Why now: Tributes are pouring in from individuals and organizations alike, including the San Bernardino County firefighters who kept watch over Jackie as she was waiting for rescue and the L.A. County officials who connected her with care.
Tributes are pouring in from individuals and organizations alike, including the San Bernardino County firefighters who kept watch over Jackie as she was waiting for rescue and the L.A. County officials who connected her with care.
TJ Fraser, a resident of Big Bear Valley’s unincorporated community of Fawnskin, described Jackie as a “neighbor” who was a “really important part of this community.”
Fraser said people were deeply pulling for Jackie’s recovery, but as fans come to terms with her death, he’s started to see more hope for the future of the nest and her longtime mate Shadow.
“I think that that's the real great lesson and the takeaway from this,” he said. “Nature adapts, nature always finds balance; that's how it works. And tomorrow is another day.”
The repository is a one-of-a-kind facility run by federal wildlife officials. It stores and distributes eagle remains to federally recognized Native American tribes for religious, cultural and ceremonial purposes.
Jackie's death earlier this week quickly became international news.
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BBC, Associated Press, The Washington Post, Hindustan Times, Modern Ghana, CBC, People, San Bernardino Sun, Los Angeles Times, ABC 6, Friends of Big Bear Valley
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Makenna Cramer
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Jackie’s stardom is a big deal
Fraser said his “phone blew up” when Jackie’s death was announced, and the instant reactions of sadness and shock were “overwhelming.”
“It really showed me how much that bird resonated with people around the country and around the world,” he said. “It was truly remarkable.”
“What she was able to represent brought people to a place of, ‘We want to protect this for them,’” he said. “And that'll never go away.”
Melanie Stagnaro, a resident of L.A.’s Laurel Canyon neighborhood, has been watching Jackie and Shadow for about six years. She said she was stunned by the news of Jackie’s death, but not entirely surprised since Stagnaro thought something may have been wrong with her earlier in the season.
Stagnaro blamed her concerns about Jackie’s condition on the trials of motherhood, which is what helped draw her more into the livestream in recent years.
“I know there's so much more to her, but for me, it was identifying to her as a mom,” Stagnaro said, adding that her kids graduated high school and “left the nest” while Jackie and Shadow’s eaglets were learning to fly and do the same.
Jackie covered under a blanket of snow on Feb. 25, 2023.
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Friends of Big Bear Valley
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YouTube
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Jackie and Shadow's eaglets during a feeding of fish in April 2025.
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Friends of Big Bear Valley
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YouTube
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Jackie and Shadow welcomed a third egg on Feb. 24, 2026, after losing their first two.
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Friends of Big Bear Valley
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With Jackie gone, Stagnaro has started to turn her affection to Shadow, whom she described as a “stud” and a “great dad.”
“He is amazing too, and … I do hope there's another mate for him,” she said. “And I do hope they keep it at this nest, you know?”
State officials and orgs are still mourning
Jackie’s legacy extends beyond the individual impact to institutions and state leaders, including Gov. Gavin Newsom.
“California mourns Jackie, the Big Bear bald eagle who reminded us of the beauty and wonder of California’s wildlife, and our shared responsibility to protect the habitats that sustain it," Newsom said in a statement Tuesday.
Visit Big Bear said Jackie captured the hearts of the mountain community and so many beyond.
“We know you are with Sandy now, watching over Big Bear together,” the group said on social media. Sandy Steers, the late leader of Friends of Big Bear Valley, died in February.
The San Bernardino County Fire Protection District, which kept watch over Jackie while she was waiting for rescuers, said it was inspiring to see the community come together with compassion and concern for her well-being.
“While we mourn her passing, we also reflect with gratitude on the legacy she leaves behind,” the institute said on social media Tuesday. “May Jackie’s story continue to inspire compassion for wildlife, stewardship of natural places, and a commitment to protecting bald eagles and other wild species.”
Support ‘In honor of Jackie’
The Ojai Raptor Center, which gave Jackie intensive care for about three weeks, is still seeing a flood of donations after her death, according to its website.
Around 20,000 people have supported its bald eagle recovery campaign. Thousands of dollars were donated throughout Tuesday and Wednesday, along with messages like, “In honor of Jackie and all you did to save her,” and, “ALL OF YOU ARE HEROES for your dedication & tireless work for Jackie and every animal you care for."
The fire at a Boyle Heights cold-storage facility was burning close to homes.
