The Brief

California’s contentious and long-debated plan to replumb the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and pump more water south finally has a price tag: about $20 billion.

The new estimate for the Delta tunnel project — which would transform the massive water system that sends Northern California water south to farms and cities — is $4 billion higher than a 2020 estimate, largely because of inflation.

Included is almost $1.2 billion to offset local harms and environmental damage, such as impacts on salmon and rare fish that state officials have called “potentially significant.”

The goal of the project is to collect and deliver more water to two-thirds of California’s population and 750,000 acres of farmland during wet periods, shore up supplies against the threats of climate change and protect the system from earthquakes.

But environmental groups and many Delta residents have long warned that the tunnel could put the imperiled Delta ecosystem at even greater risk, sapping freshwater flows needed for fish, farms and communities in the region.

The tunnel has been the focus of intense debate in California for more than 60 years. It’s the epicenter of water wars that have pitted Delta locals, environmentalists, tribes and the fishing industry against state officials and water agencies that supply cities and farms, mostly in Southern California.

The new report from the state Department of Water Resources comes as state water regulators weigh competing rescue plans for a region they have described as “in crisis” and in the midst of an “ecosystem collapse.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom backs the proposed project, calling it his “number one climate resilience program” and saying he hopes to get it permitted before he leaves office. The 45-mile tunnel would transport water from the Sacramento River around the Delta to a reservoir near Livermore, the first stop on the 444-mile California Aqueduct.

The new estimate and report will help water suppliers in Southern California, the Central Coast and the Bay Area weigh whether it’s cost effective for them to buy the tunnel’s water. The state would issue revenue bonds to fund the project, then suppliers would have to pay back the costs.

Water agencies, such as the giant Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, are expected to have all of the information they need to decide by the end of 2026, said Karla Nemeth, director of the Department of Water Resources, which operates the state’s massive water system.

“The questions are how can this project be implemented, what kind of assurances can we have in the resilience it provides to the Delta and our water supply future, and at what price?” Adel Hagekhalil, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District, said in a statement. He said the cost estimate “brings us closer to understanding that equation.”

Building the tunnel could take until at least 2044, with construction expected to start around 2029 and last roughly 15 years.

Had the tunnel been in place this year, it could have funneled 909,000 additional acre-feet of water south from intakes in the north Delta, according to state water officials. That’s nearly enough water to fill Folsom Lake, and could supply more than 9.5 million people for a year.

The total benefits of the project — calculated at around $38 billion — far outweigh the costs, according to the report, with every dollar spent expected to reap $2.20 in benefits. “In other words, doing nothing is more expensive,” said David Sunding, a UC Berkeley emeritus professor of environmental economics who led the cost-benefit analysis.

Sunding said water deliveries from the tunnel would cost about $1,325 per acre-foot — less than the average cost for water generated by desalination, recycling and stormwater capture.

Peter Gleick, co-founder of the Pacific Institute, a global water think-tank, said he has serious concerns about the analysis and whether it accounts for the real costs of construction and water treatment and distribution. He called for “far more and better” economic and environmental assessments.

“This project gets more expensive every single time a new version is proposed, and this type of project has never been brought to completion under budget,” he said. “Water conservation and efficiency improvements are far cheaper than the Delta project.”

One major benefit to a tunnel, Sunding said, is earthquake preparedness for the state’s water delivery system, which is crossed by the major Hayward and San Andreas faults. A catastrophic earthquake that crumbles levees could interrupt water deliveries for nearly seven months and degrade water quality for almost another year. Sunding said the tunnel would, ideally, allow water deliveries to continue in some form after quakes, or at least protect water quality.

The tunnel could also increase water exports from the Sacramento River when pumping from the south Delta is limited to protect threatened and endangered species, Nemeth said. Thousands of threatened steelhead trout and endangered winter-run Chinook salmon have died this year from the pumping, according to state and federal estimates.

