DISNEY INTIMIDATED AS POLITICAL POWER TRUMPS MONEY

 

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, APRIL 18, 2025 OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

 “DISNEY INTIMIDATED AS POLITICAL POWER TRUMPS MONEY”

 

For many generations, an American proverb stated that “Money talks, (other stuff) walks.”

 

But maybe that old saying needs revision, as the sixth largest publicly traded corporation in California right now has plenty of money, but appears intimidated by raw political power.

 

Of course, the Walt Disney Co. has been through a lot in recent years. Much of it was because the firm – whose Disney World resort near Orlando makes it the largest employer in Florida – tried to take a principled stand against a Florida law forbidding teachers from mentioning homosexuality or gay lifestyles in classrooms below grade 3 and in many others at higher levels. That law has been nicknamed “Don’t say gay.”

 

Anyone believing most Floridians object to this censorship might want to consult election returns subsequent to that law’s passage. Republicans have dominated elections in once-purple Florida during that time span like never before. GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis likes to say his state is “where ‘wokism’ goes to die.”

 

DeSantis took revenge on Disney quickly after the firm opposed his pet policy. He altered the nature and makeup of a local board governing development around Disney World, replacing company appointees with his own.

 

That substantially contradicted the terms under which Disney created its vast Florida amusement park, sports and hotel complex – but no one outside Disney seemed to mind. The company could not stop the change despite its more than $91 billion in annual revenue.

 

Now Disney, whose animated film “Strange World” featured the company’s first biracial gay teenage hero, appears done with principle.

 

For Disney wants to be beloved by all, as it was in the heyday of Mickey Mouse, Goofy, the little mermaid and others among its cartoon characters. But one poll of Florida voters last year showed only 27 percent of Republicans in the state had a positive view of Disney, compared with 76 percent of Democrats. Altogether, only a bare majority liked Disney. Previous surveys had showed almost universal love of most things Disney.

 

The company can’t tolerate such limited positivity from potential fans and customers when corporate profits and executive survival require across-the-board approval, maybe even love.

 

Disney is now aware that its image can be affected negatively by aggressive politicians, and it knows no politician is more aggressive than the recently-restored President Trump.

 

So Disney will now bend over backward not to offend. That’s why its wholly-owned subsidiary the ABC television network paid a $15 million libel settlement to Trump’s presidential library fund rather than fight in court against his libel lawsuit, which looked to most legal experts like a sure loser,

 

It's also why company CEO Robert Iger, who once tweeted that “don’t say gay” “will put vulnerable young LGBTQ people in jeopardy,” changed his tune. He subsequently told an investors’ meeting he would discourage overt Disney political stances.

 

“The stories you tell have to really reflect the audience that you’re trying to reach, but that audience, because they are so diverse…can be turned off by certain things,” he said. So, he said, Disney will avoid politics.

 

“Our primary mission needs to be to entertain,” he said. “It should not be agenda driven.”

 

Of course, movies have often driven public opinion without direct preaching. That was the case with classic films like Columbia Pictures’ “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” and “To Kill a Mockingbird,” distributed by Universal-International Films. And during a hiatus in Iger’s tenure as Disney chief, the company did release some films with racial content, like “Black Panther” and “Coco.”

 

Those movies were unusual for Disney, most of whose films previously avoided edgy content, instead featuring characters like Bambi, Pinocchio and Donald Duck.

 

So expect Disney’s movie fare and its conduct around other corporate assets to revert to the kind of tame content for which the company was long known.

 

As one pop culture professor told a reporter the other day, “You don’t want to get in a fight with the head of a government. Politics is not good business.”

 

At least not for Disney, which gave it a brief try and has now meekly implied that for it, profits come before principles.

 

 

    -30-

    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

 

Suggested pull-out quote: “Expect Disney’s movie fare and its conduct around other corporate assets to revert to tameness.”

IF MEASLES OUTBREAK WORSENS, LOOK TO VIEWS SPREAD BY RFK JR

 

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, APRIL 15, 2025 OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

 “IF MEASLES OUTBREAK WORSENS, LOOK TO VIEWS SPREAD BY RFK JR.”

 

 

So far, the ongoing measles outbreak across this country and this state has not reached epidemic status. If it ever does, and if large numbers of unvaccinated children die, blame will be easy to assess.

 

Some, of course, will accrue to President Trump, who last year bought out the presidential campaign of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. with a promise to make the nation’s leading anti-vaccine crusader his secretary of Health and Human Services.

