Announced by President Donald Trump and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on Wednesday, July 16, the decision comes about a month after a scathing federal report found there was “no viable path” to complete even a partial section of the long-delayed rail project. Trump, who canceled nearly $1 billion in federal funding for the project during his first term in the White House, had threatened to revoke federal funds again this go-round.

“To the Law abiding, Tax paying, Hardworking Citizens of the United States of America, I am thrilled to announce that I have officially freed you from funding California’s disastrously overpriced, ‘HIGH SPEED TRAIN TO NOWHERE,’” a post on Trump’s Truth Social account said Wednesday. “This boondoggle, led by the incompetent Governor of California, Gavin Newscum, has cost Taxpayers Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, and we have received NOTHING in return except Cost Overruns. The Railroad we were promised still does not exist, and never will.”

Duffy, in his own statement, also blamed California, Gov. Gavin Newsom and other state Democrats.

“Federal dollars are not a blank check – they come with a promise to deliver results. After over a decade of failures, (California High-Speed Rail Authority’s) mismanagement and incompetence has proven it cannot build its train to nowhere on time or on budget,” Duffy said.

Duffy said he’s also directed the Federal Railroad Administration to review other grants related to the high-speed rail project. He said the Department of Transportation, in consultation with the Department of Justice, will consider other moves, “including potentially clawing back funding related to” the project.

Voters first authorized $10 billion in borrowed funds in 2008 to cover about a third of the estimated cost, with a promise the train would be up and running by 2020. Five years beyond that deadline, no tracks have been laid, and its estimated price tag has ballooned to over $100 billion.

But Newsom, responding to the news, said the California High-Speed Rail Authority is “entering the track-laying phase and actively building across 171 miles – with 50 major railway structures and 60 miles of guideway already completed.”

“We will be exploring all options to fight this illegal action,” Newsom said.

Meanwhile, state Sen. Dave Cortese, who chairs the legislature’s Transportation Committee, said the federal funding loss won’t “derail this project,” maintaining it has enough support from state funding. And the state legislature, he said, will consider whether to allocate $1 billion per year from the state’s cap-and-invest program into the project with a goal to complete the first phase of the section, connecting San Francisco to Anaheim, and attract private investment.

“You can’t stop this kind of momentum in an innovative, can-do state like California,” Cortese, a Democrat, said. “The California High-Speed Rail Authority is also working on a plan to address potential funding gaps and continue construction.”

California High-Speed Rail Authority CEO Ian Choudri suggested in April that private investors could step in and fill the funding gap for the project that promised nonstop rail service between San Francisco and Los Angeles in under three hours. At the time, he acknowledged that even if funding is secured, it might take nearly two more decades to complete most of that segment.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Approximately 50 security officers and Disneyland employees escorted the vice president through the park, Mickey Visit reported.

Vance’s presence sparked protests. Around 100 to 150 demonstrators gathered on Harbor Boulevard near the Disneyland entrance on Friday evening, and a crowd of protesters formed again on Saturday.

Social media video showed Vance’s motorcade arriving at the Disneyland resort around 6 p.m. on Friday and the vice president walking with his family through Bayou Country at Disneyland around 10 a.m. Saturday.

The Vance party rode Tiana’s Bayou Adventure and toured Tom Sawyer Island, according to the posts. They also said Vance rode the Haunted Mansion and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and dined at the exclusive 21 Royal with his family.

Disneyland officials declined to confirm any individual plans out of respect for the privacy of all guests.

But on Friday, internet sleuths noticed temporary flight restrictions had been placed around the theme park for the weekend.

Matt Desmond, who goes by Disney Scoop Guy on Instagram, posted a social media video of a newly installed staging area tent at the entrance to Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel on Friday.

“They definitely have a staging area at the front of the Grand Californian and there’s a very heavy police presence here,” Desmond said on Instagram.

The vice president’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A weekend schedule was not posted and no fundraising events were announced.

Orange County Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento, whose office said the vice president’s advance team was in the area recently, noted the vice president’s visit comes amid the Trump administration’s continued aggressive immigration enforcement efforts, particularly in Southern California.

“I welcome any policymaker to come to our community and see for themselves how hardworking our immigrant communities are and how they make our country great,” Sarmiento, who represents the Second District, said. “It is my hope that the administration would come to the table and work with us on reversing these policies that seemed designed to crush our communities and our state.”

“I have respect for the office, but I just don’t respect their polices,” Sarmiento said.

Vance has spent a bit of time in Southern California of late.

He visited Los Angeles on official business last month, where he stood by the administration’s immigration raids and arrests and said the military presence in the area would remain. Then, Vance also toured a multi-agency Federal Joint Operations Center and a Federal Mobile Command Center and met with Marines who had been deployed to the area.

More recently, Vance was in San Diego for fundraisers and a $2,500-a-seat dinner hosted by a conservative think tank.

Earlier Friday, second lady Usha Vance visited Camp Pendleton as part of the Blue Star Books program, which donates books to military children, base libraries and Defense Department schools, to name a few.

