California Democrats have an extreme agenda. Does Kamala Harris believe in it? | Opinion

David Mastio
·4 min read

If you have a pulse, you’ve heard about the Heritage Foundation’s nefarious Project 2025, the think tank’s effort to come up with an organized, some say extreme, agenda for a second Donald Trump administration, authored by a number of former Trump insiders. If you haven’t seen a news story or a talking head on about Project 2025, you’ve heard Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign ads about it. It is a sure thing that Trump will be asked about the effort at the debate Tuesday night, even though he has distanced himself from it. Fair enough.

Harris hasn’t produced much new of substance on policy, apparently relying on what voters think of the popular parts of President Joe Biden’s agenda to get her over the hump. But there is a broad and detailed policy, I would say extreme, agenda she should be asked about in the debate.

That’s the agenda of California Democrats, the wellspring of Harris’ political career.

The state’s governor, Gavin Newsom, is having a hard time keeping a lid on it. On Friday, he vetoed legislation that would have made undocumented immigrants eligible for taxpayer-funded $150,000 zero-down, zero-payment home loans to make their down payment on houses in California.

Whose side is Harris on? Newsom’s relative moderation? Or the eye-popping extremism of the legislative supermajority Democrats who want to shovel six-figure benefits into the wallets of people who broke the law to come here?

Come to think of it — what does Harris think of giving American citizens $150,000 no-payment loans to buy their houses? Even that seems a tad extreme.

And let’s not go too far in calling Newsom a moderate. He has already allowed undocumented immigrants eligibility for the California version of Medicaid — even if they want transgender sex affirmation surgery. That is costing the state billions at a time it is struggling with the budget cuts necessary to close a $55 billion deficit. Then there’s in-state tuition for undocumented immigrants and a proposal for work-study subsidies even if students have no work permit and are here in violation of the law.

Does Harris think undocumented immigrants should get health care on the taxpayer dime? What does she think about California giving billions in benefits to undocumented immigrants who enter the country when she is supposedly working so hard to keep them out?

Let’s leave aside questions about the undocumented for a minute. This year, California’s legislature has passed a bill that will make it illegal for local school boards to make policy that allows parents to be told their kids are transgender? Does Harris think hiding important facts about kids from parents is the right policy?

The state legislature there has passed legislation that prevents local governments controlled by the state’s beleaguered Republicans from requiring voter ID at the same time it has turned a blind eye to Democratic cities allowing immigrants to vote in some local elections.

Does Harris think noncitizens should be invited into polling places even as we outlaw requiring voter ID?

Crime under California’s loose criminal laws has gotten so bad that Newsom has literally had to call out the National Guard. Some city prosecutors are so overwhelmed, Army lawyers are taking up the slack.

Does the vice president think the criminal reforms she pioneered in the state as attorney general might have gone too far? Or does she think other Democratic policies are to blame?

Harris has made climate change an issue, as her staff members have signaled that she is no longer a believer in the Green New Deal. In her home state, there have been some interesting developments. Newsom has declared that fixing sidewalks and building low-income housing count as efforts to fight climate change. And it is not some fringe issue. Newsom has put $800 million behind the climate housing initiative.

Does Harris think cities fixing sidewalks fights climate change? Would she spend federal money on the sidewalk fix to climate change?

If it is fair to ask Trump questions about the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 (and it is), then surely it is fair to ask Harris about the Democrats’ dumpster fire in her home state of Kamalafornia.

David Mastio, a former editor and columnist for USA Today, is a regional editor for The Center Square and a regular Star Opinion correspondent. Follow him on X: @DavidMastio or email him at dmastio1@yahoo.com

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