 

It's too soon to attribute the current spate of measles cases strictly to RFK Jr.’s position, although he has used his new bully pulpit to make spurious claims about the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine that until recently had seemed to relegate those diseases to what Ronald Reagan called the “dustbin of history.”

 

In one Fox News interview, Kennedy, who because of his lineage has always carried a metaphorical megaphone, made a show of encouraging MMR vaccinations, but simultaneously suggested natural immunity acquired though infection could be more protective than vaccine-produced immunity – and never mind risks from the diseases themselves – including death. Kennedy’s stance contradicts long established medical evidence, but that is nothing new for him.

 

RFK Jr. next threatened to fire all the government's top experts on infectious diseases and their spread. 

 

Kennedy long claimed routine childhood vaccinations are responsible for large increases in diagnoses of autism, a claim refuted in numerous medical journals. Another reason for questioning Kennedy’s autism claims: childhood vaccinations have been in mass use since the 1950s, complete with state laws requiring vaccinations prior to public school attendance. Increases in autism incidence are far more recent.

 

This year has seen measles cases turn up in many states, Texas leading with 400 cases as of March 28. Texas also saw one of the two measles deaths in America this year, those two deaths marking the first in this nation since 2015. It’s valid to wonder how the parents of those two children feel about Kennedy’s claims of natural immunity being superior to vaccine effects, which offer individuals a 97 percent protection rate even where there is no “herd immunity.”

 

It's also valid to note Texas has among the loosest state laws on childhood vaccinations, granting exemptions to any child whose parent claims to have a personal or religious objection. No proof of prior belief is required.

 

California’s rules have been tighter since 2015, religious objections no longer accepted. But medical exemptions can be granted here when a doctor certifies a child has medical problems with vaccines.

 

This rule has been exploited by a few doctors who oppose vaccination, some signing forms after only cursory exams and often with little knowledge of a child’s background.

 

Now some counties no longer boast what is termed “herd immunity,” a vaccination rate assuring virtually no cases of a targeted disease will occur. This is usually achieved with vaccination rates topping 95 percent for some diseases and needing to be even higher with others. For the MMR vaccine, even though the statewide rate for full vaccination among schoolchildren (two doses each) stood at 96.2 percent last winter, 16 counties did not achieve herd immunity during the current school year.

 

Subsequently, cases of measles have been reported over the last year in large counties like Alameda, Orange and Los Angeles, and in smaller ones like Tuolumne and Sutter.

 

Among the fully vaccinated, 97 percent will not experience the high fevers and rashes of measles. But where levels fall below herd immunity, death rates can reach one to three persons for every 1,000 infected, reports the University of Chicago. Measles also can cause encephalitis, with associated pneumonia, long-term neurological problems, hearing loss and even brain damage.

 

Local health officials say much of the drop in vaccination rates in counties like Santa Cruz (down from 94.1 percent to 91.8 percent over the last two years) stems from misinformation, much coming from the Children’s Health Defense group long headed by Kennedy.

 

He left that group before Trump named him America’s top health official, but there is no evidence his beliefs have changed.

 

The bottom line: If the measles outbreak worsens, much responsibility will accrue to Trump and Kennedy.

 

 

    -30-

    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

 

Suggested pull-out quote: “Local health officials say much of the drop in vaccination rates in (some) counties can be ascribed to misinformation.”

CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION? WHY OPEN PANDORA’S BOX?

 CALIFORNIA FOCUS

FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, APRIL 11, 2025, OR THEREAFTER

 

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

 “CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION? WHY OPEN PANDORA’S BOX?”

 

Two of California’s last three governors have wanted to help organize and promote constitutional conventions, either on the state or federal level. They’ve both been dangerously wrong about this.

 

Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wanted only a state convention, aiming to take some of the clumsiness out of California’s governing documents, which changes as often as every two years if voters pass ballot initiatives.

 

But current Gov. Gavin Newsom is more ambitious, seeking the first national constitutional convention since 1787, even before George Washington was elected president.

 

Newsom thinks he can confine such a convention to one issue: gun control.

 

Ironically, these seemingly simple calls from a moderate Republican and a liberal Democrat put them both in the camp of the far-right Republicans of the Convention of States organization, which has been seeking a national constitutional revision meeting for years. So far, the COS effort has garnered support from more than half the 34 states needed to call a convention. 