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Steve Saldivar
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The LA Local
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Topline:
The levels didn’t cross California’s short-term health standards, but one expert said they show the toxic gas was present at a higher concentration and across a wider area than previously known.
The backstory: For weeks, Lineage Logistics and the Los Angeles Fire Department have said ammonia — the hazardous material that’s key for industrial refrigerators — was quickly cleared from the warehouse fire zone. In the days after the fire, Lineage insisted that no measurable ammonia was detected in the area.
More details: An analysis published Aug. 5 by the Community and Environment Research Lab at UC Irvine and East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice found higher levels of ammonia in streets close to Lineage. That includes Indiana Street near Union Pacific Avenue, where the highest ammonia levels — 4,300 parts per billion — were detected on Aug. 2, more than a month after the fire was extinguished, through handheld Aeroqual monitors that community scientists from East Yard have been using to sample the air.
For weeks, Lineage Logistics and the Los Angeles Fire Department have said ammonia — the hazardous material that’s key for industrial refrigerators — was quickly cleared from the warehouse fire zone. In the days after the fire, Lineage insisted that no measurable ammonia was detected in the area.
Now, community testing as well as data from Lineage and the Southern California Air Quality Management District show that elevated levels of ammonia were present in neighborhoods near the cold-storage warehouse weeks after the fire.
Though air regulators and Lineage note the levels didn’t meet the state threshold requiring action to protect public health, community groups say the findings are alarming. Meanwhile, federal regulators are seeking answers from Lineage to determine what air contaminants were released during the fire. Lineage did not respond to questions from Boyle Heights Beat.
An analysis published Aug. 5 by the Community and Environment Research Lab at UC Irvine and East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice found higher levels of ammonia in streets close to Lineage.
That includes Indiana Street near Union Pacific Avenue, where the highest ammonia levels — 4,300 parts per billion — were detected on Aug. 2, more than a month after the fire was extinguished, through handheld Aeroqual monitors that community scientists from East Yard have been using to sample the air.
An analysis published Aug. 5 by the Community and Environment Research Lab at UC Irvine and East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice found higher levels of ammonia in streets close to Lineage.
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Courtesy of Jill Johnston
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Experts agree that’s many times higher than what’s considered typical, though the standard for ammonia levels in L.A.’s air varies.
UC Irvine and East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice classify 4 to 6 parts per billion as typical ammonia levels, a figure that’s also considered the baseline nationwide. To South Coast AQMD, typical background levels of ammonia in LA range up to 36 parts per billion.
The analysis by the Community and Environment Research Lab and UC Irvine also shows that higher-than-normal ammonia levels were also detected from a distance.
About a mile from Lineage, ammonia levels have reached 108 parts per billion, according to publicly available data retrieved from a stationary monitor that South Coast AQMD placed late July at Eastman Avenue Elementary School.
To Jill Johnston, associate professor of environmental and occupational health at UC Irvine, the findings not only show “very high” ammonia concentrations closer to the facility, but also how “these chemicals are traveling into the nearby neighborhoods.”
The recent data, Johnston said, suggests that the “big source of ammonia” is coming from the rotting food in Lineage. She also pointed to the ammonia used in the facility’s refrigeration system.
This analysis is just a snapshot of the potential air contaminants present near Lineage, said Johnston, an exposure scientist and environmental epidemiologist.
“In some ways it confirms what people have been experiencing for the last seven weeks … That they’re breathing poor air quality and subject to foul odors, and that we continue to see impacts on local air quality, even seven weeks into this process,” Johnston said.
A white van with South Coast AQMD branding sits on the playground at Eastman Elementary in East Los Angeles.
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Steve Saldivar
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The LA Local
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The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, according to its website, said normal amounts of ammonia in the environment do not cause health effects in humans. However, the agency noted that exposure to high levels of ammonia “may hurt your skin, eyes, throat, and lungs and cause coughing and burns. Lung damage and death may occur after exposure to very high levels of ammonia.”
In a statement, South Coast AQMD said it has seen “some levels of ammonia” that were elevated above L.A. background levels at the Eastman Elementary monitor and from roaming ammonia measurements. South Coast AQMD declined to comment on the air sensors being used to take ammonia measurements.
