The Brief

It's been nearly three weeks since we found out Californians decisively passed Proposition 50 to redraw the state’s congressional district maps. The Associated Press called the vote within minutes of polls closing, but the vote won’t become official until after results are certified in early December — and yes, votes are still being counted with about 12,000 to go statewide.

In the meantime, we’re keeping tabs on potential legal battles, the status of the national redistricting arms race, and how Prop. 50 is already shaping choices for the 2026 midterm elections.

Here's what's been going on so far.

Texas’ map is getting reviewed by the Supreme Court

• What happened: A federal court ruled that Texas cannot use its recently redrawn congressional maps in the 2026 midterm elections, finding it was racially gerrymandered. The Supreme Court has now taken up the case, and has temporarily allowed the map to stand while it figures out which map Texas should default to as the case goes under review.
• Wasn’t this the map that led to Prop. 50 to begin with? Yep. A quick refresher: Over the summer, President Donald Trump encouraged Texas officials to start an unusual mid-decade redistricting process to help Republicans gain five seats in the House of Representatives in the 2026 midterms. After Texas’ state legislature produced those new maps, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that California would respond with a similar move to redistrict in favor of Democrats and neutralize Texas' map — which eventually became Prop. 50. 
• Does the case affect Prop. 50? No. But there's a separate challenge underway in California. More on that below. 
• What does this mean for the House elections in 2026? If Texas winds up having to use its older map drawn in 2021 for next year's midterms — either as a default while the Supreme Court reviews the case or a result of the newer map being struck down — Democrats will be ahead in the nationwide redistricting battle. But if the new map stands, Democrats and Republicans remain neck-and-neck in the redistricting battle.

California Republicans and the DOJ filed a lawsuit

• What happened: Shortly after Election Day, California Republicans announced they were challenging Prop. 50 in federal court, arguing the new district maps favor Latinos at the expense of other groups in violation of the Constitution. The federal Department of Justice filed last week to join the lawsuit.
• Does this change anything? Not at the moment. The lawsuit requests a preliminary injunction — essentially a pause on Prop. 50 going into effect — while the case gets reviewed, but it’s not clear if the court will grant one. Any injunction would have to happen very soon, since candidates are already gearing up for the 2026 elections.

Here’s how O.C. cities voted on Prop. 50

Voters wait to cast their ballots in the California Statewide Special Election at the Huntington Beach Central Library on Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025.

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• What happened: Prop. 50 won in Orange County, but data from the county's registrar’s office gives us a clearer picture of how that vote broke down across cities. 
• Who voted no? “No” votes led by more than 60% in Villa Park, a mostly residential enclave in the heart of Orange County, along with Newport Beach and Yorba Linda, traditional Trump strongholds.
• Supporting Prop. 50: The cities of Santa Ana, Irvine, Anaheim and Tustin were among those with the highest support for the measure. You can see the full breakdown of vote margins across O.C. here.

Prop. 50 moved an entire district out of the Inland Empire 

• What happened: The previously safe-Republican 41st Congressional District, which covered the Inland Empire and Coachella Valley in Riverside County, is now primarily in blue L.A. County, with some small slices of Orange County.
• What cities are in the new 41st District? It includes Downey, Lakewood, Sante Fe Springs and Brea. You can see a map of the district here. The 41st District currently stretches through Riverside County from Corona to Palm Desert. It’s represented by Republican Rep. Ken Calvert.
• Geographic changes this big are unusual, right? Yes — even though Prop. 50 shifted most California congressional districts, this change stuck out. As Jodi Balma, a political science professor at Fullerton College, told LAist: "The others, you could kind of understand how the borders changed and some segment of the district remained the same. But this one just wholesale was picked up from the Inland Empire and moved to Los Angeles, and it's a completely new district."
• Who could represent the new 41st District? So far, there's only one candidate in the race. That’s Democratic Rep. Linda Sánchez, who currently represents the 38th District. She could have chosen to run in either the newly drawn 38th District (covering Bell, Diamond Bar, Rowland Heights and part of Yorba Linda) or the new 41st District, since both include communities she currently represents. Here’s what she said when she announced the decision:
  

  “After Proposition 50 passed and split my current district, deciding where to run was an emotional but ultimately an easy choice — I chose home. Boundaries may change, but my commitment to fighting for the people I love will never waver.”

U.S. Rep. Linda Sanchez speaks at the U.S. Capitol on May 10, 2023 in Washington, DC.