The second lady grew up in suburban San Diego, in the community of Rancho Peñasquitos.

President Donald Trump, meanwhile, was in Texas on Friday to survey the damage from the catastrophic flooding that killed at least 120 people — with many more still missing — earlier this month.

On July 8, the governor embarked on a two-day, multi-county tour of South Carolina with the state’s Democratic Party, a trek billed as an opportunity for Newsom to hear from rural communities that the party said is “too often left to recover alone from economic setbacks and natural disasters.”

It’s that latter part — disaster relief — that Newsom and his camp have said he’s focused on this trip.

California, reeling from the catastrophic wildfires that destroyed communities and killed 30 people six months ago, is still waiting on a $40 billion request for federal disaster relief. South Carolina, also still reeling from September’s Hurricane Helene devastation that left 50 people dead, received federal disaster aid last year.

Still, it’s impossible to ignore the massive elephant — or rather donkey — in the room, the 2028 of it all.

Newsom, longstanding denials notwithstanding, has been viewed as a presidential candidate for years now. And South Carolina, for even more years, has been a key player in national presidential politics.

The Palmetto State has earned a moniker, ‘First in the South,’ based on a consistent record for picking candidates in primary elections who eventually go on to become presidential nominees for both the Democratic and Republican parties.

In 2024, national Democrats moved the South Carolina primary to the top spot. And while it’s not yet set where it will land on the 2028 calendar, South Carolina is still expected to be an early state, if not first again.

But regardless of where it falls on the primary calendar, there’s no overstating how prominent a role South Carolina voters, particularly Black voters, play in Democratic presidential politics.

Since 1988, when South Carolina began holding presidential primaries, the winner of the Democratic primary has only failed to clinch the party’s nomination two times: John Edwards in 2004 and Jesse Jackson in 1988, both of whom were born in South Carolina. Last year, South Carolina Democratic primary voters picked President Joe Biden before he dropped out of the reelection race.

Experts say that makes Newsom’s visit to South Carolina — even this early in the cycle, even without formally declaring it to be a presidential campaign stop — a smart move. If Newsom, or any Democrat, is going to win a national election, he or she will have to win over voters less liberal than those who have supported Newsom throughout his career.

“California is going to go Democratic in the presidential election, but South Carolina is often make or break for who becomes the Democratic nominee,” said Scott Huffmon, who teaches American politics and voting behavior at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, South Carolina.

“The road to the White House,” he said, “leads through South Carolina.”

‘Heads Carolina, Tails California’

Over two days, Newsom barnstormed around South Carolina in relatively rural areas, including places that overwhelmingly voted for President Donald Trump in previous elections. He met with supporters and the curious in coffee shops, churches and meeting halls.

He encouraged Democrats to stand up to Trump’s policies and didn’t shy away from talking about his home state.

At a stop in Pickens — where Trump drew tens of thousands of supporters for a 2023 rally and in a county where more than 75% of voters chose Trump in 2024 — Newsom talked about the relationship between his state and the president. He drew heavily on the administration’s actions in recent months, as Trump has deployed troops to Los Angeles amid aggressive deportation efforts, the Greenville News reported.

While Republicans and Fox News have painted California as a liberal hellscape — Rep. Sheri Biggs, a freshman Republican who represents the western part of South Carolina, sent a text message blast encouraging recipients to reject “California’s woke agenda” that includes “letting mob rule and crime run rampant” — not everyone thinks Newsom should avoid his Golden State bona fides.

California, after all, generates more economic output per person, contributes more in federal taxes and ranks better (or far better) than national averages for homicide, obesity, cancer deaths and educational attainment, among other things.

“I certainly think if you were to ask a Republican about Gov. Newsom, you’d hear things about California not being a great place to live,” said state Rep. Kambrell Garvin, a Democrat who represents Richland County in the statehouse.

“But I think if you talk to Democrats, I don’t think that perception is the same,” Garvin said. “As a lawmaker, I look to California for many of the progressive policies that are being implemented there as a template of what can be done in South Carolina.”

“Of course, there are going to be conservatives who say we don’t want to do things the way California does, but there are some actually good things happening in California that the rest of the nation can follow.”

Still, South Carolina — as it long has been for Democratic presidential hopefuls, official or not — has long been a testing ground for candidates’ messaging.

And Newsom has some work to do there, said Joshua Hollington, a Democratic voter in South Carolina, who argued that the Democratic Party, as a whole, needs to do more to win back rural communities, blue-collar workers and suburban voters.

If Newsom is to be successful, he said, the governor has to shake any reputation as “being out of touch with the average person” and solidify himself as “an everyday guy you want to have a beer with.”

“The only way to do that is to connect with rural voters,” Hollington said.

“You’ve got to get out of your posh areas and into the heartbeat of America.”

“I think it’s smart to meet people and campaign, and there’s no better way than to meet (voters) face-to-face. Good for him for coming to South Carolina,” said Rep. Neal Collins, a Republican who represents Greenville and Pickens counties in the Upstate.