However, the agency noted, California’s short-term health benchmark — the level of ammonia a person could inhale continuously for one hour without adverse health effects — is 4,500 parts per billion. Despite elevated levels recorded near Lineage, “they do not exceed the State’s short-term health standards,” South Coast AQMD said.
“We understand that the situation is dynamic and conditions are changing, particularly with the heat and the decomposing materials that have potential to offgas. We continue to monitor the situation closely,” the agency added.
These findings come on the heels of a letter that the Environmental Protection Agency sent to Lineage on Aug. 3, ordering the company to detail the “specific substances,” including “all air contaminants,” that were released during the time of the fire.
“The EPA is aware of a potential hazardous substance release event at the Lineage Logistics,” according to the letter. The agency did not state which substance and gave Lineage 14 days to provide them with the information.
Lineage, which has conducted air monitoring near the warehouse since June 23, said it has not identified chemical concentrations “above health-based action levels.” After saying on June 19 that it had not detected “measurable” amounts of ammonia, on Aug. 8, the company acknowledged on its website that “short-lasting ammonia detections” were observed at northern and eastern portions of the fire site. Lineage detected a peak of ammonia at 1,000 parts per billion.
Firefighters assess the remains of the Lineage warehouse that burned for a week and sent smoke into nearby communities.
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Andrew Lopez
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Boyle Heights Beat
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Mark Lopez with East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice pushed back against the thresholds that air regulators are relying on to determine what’s safe and unsafe for residents.
“What we’re dealing with is not short-term exposure. We’re not dealing with one hour, two hours, six hours, eight hours. We’re dealing with a lot of folks who are there 24 hours. It’s inappropriate to use the lowest bar for protecting the community,” Lopez said. “They’re using a standard that’s inappropriate for the actual lived experiences of our community.”
Lopez said air regulators shouldn’t normalize the notion that “there’s always elevated levels of pollution in our communities ... What they’re seeing is not alarming, and we’re like, yeah, because you’re not alarmed by environmental racism, and that’s the problem,” Lopez said.
A demonstrator kicks a canister of tear gas during a protest Saturday, June 14, 2025, in Los Angeles.
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Noah Berger
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AP Photo
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Topline:
Los Angeles police defended the use of chemical agents against people protesting the federal immigration crackdown last year, the first time police had used the hazardous munitions since the 1970s.
LAPD after action report: Department administrators claimed at Tuesday’s Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners meeting that the agents were needed to control crowds and could be used again during major events in the future, such as the Super Bowl and the 2028 Olympics.
LAPD discussed the use of tear gas, rubber bullets and other projectiles referenced in a 60-page LAPD report on the 2025 protests. The report analyzed demonstrations, including ones at federal buildings in downtown LA, between June 6 and June 17, 2025, which the department estimated peaked at about 20,000 participants.
Questions raised: Several people at the Police Commission meeting contested the department’s account, saying chemical agents were used on journalists and members of the public who said they were peacefully protesting or doing their jobs — with little warning.
Los Angeles police defended the use of chemical agents against people protesting the federal immigration crackdown last year, the first time police had used the hazardous munitions since the 1970s.
Department administrators claimed at Tuesday’s Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners meeting that the chemical agents were needed to control crowds and could be used again during major events in the future, such as the Super Bowl and the 2028 Olympics.
What LAPD said happened
Lt. Joseph Franzen and Commander Mario Mota discussed the use of tear gas, rubber bullets and other projectiles referenced in a 60-page LAPD report on the 2025 protests.
The report analyzed demonstrations, including ones at federal buildings in downtown L.A., between June 6 and June 17, 2025, which the department estimated peaked at about 20,000 participants.
Franzen, one of the report's authors, said it was intended to be a reflection on the department’s actions for future reference. The report does not detail injuries to members of the public and journalists, and does not include statements from them about what they experienced.
Commission President Rasha Gerges Shields asked the department to provide more information at a future meeting about injuries to members of the public and the amount and type of force used.
While the department said the chemical agents were needed to disperse crowds, their use has been the subject of ongoing debate. In January, a federal judge ordered the Police Department to stop using certain crowd-control weapons that posed risks to the public.
Shields said that order should have been included in the report.
Franzen and Mota said officers used chemical agents on June 8 and June 14, respectively, in response to large crowds that had grown unruly. They reported that officers had various items thrown at them.
Police Chief Jim McDonnell told the commissioners that most of the crowd exercised its First Amendment rights, but that a small portion of the crowd was “exceptionally violent.” He said he had never experienced that level of violence at a public gathering in his decades of police service.