But conservationists warn that a tunnel wouldn’t reduce the risk to fish: The existing pumps would still be operational — posing a continued threat to protected species. Environmental groups and fishing organizations have sued over the project, saying adding the tunnel would further reduce freshwater flows — increasing salt levels and harmful algal blooms, and harming native fish.

Tribes and environmental justice organizations also oppose the state’s application for a change in water rights to build and operate the tunnel. “The injurious impacts of mismanagement in the Bay-Delta can no longer be endured by Tribes and Delta communities,” Malissa Tayaba, vice chair of the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians, said in a statement.

Jon Rosenfield, science director of San Francisco Baykeeper, called it “just the latest version of a plain old water grab.”

The state’s own environmental analysis warned two years ago that the tunnel could harm endangered and threatened fish, including the Delta smelt, winter-run chinook salmon and steelhead trout. Changes to flows at the intakes or downstream, for instance, could reduce migration, damage habitat and expose salmon and other native fish to more predators.

The analysis calls for thousands of acres of wetland restoration to offset the “potentially significant impacts” — projects that critics say have historically been slow and inefficient in California.

The Delta watershed supports about 80% of the state’s commercial salmon fishery, which was cancelled this year for the second time in a row because of plummeting populations.

“What better way to address declining salmon populations than by draining their homes?” Scott Artis, executive director of the Golden State Salmon Association, said in a recent statement. “Bravo, Governor, for turning healthy rivers and estuaries into a punchline that harms tens of thousands of families, businesses and employees across California and Oregon.”

In the increasingly bitter legal standoff between President Donald Trump and media outlets whose reporting he dislikes, a new and crucial third party has emerged: citizens who watch and read the news and need it to do their jobs.

A lawsuit filed Monday on behalf of six such citizens — essentially representing the wider public audience — argues that it’s not only the rights of news organizations that are violated when Trump bans them from White House premises. Even more fundamentally, the lawsuit argues, such bans violate the public’s right to independent reporting about its president and government.

“The ultimate injury here … is to the democratic public,” says the suit, filed in federal district court in New York against Trump and three key aides, including the White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles.

“The First Amendment protects the public’s right to know what its government is doing,” said Katie Fallow, deputy litigation director at the Knight First Amendment Institute, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the plaintiffs, along with the Media Freedom & Information Access Clinic at Yale Law School.

“The White House cannot decide what information Americans receive by punishing critical reporting,” Fallow said in a statement. “When the White House expels reporters because of their coverage and threatens others with expulsion, it isn’t just the press that suffers — the public loses access to independent reporting and gets something closer to government propaganda.”

The Trump administration, asked for comment on the lawsuit, responded in a statement that it attributed to an unidentified White House official: “No person may demand access to the Oval Office.” It said media that peddle “misinformation and defamation are completely capable of reporting their manufactured stories from directly outside.”

The plaintiffs all rely on White House news for their work

The six plaintiffs are all people who say they rely on independent and diverse White House reporting for their teaching, journalism or advocacy. They include a noted human rights advocate, a political journalist, a Yale history professor, a high school civics teacher, a legal journalist, and a student journalist at the University of Pennsylvania.

The complaint filed Monday recounts how various news organizations that have been targeted by Trump are already battling the administration in the courts. These cases include the current lawsuit by CNN, MS NOW and Politico, whose journalists were banished from the White House in September.

A federal judge recently extended an order preventing the White House from enforcing the ban while the case makes its way through the legal system. Still affected, though, is CNN’s pool coverage of Trump. The White House has been denying the network its usual slots in the video pool covering the president’s activities and travel, and CNN has threatened further action.

Also continuing is the legal case involving The Associated Press, whose reporters were barred last year from the Oval Office, Air Force One and some events in retaliation for the outlet’s decision not to follow Trump’s lead in changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico, which lies partially in Mexican and other waters, to the Gulf of America.

The New York Times is also involved in litigation, over a Pentagon policy requiring escorts for journalists on its grounds. And ABC is fighting back against the Trump administration in a dispute over renewal of its broadcast licenses.