“In the general, we’re maybe not as important,” said Collins, noting South Carolina has a Republican supermajority and is extremely likely to go for the Republican candidate in the general presidential election.

“But we’re immensely important for the primary.”

‘Gone to Carolina’

Newsom isn’t the only Democrat whose name is being whispered along with “2028” and “White House” who has forayed into South Carolina in recent months.

In May, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (the 2024 Democratic vice presidential nominee) and Maryland Gov. Wes Moore headlined events in Columbia, the capital city.

“I would be interested to see who else is going to journey to South Carolina,” said Chase Meyer, who teaches American politics and elections at the University of South Carolina.

“How you run for president, a lot of it is determined by who else is running and how they’re running their campaigns,” Meyer added.

Take 2020, for example. That year, Meyer said, many Democratic presidential hopefuls took more left-wing positions, an attempt to woo supporters away from progressive Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. The shift, he said, left room for more moderate candidates, like then-South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg and eventual nominee and president Joe Biden, to find success.

“Newsom has recently started to position himself to try to be more moderate,” Meyer said, pointing to Newsom’s podcast featuring a host of right-wing figures.

“Is that going to play well with Democratic voters? It depends on what everyone else does. If every other candidate says, ‘No, that’s horrible, I’d never talk to Steve Bannon,’ there might be an opening for such a candidate,” he said.

For Democrats, South Carolina is the place to test whether a candidate has national appeal. The state is incredibly diverse, and local voters can help champion a candidate in other southern states, including potential swing states like Georgia and North Carolina.

That means the first step for Newsom — should he decide he is running for president — is to start building a network in South Carolina, said Huffmon, the Winthrop professor who leads the school’s Center for Public Opinion & Policy Research.

“If Gavin Newsom is smart,” Meyer echoed, “he’ll be meeting with Democrats in the state legislature, local Democratic mayors, local City Council, and will put their political machinery to work behind him. That means their volunteers and political consultants.”

If history provides any lessons that might be key in the next presidential election cycle, it’s the 2008 Democratic primary where Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton clashed in South Carolina. Their battle only underscored how important Black voters, particularly Black women, are in the Democratic primary.

“Black women voters in South Carolina are very smart, and they know their power. They’re going to spot a fake appeal a mile away,” said Huffmon, saying the last candidate to court Black women voters organically was Obama.

While the former secretary of state’s strategy for winning over women was to deploy her husband, former President Bill Clinton, he ended up putting his foot in his mouth, said Huffmon. Bill Clinton, who was nicknamed the “first Black president,” was perceived as angry during the primary campaign in South Carolina, and called Obama’s opposition to the Iraq War “the biggest fairy tale I’ve ever seen.”

“But the Obama folks had the beauty parlor campaign. They’d call up Black beauty parlors and say, ‘Can I come and talk about this candidate who’s running?’ It’s tough to catch lightning in a bottle like that again, but you do need to find a way to appeal to African American voters, especially African American women, in a legitimate way.”

Democrats in South Carolina, said Garvin, the state representative, are looking for a leader.

“What Democrats need most right now is somebody who is willing to fight and can take the message of why being a Democrat — and what we stand for — is a positive thing,” said Garvin, who has not yet endorsed anyone for 2028.

“Democrats are at a point where we must decide who we are as a party, and what we believe,” Garvin said. “I think that we have got to do a better job of explaining to people why it’s cool to be a Democrat and why what we believe can be transformational to their lives and to our future.”

“Everything I’ve seen from Gov. Newsom thus far, he’s checked those boxes,” he added.

While Newsom has remained relatively mum on his presidential aspirations, others are less so, including one of the most important figures in South Carolina politics, longtime Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn.

Clyburn, who is credited with saving Biden’s 2020 campaign, appeared with Newsom at a stop in Camden, just northeast of Columbia, introducing him as one of the “candidates that are running for president.” Clyburn later told reporters that he feels “good about (Newsom’s) chances” in 2028.

Just what Newsom’s future political plans are remains to be seen.

In Los Angeles, before he left for the East Coast, Newsom waved away questions ahead of the trip about 2028, insisting that it’s important to him to “work with governors, not just Democratic governors but Republican governors” on the issue of disaster relief.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster did not meet with Newsom this week, said Brandon Charochak, a spokesperson for the Republican chief executive.

But if Newsom is preparing a run for the White House, getting to know South Carolina — its voters, its issues and maybe even just how important Joe’s Ice Cream Parlor in Easley is to the community — is a first step.

He was, after all, one of the founding members of the pop-rock band OneRepublic. He’s written hundreds of songs, his biography boasts, and he founded record label Palladium Records, which has signed more than 60 artists.

But Myers, 40, has turned his attention to different voices — this time, less musical, more political.

Myers has launched a 2026 bid for California lieutenant governor, the No. 2 spot in state government.

The former OneRepublic bassist said he’s been disappointed in California’s current leadership.

