Goodbye to the Rendon era

From: POLITICO California Playbook - Thursday Jun 29,2023 01:08 pm

Jun 29, 2023

By Jeremy B. White, Lara Korte and Sejal Govindarao

Presented by CCIA

THE BUZZ: Seven-plus years, four election cycles and thousands of floor votes later, it’s the final day of the Anthony Rendon speakership — the only one most Assembly members have experienced.

The Lakewood Democrat has presided over a progressive policy bonanza. California hiked the minimum wage, gave farmworkers overtime, enacted ambitious climate laws, expanded early childhood education and delivered landmark labor wins. That last achievement is on brand for a man who derided the gig economy as “fucking feudalism” as unions battled with tech companies over job classification. His baseball doppelgänger won a World Series title. He has touted diversity, taken pride in rallying California against President Donald Trump and redeveloping the Los Angeles River.

Enormous vote margins smoothed the path. The election before Rendon came into power, Democrats lost their short-lived legislative supermajorities. Democrats regained two-thirds margins in 2016 as candidates flipped Republican seats with Rendon at the helm. The caucus has never forfeited that supermajority, growing their advantage to a once-unfathomable three-quarters that Rendon dubbed the “gigamajority.” Booming budgets also increased opportunity: Rendon didn’t have to haggle over a deficit until the budget negotiations just wrapped.

Decentralization has been the hallmark of Rendon’s management style. His teeming class of 2012 arrived during the speakership of John Pérez, who embraced assertive and top-down leadership tactics of show-running predecessors. Rendon could certainly wield his powers to rein in members, stripping intransigent or overly ambitious Democrats of committee slots and chairmanships. But he ascended on a promise to give committee chairs more autonomy, and he rarely carried or co-authored legislation.

Newly empowered chairs benefited from the freedom — and from the long-term policy runway that came with up to 12 years in office thanks to a voter- approved change. As a rule, elected officials tend to resent being dictated to. But there were detractors: Members stewed when chairs killed their legislation, particularly by declining to hold votes. Critical committee leaders became power centers in their own right: The Rendon era was also, in a substantial way, the Lorena Gonzalez era.

That game of chairs wasn’t the only source of intra-Democratic conflict. Rendon incurred the left’s white-hot wrath when he halted a single-payer healthcare bill in 2017, calling the measure untenable (They’ve never forgotten.) Frustration over his Covid-19 management style boiled over in a chaotic end-of-session melee that saw a housing bill run out of time and a lawmaker bring her baby to the Assembly floor. More members means more mouths to feed, and a bloc of moderate Democrats complained of feeling sidelined.

And then there was the bitter end: a caustic and publicly divisive succession struggle that dragged on for months. Back in 2015, Rendon closed the deal soon after then-Speaker Toni Atkins (now the Senate leader) asked Democrats to sign a pledge committing to holding off on a vote. In 2021, it was Rendon facing a vote earlier than he wanted after soon-to-be-speaker Robert Rivas consolidated support. The fallout that ensued is indelibly part of the Rendon era.

But that coda is only a piece of one of California’s most consequential speakerships. While term limits prevent another Willie Brown or Jesse Unruh, Rendon’s tenure trails only those two — and he will have served as speaker longer than anyone in the last 30 years. Most of the Class of 2012 allies who launched Rendon into the speakership are gone already. On Friday, he'll cede the crown. A long policy and political record will remain.

BUENOS DÍAS, good Thursday morning. California’s reparations task force is set to transmit its final report to the Legislature today, moving us into the next phase of lawmakers actually trying to enact some of those ideas. We will see if Gov. Gavin Newsom takes a firmer position after distancing himself from cash payouts while deflecting questions about specific policies.

Got a tip or story idea for California Playbook? Hit us up at jwhite@politico.com and lkorte@politico.com or follow us on Twitter @JeremyBWhite and @Lara_Korte.

A message from CCIA:

A link tax is the last thing California needs. Oppose AB886.

WHERE’S GAVIN? Talking wildfires in Nevada County.

QUOTE OF THE DAY: “I put up with a lot of shit, like any manager. We can be overly forgiving at times. … To a large extent, I always wanted to be forgiving and provide people with opportunities for redemption. I don’t always know that I was quick to punish as I should have.” Rendon on his leadership regrets during a Public Policy Institute of California talk.

PLAYBOOK MEET & GREET! Join POLITICO in welcoming our new Playbook Author, Dustin Gardiner, at Cafeteria 15L on Wednesday, July 12, 2023. We're convening our most influential readers in Sacramento and beyond as we expand our footprint across the Golden State. Swing by and have a cocktail on us—you never know who you might run into! Register here.

TOP TALKERS

AND ANOTHER ONE: Bay Area tech executive and tech investor Lexi Reese is formally declaring her Senate candidacy today.

Reese, a Google and Facebook alumna who served as chief operating officer at the HR platform Gusto, told POLITICO she wants to put to work her three decades of experience in tech, business and nonprofits — and she rejects the idea that she should “stand in line” and “wait for your turn” before taking on a Senate run. “Our economy is a hot mess and it’s increasingly unlivable,” she said,” adding that “the Senate is where direction for the country is coming from and we’re getting very bad direction.”

Reece said she would contribute to her own campaign but declined to provide a budget she had in mind, beyond saying she was prepared to raise “many, many millions of dollars.” She rolled out a launch video and fired a shot across Elon Musk’s bow, including boycotting his Twitter platform out of concern for his politics and his treatment of employees. She’ll be vying with Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff, Katie Porter, and Barbara Lee, all of whom started with established bases and name recognition.

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CAMPAIGN MODE

— "Harris on the hot seat: Veep has critical stretch ahead as campaign heats up," by POLITICO’s Eugene Daniels: “Toward the end of last year, senior aides of Vice President Kamala Harris gathered in the vice president’s ceremonial office and sat around a table to chart out the year ahead. The group presented her with a strategy document.”

— "Former Sacramento mayoral candidate changes course, will run for state Legislature instead," by The Sacramento Bee’s Theresa Clift: “Sacramento mayoral candidate Maggy Krell is dropping out of the race to run for a California Assembly seat. Krell, a prosecutor specializing in sex trafficking prevention, is running for Democratic Assemblyman Kevin McCarty’s Sacramento-area seat, she said.”

CALIFORNIA AND THE CAPITOL CORRIDOR

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— "Some L.A. fireworks shows canceled after new environmental rules. ‘We’re all disappointed,’" by the Los Angeles Times’ Grace Toohey: “The decisions come just a month after the L.A. Regional Water Quality Control Board adopted a protective fireworks display permit in late May, which requires new best practices aimed at reducing plastics and other pollution that could fall into oceans or marinas from fireworks displays.”

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Lawmakers are proposing a bill that would charge websites every time they link to a news article. A new tax is the last thing CA needs. Oppose AB886.

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