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The other SoCal congressional candidates running in 2026

As expected, the Prop. 50 map is causing a big game of musical chairs among sitting congressional representatives now deciding which new districts to run in. New candidates are also jumping in to see if voters in freshly redrawn districts will elect them to office. Here’s what Southern California’s choices are looking like for the 2026 elections:

• Two sitting Republicans face off to represent O.C. and Riverside: The 40th Congressional District is one of the only districts that’s significantly more Republican under Prop. 50, so it’s prime territory for GOP candidates. 
• Previously in the 40th District: It covered eastern Orange County, San Bernardino and Riverside counties, including North Tustin, Chino Hills, Yorba Linda, Laguna Hills and Mission Viejo. It’s currently represented by Republican Rep. Young Kim. 
• The 40th District after Prop. 50: It hangs on to parts of Orange County, including Mission Viejo and Villa Park, but now includes large swathes of Riverside County, including Lake Elsinore, Murrieta and Menifee. 
• Who’s running in 2026: The 40th’s current representative, Republican Rep. Young Kim, will run for reelection. Republican Rep. Ken Calvert, who currently represents the Riverside County areas being added to the 40th District, says he will run against Kim in 2026, so voters will see a rare race between two incumbents from the same party.

An open seat in southeast L.A. County

L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solis speaks at a press conference on Feb. 18, 2025 in Los Angeles.

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The mostly-blue 38th Congressional District seat is staying mostly blue, although it’s grabbed a larger piece of Orange County — and the seat is up for grabs.

• Previously in the 38th District: This L.A. County district included Montebello, Santa Fe Springs, Norwalk, Whittier and Diamond Bar, and is currently represented by Democratic Rep. Linda Sánchez.
• The 38th District after Prop. 50: It holds on to Montebello, Hacienda Heights, Rowland Heights and part of Diamond Bar, and adds on Bell and part of Yorba Linda. It also loses Norwalk, Whittier, Santa Fe Springs and La Habra to the 41st District. 
• Who’s running in 2026: With incumbent Sánchez running in the 41st District, the 38th is open. L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solís, a Democrat, is already in the race. Solís previously served in the House from 2001 to 2009 before becoming Secretary of Labor under President Barack Obama and then being elected to the L.A. County Board of Supervisors in 2014.

Huntington Beach moves to a Democratic stronghold

The city has an all-Republican City Council that’s supported voter ID laws and restrictions on children’s books in public libraries. Under Prop. 50, Huntington Beach will join the 42nd Congressional District, which includes a heavily Democratic swath of L.A. County.

• Previously in the 42nd District: It was in L.A. County alone, covering Huntington Park, Downey, Bell, Lakewood and Long Beach. It’s currently represented by Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia.
• The 42nd District after Prop. 50: It covers the coast between L.A. and Orange counties, starting at Long Beach and going south to Huntington Beach, Costa Mesa and Newport Beach. The new district includes significantly more Republican voters than before, but it still has a Democratic majority. 
• Who's running in 2026: Incumbent Garcia is running for reelection. If he wins, that would put the progressive Long Beach Democrat — who has directly challenged the Trump administration on immigration enforcement and spending cuts from the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) — in place to represent some of the most conservative areas of Orange County.

This story was adapted from an issue of LAist's Make It Make Sense newsletter. You can sign up here.

Marguerita Elementary School teacher Claudia Ralston spends most of her day on the floor, guiding her transitional kindergarten students through play. She said if it weren’t for TK, the Alhambra educator would be considering retirement.

“Yes, I am exhausted,” Ralston said. “But just being here for the children and doing all the different activities … their curiosity, them wanting to learn just gives you that extra energy.”

This school year is the first where every 4-year-old in the state can enroll in the universal preschool program, also called TK, at their local public school. Schools need to hire an estimated 12,000 teachers to staff the program. Some may come from child care settings and preschool programs, but others are veteran educators who’ve gone back to school to get the credential required to teach TK.

And once they get into the TK classroom, many educators told us, they’ve found new joy in the work.

Lauren Bush started teaching transitional kindergarten three years ago after more than two decades coaching other educators and teaching every grade from kindergarten through sixth.

Her classroom at Lucille J. Smith Elementary in Lawndale is broken into different “centers,” where students can play with colorful magnetic tiles, practice painting their name or construct a ramp to roll a ball from one end of the room to the other.

“It was just so joyful to be with the kids again,” Bush said. “That's when I just, like, got back to myself as an educator, and now I'm gonna die here. That's my plan. I love it here.”