As a Democrat, Myers said he wants to see state leaders stand up more to President Donald Trump and his administration’s policies, specifically pointing to the deployment of troops to Los Angeles amid increased immigration enforcement operations and scaled-back or eliminated funding to universities and Medicaid, to name a few.

He is also concerned about affordability and homelessness in California and “career politicians.”

“One of the main reasons I’m running is I want to be a loud voice that’s standing up to the political establishment and standing up to Trump and the Republicans,” Myers said in an interview.

A Hidden Hills resident now, Myers was born in Orange and grew up in Corona, where his father served as a pastor at Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside. His family eventually moved to the valley, where he attended Newbury Park High School.

It’s his experiences growing up that has, in part, fueled his desire to run for public office.

Myers remembers feeding the homeless with his father, a tradition he has since continued with his own two daughters. Pre-OneRepublic fame, Myers worked as a janitor at his dad’s church and later juggled opening up Starbucks at 5 a.m. as a barista along with attending school and playing in multiple bands, he said.

“My story is a story of the California dream,” Myers said, “which is coming from nothing … and becoming something.”

Myers had previously said he was running for California’s 41st Congressional District, a challenge to Inland Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Corona.

“Ken Calvert has been in Washington for 30 years,” Myers said in his original announcement. The “status quo isn’t working.”

But he has since changed his mind, saying in a statement this week that he has “witnessed things that are deeply disturbing — and impossible to ignore.”

“But when I looked around, I didn’t see our state politicians standing with us, and I realized: I can’t stay silent. I can’t stay on the sidelines. That’s why I’m shifting my campaign from Congress to California lieutenant governor — to represent all 40 million voices across this state and to fight for a government that actually works for us.”

Myers joins an already relatively crowded field in the race for lieutenant governor.

There’s California Treasurer Fiona Ma and California Chief Service Officer Josh Fryday, as well as former Sausalito Mayor Janelle Kellman and Mike Schaefer, a member of the California Board of Equalization. All are Democrats.

Fryday, a Navy veteran and Novato native, said he is running for the seat “to fix the problems in the communities we love and make it possible for us all to build a better future here.”

Ma is a former state legislator and member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors where, according to her bio, she led an effort to combat human trafficking and prostitution rings in massage parlors.

Schaefer served on the San Diego City Council and has said he’s “dedicated (his) life to protecting taxpayers and challenging powerful interests.”

Kellman grew up in a small Pennsylvania mining town, later earning an environmental law degree at Stanford Law School. She founded the nonprofit Center for Sea Rise Solutions, which aims to build coastal resilience with local decision-makers.

Myers, meanwhile, said he wants to represent a new generation in California politics.

“I want to be a new voice, a different voice that we haven’t heard yet in California politics,” he said. “We need something new.”

Aside from his work in the music industry, Myers is also a dad, a die-hard L.A. Kings fan and a big fan of California cuisine. (You might find him on the campaign trail at a Mexican joint or In-N-Out.)

He is also looking at his own family dynamics as he runs for a statewide office. He is running as a Democrat, but he considers his parents to be “moderate Republicans.” He has one sibling who is a member of the LGBTQ+ community and another who is also a Republican.

“We love each other, and we talk to each other,” Myers said. “It’s interesting the dynamics we’re in right now. There’s a lot of hate, you know, but I’m really hoping here in California I can bring people together and create some major, major change in the state.”

Immigration policy has been a contentious and complicated task for lawmakers for several years — that’s not new.

But in recent weeks, with the federal government ramping up immigration enforcement operations across the country, including in Southern California, the challenge is underscored even more.

On Wednesday, July 2, a cohort of Republicans and Democrats who make up the bipartisan California Problem Solvers Caucus in Sacramento, though, said there are several core principles they agree on when it comes to immigration.

Undocumented immigrants and DACA recipients, they said during an event outside the statehouse, “have contributed greatly to California’s culture and economy for decades.” And many undocumented immigrants are long-term residents of their California communities who work essential jobs and could contribute even more if they were granted legal status, they said.

A pathway to legal status should exist for undocumented workers who are not threats to public safety, they said.

And due process “is a foundational value of our democracy,” they said.

But the legislators also agreed that a secure border is crucial to combating drug and human trafficking and strengthening the country’s national security.

Assemblymembers Laurie Davies, R-Laguna Niguel; Diane Dixon, R-Newport Beach; and Blanca Pacheco, D-Downey, are part of the California Problem Solvers Caucus.

The legislators said they are working in tandem with the congressional Problem Solvers Caucus to advocate for their shared immigration principles.

“For too long, federal inaction has left our communities in limbo,” said Assemblymember David Alvarez, D-San Diego. “These principles lay the groundwork for real solutions — securing the border, honoring due process and providing a path to legal status for those who have earned it. It’s time for Washington to do its job.”

“These bipartisan principles strike a balance between securing the border and recognizing the value that hardworking immigrants bring to our economy,” said Assemblymember Josh Hoover, R-Folsom. “California can’t solve this alone — Washington must lead.”