Questions raised about the report
Several people at the Police Commission meeting contested the department’s account, saying chemical agents were used on journalists and members of the public they said were protesting peacefully or doing their jobs — with little warning.
The League of Women Voters of Greater Los Angeles wrote a letter in advance of the meeting, disagreeing with the characterization of the protests as "riots" in the report and urged better word choice.
“‘Rioting’ connotes serious violence,” wrote Carolina Goodman on behalf of the organization.
During her first meeting as a police commissioner, Heather Aubry asked Mota to clarify that whatever violence did occur was not sanctioned by the organizers of the various protests that took place over the study period.
L.A. resident Kayla Esmond joined a preplanned march that included children, seniors and disabled people hoping to protest federal immigration enforcement. She told the commissioners that people in the large crowd began yelling that police were preparing to use tear gas.
“There was no dispersal order,” Esmond told The LA Local. “Someone yelled that there were children present. They fired the canisters without any response or warning that we could hear.”
Mayor Karen Bass eventually issued a curfew for downtown L.A. on June 10. Franzen and Mota reported that 435 people were arrested during the protests. Of those, 344 were arrested on suspicion of unlawful assembly. It’s unclear how many were charged with a crime.
The department paid about $17.4 million for personnel during the protests, with about $12.2 million going toward overtime.
The LAPD’s actions during the federal immigration operations last year have been widely cited as a source of confusion for city residents who remain uncertain about what police were responsible for during the operations.
The American Civil Liberties Union and other advocacy groups previously reported to the commission about a federal raid at a garment warehouse last June where LAPD set a perimeter for federal agents while they detained workers there. During the presentation, the groups advised that police make it clear to the community in the future what they are there to do.
People echoed during public comment that the same confusion persists in the protest report, which describes the immigration raids and the public response to them as a “complex challenge” for local police.
“The Department’s role was limited to providing public safety support when demonstrations escalated into violence or when federal personnel were at risk of being overwhelmed,” it reads.
For months, immigration advocates and other elected leaders called on McDonnell and Bass to provide more clarity on LAPD’s role in federal immigration sweeps. In February, Bass issued an executive directive explicitly limiting LAPD’s role during these operations and calling for greater transparency about the department's interactions with federal agents.
LA Documenter Martin Romero contributed to this piece from the LAPD Board of Police Commission meeting. LA Documenters trains and pays LA residents to take notes at local government meetings around Los Angeles. You can find meeting notes and audio at losangeles.documenters.org
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Federal agents walk along a street in Minneapolis in February.
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Ryan Murphy
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Associated Press
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Topline:
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers may soon be outfitted with gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks intended to gain compliance from combative individuals. ICE plans to spend up to $20 million to purchase thousands of “conductive distraction and de-escalation devices” for officers and agents.
How it works: Manufacturer Compliant Technologies says the devices function as a normal pair of patrol gloves until officers press a switch to activate their electrical mode. The gloves must be applied directly to someone’s skin to deliver a pain stimulus that typically helps an officer gain compliance within seconds, according to the company.
Opposition: Civil rights advocates expressed alarm at the plan, saying ICE officers already face criticism for their use of force with little oversight or accountability while enforcing President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Read on ... for more details about the plan and reaction to it.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers may soon be outfitted with gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks intended to gain compliance from combative individuals.
ICE plans to spend up to $20 million to purchase thousands of “conductive distraction and de-escalation devices” for officers and agents by March, according to a notice published Monday by the Department of Homeland Security.
The devices are known as the G.L.O.V.E., which stands for Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter, and are manufactured by Compliant Technologies LLC of Lexington, Kentucky. They have been used in recent years by some jails and police departments.
DHS said Tuesday that it was working on a response to an Associated Press inquiry and offered no immediate comment. Jeff Niklaus, the founder and chief executive of Compliant Technologies, wrote in an email, “Unfortunately, we are unable to speak on this subject.”
The notice said the solicitation for a no-bid contract could be published as early as Friday.
Compliant Technologies says the devices function as a normal pair of patrol gloves until officers press a switch to activate their electrical mode. The gloves must be applied directly to someone’s skin to deliver a pain stimulus that typically helps an officer gain compliance within seconds, according to the company.