This lawsuit seeks more wide-ranging relief

The new lawsuit filed Monday, though, is different from previous legal action against the president — first, in that the plaintiffs are ordinary citizens, shifting the focus from news gatherers to news consumers, and thus implying a much larger pool of stakeholders. In addition, it seeks more wide-ranging relief.

The suit, which names Trump as defendant along with Wiles, White House Communications Director Steven Cheung, and Secret Service Director Sean M. Curran, calls not merely for reinstatement of access that has already been impacted, but for a broad injunction that would protect from retaliation every news outlet that covers the White House —- now, and in the future.

“Defendants’ policy of restricting the access of disfavored news organizations deprives the public of the reporting of those organizations,” the complaint says. It also “inevitably deprives them of the independent reporting of other news organizations as well, since every journalist who reports from the White House must now account for the possibility that a critical or ill-advised word about the president may result in their access being summarily restricted or revoked.”

“Plaintiffs ... seek a declaration that the policy is unconstitutional because it imposes restrictions on a limited public forum that are viewpoint-based and unreasonable,” the complaint adds. “They also seek an injunction barring defendants from enforcing the policy.”

Plaintiffs include a human rights advocate, a teacher and a student journalist

The plaintiffs are:

—Kenneth Roth, former longtime executive director of Human Rights Watch and a lecturer at Yale’s law school and school of global affairs. Roth “relies on newsgathering and reporting from members of the White House press corps to inform his public writing and commentary,” the suit says.

—Daniel Froomkin, media and political journalist and editor of Press Watch, a nonprofit that encourages political journalists to “fulfill their essential mission of creating an informed electorate and holding the powerful accountable.”

—Beverly Gage, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and professor at Yale University who “relies on newsgathering and reporting from the White House press corps to inform her scholarship, public writing and commentary.”

—Peter Schmidt-Nowara, a social studies teacher at a New York City high school, who teaches civics courses and considers White House reporting “essential to his work as an educator.”

—Benjamin Wittes, editor-in-chief of Lawfare and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, whose publication is “especially reliant on the White House press corps to provide accurate and timely coverage of the president.”

—Ethan Young, a student at the University of Pennsylvania and editor-in-chief of The Daily Pennsylvanian, who, as a student journalist, “relies on a diverse, independent and trustworthy cohort of White House reporters to serve as his proxy.”

Schmidt-Nowara, who teaches at Brooklyn Technical High School, is quoted in the lawsuit as saying: “As a social studies teacher, I want my students to have access to accurate, independent reporting about their government.” He adds he is “gravely concerned that the Trump administration’s restrictions on White House reporters are cutting off access to crucial information.

“I joined this lawsuit because my students deserve to know what’s happening in their government and to hear from a free and independent press,” he says.

Young, the student journalist, contends that since he can’t personally access White House press spaces, he relies on “a diverse, independent and trustworthy cohort” of White House reporters to serve as his proxy.

The effect of federal policy changes has been “acutely felt on college campuses, Penn’s included,” Young is quoted as saying. “As a student journalist, I rely on reporting from the White House press corps to understand the decisions made in Washington, their consequences, and how they impact my college community. A vibrant free press allows me to do just that.”

A panel of federal appellate judges on Sunday questioned the timing, constitutionality and authority of the Justice Department’s demand that California election officials set aside thousands of mail ballots from people the federal government suspects may not be citizens.

During rare weekend arguments, two of the three judges on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals appeared skeptical of a lawsuit brought by President Donald Trump’s administration in mid-October. The lawsuit accuses California officials of failing to meet a 48-hour deadline to review 20,000 names the administration flagged as likely noncitizens on the state’s voter rolls.

The administration asked a federal judge to require the state to withhold counting those ballots until the voters’ immigration status could be verified. The district judge scheduled a hearing for Oct. 27, days after the case was assigned, but the federal government appealed to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, seeking an expedited decision.