The group’s press conference came after a handful of Republican legislators, including Davies and Dixon, sent President Donald Trump a letter, urging him to focus his administration’s immigration enforcement efforts on targeting “violent criminals” rather than “non-violent migrants.”

A White House spokesperson, in response, said the Trump administration is focused on those who pose a threat to public safety.

“President Trump remains committed to carrying out the largest mass deportation operation in history by removing dangerous, violent criminal illegal aliens from American communities and targeting the sanctuary cities that provide safe harbor to criminal illegals,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in an email.

In other news

• Assemblymember Avelino Valencia is behind a bill to prohibit online games that use “dual currency” to imitate casino-style betting. These are games that use virtual coins — which in turn, can be cashed in for real money or prizes — to play online casino-like games, according to the Anaheim Democrat’s office.

“We cannot look the other way while these platforms exploit legal gray areas,” said Valencia. “These operations undermine the voter-approved framework that affirms tribal governments’ sovereign right to conduct gaming in California.”

This bill is in the Senate.

• An agreement was reached between legislators and the governor last week to delay implementation of a law mandating that large group health care plans provide coverage for infertility care, including IVF. It was slated to go into effect on July 1 but has been pushed back six months, to the start of 2026.

“As someone who would have to rely on access to fertility treatments for my own family-building, I understand the disappointment with a delay of coverage,” Sen. Caroline Menjivar said. “I know how frustrating another six months is, both emotionally and financially, for folks who are counting the days until they can welcome a child.”

“Our state has never mandated infertility health care coverage, so I hope Californians can be patient with us a little longer as we get this right for its implementation now in January 2026,” she said, noting people should check with their health plans directly because some employers may still have already elected to include this coverage.

The other five Orange County representatives all voted against it, along with the rest of the House Democrats.

Still, the bill passed the House Thursday, July 3, 218-214, after a marathon overnight dealmaking among Republicans and a record-setting, nearly nine-hour speech by Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York. It’s considered a major legislative victory for President Donald Trump.

Democrats, and some Republicans, had expressed various levels of concern about the $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid funding the Senate added to the bill earlier this week. More than 2.3 million Californians could lose access to Medi-Cal coverage, projections estimate.

Kim had been among a small group of House Republicans, many of whom represent swing districts, who had said they would not back any major cuts to Medicaid that could impact coverage to vulnerable populations or that could threaten hospitals, nursing homes and safety-net providers.

“A budget resolution that does not protect vital Medicaid services for the most vulnerable citizens in my community will not receive my vote,” Kim said in April. “I’ve made this clear to my constituents and to House leadership and will continue to do so.”

But shortly after Thursday’s vote, Kim took a victory lap, her office saying in a news release that she “stood up to the White House and House leadership” to secure that $30,000 increase to a cap on how much taxpayers from high-tax states can deduct from federal tax obligations.

As for changes to Medicaid and food assistance programs, Kim said: “This bill takes important steps to ensure federal dollars are used as effectively as possible and to strengthen Medicaid and SNAP for our most vulnerable citizens who truly need it.”

“I will keep working to get our country back on the right track and protect the American dream for future generations,” she said.

Meanwhile, Rep. Lou Correa, D-Santa Ana, said the bill will impact thousands of seniors in Orange County who rely on food assistance programs, including SNAP, that will now be in jeopardy, in addition to the health care coverage concerns.

“I voted against this bill because I cannot in good conscience put the hundreds of thousands of hard-working American taxpayers in Orange County who rely on these programs to survive at risk,” Correa said. “It’s unacceptable, unconscionable and un-American.”

“My constituents sent me to Congress to fight for lower costs and safer communities. This un-American bill accomplishes neither of those goals and will instead rip resources away from hardworking families while giving tax breaks to the ultra-wealthy,” said Rep. Derek Tran, D-Orange.

Kim, along with a handful of House Republicans from New York and New Jersey, had also made raising the cap on how much of a deduction taxpayers can claim to offset high state and local obligations a priority during the negotiations over this spending bill.

The Senate had left in the House’s proposal to allow taxpayers to deduct up to $40,000 per year from federal taxes, phasing it out if their income hits $500,000. But the upper chamber reverts the cap back after five years to $10,000 — the limit placed in 2017 as part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act spearheaded by the first Trump administration.

“For too long, middle-class Americans, working families and small businesses I represent have been hurting from high taxes, rising prices and skyrocketing living costs made worse by out-of-touch policies from Sacramento and Washington,” Kim said in a statement. “This bill lowers taxes and provides relief to put money back in the pockets of everyday Americans.”

California’s 40th Congressional District “leans Republican” for 2026, according to the latest ranking by the Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan election analysis site.

Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Thomas Massie of Kentucky were the only two Republicans who voted against the bill Thursday.

The recent law school graduate — and new contender for California’s 47th Congressional District in 2026 — is part of a younger group of Democratic candidates across the country who want to challenge the establishment in the midterms.

