California Gov. Gavin Newsom Appears to Go All-In on Ending Homeless Encampments
Newsom threatens to take money from counties and cleans-up camps as a photo-op.
Early in his career, California Gov. Gavin Newsom said that he had a plan to end homelessness in ten years.
Late last year, that promise marked its 20th anniversary.
So, imagine my surprise when I saw a video on X showing Newsom seemingly single-handedly cleaning up an homeless encampment.
California Governor @GavinNewsom is in Mission Hills, CA helping clear-out a homeless encampment. About 2 weeks ago Newsom issued an executive order telling state officials to take down homeless camps. He tells me cities need to have more urgency. #California pic.twitter.com/Lkamf7B4to
— Matthew Seedorff (@MattSeedorff) August 8, 2024
California Governor Gavin Newsom was seen apparently avoiding the limelight as he was spotted clearing out a homeless encampment in Los Angeles.
The Democrat, 56, stepped out on Thursday to personally tackle his state’s homeless epidemic, days after he ordered California agencies to step up their efforts to combat the issue.
Wearing jeans and a T-shirt, Newsom was seen in a clip shared by a FOX Los Angeles reporter throwing away junk around an encampment in Mission Hills.
Avoiding the limelight? I think not, since he had a camera crew with him. But clearly something is afoot as Newsom is appearing to go “all in” on tackling homelessness in this state.
He is now threatening to take away state funding from counties that don’t show improvement on homelessness.
“If we don’t see demonstrable results, I’ll start to redirect money,” Newsom said.
“This is a sincerely held belief that we need local government to step up. This is a crisis. Act like it.”
Unbridled frustration from the Democratic governor over the lack of progress on his top issue — homelessness — isn’t new, nor is warning about stripping money from reluctant counties. As he nears the halfway point of his second and final term in office, Newsom is using his soapbox as governor to increase public pressure and lay blame on local leaders for California’s most glaring humanitarian crisis.
After the Supreme Court decision giving local governments the authority to remove encampments and ticket people for camping in public, Newsom got serious and issued the executive order and then delivered the ultimatum.
It appears that Los Angeles County has become a big target of Newsom’s frustration over the lack of progress. To be fair to the governor, this is who is in charge there:
Some local officials, including L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, have criticized the move, saying that citing or arresting people in encampments is not a solution if doing so unfairly criminalizes them.
“My position has and continues to be that I do not believe the criminalization of homelessness is the right path,” said L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger.
“I find it almost ludicrous to think that we’re going to issue $250 tickets to individuals who are unhoused who are then going to get another ticket and another ticket and then have a warrant out for their arrest…and for what?”
Newsom could have had a serious partner in this approach with Bass’ opponent in the mayoral contest: Real estate mogul Rick Caruso. But Los Angelenos chose poorly.
Newsom has his work cut out for him, as the social justice advocates are coming out of the woodwork. Take, for example, Gina Rodarte Quiroz, a board member of the Committee for Social Justice and Continuum of Care, who wants to feds to step in:
We call on the U.S. Department of Justice to review our concerns and consider the human rights implications of these policies. We urge you to advocate for more compassionate and effective approaches to ending homelessness in California.
Emphasizing the long-term economic benefits of permanent housing solutions over temporary encampment sweeps is crucial. Building affordable homes or repurposing vacant buildings is key to ending homelessness.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed is a bit more on board with Newsom. She directed city officials to offer bus tickets out of town. So my Legal Insurrection friends are prepared, here’s where they are going:
When it comes to states where people are going — after California is Oregon.
Nevada and Texas are tied for third.
Within California, the top three destinations are Los Angeles, Sacramento, and Humboldt counties.
My suspicion is that Newsom is making this move to beef up his presidential campaign portfolio, which is slender. I think his actions clearly show what the Democrats really think about Vice President Kamala Harris’ chances in November.
Newsom likely anticipates that in 2028 the field will be wide open and crowded, and that success in this venture might help him stand out. We shall see.
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Comments
Nothing is going to change on the street in CA. The homeless junkies will just move around to different streets. Its minor inconvenience for them. They won’t go to shelters even when there are open beds. They can’t do drugs in shelters. They won’t seek treatment. Open air drug use is tolerated in the street, police walk right by. Not to mention the get out of jail free card for shoplifting. Plus the most generous government hand-outs of any state. Fentanyl cheaper than cup of coffee.
SF mayor breed can only offer free bus ticket. She has no legal authority force anybody to take it. Its publicity stunt. Giving the appearance of doing something.
Confirmed: Squalor is a policy decision.
It’s a personal decision made by numerous bad previous decisions
California has a campless problem.