Justice Department attorney Matthew Donnelly told the panel that California is causing irreparable harm “by allowing noncitizens to vote in violation of their own state laws. The damage is irreversible and irrevocable.”

The Trump administration has made efforts to identify noncitizen voters a priority this year, even though noncitizen voting is exceptionally rare.

Circuit Judge Mark Bennett, a Trump appointee, questioned whether the appellate court even has jurisdiction to hear the case even before a ruling by the lower court.

Donnelly argued that the schedule set by the lower court judge was too slow and effectively a denial of the government’s request, as state elections officials process thousands of mail ballots every day.

Judge Gabriel Sanchez, appointed by former President Joe Biden, questioned whether the federal government was violating the Tenth Amendment, essentially commandeering the state to enforce a federal law that makes it a misdemeanor for a noncitizen to vote.

The federal government is simply asking California to enforce its own law, which also bans noncitizens from voting, Donnelly said. He argued the state’s refusal to comply with the federal request to set aside the ballots for review was “frustrating the purpose” of the federal law against noncitizen voting.

The Elections Clause of the U.S. Constitution gives state legislatures the power to set the time, place and manner of congressional elections, Bennett said. The executive branch may be “unhappy with what they’re doing, and doesn’t like the manner,” Bennett said, but under the Election Clause the state has the right to determine those issues — including how it sorts out any noncitizen voters.

Attorney Seth Waxman, representing Los Angeles County Clerk Dean Logan, said the federal government’s list was unreliable and that segregating the ballots for a review process would effectively disenfranchise thousands of eligible voters.

Even if election staffers spent just three minutes checking each of the expected 2.75 million mail ballots against the government’s list, the process would take 140,000 man-hours, Waxman said — or about 16 years of working time.

Waxman cited a review of 200 records from the Trump administration’s list conducted by Los Angeles County staffers. Assistant Registrar-Recorder Monica Flores said in a court filing that the sample included canceled or inactive registrations, individuals with no voting history and voters who appeared to have been born in the United States, which the filing notes “is strong evidence of citizenship.”

If the administration disagrees with how California runs its elections, it can ask Congress to change that process, said attorney Sam Siegel, representing California Secretary of State Shirley Weber.

The federal government has provided no credible evidence to support its suspicions, said Siegel.

“It has no basis in law or in fact,” he told the panel. “We just dispute the premise that noncitizens are voting.”

But Judge Patrick Bumatay, who was appointed by Trump, said everyone has an interest in ensuring that only eligible citizens vote. He suggested that granting the administration’s request for an emergency order could provide clarity.

“Without an injunction, you will never know” if that is happening, Bumatay told Siegel.

Bennett said the panel would try to issue a ruling as quickly as possible.

Democrats and outside watchdogs are planning a massive presence at the polls on Election Day driven by concerns that President Donald Trump will further leverage the vast resources of the federal government to interfere with a midterm that could hobble his final two years in office.

They won’t be the only ones there. A sprawling election protection effort on the left that is expected to deploy tens of thousands of monitors will be met by the largest-ever monitoring program by the Justice Department and still more observers from Republican-aligned groups. The result could be unlike anything seen at the polls in modern times.

The effort among Democratic and nonprofit groups includes training volunteers to stand watch outside polling places and report activities they consider concerning. The network includes traditional government watchdogs such as Common Cause and the American Civil Liberties Union plus a flood of volunteers assembled by state Democratic parties, congressional leaders, national activist groups and organizations focused on protecting democracy.

The Democratic National Committee’s Association of State Democratic Committees created a first-of-its-kind cybersecurity unit staffed by former CIA and FBI officials to monitor and report online misinformation, including artificial intelligence deepfakes, said Jane Kleeb, vice chair of the DNC.

That’s as Democratic mayors, attorneys general and secretaries of state host tabletop exercises simulating worst-case scenarios, such as a surge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials at voting locations or the seizure of ballots and voting equipment.

On Capitol Hill, Democratic leaders have assembled a legal team that rivals that of any presidential campaign.