And that includes going up against Democratic incumbents, like Miranda plans to do in the 47th District in 2026, where Rep. Dave Min says he will run for re-election.

“The (Democratic) Party and our government have veered away from championing these essentially key issues that average Americans need and are reliant on,” Miranda said, pointing specifically to cost of living and high taxes. “They have great slogans, but when it comes to implementing the changes that need to happen, they’ve failed.”

“If people genuinely think a status quo politician … is going to make the fundamental changes we need, then by all means, vote for that. But I’m excited for voters to be aware that there’s an alternative,” he said.

The 27-year-old was born and raised in Orange County, residing now in Rancho Santa Margarita after recently finishing up law school at American University in Washington, D.C.

He’s focused full-time on his campaign, he said, but is looking into doing some legal work on the side in immigration, an issue he said is particularly important as the Trump administration continues to ramp up enforcement operations in Southern California.

Miranda credits his family’s long history of service for one of the reasons he felt compelled to run for office. His grandfather served in World War II, his father in Vietnam and his brother in Iraq.

“Their dedication to the country really inspired me growing up,” said the UC Berkeley alumnus, “the importance of service and giving back to the country.”

California’s 47th Congressional District spans the coastline of Orange County and juts inland to include Costa Mesa and Irvine.

Min, a former state legislator, is in the midst of his first term representing the seat. He was elected in 2024, defeating Republican Scott Baugh in an open race after former Rep. Katie Porter opted to run for U.S. Senate instead.

So far, Min, who is also an attorney, has advocated for the cap on state and local tax deductions to be lifted, introduced legislation to track marine life along Southern California’s coastline and joined a bipartisan effort to boost wildfire mitigation efforts in shrubland ecosystems.

A spokesperson for Min’s reelection campaign declined to comment for this story.

Miranda said he’s part of the “groundswell of people stepping up and saying the party is no longer doing what it needs to be doing for people like us.”

In California’s 32nd Congressional District, which covers communities in Los Angeles and Ventura counties, Jake Rakov, a former staffer to Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, is running against his ex-boss in 2026. Rakov, 37, has said it’s time for a new generation of Democrats to lead in Congress.

While still relatively early in the 2026 cycle, the 47th Congressional District is considered to “lean Democrat” now, according to the Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan site that analyzes elections.

Min raised more than $750,000 during the first quarter of 2025, according to FEC data.

Tran said he plans to use his new leadership position on the task force — which is meant to “engage experts and convince members to reassert America’s role as the leader of the free world,” according to a news release — to counter the Trump administration and Republicans on national security issues.

A freshman Democrat who represents California’s 45th Congressional District in Orange and Los Angeles counties, Tran was picked to lead the task force alongside Democratic Reps. Jason Crow of Colorado, Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire and Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey.

“I joined the Army Reserves when I was 18 to give back to the country that had given me so much,” said Tran, D-Orange. “I bring that devotion to service with me to Congress.”

The task force was recently relaunched by House Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar, D-San Bernardino.

Tran pointed to Russia’s ongoing conflict with Ukraine and the Chinese Communist Party’s “growing military presence and pressure,” particularly as it relates to Taiwan, as two of the most pressing issues affecting America’s national security.

He said he’s also concerned by cuts to various national security departments during the second Trump administration.

Particularly led by what the administration has dubbed the Department of Government Efficiency, the Trump White House has made cutting what it views as excessive government spending a priority — and that includes jobs in the federal workforce, even in the defense space. Tran said he is concerned that this has resulted in a lack of institutional knowledge among national security workers.

“We’ve lost veterans who served in cybersecurity, nuclear experts,” Tran said. “These people are no longer with us.”

Tran served in the Army Reserve for eight years, including in military operations after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, his congressional bio notes.

Crow is a former Army Ranger and Bronze Star recipient. Goodlander served as an intelligence officer in the Navy Reserve for more than 10 years, and Sherrill flew missions as a helicopter pilot during her nearly decade of active duty in the Navy.

It’s those cuts to Medicaid that are among the most significant changes to the Senate’s version of the package, which passed Tuesday morning, July 1, after a marathon, overnight voting session.

The Senate approved slashing $1 trillion from Medicaid — which provides health insurance for people with limited means — through work requirements for able-bodied people and changing how much states will be reimbursed by the federal government. Those cuts are expected to hit hard in California, where it’s projected that more than 2.3 million people are at risk of losing their Medi-Cal coverage.

Both of California’s U.S. senators, Democrats Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff, sharply criticized the bill on Tuesday.

“Their votes will cause rural hospitals across the country to close,” Padilla said, referring to his Republican colleagues. “They’re decimating SNAP nutrition assistance that parents count on to feed their children. And electricity bills will go up while our energy system becomes less reliable.”

Trump, meanwhile, said the bill’s passage in the Senate was a “win” for Americans, promising they will see “permanently lower taxes, higher wages and take-home pay, secure borders, and a stronger and more powerful military.” He said Medicaid and Medicare programs are “being strengthened and protected.”

