(Bloomberg) -- California Governor Gavin Newsom wants to allocate as much as $25 million to challenge President-elect Donald Trump’s most aggressive policies with a battalion of lawyers.
On Monday the state legislature, led by a Democratic supermajority, will convene a special session at the request of Newsom. They’re looking to add resources to the state’s legal team in preparation for what could be a wave of court challenges once the Republican president takes office on Jan. 20.
“We’re in the calm before the storm,” Senate President Pro Tempore Mike McGuire said in an interview. “Believe me, the hurricane force winds are about to hit this nation, and especially California and other like-minded states.”
California already has a playbook for thwarting Trump’s most hardline policies on the environment and immigration. During his first term, the state sued his administration more than 120 times, winning cases that preserved California’s stricter vehicle-emission standards and protected the legal status of migrants brought to the US as children.
Now, Newsom and his allies are preparing for a renewed confrontation, though they face new political and fiscal realities, including a tight state budget and growing dissatisfaction among some voters with the state’s liberal policies.
Lawmakers are considering Newsom’s request for up to $25 million for the state Department of Justice and other agencies, with the bulk of the funding directed toward increasing staff and supporting ongoing legal challenges, the governor’s office said on Monday.
“Litigation is expensive, and we have to go to the mat to be able to protect the people, the policies and the progress that we’ve made over these past many years,” McGuire said.
Attorney General Rob Bonta, also a Democrat, sent out his own warning to the incoming president.
“Know that if he breaks the law, I’ll stop him,” Bonta said on X.
For a glimpse of the issues likely to land California in court, Assembly Budget Committee Chair Jesse Gabriel pointed to Project 2025, a manifesto for a future Republican White House that calls for mass deportations, rolling back environmental regulations and other steps that would clash with the policies of the deep-blue state. Trump disavowed Project 2025 on the campaign trail but has since tapped several of its backers for roles in his administration, including at the Federal Communications Commission and in border enforcement.
A practicing attorney before his election to the legislature in 2018, Gabriel worked on lawsuits against the Trump administration in 2017 over its efforts to repeal the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.
“Speed matters and being prepared matters,” he said. “Hopefully we’re not going to need to file a lot of litigation, but we learned from experience.”
A central issue in California’s legal strategy will be the fight over immigration. Trump’s pledge to ramp up deportations has raised alarms in a state with the largest population of undocumented migrants in the nation, at 1.8 million people, according to the Pew Research Center. California’s sanctuary policies and protections for undocumented migrants — who power the state’s economy from agriculture to food service — have made it a flashpoint for clashes with federal immigration enforcement.
Aid Threat
State lawmakers are also considering how to prepare for a scenario in which the federal government fails to provide needed aid after a disaster, pointing to Trump’s comments in September that he would withhold wildfire assistance if Newsom doesn’t agree to send more of the state’s water to Central Valley farmers.
Still Newsom and other California Democrats face a balancing act as they lead the charge in resisting Trump.
California’s budget is “roughly balanced” but has little room for additional spending, according to a projection released by the state’s legislative analyst last month.
The 2024 election also exposed growing discontent with California’s liberal policies and high cost of living, with Trump garnering 38% of the vote last month, the best showing for a Republican presidential candidate in the state since 2004.
For Newsom, who is widely seen as a future presidential candidate himself, that may pose a dilemma.
“His primary political goal is to be the hero of the Trump resistance,” said Dan Schnur, a California political analyst. But “he can’t be seen as taking on Trump’s supporters. It’s worth assuming that he’ll make a great effort in the special session to draw that distinction.”
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