Why do Democratic politicians almost always take to fake acting in public and hypocrisy in private?
Round them up and make them dig ditches or shovel manure.
How about rounding them up and put them in California’s abundant and growing number of empty warehouses,
There should be a two track system, one where they seek treatment, they other where they have unlimited drugs. There should be no treatment for overdose.
No mater what we do, some people are self destructive, the only question is how much they damage society before they kill themselves.
Newscum doesn’t want to end homeless encampments. He just wants to be seen as “fighting them” until election day. The day after the election everything will revert back to normal … or even worse, if the commies actually manage to cheat their way to a win that America accepts.
It’s 2024, dems have a shitty candidate at the top of the ticket and word has come down to the governors that it’s time to start tackling long standing issues like homelessness and crime. My governor called the legislature back for a special session in July to deal with crime. They met for one day, passed a feed bill to pay for that one day of work, added some money to it for wildfire aid and closed the session. Uncharacteristically, the governor actually blamed the democrats (who have control over the legislature) and pointed out that republicans actually had prefiled crime bills but the democrats had done nothing.
What state
Nuevo México.
See, this is one of those things where if you had enforced the law from the beginning, you wouldn’t be having these problems.
Mayor Bass is right about one thing — giving the homeless $250 tickets is worthless.
Getting arrested is a goal with them. 3 hots and a cot. I wonder how they would view that 3 hots and a cot if it was attached to an 8 hr day cleaning up homeless camps. Of course that suggestion would be voted down by any one of the newly minted cleanup companies. All of these liberal havens are deeply infected by the Homeless Indistrial Complex and nothing will change until the money stops. Well, that is not correct. Nothing will “improve” until the money stops, because the current money just makes it worse, requiring even more money, and that to them falls under their mantra of “change.”.
Disagree. Public safety is the next cash cow for Dems.
Unless one of the transients attacks a cop, they don’t take them to jail. There’s not enough room and even if they are arrested, our no-bail system puts them right back out on the street. And the people with mental issues or substance abuse issues? The local hospital won’t take them either and the state doesn’t have the resources to deal with them so they go right back on the street where they continue to prey upon citizens.
That video of Newscum “cleaning out the homeless encampment” in Mission Hills … it just looks like he’s collecting a bit of junk. I don’t see the remnants of any “encampment”. ANd it looks as though he’s working IN a storm drainage canal. Who builds an encampment in a storm drainage canal?? It gets cleaned out by Mother Nature every time it rains. Something is very weird. … even weirder than usual for Newscum and Cali.
Reminds me of those Chinese staged public service short videos where cops are shown building sandbags, helping people across a (barely ankle-deep) flooded street, etc, under the pouring rain of an off-camera fire hose. Meanwhile the actual flooding is a comfortably safe distance away.
That’s just the usual garbage that ends up in the canals by people temporarily squatting or moving through.
Ca / Or / Wa will all be taking action, but in different ways.
California. Ca has a revenue problem. They have run out of other people’s money to spend and productive citizens of Ca are now productive citizens of Texas, Idaho, and elsewhere (like TN). Jails are expensive and they have lost the tax base to fleece for this cost. All they can do is attempt to export. Good luck.
Washington. Washinton has a largely net neutral population- with influx from Ca and most exodus just heading to rural areas within the state. They have a tax paying population whom they are not done fleecing. The dems from the city, county and state levels plan on extorting the tax payers as much as possible as they turn the Homeless Industrial Complex into a Prison and Public Safety Industrial Complex. Washington’s population and wealth is spread out enough (as opposed to the State of Portland) that this will work. Check out We the Governed (youtube) and KOMO news for stories where they are extorting each other up and down the chain. Public safety is the top of the voters concerns and these voters will never vote Republican (I’ll be proven wrong if Reichart wins). This is a cash cow and they have an endless supply of lifetime criminals. They will gladly take them from Ca and Or because it’s endless jobs for Prosecutors, Defendors, Judges, Court Facilities, jails, prisons, parole boards juvie facilities, treatment centers…. oh the government jobs they can milk out of the problem they have created and will never be solved.
Oregon: Sorry but Portland can only shove their homeless criminals north into Washington. The rest of the state will simply put these rolling drug den owners in jail and let them rot.
Fact is- they are 95% drug zombies and criminals. Mental health goes with it, but don’t say this is lack of meds and counselling.
Does Republican counties busing homeless to Democrat counties constitute improvement? 🙂
I’m surprised that the democrats don’t solve this problem in their usual fantastical way. Just issue a yet-to-be-built home voucher to each homeless person and describe them all as holders of housing futures.
Expect the video of Newscum in his commercials when he runs for the White House.