It’s not over yet, though, as the bill still needs to go back to the House, where leadership has expressed confidence that they can get the bill across the finish line before Trump’s imposed July 4 deadline.

From state and local tax deductions to changes to Medicaid, here’s a look at what Southern Californians could expect to see, should the Senate’s version stand.

Changes to Medicaid

The Senate’s slashes to Medicaid are much greater than what the House had previously imposed, and an analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that 11.8 million more Americans would be uninsured by 2034.

For California, that means more than 2.36 million people are at risk of losing Medi-Cal coverage, according to an estimate from Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee.

Gov. Gavin Newsom has put that figure even higher, at 3.4 million Californians. He said the changes to Medicaid and federal rules regarding health care taxes risk up to $28 billion in federal funding for California.

He warned that the changes would result in hospital and clinic closures and curtail efforts the state has made in reducing the number of uninsured residents.

That’s left Huntington Beach mom Kim Doyle concerned, who said regular wellness and health care checkups for her daughter are crucial.

Her daughter Trinity — or “extra fancy girl,” as her mom affectionately calls her — has a dual diagnosis of autism and Down syndrome. She’s considered medically fragile, is non-verbal and cannot develop antibodies to fight regular infections.

Trinity, at age 20, sees seven different specialists through Children’s Hospital of Orange County fairly regularly. There’s the neuroligist, the gastroenterologist, the endocrinologist, all of whom she sees about twice a year.

Regular lab work and testing is cheaper because they can catch a problem more quickly and avoid further hospitalizations or prolonged illnesses, said Doyle, noting that her daughter relies on both private insurance and Medi-Cal, California’s version of Medicaid.

In all, Trinity has had nine ear surgeries because she cannot develop the antibodies to fight ear infections, Doyle said. Eight years ago, she underwent a 12-hour surgery at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles to remove a microvascular tumor in her hand, with doctors reattaching nerves and veins.

Doyle said she’s in a bit of a “wait and see” holding pattern now, as she watches what lawmakers will ultimately decide to do with this spending bill. Her full-time job is taking care of her daughter, and she is worried the proposed changes to Medicaid will mean fewer regular checkups for her daughter, or a loss of the convalescence and social services they’ve come to rely on.

“We’ve fought so hard to get these services for our kids,” Doyle said. “I’m concerned that things will be cut, and she won’t get the same quality of care.”

The White House, meanwhile, has pushed back on assertions that people will be “kicked off” of Medicaid, instead insisting that it will protect the most vulnerable patients while “eliminating waste, fraud and abuse.”

The bill still needs to go back to the House, where leadership has expressed confidence that they can get the bill across the finish line before Trump’s imposed July 4 deadline.

Rep. Young Kim, who represents communities in Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, is one of a handful of House Republicans who have unequivocally said that they wouldn’t support a bill that includes large cuts to Medicaid. They have said they would support certain reforms, but could not back cuts to coverage for vulnerable populations or those that would threaten hospitals, nursing homes and safety net providers.

A spokesperson for Kim said they were still reviewing the changes the Senate made when reached for comment Tuesday.

The spending bill also includes a provision blocking Planned Parenthood and other similar organizations from receiving Medicaid payments for one year — part of a long-term effort by Republicans to cut federal funding from going to abortion providers.

Last year, Planned Parenthood of Orange and San Bernardino Counties provided nearly 270,000 medical visits at nine health centers across those two counties, according to statistics provided by the organization.

Abortions, Planned Parenthood said, only account for “a very small but important part of the services” provided, which also include cancer screenings, breast exams and birth control.

It’s still unclear what the loss of federal funding will mean for any future services PPOSBC provides to the region, said Krista Hollinger, its president and CEO.

“We are looking into multiple options to help mitigate any potential federal funding loss so that we can continue to serve the patients who rely on us for needed medical care,” Hollinger said. “Thousands of patients depend on us for high-quality, compassionate care, and we remain steadfast in our commitment to keeping our doors open to them, no matter the challenges we face.”

AI moratorium

Senators also axed a ban on states and local governments from regulating artificial intelligence for a decade — a provision that the House had added into its earlier version, surprising some members.

California is among multiple states that have enacted AI-related regulations. The governor last year OK’d a transparency and disclosure bill that requires large AI companies to clearly mark what content was generated by AI or provide consumers with a detection tool.

Attorney General Rob Bonta had urged the Senate to strip the effort that would ban states’ ability to enforce their own regulations.

“States are often on the front lines of developing strong privacy and technology protections for their residents,” Bonta said last month.

State and local tax deductions

Senators left in an increase to the cap on how much of a deduction taxpayers can claim to offset high state and local tax obligations — for the next five years.

Raising the cap on these deductions, called SALT, was one of the trickier negotiations among House Republicans, particularly for those who represent communities in the high-tax states of California, New Jersey and New York. The Senate left in the House’s proposal to allow taxpayers to deduct up to $40,000 per year from the federal taxes, phasing it out if their income hits $500,000.