 

Like Newsom and Schwarzenegger, COS claims its convention could be confined to its narrow goals, which include imposition of severe spending restraints on Congress, along with term limits for senators and Congress members and a few other officials. (Presidents are already limited to two terms by the existing Constitution’s 22nd Amendment.)

 

And there’s the problem: Because there’s never been a second constitutional convention, no one knows if such a gathering’s activity can be confined to one or two subjects, or whether everything would become fair game. The First Amendment, guaranteeing free speech and freedom of religion, might disappear. So might the Second Amendment’s guarantees of gun rights. Or the 14^th Amendment guarantees of due process in all criminal proceedings. And on and on.

 

In short, a constitutional convention would be a Pandora’s Box and no one knows what institution might supervise or limit its scope. For just one example, since the Constitution sets up the Supreme Court as one of today’s major authorities, why would anyone believe that court’s justices might have jurisdiction over the doings of a constitutional revision convention that might potentially change or eliminate the court itself?

 

That’s why San Francisco’s ultra-leftist Democratic state Sen. Scott Wiener wants the Legislature this year to revoke its approval of a resolution calling for a convention to deal with gun control. Wiener, who has been wrong about many things including reshaping California housing to make it far more dense than before, is right about this. There’s even the possibility that California’s call for a gun control confab could be added to the COS efforts for a convention dealing with vastly different issues. No one knows.

 

Said Wiener, “There is no way I want California to accidentally help these extremists trigger a constitutional convention where they (might) rewrite the Constitution to restrict voting rights, to eliminate reproductive health access and so forth.”

 

Wiener’s fears are becoming more common, as states like Illinois and New Jersey, which previously had open calls for a constitutional convention, have rescinded their prior actions. Any that are not rescinded remain valid indefinitely and could be used by COS or anyone else wanting to call a convention, whatever their motives.

 

No doubt a constitutional convention, whether at the state or federal level, would be a delight for people who like to tinker with or brainstorm about government structure. But it also could turn into a nightmare for those who treasure civil liberties and protection against the tyranny of the majority when it comes to things like taxation.

 

The fact is, no one even knows how delegates to such a convention might be chosen, or who would be eligible to serve. The current state and federal constitutions indicate only they must represent different areas and states in proportion to their population. Whether they would be elected or appointed by current officeholders is an open question. For sure, there are no guarantees of which groups would be represented and which might not.

 

The bottom line: It’s best not to confront questions like this at all, since the lack of existing rules could mean that decisions would be made by the loudest among us, rather than the wisest. So why open this Pandora’s box at all?

 

 

 

    -30-

    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

“EVERYONE ELSE ABOUT TO START SUBSIDIZING MANSION PAYOUTS

 

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, APRIL 8, 2025 OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“EVERYONE ELSE ABOUT TO START SUBSIDIZING MANSION PAYOUTS”

 

Here’s the likely outcome of the April 8 hearing set to follow the California insurance commissioner’s tentative mid-March approval of a 22 percent average rate increase for customers of State Farm General Insurance Co., this state’s largest carrier of home insurance policies:

 

All other Californians will soon be subsidizing the rebuilding of myriad mansions burned down in the January firestorm that ravaged much of Los Angeles County. Plus a good number of less luxurious homes, too.

 

Commissioner Ricardo Lara tentatively approved the average 22 percent rate hike for State Farm customers, with similar increases sure to come also for customers of other insurance companies like Mercury, Safeco, Travelers, Allstate and more.

 

These increases will hit virtually everyone: They include a 38 percent hike for rental properties, with a 15 percent raise for renters’ insurance on contents and for condominium owners.

 

The hearing will see opposition from several consumer groups, most prominently the Consumer Watchdog advocacy group. The eventual outcome may end with some increases dropping a percentage point or two. As it stands, what Lara tentatively approved amounts to an average of about $600 per year for every policyholder in the state.

 

Make no mistake, this is a pure subsidy for State Farm and the folks it insures. Perhaps the archetype claim from the January fires was for a destroyed home on two contiguous ocean-front lots in Malibu that sold three years ago for $85 million.

 

Trying to put up a show of looking after customers’ interests, Lara said he will expect State Farm to stop canceling homeowner policies, a practice that led to intense distress for some victims of the latest crop of large wildfires because many were forced after cancellations to turn to the state’s expensive and not very comprehensive last-resort insurer, the California Fair Plan.