“We’ve never done this before,” Kleeb said of the party’s sweeping efforts. But “we’ve never had to deal with the president of the United States saying that he may seize ballots, put ICE agents outside polling locations and other kinds of very clear direct threats to the voting process.”

The Department of Justice has already filed lawsuits in California and Alaska that could affect ballot counting or certification.

While Trump continues to make baseless allegations of cheating in the election, administration and military officials have said they have no plans to deploy immigration agents or troops to polling sites.

White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis blamed “radical Democrats” for creating fears about election security by refusing to enact voter ID requirements and other Republican-backed measures.

“President Trump has done more than any other president to ensure we have free and fair elections,” Bis said.

Tens of thousands of volunteers trained to observe

State Democratic parties have trained an estimated 10,000 volunteers to observe polling places and report anything potentially concerning they might see from federal agents. Common Cause has trained roughly 16,000 more volunteers to stand watch at voting precincts, said Suzanne Almeida, vice president of states for the group

She said a broader Election Protection coalition involving 300 other groups has trained tens of thousands more.

Smaller pockets of volunteers from other groups also are preparing to show up, including roughly 100 organized by Senate Democrats and hundreds more from a Democratic-allied group called Save America, which is training clergy members, veterans, teachers and other local community members. National groups such as Indivisible and MoveOn are activating their own expansive networks.

There are so many organizations working to protect the voting process — including many that cannot legally coordinate with each other — that some officials involved worry about unintentionally creating chaos outside polling locations.

Almeida said Election Day confusion is possible in some precincts but the nature of the threat requires a collective effort.

“It will actually take all of us if some of the threats we are most worried about come to pass,” she said.

Trump administration sends its own team

Harmeet Dhillon, a Trump appointee who leads the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, was asked on CBS’ “60 Minutes” whether the Republican administration is planning to send ICE agents to polling places.

“There is no plan to do that,” she responded.

Still, the Justice Department is planning its largest-ever election monitoring effort, with about 1,000 department staff expected to observe voting and ensure federal laws are being followed, spokesperson Kiersten Pels said. That comes after a primary season in which the department said it deployed more than 100 election monitors across hundreds of polling locations.

At least one of those placements sparked tensions with local officials. Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon, a Republican, said the behavior of two monitors during that state’s primary was “a bit aggressive” and “irregular.” A Laramie County clerk said the Justice Department monitors arrived at the polls intending to interview voters, but her office didn’t allow it.

The department disagrees that the monitors did anything improper, Pels said. She added that the monitors are trained to comply with federal law governing conduct at polling places and won’t “interfere with the voting process.”

Democratic lawmakers and voting rights advocates have raised concerns that the Trump administration’s monitors could intimidate voters or abandon the duty they’ve had for decades to protect against civil rights violations.

The department plans to send them to every state, focusing on high-population areas, jurisdictions that have had problems in the past and districts with close elections, according to a senior department official who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity under terms set by the department.

The Republican National Committee said its operation involves deploying “election integrity deputy state directors” in 22 states, among them Arizona, Michigan, Georgia and North Carolina.

Those workers are the “eyes and the ears of the RNC in the field” who recruit volunteers and organize trainings, said Ally Triolo, the RNC’s election integrity communications director. Their mission is to surface anything that seems unlawful.

At the same time, the RNC has enlisted nearly 22,000 poll workers and is recruiting poll-watching volunteers for competitive districts. The poll watchers will “observe the process and help ensure election rules are followed in accordance with the law,” Triolo said.

Local election officials prepare for increased attention

While federal monitors have quietly observed elections for decades, largely without incident, some election officials are taking precautions.

Chris Swope, the city clerk in Lansing, Michigan, said he preemptively contacted law enforcement and his attorney in case federal monitors violate election law, although he expects them to abide by the rules.

The Democratic Mayors Association issued guidance to local Democratic officials with detailed instructions about what to do if federal agents appear at polling locations.