But the Senate’s version, after five years, reverts the cap back to $10,000 — the limit placed in 2017 as part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act spearheaded by the first Trump administration.

Tips and overtime pay

Included in the package is a provision that allows workers to deduct overtime pay and tips from taxable income.

The deduction for overtime pay is capped at $12,500 for an individual filer and decreases for those who make more than $150,000 a year. The deduction for tips is capped at $25,000 and also decreases for individuals who make more than $150,000 a year.

Both tax cuts are only in place for tax years 2025-2028; in other words, they last throughout the rest of Trump’s term.

The U.S. Senate has already passed a bill that would enact similar deductions on tips.

There was also a similar effort in the California Statehouse this year, led by Republican Sen. Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh, who represents communities in San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

Environmental tax credits

Senate Republicans voted to strip billions in green energy tax credits, essentially dismantling a 2022 Biden-era climate law and ending incentives for clean energy more quickly than previous drafts of the spending bill had suggested.

Schiff warned these changes will “destroy the future of renewable energy and raise energy bills by hundreds of dollars every year.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Led by Sen. Suzette Martinez Valladares, whose district includes Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties, the legislators said they support “efforts to identify, detain and deport violent criminals” who are in the U.S. illegally.

But they also said recent raids targeting violent criminals have swept up non-criminal migrants as well.

“Unfortunately, the recent ICE workplace raids on farms, at construction sites, and in restaurants and hotels, have led to unintended consequences that are harming the communities we represent and the businesses that employ our constituents,” they said in the letter to President Donald Trump.

“We have heard from employers in our districts that recent ICE raids are not only targeting undocumented workers, but also creating widespread fear among other employees, including those with legal immigration status. This fear is driving vital workers out of critical industries, taking California’s affordability crisis and making it even worse for our constituents.”

The six Republicans also asked for the Trump administration to modernize the country’s immigration process to allow for a pathway to legal status for non-criminal undocumented immigrants who have “longstanding ties to our communities.”

And they want Trump to expand temporary visa programs for agricultural and temporary workers so more legal workers can come to the U.S. and employers can more easily get vital workers, they said.

“America needs a system that reflects both compassion and lawfulness — one that upholds sovereignty while recognizing the reality on the ground,” they said. “The last president to successfully tackle this issue was Ronald Reagan nearly 40 years ago, and it is long past time to modernize our immigration policies.”

Aside from Valladares, the letter was signed by Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones of San Diego and Sen. Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh, whose district includes Riverside and San Bernardino counties. Orange County Assemblymembers Laurie Davies of Laguna Niguel and Diane Dixon of Newport Beach, as well as Assemblymember Heath Flora of Ripon also signed on.

“We are now urging the administration to prioritize public safety, while advancing immigration and visa policies that strengthen our economy, secure our borders and keep our communities safe,” Valladares said.

The Trump administration has ratcheted up federal immigration enforcement efforts across the country, but particularly in Southern California, in recent weeks.

Videos have shown masked federal agents, without warning to even local police, getting out of unmarked or lightly marked cars and swiftly detaining people. There have been reports of asylum seekers being arrested while appearing at routine court hearings and U.S. citizens being detained during enforcement operations.

Large-scale protests have broken out around Southern California as a result — which led to Trump deploying the military and federalized National Guard troops to Los Angeles. Gov. Gavin Newsom is challenging that action in federal court, where attorneys for the Trump administration have defended the move, saying the National Guard is needed to protect federal buildings and agents in Los Angeles amid “ongoing violence.” Without the Guard, they’ve argued, properties and people would be at risk.

A White House spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the six Republicans’ letter Monday afternoon.

But while most of the letter urged change from the White House, it also criticized laws and policies championed by California’s Democratic supermajority.

California, the letter said, is “hurting” due to overregulation, rising costs and a labor market that is “strangling” businesses.

“The Latino community in particular has borne the brunt of many of the state’s far-left policies that, instead of serving them, only protect criminals and eliminate opportunity,” the legislators said.

Dixon, meanwhile, said she toured the southern border last year and alleged that California’s sanctuary policies — which limit resources from assisting federal immigration enforcement officers and efforts — have turned the state “into a magnet for illegal migration.”

“We are still facing the consequences of becoming a sanctuary state, which has led to countless illegal migrant criminals becoming repeat offenders of our legal system,” Dixon said. “Additionally, I have major concerns about the illegal fentanyl coming across the border and killing Americans, and the horrific crimes being committed related to human trafficking.”

Davies echoed those sentiments, saying, “for far too long, previous administrations have allowed unchecked illegal immigration to explode.”

“Commonsense immigration reform is quite simple: Deport those with criminal records and find a pathway to citizenship for those who have become productive members of their communities,” Davies said. “If we want our region secure, that involves securing our border. This will help us combat drug and human trafficking operations.”

“It’s time to leave party labels at the door and begin action on much-needed reform,” said Davies.