The Brief

Jimmy Chavez, the general manager of Duke's in Malibu, felt lucky in January. His restaurant on Pacific Coast Highway had survived the Palisades Fire, as it had the Woolsey and Franklin fires.

“Luckily, we didn’t sustain much direct damage from the fires,” Chavez said.

Duke’s was one of the few buildings still standing, which came with its own set of difficulties.

“All of our neighbors around us were dramatically impacted, if not lost their homes. So there was a little bit of survivor's guilt initially,” Chavez said.

But he was about two weeks from reopening when it began to rain.

On the evening of Feb. 13, a mudslide rushed down Las Flores Creek, turning into a river that charged into Duke’s.

The water filled the crawl space under the restaurant. Mud coated the walls. The furniture, the ovens, the refrigerators, the plumbing — all unusable.

The entry to Duke's, taken shortly after the mudslides.

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“The mudslide was initially like wow, we can’t get a break,” Chavez said.

Then began an odyssey that Duke’s continues to claw back from.

Unable to open, Chavez let go all 130 employees, some of whom had been there for 15 or 20 years. Five months out from the flood, unemployment has run out amidst delays.

“You’re feeling their pain,” Chavez said. “ There's lots of restaurants fun to work at and stuff, but we have very much a family feeling in our restaurant.”

He began to rebuild alone.

“It took a little over two months just to get the mud out of the building,” Chavez said.

Emptying the building was just the beginning.

“We essentially had to gut the restaurant,” Chavez said.

He’s had to replace the plumbing, electrical and myriad equipment — ovens, grills, flattops, the literal bar. And that has meant a lot of waiting and delays.

“ It seems like everything is taking a little longer than is expected,” he said.

Muddy water rose about a foot high inside the restaurant.

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Chavez and Duke’s have been through weather damage before. In 2011, the recovery after part of the restaurant was hit by flooding took 10 weeks.

“ I was there the night that it flooded in 2011, that you just, you can't do a whole lot to control that,” he said.

This time, “I was trying to just extrapolate that in my head of, how long is this going to be?”

He wondered if it would be three, four, even five months. In all, Chavez is looking at an eight- to nine-month repair.

Chavez said the city, local officials, the health department and even the insurance company have all come to aid the restaurant’s rebuild.

The restaurant had been a pillar in the community.

“We have good  brand recognition, but they're a lot more than that to the communities that they're in,” Chavez said about the restaurant. “They're places that families gather.”

And now, zooming out, he can see the flooding as “ probably a blessing in disguise for two reasons.”

The restaurant's signature sculpture of Hawaiian surfer Duke Kahanamoku, covered in debris and mud.

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First, if Duke's had reopened in February, when Pacific Coast Highway would have been closed for the following three months, the restaurant would have struggled as other Malibu businesses did.

Second, “ We're almost 30 years old, and to get a full refresh is amazing,” he said.

For such an overhaul, permitting, fabrication and shipping materials are all taking longer than expected. Chavez is realistically looking at partially reopening the Barefoot Bar patio in mid- to late August.

“The marketing team is a little ahead of ourselves,” he said with a laugh, correcting an initial announcement of reopening in July.

The Barefoot Bar at Duke's in Malibu, before the mudslide. The restaurant's owner hopes to reopen at least the bar in August.

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Duke's Malibu

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He’s looking at a full reopening at the end of September or October. He calls this “stage two” and admits that it’s almost too far out to think about.

But he looks forward to doing events for the community as it rebuilds.

“ We’ll definitely be doing events, at least one, if not multiple big events for the community,” he said.

There are still blocks in eastern Malibu that haven’t cleared debris.

"Malibu’s ready to start the rebuilding process,” he said. He hopes to host events “ that honor those very specific communities and the people and the families that have been there for generations.”

He's spoken to the homeowners association from Big Rock, where homes were destroyed, to contribute to fundraising efforts.

Going into the restaurant’s 30th anniversary in 2026, Chavez’s focus will remain on the community.