“It’s immediate and sharp, and it will distract you. I call it like a bee sting,” said John Peters, president of the Institute for the Prevention of In-Custody Deaths, who is studying how the device has been used. “If the officer is getting any type of resistance from the person, this is certainly an effective tool.”
Peters said he believed ICE’s planned purchase would likely be the largest from the company to date. He said he could envision ICE officers using the gloves to help remove uncooperative subjects from cars and houses and in and out of detention facilities.
“For smaller officers or weaker officers or older officers, I think it has a great advantage” because it can produce faster takedowns and shorten confrontations, he said.
The manufacturer warns the device should not be used as punishment, against people merely exhibiting “verbal defiance or belligerence” or on high-risk populations such as children, pregnant women or elderly or disabled people.
Jenn Rolnick Borchetta, deputy project director on policing at the American Civil Liberties Union, said the public should have no confidence that ICE officers will use the devices appropriately. She questioned why the devices would be necessary for civil immigration enforcement and noted those getting shocked might have no advance warning.
“ICE spent the last year showing this country they are too quick to use force. Now they will be able to deploy electric shocks with the slight push of a button that maybe nobody else can see them do,” she said. “Introducing gloves that can so easily be used to deliver terrible pain in encounters is a recipe for harm to the public.”
Supporters say the devices are generally used in specific jail and transport situations, rather than broadly to patrol on the streets. They have been used to subdue violent suspects who are refusing to get into squad cars and inmates who are harming themselves and threatening officers, according to Compliant Technologies.
Peters said he expected the devices to be misused by a small number of employees, as with other policing technologies, but he said they are unlikely to cause injuries. He said it would be important for ICE to have robust policies and training in place.
To use the device, officers must complete a course and be recertified every two years, the manufacturer says.
Newsom makes last-minute push to help CA utilities
By Jeanne Kuang and Levi Sumagaysay | CalMatters
Published August 12, 2026 11:00 AM
The Eaton Fire leaves devastation behind in Altadena on Jan. 17, 2025.
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Jae C. Hong
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AP Photo
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Topline:
One of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s final political fights in California is a revival of an old one. As wildfire costs threaten utilities’ financial models, the governor wants to help them pay less for fires.
More details: Wildfire survivors worry the governor’s proposal would prevent them from being made financially whole for suffering trauma. Local government leaders are demanding that they continue to be paid the full cost to rebuild incinerated infrastructure. On the other side are the politically influential utilities, who have drawn fury for their equipment sparking several of the state’s most devastating wildfires.
The backstory: As he mulls a presidential run, Newsom has political incentive to push through a deal. Opponents from the right are eager to paint California as unaffordable and lurching through disasters; further rate hikes or the specter of a utility bankruptcy wouldn’t help. But backing the utilities also comes with risks: Anger at the companies remains fresh after Edison was last week found by Cal Fire and the Los Angeles County Fire Department to be responsible for the January 2025 Eaton Fire that killed 19 people in Altadena.
Read on... for more on the proposed package.
This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.
In the final few weeks of his last legislative session as California governor, Gavin Newsom is asking lawmakers to help reduce how much profit-making utility companies must pay out after wildfires.
His administration has for weeks floated to lawmakers a wide-ranging but still-vague package of bills to address the spiraling costs of wildfires that has made a slew of different interests unhappy.
Insurance companies have launched an ad campaign against what they call a potential “utility bailout,” that would leave them unable to recover from the power companies the costs of paying homeowners’ insurance claims. Attorneys representing fire survivors and other plaintiffs that sue utilities don’t want to see their fees reduced.
Wildfire survivors worry the governor’s proposal would prevent them from being made financially whole for suffering trauma. Local government leaders are demanding that they continue to be paid the full cost to rebuild incinerated infrastructure.
On the other side are the politically influential utilities, who have drawn fury for their equipment sparking several of the state’s most devastating wildfires.
The state’s three investor-owned utilities, Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas and Electric, aren’t in imminent financial danger and last year saw profits rise. But fire costs have contributed to Californians paying the second-highest electricity rates in the country, and lawmakers and Newsom’s office worry that if it becomes harder for utilities to borrow money those bills will continue to climb. The utilities together provide power for about three-quarters of the state.
Newsom and the lawmakers say utilities are held responsible for too much after a wildfire and that bad actors like hedge funds are taking advantage to get a cut. If another devastating wildfire triggers damages too high for a utility to pay, the potentially resulting bankruptcy would make it even harder for victims to collect.