 

Lara also said he will expect State Farm General’s parent company, Illinois-based State Farm Mutual, to contribute hundreds of millions, perhaps as much as $500 million, from reserves long held by the parent company. That would be a tiny fraction of the company’s actual reserves, which in January stood at a minimum of $134 billion, with some estimates as high as $192 billion.

 

So people who live in areas that have never seen a wildfire and are not likely ever to experience one will soon contribute to payouts for owners of large homes in Malibu and Pacific Palisades.

 

What’s more, State Farm and other insurance companies stand to get much of their money back via the current spate of lawsuits blaming Southern California Edison Co. transmission lines for sparking the Eaton fire that incinerated much of Altadena, about 40 miles east of Pacific Palisades. Once insurance companies pay their policyholders off in that area, they will inherit any customer claims against the big utility.

 

Then there’s re-insurance, routinely bought by insurance companies to insure themselves against big losses. That will cover more billions of dollars for them.

 

None of that will much mitigate what Lara likely will allow the insurance companies to add to customer premiums starting in May. These other factors making life easier for the insurance industry have played little or no role in price increases assessed after previous wildfires hit other parts of California through the last eight years.

 

Meanwhile, the closest customers have heard to the truth about all this came from a since-fired State Farm executive who was secretly recorded saying his company uses policy cancellations as a ploy to drive prices up in California and other disaster-prone states.

 

Haden Kirkpatrick, until recently State Farm’s vice president for innovation and venture capital, was fired immediately after he became the first completely truthful insurance executive this nation had seen in decades.

 

But Lara showed no sign of paying the slightest heed to anything Kirkpatrick admitted. Which should come as no surprise from a state official who promised never to accept campaign donations from the companies he regulates and then took large sums, only to be shamed into returning the money later.

 

The entire exercise is shameful and demonstrates why, when Lara leaves office after next year, his replacement must be far more consumer friendly.

 

-30-

    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough, The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

WESTERN REGIONAL GRID IMPERILS CALIFORNIA INDEPENDENCE

 CALIFORNIA FOCUS

1720 OAK STREET, SANTA MONICA, CALIFORNIA 90405
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, APRIL 4, 2025 OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“WESTERN REGIONAL GRID IMPERILS CALIFORNIA INDEPENDENCE”

 

If California wants power company executives from coal-happy states like Wyoming and Utah to run energy policy in this state, then the state Senate should pass a proposed law called SB 540, sponsored by Silicon Valley Democrat Josh Becker.

 

Similarly, if California wants its most important environmental decisions to be made by a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) controlled by President Trump, pass this bill.

 

But if California wants to continue controlling its own destiny in deciding what kinds of energy sources to employ as power needs expand, then a no vote is needed.

 

Make no mistake, large companies like Google in and near Becker’s district want this bill, which would probably allow it and similar firms operating insatiably power-hungry artificial intelligence (AI)  plants going up in many rural parts of the West to use all the coal-fired energy they like, and hang the smog effects – which California has resisted for decades.

 

 

Becker chairs the state Senate Energy Committee, where his bill is due for its first vote April 8. Ironically, on accepting that job, he promised to push for clean energy.

 

 

This is actually the second big effort in the last eight years to have California join something informally called a Western regional electric grid. Like current Gov. Gavin Newsom, ex-Gov. Jerry Brown also pushed the idea.

 

The advantage: New power supplies could become available to California more quickly. The disadvantage: much of that power would be from “dirty” sources, plants fired by coal, oil and natural gas. Especially coal, which is favored heavily by regulators in states with large coal reserves, like Montana and Wyoming.

 

No question, Idaho and Utah are not as coal dependent as they once were, but they remain far more reliant on that source than California. Utah, especially, has plants itching to export coal energy to California.

 

So, says Jamie Court, director of the Consumer Watchdog public advocacy group and the most vocal opponent of the Western grid, “Sovereignty issues that have doomed the Western Regional Transmission Organization and prevented it from becoming law have not gone away. In fact, they are more perilous than ever.”

 

Advocates against the regional grid contend flatly that “This…would place control over California’s energy market in the hands of an (organization) heavily dominated by coal interests. California would be subject to…a market authority not interested in either California or its policies.”

 

One reason this plan has a better chance of passage today than in 2017 is increased union domination of the California legislature, achieved mostly via campaign donations.

