WATCH: Gov. Gavin Newsom signs climate and energy bills

By Dave Mason
The Center Square

California Gov. Gavin Newsom Friday morning promised up to $60 billion in tax rebates on electricity fees just before signing climate and energy bills.

The legislation includes expansion of the state’s climate credit, which gives residents discounts each year on their electrical bills.

Newsom made his remarks during a press conference in a planetarium in San Francisco, where he was joined by Democratic legislative leaders who praised the measures for reducing energy costs, stabilizing the petroleum market and reducing pollution. The legislation allows what supporters call an environmentally responsible and safe increase in oil production in Kern County to boost the supply of gas.

“Today’s a big day because promises were kept in California,” Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire told the large crowd of supporters and media. “Today California’s dream is more affordable.

“We’re working to ensure Californians can get relief in their electric bills,” McGuire, D-Sonoma County, said.

“Today’s a big win for the Golden State,” he said. “If you pay utility bills and you want them lower, you win. If you drive a car and hate gas price spikes, you win. If you want clean drinking water, you win. If you want to breathe clean air, you win.

“It’s a pretty big winners’ circle,” McGuire said. “But this is a pretty ambitious package. But this is what California is all about. In tough times, we come together and pass bold policy that leads this nation.”

Newsom signed Assembly Bills 825 and 1207 and Senate Bills 237, 254, 352 and 840. The legislation is designed to stabilize the petroleum supply to keep gas prices down, reduce air pollution and greenhouse gases, and expand the climate credit on electrical bills.

“Today we are running the world’s fourth-largest economy with 67% of our energy carbon-free,” Newsom said before signing the bills. “It’s unprecedented. There’s no other jurisdiction in the world that can lay claim to that.”

The governor praised California for taking a balanced approach that reduces costs for consumers and protects the environment.

“The issue of affordability, as you heard, is top of mind,” Newsom said.

“Millions of Californians will soon start saving billions on their energy costs, and the savings don’t stop there,” Newsom said. “We’re stabilizing the state’s gasoline supply to avert severe price spikes at the pump, and we’re making it easier to build the abundant clean energy we need to keep bills lower.

“On top of all that, we’re doubling down on our best tool to combat Trump’s assaults on clean air – Cap-and-Invest – by making polluters pay for projects that support our most impacted communities,” he said.

Emphasizing the bipartisanship of climate and energy efforts, Newsom noted Republicans such as California Gov. Ronald Reagan and President Richard Nixon led early environmental protections.

Reagan signed the Mulford-Carrell Act of 1967, which created the California Air Resources Board. Nixon signed the 1970 reorganization plan that created the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which followed the devastating 1969 oil spill in Santa Barbara, Calif.

Newsom criticized another Republican, President Donald Trump, for his harm on issues such as the environment and health care costs.

After Newsom signed the climate and energy bills, a reporter asked him about the governor’s agreement to fund California’s long-delayed controversial high-speed train project to the tune of $1 billion every year through 2045. It’s part of the Cap-and-Invest legislation that was part of the bills Newsom signed Friday. It was formerly known as “Cap-and-Trade.”

The project has taken time because the state had to buy 2,270 parcels, complete thousands of utility projects and finish environmental work, but track is about to be laid in the state’s Central Valley, Newsom said. “This project is supporting thousands and thousands of jobs.”

And the first tracks of the rail will benefit rural residents, Newsom said. “The first beneficiaries are people who primarily supported Donald Trump, but we don’t play politics.”’

Another reporter asked Newsom about California Democrats in Congress proposing the Redistricting Reform Act to prohibit mid-decade redistricting and mandate the use of independent redistricting commissions across the U.S.

“Let’s do it!” Newsom said. “I would support it.”

In August, U.S. Rep. Kevin Kiley, R-California, proposed a bill, H.R. 4889, to limit states from carrying out more than one congressional redistricting after a census.

Newsom noted more than $20 million has been raised for the campaign for Proposition 50, which is on the Nov. 4 ballot and would create congressional redistricting to put five more Democratic seats in the U.S. House. The measure is meant to counter Texas’ redistricting to add five Republican seats ahead of the 2026 midterm election.

Newsom said he hopes other Democratic governors will do what they can with redistricting to counter the redistricting in Texas and possibly other Republican states.

Funds for the pro-redistricting campaign have come from unions, the House Majority Political Action Committee (focused on electing Democrats) and companies such as Google. Progressive donor George Soros contributed $10 million, according to media reports.

The campaign against redistricting has raised more than $35 million. Most of that has come from Charles T. Munger Jr., a Palo Alto physicist and Republican Party donor who backed the successful 2010 initiative that moved congressional redistricting to the independent citizens commission created two years earlier.