State Senate Republicans Celebrate Success Of Six Veto Requests

California Senate Republicans announced Monday that six major requests for bill vetos succeeded this session, which required Governor Gavin Newsom going against the majority of Democrats in both houses by not signing the bills.

While Newsom did sign around 85% of all bills this year that made it to his desk, around 15% were ultimately vetoed. Of those 15%, the vast majority had been authored by Democrats. Republicans zeroed in on several bills in both houses that had both wide implications and had a decent chance of getting vetoed. In the Senate, the focus of Minority Leader Brian Jones (R-San Diego) included six major bills. These were:

• SB 58 – Authored by Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), this bill would have decriminalized several plant-based and naturalistic psychedelic drugs including magic mushrooms, DMT), ibogaine, and mescaline. SB 58 would have also removed bans on having psilocybin or psilocyn spores that can produce mushrooms, and on having drug paraphernalia associated with all decriminalized drugs.
• SB 81 – Authored by Senator Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley), this bill would have forced courts to override both the Governor and parole boards and release most of them early from prison, beginning on their minimum eligible parole date.
• SB 403 – Authored by Senator Aisha Wahab (D-Hayward), this bill would have prohibited caste and ancestry discrimination at the Governmental level, including through the California Fair Employment and Housing Act, the Unruh Civil Rights Act, and the California Education Code. As a consequence, racial-profiling and targeting of South Asian Californians would also increase.
• AB 1604 – Authored by Assemblywoman Mia Bonta, this bill would have added many draconian restrictions on charter school building funding throughout the state.
• SB 541 – Authored by Senator Caroline Menjivar (D-Panorama City), this bill would have all public and schools district operated schools to have condoms available to all pupils in grades 9 to 12 without cost. Schools would have also needed to alert students of the condoms being available, as well as give information on how to use them properly and have school clinics authorized to give them away.
• SB 596 – Authored by Anthony Portantino (D-Burbank), this bill would have attempted to silence concerned parents who speak out at school board meetings with a new crime that was widely seen as ‘vague’ in the bill.

Vetoes by Newsom

Senator Jones, on behalf of Senate Republicans, sent out veto request letters to Governor Newsom on all six bills last month. While Newsom overlooked many requests and acquiesced to many smaller ones, Newsom ultimately sided with the Republicans on the six bills they especially wanted vetoed this year.

“I urged the governor to veto several bad bills passed by the Legislature this year and I thank him for listening to my requests,” said Leader Jones in a statement on Monday. “I’m always glad to see bipartisan leadership on important issues.”

Some inside the Capitol told the Globe on Monday that while Jones’ requests likely were not the main reasons for the bills being vetoed, they could have played a factor.

“Newsom gave his reasons in each veto, and in some cases, everyone was pretty much expecting a veto to happen,” added Dana a Capitol staffer. “Newsom used the “It’s expensive” excuse for many, and for others, had problems with the language of the bill. It wasn’t a veto request letter that did it.”

“What is likely is that they were a factor in his decision. The Governor looks at these bills and sees opposition from the GOP on some, as well as reasons given. He may tend to agree with them and it influences his decision that way. Who knows – he may have been split on his decision, saw the letter, then used it as the deciding factor. Considering that these are Republicans, that scenario is unlikely. But have the letter be one of several deciding factors? Very likely. Wanting some bipartisanship before heading out on another major election? Also possible.”

“Newsom didn’t specifically mention letters, so listening to requests might be a stretch. But his letters helping add to Newsom’s ultimate veto decision and having him see different viewpoints go into it? Definity can say that.”

In total, Newsom vetoed 169 bills this session.