“The status quo doesn’t work,” Newsom said at a press conference last week when asked whether his proposal is in the best interests of fire survivors. “And we're trying to balance all of those needs in a very familiar process that will unfold over the course of the next few months.”
CalMatters asked the governor’s office whether the timeline Newsom mentioned was correct, considering the legislative session ends in three weeks. A spokesperson said the governor meant “the next couple of months of the legislative session,” and did not respond to whether Newsom will call a special session to address the issue.
As he mulls a presidential run, Newsom has political incentive to push through a deal. Opponents from the right are eager to paint California as unaffordable and lurching through disasters; further rate hikes or the specter of a utility bankruptcy wouldn’t help. But backing the utilities also comes with risks: Anger at the companies remains fresh after Edison was last week found by Cal Fire and the Los Angeles County Fire Department to be responsible for the January 2025 Eaton Fire that killed 19 people in Altadena.
The chair of a key Assembly committee, Democratic Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris, is generally on board with Newsom’s proposals, but lawmakers in the Senate appear less certain. Fire survivors are urging them to slow down and commit to a more public debate.
“You cannot be ‘there are some bad actors’ and therefore we will have a secret bill,” said Joy Chen, who leads a group of Los Angeles wildfire survivors. “Then your bill is the bad actor.”
A familiar fight
It’s a redux of a bitter fight that has bookended Newsom’s time as governor.
The utility was in a bind: Under California law it was strictly liable for fires that were getting more severe, partly due to climate change, and regulators were no longer letting the companies pass damages onto customers in cases where they were found careless.
Facing mounting suits from victims and insurance companies, the company in 2019 declared bankruptcy. Newsom quickly signed legislation to help buffer utilities from those claims, drawing accusations of a bailout. The state created a $21 billion wildfire fund, paid for half by utility shareholders and half by customers through a $2.50 surcharge on their monthly electricity bills, to pay victims’ claims, provided the utilities follow stricter safety regulations.
The remaining structure of a building burned from the Eaton Fire in Altadena. Jan. 8, 2025.
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Ted Soqui
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CalMatters
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Then in January 2025, during an intense windstorm, electricity arcing from a century-old out-of-service Edison tower in Southern California’s Eaton Canyon set dry brush ablaze. The resulting Eaton Fire, burning at the same time as the deadly Palisades Fire, claimed 19 lives and nearly 9,500 homes and other buildings. UCLA estimated losses at between $24 billion and 45 billion.
The state wildfire fund is expected to be drained once the costs of insurance claims, Edison’s multimillion-dollar voluntary settlements with survivors and numerous unsettled lawsuits are tallied. (Lawmakers extended the fund last year to address future fires, adding to electricity customers’ surcharges through 2045.) Profiteering hedge funds have sought to take advantage by buying up insurance claims.
Newsom’s goal is twofold: Limit who can make claims to the fund and limit how much they can get. In private briefings last week and a document outlining his package released Tuesday, his office said he would combine the cost reductions with bills to boost home hardening, help homeowners get off the state’s insurer-of-last-resort and re-enter the home insurance market, tie utility executive pay to safety and require shareholders to pay down customers’ rates for two summers.
Details of the package remain scant. The outline released Tuesday did not include proposed legislative language.
CalMatters contacted the state’s three major utility companies. San Diego Gas & Electric did not respond. PG&E and Edison referred questions to Nathan Click, spokesperson for the utilities’ campaign, which is called Wildfire Victims First and has been blanketing the state with ads telling Californians to urge their lawmakers to act.
Click, who is also a political spokesperson for Newsom, did not answer specific questions, including whether utilities are meeting directly with lawmakers. Instead, he shared statements from a handful of business groups and a powerful electrical workers’ union urging lawmakers to advocate for the proposed liability reduction.
In addition, the chief executives of PG&E and Edison have said they plan to take action to protect their shareholders if California lawmakers do not pass legislation to limit their fire liability. They did not specify what they planned to do.
Over the past four years PG&E, Edison and SDG&E collectively spent $5.2 million on California political campaigns, sponsored travel for lawmakers and donations to officials’ favored charities, according to CalMatters’ Digital Democracy database.
PG&E also has the fifth-highest spending on lobbying in the 2025-2026 legislative session and was the top spender from April through June. In the first half of this year, the three utilities reported spending nearly $7 million to influence Newsom’s administration, the Legislature and their regulators at the California Public Utilities Commission.