 

Back in 2017, the similar earlier plan was opposed by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), which issued dire warnings about loss of California authority. Now the IBEW sports contracts with big AI farms and with PacificCorp, an Oregon-based utility that controls vast coal resources from Montana to Texas, the nation’s largest coal using state.

 

The regional grid, said Court, could completely control how California’s Independent System Operator manages this state’s grid. “California,” he said, “would give up its right to demand that its own environmental, consumer and health laws be followed.”

 

What’s more, California consumers could be forced to help pay for construction of new transmission lines all over the West. Building new power lines is already a major part of most utility bills here.

 

The new plan does contain so-called guardrails aiming to protect California, including a “statement of governance”  saying the new regional grid would “respect California’s right to set policies.” But that statement could be overridden by a simple order from FERC whenever Trump desires. 

 

What’s more, there is no realistic way to escape this deal, once made. Any attempt for California to get out would need approvals both by the regional grid’s officers and by FERC.

 

It’s as if California were considering inviting Enron to move in and take over the state’s grid again, even if that turns out to be as crooked and disastrous as when it happened during the early 2000s energy crunch.

 

No, this proposal is not labelled “Coal, Coal, Coal,” but reality is that a lump of worthless coal is just what California would likely end up holding.

 

 

-30-
    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough, The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It" is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

CONSUMER FRAUD, PRICE GOUGING THREATEN FIRE RECOVERY DELAYS

 

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, APRIL 1, 2025 OR THEREAFTER

 

 

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“CONSUMER FRAUD, PRICE GOUGING THREATEN FIRE RECOVERY DELAYS”

 

 

And so the word went out almost precisely two months after fire incinerated most of the Pacific Palisades district in Los Angeles: The water is OK again, you can drink it, come on back home.

 

 

Immediately, the old Latin slogan Caveat Emptor (let the buyer beware) gained new relevance, for survivors of both January’s fires in the Palisades and burned out Altadena, 40 miles east – and for prospective survivors of big new fires state authorities predict later this year.

 

 

For no matter the happy talk from embattled Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, few paid much heed. “In the tragic Camp fire (which destroyed Paradise in Butte County in 2018), it took a year (to restore water quality). It was done here in two months,” she said.

 

 

That may not matter much. The great bulk of the thousands of residents whose homes did not burn are not moving back for the time being. There enters the sometimes bitter reality of Caveat Emptor.

 

 

Frank and Grace Milton (not their real names) ran afoul of this very quickly. Once the 70-something grandparents learned their home survived and that, at a minimum, all its internal walls and ceilings would need scrubbing, they took bids from rehab contractors. Such contractors are subject to California’s anti-price gouging law (penal code section 396), but for washing their walls, estimates for the four-bedroom Milton place began at $40,000. Not including polluted furniture, carpeting and beds that must all be replaced.

 

 

They gave one contractor a $500 deposit, then never heard from the firm again. An out-of-state company, its “office” was a South Carolina cellphone.

 

 

Does $40,000 for a three-day job constitute price gouging? It was the best price the Miltons could find. Lawyers differ on whether it’s gouging, and if the company did not previously operate in California, no one will say for sure for lack of a baseline price. Similar problems reportedly plagued survivors of the 2017 Tubbs fire in the Santa Rosa area, which destroyed more than 5,600 structures. No one knows the full extent of such possible fraud and gouging; there is no formal registry.

 

 

The Miltons still have not secured a dependable rehab contractor.

 

 

Another family whose home in the nearby Sunset Mesa subdivision (a reported 400 out of 500 homes there burned down) is unsure they want to return, even if their home can be cleaned up.

 

 

Said the husband, “Our house and some others survived, but we can see no other standing homes from our windows. We don’t yet know how much toxic material penetrated our house. We’re not sure we want to move back to such pure desolation.”

 

 

Meanwhile, that couple pays $15,000 per month for an 850-square-foot one bedroom apartment in a nearby part of Los Angeles. That’s more than three times the pre-fire going rate in the area; rent gouging is illegal. But the apartment was never previously on the market. The couple rented while feeling pressure after living a month in a string of Airbnbs and on relatives’ couches. They’ve been unable to determine whether they’re subjected to illegal price gouging.

 

 

All this is before most returning residents even begin to test toxicity in their walls and yards. And well before the fires widely predicted statewide later this year materialize.

 

 

Yet, there are positive stories, too, of reliable contractors and newly fenced properties sporting contractor signage.