“ I'm looking forward to that part of the rebuilding process and getting everybody down to the restaurant again, where we can hold an event for the community and everybody can then start to celebrate things again,” he said.

California scored another win against the Trump administration in their battle over how to address the homelessness crisis here and nationwide.

A federal judge this week shot down the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development’s 2025 attempt to divert money away from permanent housing and instead fund temporary shelters and programs that require sobriety. But the judge stopped short of banning the Trump administration from making such changes in the future.

“The federal court’s decision to reject the Trump-Vance Administration’s attempt to disrupt essential housing services for people experiencing homelessness, including families, seniors, veterans, and people with disabilities, is both appropriate and just,” Renee Willis, chief executive of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, wrote in a news release.

In November, the Department of Housing and Urban Development said jurisdictions applying for about $4 billion in federal Continuum of Care funding can’t spend more than 30% of it on permanent housing — a move that would result in a significant cut to the type of long-term housing that for years has been a cornerstone of the fight against homelessness.

Last year, California communities spent about 90% their share of that money on permanent housing.

A group of states, including California quickly sued. San Francisco, Santa Clara County and a group of national homelessness nonprofits filed a separate lawsuit. In December, a federal judge in Rhode Island temporarily blocked the changes. In February, Congress ordered HUD to renew grants from 2025 under the old rules.

This week, U.S. District Judge Mary McElroy partially granted the plaintiffs’ request for summary judgement in both cases. She ruled that the federal agency did not try to foresee the harm its “breakneck” transition away from the country’s longstanding “housing first” model – which prioritizes getting people into housing without first forcing them to seek treatment – would have on the country’s homeless individuals.

“Overall, the actions undertaken by HUD in attempting to hastily eliminate its housing first approach serve as the hallmark of unreasoned decision making,” McElroy wrote.

HUD did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The ruling wraps up both cases, unless the Trump administration decides to appeal.

But the fight isn’t over. The Trump administration tried again last month, moving to shift 2026 federal funding away from permanent housing and the housing first framework. Housing advocates tried to challenge that latest shift in the prior lawsuit. The judge rejected that attempt, but welcomed the plaintiffs to file a new lawsuit.

The housing advocates said they are weighing their next steps.

Topline:

Where the greatest risks are: Areas around downtown Los Angeles, the San Gabriel Valley, and northern Orange County may see hazardous air on the evening of July 4 due to particle pollution from fireworks, according to the South Coast Air Quality Management District. Riverside County and San Bernardino could see hazardous air the next day as the particles from fireworks move east and combine with the region’s elevated levels of air pollution.

Other risks: The Inland Empire and most of Los Angeles and Orange counties — that is, nearly all of SoCal — may see unhealthy air at times throughout the weekend, as they do every year.

Why it’s unhealthy: Exposure to particle pollution can cause chronic coughs in healthy people and flare-ups of symptoms for people with asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, according to the American Lung Association. If you’re in an area where people set off personal fireworks, the organization said those can be even more dangerous, since they’re closer to the ground and the air we breathe.

What to do: Stay inside if you can, and avoid physical activity outside. Unlike the recent fire at the Lineage Logistics warehouse in Boyle Heights, air quality officials say running air conditioners in your home will help, as will air purifiers, though they recommend against turning on fans that bring in outside air.

Other issues: Visibility in Orange County and the Inland Empire may be low Saturday night due to a soupy blend of high humidity and particle pollution.

How long the advisory lasts: It’s in place from 5 p.m. July 4 until 3 p.m. July 5.

The U.S. telecasts of this summer's World Cup games are drawing a record number of viewers. Fox Sports, which broadcasts the games in English, reports an average of 5 million viewers per match across 72 group stage matches. And Telemundo says nearly half of all World Cup viewers in the country are watching its Spanish language coverage.

Wednesday night, fans celebrated as the U.S. men's national soccer team knocked out Bosnia Herzegovina's team two-nil during the latest round of the Copa Mundial, as it's known in Spanish.

