and 2025 to cover the costs for 94,000 dead people. “While Californians are taxed to the grave and back, its governor especially can’t pass the buck when the state is allowing providers to enroll dead people in a federal program,” Ernst told The Post. A...

The former head of a San Francisco homelessness organization appeared in court on Tuesday after being accused of misappropriating $1.2 million and stealing $91,000 in public funds, the latest in a string of city nonprofit spending scandals in recent years. Gwendolyn Westbrook, who served as the CEO of the United Council of Human Services for two decades, faces nine felony charges related to the misuse and theft of city funds. She was booked into county jail late Monday and later posted bail. “Gwendolyn Westbrook enriched herself and misappropriated millions of dollars in public funding meant to benefit the community,” said...

Poor Gavin Newsom. Who knew he grew up poor, had to hustle to stay alive, resorting to Wonder Bread and Mac-n-Cheese for meals, according to his latest guest appearance on the “All the Smoke” podcast? Most poor families back in the 1970’s and 1980’s ate generic, day-old store-brand bread, discounted canned soup and meats, and government cheese. I knew skinny poor kids. Here is the “All the Smoke” podcast: Notice during the podcast video Newsom slips into some street slang, claiming “It was about payin’ the bills, man.” “Wonder bread and Mac ‘n cheese. That’s how I grew up, bro.”...