 

 

So when Bass and other politicians crow about speedily taking care of one aspect of reconstituting fire areas, survivors of these and future fires easily see how empty even comforting words can be.

 

 

For many present fire victims, the bottom line is that they’ll wait until today’s overheated activity dies down before deciding their futures. Meanwhile, others are moving elsewhere or planning to wait two or three years for the value of their lots to recover sufficiently to be sold off without heavy losses.

 

 

In the end, as with the Camp fire – where almost seven years after the blaze, about 43 percent of structures are rebuilt or permitted to rebuild, with more than 3,000 more permit applications pending– this now looks like a decade-long process with both good news and bad, but likely to be plagued by consumer issues, regardless of anything politicians say. 

 

 

-30-

 

    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough, The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

TRANSGENDER EDICT PART OF TRUMP’S PROMISED DICTATORIAL STYLE

 

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, MARCH 28, 2025, OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

 “TRANSGENDER EDICT PART OF TRUMP’S PROMISED DICTATORIAL STYLE”

 

The news has been bleak for weeks for teenagers convinced they were born in the wrong style of body, children better known as “transgender.”

 

Because of a president untrained in anything medical or psychological, but expert in manipulating public emotions, many of them will be denied previously available care for the foreseeable future.

 

This began as part of what President Trump promised while a candidate, being a “dictator on Day 1.” He never promised to cease acting that way after Day 1, and has not.

 

Trump issued a blizzard of executive orders immediately after his inauguration, a tide that has not abated much. His operatives, led by entrepreneur Elon Musk and a cadre of early-20s computer programmers at the quasi-official Department of Government Efficiency, quickly accessed large quantities of previously private information on everything from foreign aid to student loans and Medicare payments – and showed few signs of stopping even when so ordered by courts.

 

 

This is enabled by usually sycophantic, intimidated, but tiny Republican majorities in both houses of Congress, where virtually no Republican protests any Trump move.

 

One illustration is what’s happening to transgender youth – massive uncertainty. Already controversial and never available in all states, gender affirming treatments and surgeries suddenly became harder to get in states like California, New York and Virginia because of a first-day Trump edict.

 

Trump ordered such treatments stopped, saying no young person’s feelings about being in a type of body unmatched to their nature can be valid. He has called this type of care “chemical and surgical mutilation.” One of his first orders halted federal payments for such treatments while the rules are rewritten.

 

Almost immediately, some major hospitals shut down gender care programs. They feared not getting paid for their work and also the possibility that once rules are redone, Trump-appointed officials might try to claw money back from them. After a few court actions, some programs tentatively restarted.

 

In California, the most notable stoppage came at Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles, the state’s largest medical facility for juveniles, which operates a Center for Transyouth Health. After Trump’s order, the hospital “paused” starts of hormonal care for transgender patients under 19. The facility also said it would continue an “existing pause” on gender-altering surgery for minors. The surgical ban continues, but other treatments have resumed.

 

The original decision was cheered by longtime anti-transgender organizations like the California Family Council, while LGBTQ+ groups called it “alarming.”

 

Hospitals in other states made similar moves, including the Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C.; Denver Health in Colorado, and NYU Langone Health in New York, among others.

 

These changes potentially affected hundreds of young people and might be illegal, say California Attorney General Rob Bonta and several other state attorneys general.

 

This is only one area where the often inexpert Trump has spoken and acted on presumptions, not facts. Another example: when visiting California wildfire areas, he demanded deliveries of “more beautiful, delicious Pacific Northwest water” to this state. Of course, California has never received water from the Northwest, nor is there now any way to deliver it. Trump also demanded the Army Corps of Engineers suddenly deliver thousands of acre feet of water from behind dams feeding the federal Central Valley Project.

 

When some of that water reached San Joaquin Valley farms in late January, it was unusable because of the already wet season. Most flowed into underground aquifers. No one knows yet if this will cause water shortages later, in hot weather. None reached any part of Los Angeles, as no means exists to bring Central Valley Project water to Southern California.

 

Trump’s vice president then raised the possibility of outright defiance if any court orders a stop when Trump acts illegally on uninformed presumptions rather than real facts and needs.

 

Said JD Vance on the X social media outlet, “Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”

 

Trump and his allies have been fine with the courts when they agree with rulings, but no one knows if they will try to ignore future decisions they don’t like.

 

The entire area remains far from settled.

 

   -30-

    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net