At Café Brasil in Culver City, California, Giselle Rosas and her mother Graciela Reyes, who were both born in Mexico, cheered for the U.S. team, along with Telemundo's famously exuberant announcer Andrés Cantor.

"That's the best part for everybody," Reyes said, imitating Cantor's long "Goooooool" calls.

Rosas noted the growing popularity of soccer in the U.S. "thanks to immigrants," and she said it's more fun to watch the World Cup in Spanish.

"A million percent. We like the excitement," said Rosas, "the feeling, the sentiment, the ambience, it's a night and day difference."

Giselle Rosas and her mother Graciela Reyes cheered for the U.S. men's national soccer team on Wednesday at Cafe Brasil in Culver City.

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That kind of passion, to date, has translated to an average of 4.6 million World Cup viewers of Spanish-language sportscasts on Telemundo and Peacock streaming services per match, according to NBCUniversal.

"This is the most watched World Cup ever in Spanish language in this country. The numbers are just mind blowing, really," says Miguel Lorenzo, a senior vice president at Telemundo Deportes.

"Basically, half of the country of the United States is watching the World Cup in Spanish on Telemundo. But we also know that only 20% of the U.S. population is Hispanic," says Lorenzo. "We're seeing audiences that are bilingual, that are Spanish dominant, that speak English enjoying World Cup coverage."

According to Nielsen ratings, 20% of Telemundo's World Cup viewers speak English as their primary language. And overall, Lorenzo says the viewership on its telecasts has increased by 122% since the 2022 World Cup Games.

He says excitement has been highest for the winning matches by Mexico and the U.S., and the network's social media platforms have surpassed a record-breaking one billion views.

"I can't tell you how many comments I've seen where people are saying, 'I don't speak a lick of Spanish, but I want to watch it on Telemundo because it just sounds more exciting. And maybe by the end of the World Cup, I'll learn Spanish,'" Lorenzo says. "Joy and excitement and drama: it's language agnostic, it's universal."

Unlike Fox, which runs commercials during hydration breaks for the players, Telemundo keeps its cameras on the field. That's something very much appreciated by fans like comedian Trevor Noah.

"We're seeing the players on the pitch discussing what's happening. You see which coach is more stressed…This is part of the game," Noah said during one of the World Cup parties he hosts on his YouTube channel. "When you cut to ads, you lose the stress, you lose the joy, the anticipation. So shout out again, Telemundo: Really, really amazing coverage."
Copyright 2026 NPR

Drivers are heading into the Fourth of July weekend with national gas prices at their highest level for the holiday in four years. In California, where prices remain well above the national average, the state’s petroleum watchdog has flagged a separate problem — one that goes beyond the state’s shrinking refinery capacity and isolated fuel market.

The last week of May was the Memorial Day holiday, when the Iran-war price spike was near its peak. Chevron stations in California charged an average of $6.34 a gallon that week — the highest of any brand tracked in the state, and 44 cents above the average unbranded station, those that sell gas without a major oil-company logo.

The finding came from California’s gasoline watchdog, a unit inside the state Energy Commission called the Division of Petroleum Market Oversight, which delivered a presentation to a state Senate committee on June 3.

The presentation showed branded stations charged more than unbranded ones in California — a bigger gap than in the rest of the country — and identified major brands’ grip on the retail market as a driver.

California can now see into its gasoline market as never before. But its laws may be fighting the wrong problem.

The state’s existing gas-price oversight laws, pushed by Gov. Gavin Newsom earlier in his term, centered on emergency price hikes, refinery outages and California-specific supply disruptions. Newsom backed away from some of the most aggressive measures last year after two California refineries announced closures. Economists say the harder target is a retail market where prices can be shaped by algorithms, supplier contracts and the buying power of the biggest brands.

As another holiday weekend approaches, and the worst of the Iran-war price spike appears to be subsiding, the debate has moved into court and the Legislature.