Limiting damages
Newsom suggests chipping away at utilities’ liabilities by limiting attorneys’ fees, reducing the amount of money local governments can recoup to rebuild burned infrastructure and curbing how much some victims can receive in damages.
His proposal would set up a state-administered “fast pay” program to prioritize wildfire fund payouts for survivors whose loved ones are killed, who are injured or whose properties are destroyed. To participate, claimants would likely need to give up their right to sue the utility — trading an often lengthy wait through litigation to get comprehensive damages in exchange for the relief of a quicker payout.
'If you were part of a disaster no one’s going to say you can’t make a claim.'
— Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris
For other victims “in harm’s way,” the Tuesday outline suggests allowing up to $150,000 in damages.
Newsom’s office and Petrie-Norris, who generally supports the idea, said they do not intend to limit emotional distress claims for survivors they deem legitimate but those kinds of damages should be curbed for others.
“If you were part of a disaster no one’s going to say you can’t make a claim,” Petrie-Norris, an Irvine Democrat who chairs the Assembly utilities committee, said. “If you did not actually experience a disaster, what non-economic damages should you be entitled to?”
Petrie-Norris and Newsom are concerned about billboard attorneys who seek clients to file lawsuits against utilities and the wildfire fund; one study has found attorneys are likely to get 30% to 40% of victims’ payouts. Groups representing survivors and attorneys argue it’s not so clear who should count as a victim. Residents who lost no property and stayed in their homes miles away could still be harmed by smoke inhalation, for example.
Chen said she was “stunned” after she was briefed by the governor’s office last week and was told that only people who are evacuated and have their house burn down would be eligible for non-economic damages.
“Let’s say someone was out of town, but their house burned down so they didn’t evacuate,” she said. “But they lost everything, so they have to rebuild. So you won’t compensate them for pain and suffering?”
Newsom also wants to stop investors from buying claims and prioritize small business claimants over corporations, but his office has not explained how to accomplish that.
The proposed bill package has so incensed some wildfire victims that opponents of the plan have shrugged at arguments that some claimants are taking advantage of the Wildfire Fund.
“The utilities are finding a lot of creative ways to avoid responsibility. That’s it,” said Graham Knaus, chief executive of the California Association of Counties. “We should not be opening the door for them to escape accountability.”
Shifting costs
Another component of the outline released Tuesday could affect homeowners across the state. Newsom is proposing to limit — or eliminate entirely — insurance companies' right to recoup money from utilities when a utility-caused fire forces those insurers to pay out homeowners' claims.
The process is known as subrogation. The two powerful industries have been at odds over it for years.
Utilities and insurance already clashed in 2018 when utilities unsuccessfully backed a bill to loosen a unique California legal doctrine that holds power providers strictly liable for wildfire damages near their equipment even if they aren’t found responsible for the fire.
“We’re a well-resourced industry, but not like (the utilities),” Rex Frazier, president of the Personal Insurance Federation of California, recalled. “Their lobbying spend was just crazy.”
Denni Ritter, vice president for the American Property Casualty Insurance Association, said eliminating subrogation could impede the progress that has been made due to the regulations California adopted last year to address insurance availability problems.
“We’re at this precarious time,” Ritter said. Because the state now allows insurance companies to consider catastrophe modeling and reinsurance costs in pricing their premiums, some insurers have resumed writing new policies in California, and the number of policies in the last-resort FAIR Plan is growing at a slower rate, according to the state insurance department.
But if they can’t recover the costs of wildfire claims, Frazier and Ritter said insurance companies will raise premiums, which would affect homeowners even in areas with low fire risk.
“We don't understand how they're not embarrassed to suggest that the answer to their problem is to shift their costs over to other people,” Frazier said. “Why should a homeowners insurance customer in a dense urban environment have to pay considerably more?”
Sen. Ben Allen, the Democratic chair of the Senate utilities committee and a candidate for insurance commissioner, said he doesn’t want to make that tradeoff if the package doesn’t include other benefits for consumers or taxpayers.
Petrie-Norris said it could be worth it.
“If I can save you $2 on your utility bill and your insurance bill goes up by $1, that seems like a smart thing for us all to do,” she said. But we've got to make sure that's true and whether there are unintended consequences.”
Jeremia Kimelman and Digital Democracy engineer Andrew Chan contributed to this story.
