With Feinstein’s death and McCarthy out as Speaker, California ‘lost a lot of horsepower’

The California political world has been shaken by two seismic events — last week’s death of Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Tuesday’s ouster of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Among the collateral damage could be the state’s federal funding and congressional clout.

Feinstein, the 31-year Senate veteran whose funeral will be held Thursday in San Francisco, was the second-ranking Democrat on the powerful appropriations committee, where key spending decisions are made. Over the summer, she released a lengthy list of $190 million in California projects to be included in spending bills.

McCarthy, the Bakersfield Republican, was speaker for only nine months, hardly enough time to leave significant mark. But his removal Tuesday could be an opportunity missed for California.

“We lost a lot of horsepower yesterday,” Rep. David Valadao, R-Hanford, said Wednesday of McCarthy’s dismissal.

Feinstein and McCarthy are the latest in a recent series of significant California losses and transitions. It began with Republicans taking the House in 2022. Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, had been speaker.

It also meant some powerful Democratic committee chairs lost their posts, including Rep. Maxine Waters of Los Angeles (Financial Services) Rep. Mark Takano of Riverside (Veterans Affairs) and Rep. Zoe Lofgren of San Jose (Administration).

Among Democrats, Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-San Bernardino, is third-ranking Democrat in the House as chairman of the party caucus. Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Los Angeles, is vice chairman, the number four slot.

“There are people watching California’s interests,” said Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., who came to the Senate in 2021. “It’ll never be the same as Nancy Pelosi.”

Losing all this power “clearly can make a difference,” said former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. No Californians are said to be in the running to succeed McCarthy. The House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, is from New York. So is Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Clearly, “the loss of Californian leadership in the Capitol means California legislative and spending priorities will not get as much attention or focus,” said Wesley Hussey, professor of political science at California State University, Sacramento.

The loss of Feinstein

Lott cited Feinstein as a huge loss for California.The appropriations committee writes 12 spending bills each year that often consume hundreds of pages — and include page after page of projects important to constituencies. Federal money helps fund schools, roads, health care, defense and more.

“You can help direct funds to projects, to bases or to cities. Senators traditionally do that,” Lott said. “What’s really important is that as you move up and gain seniority you can do more of that.”

For the first time in decades, there are no Californians on the Senate appropriations committee.

“With a state that contributes the most to the federal treasury?” Padilla said. “We deserve a voice there.”

“One of us needs to be on there,” he said, referring to Sen. Laphonza Butler, D-Calif., whom Gov. Gavin Newsom appointed to succeed Feinstein.

Padilla is on the Judiciary, Environment & Public Works, Homeland Security, Rules & Administration and Budget committees. Butler, sworn in Tuesday, has not yet received committee assignments.

Leadership in the House

While it’s difficult for lawmakers to ignore California, “our water and agricultural needs are different than the Midwest, for example, so keeping the focus on California issues was helpful when we had a California Speaker of the House and someone with Senator Feinstein’s seniority and well-respected policy expertise,” Hussey said.

The more difficult path to power is likely in the House, where Democrats are currently in the minority.

Of the 52 California House members, 11 are Republicans. Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Corona, has influence as head of the appropriations defense subcommittee. Valadao is a committee member.

“We had Speaker Pelosi who was there for the longest time, and even as the Minority Leader in the time of Boehner and the speaker before that,” Valadao said. “Obviously we disagreed on some topics that McCarthy came in and pulled more in a direction that helps the Central Valley a lot.”

Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Elk Grove, is an important player on immigration issues as chairman of the Judiciary Committee’s immigration panel.

Water and Wildfires

California is slated to receive about $144 billion in federal funds during its fiscal year. Most of that is headed for specific programs, such as disaster funding, or formula-driven public assistance such as child nutrition programs, education and Medicaid.

The state is unlikely to see much negative impact in the event of emergencies. Newsom had a good relationship with McCarthy and has cooperated with Republicans and Democrats about California’s needs.

McCarthy and Newsom talked and texted about the state regularly. “There was a line of communication between Gov. Newsom and McCarthy. They had each other’s phone numbers and they would text each other,” said Mark Baldassare, former president and CEO of the Public Policy Institute of California and now its survey director.

Padilla noted that states like Hawaii look to California on responding to disasters that have grown more common with rising global temperatures.

The money to watch is what could come through the appropriations process.

Among the projects listed by Feinstein was $4.3 million for “wildfire fuels reduction and emergency evacuation routes across Butte, Nevada and Tehama Counties.”

For raising certain priorities like agriculture, water and wildfires, more advocates in high places helps.

Wildfires and water emerged as important Padilla priorities, having successfully gotten legislation signed into law to bolster federal response to wildfires. He chairs the Environment & Public Works Subcommittee on Fisheries, Water, and Wildlife and has lobbied along with Feinstein to get firefighting funding and transfers of long-awaited aircraft into spending bills. Through his climate and immigration work, he’s tackled farm worker issues and crop protection.

The path forward for agricultural priorities in the Central Valley, which grows a third of the nation’s produce, is less clear from California’s 2024 U.S. Senate candidates, who are from Southern California cities and Oakland.

Valadao mentioned priorities like the 2016 Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation (WIIN) Act, which Feinstein had worked on with McCarthy. The act encouraged increases in water allocations south to farmers and cities from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

It was controversial, requiring a filibuster override to pass and drawing ire from Democratic colleagues like then-California Sen. Barbara Boxer, who ultimately opposed her own bill that had the WIIN Act attached to it.

Environmental advocates said they weren’t consulted about the proposal that developed out of Feinstein’s discussions with Westlands Water District and its former general manager Tom Birmingham. Birmingham told The Bee last week that Feinstein’s fondness for San Joaquin Valley farmers came in part from summers she spent at a Kern County ranch belonging to a friend of her father’s.

The Friant-Kern Canal, the more than 70-year-old water system that runs the eastern edge of the San Joaquin Valley, received increased funding for repairs thanks in part to Feinstein and McCarthy.

And the Valley Fever Task Force, co-chaired by McCarthy and Arizona Rep. David Schweikert, too, raised research for farmers and farm workers dealing with the fungus-caused disease that grows in California and southwestern soil. McCarthy was, Valadao said, “moving dollars that we possibly could within the appropriations to try to fund some of the research facilities and equipment they needed.”

“Those are things that are actually benefiting the Valley still to this very day,” he said.