A federal class-action lawsuit filed last week in Sacramento accuses Kalibrate, a fuel-pricing software company, and several major gasoline retailers of using algorithms and competitor data to keep California pump prices artificially high, citing a state law that took effect this year barring algorithmic price coordination. Kalibrate has denied the allegations.

The lawsuit names several major retailers, including Marathon, which operates ARCO stations; 7-Eleven; WalMart, including Sam’s Club; Circle K and Albertson’s.

The complaint alleges that even small increases in California’s gas market can make huge differences, with every one cent increase costing drivers $134 million a year. It also cites research that using the software can increase prices by 6 cents per gallon, and up to 30 cents per gallon when many stations in an area are using the software.

The suit taps into a longstanding theory: Severin Borenstein, an energy economist at UC Berkeley, has pointed to what he calls a “mystery gasoline surcharge” — the part of California’s high prices left unexplained after taxes, environmental programs and production costs are accounted for — that shows up after gas leaves the refinery.

“The real question is, do they have evidence that the company or the gas stations are using the company to coordinate their activities?” Borenstein said of the suit. “That would be a major antitrust problem.”

On Monday, two Democratic state senators promoted new legislation that would let California’s attorney general investigate gas price gouging during wartime.

“This is not natural market forces at play,” said Senator Ben Allen, of El Segundo, a co-author of the bill. “That’s what we’re here to correct.”

New evidence points to the retail market

Even if the Iran war explains much of the statewide spike, it doesn’t explain why some California stations charge far more than nearby competitors. At a June 3 hearing, Tai Milder, head of the state’s petroleum watchdog, told senators the spike had exposed a separate problem.

“This is a global supply shock, and so it’s affecting the whole country,” Milder told senators. “As prices go up, it’s revealing what we already know, which is we have a branded gasoline pricing problem.”

His division’s data showed that the highest-price stations it examined were all major brands, not unbranded or hypermart stations, even though all gasoline sold in California meets the same fuel standards.

Chevron also charged the highest premium over nearby competitors, the watchdog showed. Milder’s division has traced that gap to how the fuel is bought and sold.

California has an unusually high share of sales through contracts in which a refiner sells fuel directly to a branded retailer at a price the refiner sets, the division’s analysis found. Those contracts can lock branded operators into paying more than unbranded operators for the same fuel.

Jeremy Martin, director of fuels policy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, put it more simply: branded stations don’t get to shop around for the best price; they’re locked into buying from whichever refiner supplies their brand.

Chevron spokesperson Ross Allen said the company’s branded stations “compete in a highly competitive marketplace where consumers have many choices” and that most are independently owned, setting their own prices based on local competition and costs. He blamed California’s energy policies, not Chevron’s pricing, for the state’s high gasoline prices.

The Western States Petroleum Association, the state’s industry lobby, said California has fewer gas stations per capita than the rest of the country and fewer unbranded stations.

“Can you name any consumer good where the branded version does not sell at a premium to a generic alternative?” WSPA spokesman Jim Stanley said. “That’s true whether you’re talking about cereal, snack foods, jeans, you name it.”

The governor has made the wartime framing personal. Newsom singled out Chevron by name, accusing the company on social media of using its brand name to overcharge drivers amid wartime oil profits.

The tools California did not use

While California’s gasoline watchdog is finding weak points in the fuel market, the rest of the state’s price tools remain largely unfinished or unused.

After price spikes, Newsom called two special legislative sessions in 2022 and 2024 and pushed through new powers meant to prevent future shocks. The laws created the state’s petroleum watchdog, which has since found an unexplained gasoline premium of about 41 cents per gallon between 2015 and 2024, costing California drivers an estimated $59 billion.

But the laws also authorized more aggressive steps that have not taken effect: a possible penalty on excessive refinery margins, a requirement that refiners keep more gasoline in storage, and a rule requiring them to line up replacement fuel before shutting down for maintenance.