It notes that federal law prohibits the presence of federal immigration agents, the FBI or other investigative personnel. It also issued a reminder that federal agents are not allowed to be armed at the polls, nor are they allowed to interact with voters or handle ballots or election equipment.

Justice Department officials have said their monitors won’t be armed and will not interfere with voting. Asked about department monitors being sent to Georgia, Trump told a reporter recently: “They’re not going to do anything other than watch.”

Some of the poll observations have already begun. Mary Corcoran, Save America’s executive director, said her group’s volunteers have been monitoring precincts during early voting in Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina and Ohio to help give voters a sense of security.

“The fear is the point, and we must do something about it,” she said. “Left unanswered, fear does the work of keeping people home without a single agent setting foot at a polling place.”

— Associated Press writers Jacqueline GaNun in Lansing, Mich., Mary Clare Jalonick in Washington and Jessica Hill in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

Richard Marx knows how to write a pop hit.

His first seven singles all reached the top five of the Billboard Hot 100, with hits like "Satisfied" and "Right Here Waiting." His writing credits include Luther Vandross' "Dance With My Father."

But his latest album is showcasing a different side of him.

After Hours blends Great American Songbook standards with original songs that Marx wrote in that classic style. There's also a five-song EP, After Hours: Live From the Grammy Museum, which came from his August performance there.

Marx will bring the album to the Yaamava’ Theater at Yaamava’ Resort & Casino in Highland on Sunday, Nov. 1.

From backup singer to hitmaker

Marx's journey started when he arrived in Los Angeles at 18.

"The first door opened for me kind of immediately," Marx said in an interview with LAist Morning Edition Host Austin Cross. "The first job I had right out of the gate was singing background vocals for Lionel Richie on his first solo album."

That connection allowed Marx to meet Kenny Rogers, with whom he wrote the No. 1 country song "Crazy." But it would still take years before Marx would find his own success as an artist.

"I remember when I started having success as a songwriter and singing on all these other people's hit records," Marx said. "I really thought that would be the fuel, but every record company rejected me for several years. I got rejected time and time again on songs that became massive hits. So, you have to just believe in yourself and wait for that right opportunity to come around."

Writing like it's 1948

Marx's new album is a real departure from the music that made him a star. Initially, he didn't think he was ready to record these types of songs.

"It was a delusion on my part that I wasn't old enough," Marx said. "I thought, 'I'm not old enough to sing those old standards.' Then it dawned on me that I'm 63 years old."

Marx decided not to just record American classics. He also wrote original music in that same style.

"When I realized that I could create something special in writing half the album, it all started to make sense to me," Marx said. "And I have to say that the writing of this album was the most challenging and enjoyable songwriting I think I've ever done."

The first song Marx wrote for the album was called "All I Ever Needed," which features a trumpet solo by Chris Botti.

"I pretended that I was a young, struggling songwriter in 1948, trying to get Sinatra to cut one of my songs," Marx said. "I took a long walk, and I thought whatever comes into my mind, I'm gonna go with it. An hour later, when I came back home, that whole song was written."

For another song called "Magic Hour," Marx got an assist from his wife, Daisy Fuentes.

"It's my favorite song on the album," Marx said. "The lyrics plagued me for a while. So [Fuentes] and I sat down and had a martini, and she just kept talking and telling me this story, and I turned it into lyrics."

Another highlight on After Hours is Marx's duet with Rod Stewart on the song "Young at Heart."

"Rod was just such a hero my whole life," Marx said. "We just kind of accidentally became great friends over the last four years. And in that process, it was Rod who suggested that we do a duet."

Marx is now looking for new goals.

"I'm in the process now of building my new bucket list, and there's really nothing on it so far," Marx said. "I wanna keep making music that makes me feel the way this album made me feel."

See him live

Tickets for Marx's upcoming show at the Yaamava’ Theater at Yaamava’ Resort & Casino in Highland on Sunday, Nov. 1, are available through AXS.