California News:
The Dhillon Law Group and legislative plaintiffs held a press conference Tuesday morning ahead of the Assembly Elections Committee hearing to announce an emergency petition filed with the California Supreme Court to stop Governor Gavin Newsom and legislative leaders from rushing through an unconstitutional redistricting plan without the 30–day public review period required by the California Constitution.
Attorney Michael A. Columbo with the Dhillon Law Group was joined by the petition’s plaintiffs: Senator Tony Strickland, Senator Suzette Martinez Valladares, Assemblyman Tri Ta and Assemblyman Carl DeMaio.
The Emergency Petition for Writ of Mandate filed with the California Supreme Court challenges the Legislature’s attempt to bypass the California Constitution’s 30–day public review requirement by “gutting and amending” unrelated bills (AB 604 and SB 280) into sweeping redistricting legislation without giving Californians the time guaranteed by law to review and deliberate.
The petition seeks immediate relief to halt legislative action on this unconstitutional measure until the public’s right to review has been honored.
Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Huntington Beach) said last night in the Senate was a shining example of why the people took back redistricting from politicians. “California already has the ‘Gold Standard’ redistricting process, Senator Strickland said.
The other important issue is who drew the maps? Sen. Strickland said it is unconstitutional for elected politicians to touch the maps, and asked members of the press to ask Senate President Pro Ten Mike McGuire, Senator Angelique Ashby and Assemblywoman Jasmeet Bains if they saw the maps – three lawmakers rumored to be looking to run for Congress.
“Governor Newsom and Democrats are willing to violate our laws and their own rules,” Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher said. “We are not going to allow this to happen anymore.”
“The law is on our side.”
Assemblyman Carl DeMaio called this “one of the darkest moments in Sacramento,” and explained that Article 4, Section 8 of the California Constitution provides the public with the right to know what goes on in our government, to participate and to have a voice in that government. That is why passage of these bills requires a mega majority – 3/4 of the Legislature.
“Any first year law student would agree,” DeMaio said.
“They don’t have the votes to do what they want to do,” DeMaio added.
Senator Suzette Valadares (R-Santa Clarita), said her community of 400,000 residents is being divided up into 5 different congressional districts.
Assemblyman Trin Ta said he’s received many calls from constituents concerned about their district.
Attorney Columbo explained that the petition argues that:
California’s Constitution guarantees a 30–day period for both the public and lawmakers to review new legislation before it can be acted upon.
The Legislature’s last-minute “gut-and-amend” maneuver violates this constitutional safeguard.
Without court intervention, Californians will be deprived of their right to transparency and deliberation on consequential legislation that redraws congressional districts.
Attorney Columbo said the citizens of the state of California have a constitutional right to have proposed legislation published for 30 days before the Legislature can hear or act upon it. Article IV, § 8(a) of the California Constitution states this.
The lawsuit explains:
This right serves an important purpose: Both the public and lawmakers must be afforded adequate time to review and deliberate upon proposed legislation before the Legislature acts upon it. The stark issue for this court to decide in this case is whether this constitutional right is merely the right to publication of a bill number rather than publication of the proposed legislation in that bill.
The Governor announced on August 14, 2025, that the Legislature would enact a new and consequential package of legislation to change congressional district maps. This legislation is of intense public interest because, as explained below, it would enable the political dissection of numerous communities. This includes chopping counties 114 times and cities 141 times, carving historically Chinese- and Asian-American contiguous communities of Walnut, Diamond Bar, Rowland Heights, and Chino Hills into three different districts, cleaving the Hispanic enclaves of Baldwin Park, El Monte, and Pico Rivera from their existing districts, shattering San Joaquin County into five separate districts, and slicing Stockton’s southern Hispanic core from the district containing the rest of Stockton.
Instead of a months-long transparent and participatory process overseen by an independent citizens redistricting commission for such a sensitive matter, the public would be presented instead with an up or down vote on maps unilaterally prepared in secret by the Legislature. This legislation was first published today, on August 18, 2025, the Legislature is holding hearings on it tomorrow after overruling objections based on the Constitution’s 30-day rule, and every indication is that the Governor intends to sign the legislation this week to meet a deadline of August 22 set by the Secretary of State.
To circumvent the public’s rights under the Constitution’s thirty-day rule, the Legislature deleted the contents of two wholly unrelated old bills – known as “gut and amend” – and added in the new language.
Collectively, these bills now comprise the newly named “Election Rigging
Response Act” (“ERRA”). The Legislature claims that this self-serving
tactic, satisfies the public’s right under the constitution to review proposed legislation for thirty days, even though the only information available to the public about AB 604 and SB 280 for more than thirty days has been their Assembly and Senate bill numbers.
This case does not challenge the use of gut and amend for all purposes, but is confined to the narrow case where the Legislature blatantly and intentionally uses it to circumvent a constitutional right of the people to adequate time to review proposed legislation—a right that is inherently meant to restrain the Legislature from ramming legislation into law without an opportunity for the
public to review it. To be clear, this Petition does not ask this Court to enforce internal legislative rules, but rather to enforce an external constitutional constraint against the Legislature to protect the people’s rights.
“The people of California obviously have trust issues with this body. They put restrictions on them with the independent Citizens Redistricting Commission.”
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Author: Katy Grimes
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