A key reason: two refineries have shut down over the past year. This spring, average gas prices climbed above $6 a gallon as the Iran-Israel war roiled oil markets, and the administration has been working closely with refineries to ensure supply.

The oil and gas sector, always a major lobbyist in California, spent $10.3 million lobbying Sacramento in the first three months of the year, according to California Secretary of State filings. The Western States Petroleum Association and Chevron made up the most of that spending total, respectively spending $4.3 million and $3.7 million.

The most aggressive of the special session tools — the penalty — would have capped the gap between what refineries paid for crude oil and what they charged wholesalers for gasoline. In August 2025, a majority of Energy Commission members voted to shelve the idea for five years, saying they could not conclude that the benefits to consumers clearly outweighed the costs.

That decision has drawn new criticism as refinery margins climb — from 49 cents per gallon in January to $1.24 per gallon in April, according to Energy Commission data cited by Consumer Watchdog. “The problem is we’ve sat on our hands and didn’t develop the tools — so they weren’t there when we needed them,” Consumer Watchdog President Jamie Court said. “That was a big mistake, and it cost consumers a lot of money.”

The Newsom administration argues the unfinished tools wouldn’t have shielded consumers from this year’s spike. In written responses to CalMatters, Energy Commission spokesperson Niki Woodard said no state-level policy could protect against a global oil shock the size of the Iran war, and that California’s price increases this year have tracked national trends.

The Energy Commission said it is actively advancing the resupply rule, but has not moved forward with the reserve requirement. Last year, Newsom pushed a major priority of the oil industry through the state Legislature: a measure aimed at boosting domestic oil production in Kern County.

California mulls different gasoline strategies

The spring spike has revived a more basic question: if California will still need gasoline for years, how does it keep a shrinking fuel system stable, competitive and affordable?

One answer is more supply. The Newsom administration is tracking import infrastructure proposals for signs they could boost supply, including a proposed Phillips 66-Kinder Morgan project called the Western Gateway pipeline, which would move refined gasoline from central U.S. refineries into California and Arizona.

Anthony Martinez, a spokesman for Newsom, called Western Gateway “a promising opportunity to bring additional gasoline supply into the state and bolster resilience.”

Other proposals look at the structure of the retail market. A bill by Sen. Henry Stern, SB 1245, could give California more authority to change its unique gasoline blend, a cleaner-burning formula that is difficult to produce out of state, to make it easier to bring in fuel from elsewhere.

Martin, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the blend made sense at its creation. He said its benefits are smaller now because federal fuel standards and cleaner cars have caught up, and its costs are higher because California has less refining capacity and depends more on imports.

The Western States Petroleum Association opposes the idea, saying refiners already spent heavily to produce the cleaner fuel California required, and should not now be punished for making those investments.

The bill, SB 493, authored by Allen and Senator Josh Becker of Menlo Park, would expand California’s price-gouging law by adding war to the list of emergencies that can trigger the state’s 10% cap on raising prices for gasoline and other essential goods, unless the increase is justified by higher costs.

Becker and Stern have not taken any contributions from WSPA or Chevron, according to campaign filings compiled by CalMatters’ Digital Democracy database. Allen received a donation from Chevron in 2015, and none from WSPA, the database shows.

The oil industry sees that as a return to an old fight. Zach Leary, a lobbyist with the Western States Petroleum Association, said California already debated price-gouging penalties during the 2023 special session, and that the Energy Commission decided the refinery-margin penalty could hurt supply, maintenance and consumers.

Becker rejected that comparison, saying SB 493 targets a wartime emergency, not the regulation of refinery margins.

But even Becker, who is proposing a new way to crack down on the industry, stopped short of calling for California to revisit the most powerful tool it has already set aside. Asked whether the Energy Commission should revisit its decision to delay the refinery-margin penalty, Becker called that “a separate process,” and “a separate decision,” one that is in the hands of the Newsom Administration.