Education research shows that teachers who like their jobs are more likely to stay, and that stability can be good for long-term learning outcomes.

So we wanted to understand what makes TK so joyful for educators and how that can shape how and what students learn.

Lauren Bush and her students practice saying the sounds associated with the letter 'A' at Lucille J. Smith Elementary in Lawndale.

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Welcoming students with joy

Broadly, the goal of transitional kindergarten is to prepare students for kindergarten and beyond.

“I wanna make sure that their first experience in a public school setting is one that is joyful, where they feel loved, where they feel welcomed, where they get to really transition nicely into like the rigor of the school,” Bush said.

California’s learning foundations for preschool and transitional kindergarten include academic concepts, like the alphabet and writing, but also learning about emotions and developing kids’ muscles.

“The progress in academics in the lower grades is so satisfying because it's such a huge, huge jump,” Bush said. “You don't necessarily see that in the upper grades. It's so gradual… They come into me not knowing how to hold a pencil, and they leave writing their name and drawing.”

That’s why Bush has her students tear paper, to hone the fine motor skills that will be useful to one day using a pencil.

“Yes, they're playing all day, but it's very intentional play,” Bush said.

Teachers also told us without the pressure of standardized testing, there was flexibility to tailor their instruction to students’ interests.

“I can take something that they're curious about and go from there and do little mini lessons with that,” said Alhambra TK teacher Claudia Ralston.

For example, when she noticed a group of students was ready to practice writing, she set up the materials for them to make signs. The subject of the signs, pumpkin pies and pumpkin drinks, was a topic they’d previously expressed interest in.

And while every school is different, she said in her experience, there are also fewer worksheets used in TK than other grades.

“Before, we used to have to run off a lot of copies,” Ralston said. “We're not doing that. It's all hands on.”

Samantha Elliott, a first-year TK teacher at Price Elementary School in Downey, said she starts the year focused on friendship and manners.  "If [the students] don't feel safe or welcome, then there's really no learning going on there," Elliott said.

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Pacific Oaks College professor Jorge Ramirez said this approach is a key part of effective early childhood education.

“ We're not dictating what they should learn, how they should learn in or in the manner that they should learn it,” Ramirez said. “It's more of us really understanding what the child wants and what they need.”

At Price Elementary in Downey, Samantha Elliot’s TK classroom features “wiggle breaks” between lessons, and students learn a physical action with each letter of the alphabet.

“It's incorporating instruction and kind of the movement to help bridge the gap a little bit and get them moving, but also still learning,” Elliot said.

And classes are also smaller. Kindergarten classes can have up to 33 students, but California requires that a school’s average TK class have no more than 24 students, and there must be one adult for every 10, which means teachers also have help from aides.

In Bush’s class, teacher assistant Maria Estrada often sets up activities and works 1-on-1 with students, including those learning English.

“ My goal is to help those students that need that extra support, so they can catch up at the end of the day,” Estrada said.

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All four-year-olds in the state of California now have access to a free preschool program in their local school district. So what does transitional kindergarten offer kids and what are the challenges in its implementation? In this episode of Imperfect Paradise, we break it down with the LAist education team.

California's new public preschool program for 4-year-olds: Exploring transitional kindergarten

All four-year-olds in the state of California now have access to a free preschool program in their local school district. So what does transitional kindergarten offer kids and what are the challenges in its implementation? In this episode of Imperfect Paradise, we break it down with the LAist education team.

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Does the joy of TK last?

Susan Moore Johnson has studied teaching for decades and leads the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Project on the Next Generation of Teachers.

One frequently cited study she led found that teachers’ satisfaction with their working conditions predicted how long they’d stay in the classroom and their students’ performance on standardized tests.

Three main factors teachers mentioned were the opportunity to collaborate with skilled colleagues, a safe and orderly school and a supportive principal who understands teaching.

“ The idea of working with kids who really need good teachers is very attractive to people,” Johnson said. “But they can't do it in a place that's disjointed and chaotic and doesn't have curriculum materials.”

Marissa Mateo started teaching TK in the 2010s in the San Fernando Valley. Early on, her principal supported her participation in an L.A. County program where a substitute covered her class about once a month so that she could attend in-person training, meetings and observe educators in other districts.

Lucille J. Smith Elementary School Principal Cristal Moore said it's not uncommon for her to end a stressful day in one of the school's TK classrooms. "It's a very joyful place to be," she said. "It almost grounds you. Restores you in a very positive way."

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Students learn how to balance and run during their second recess at Marguerita Elementary School in Alhambra.

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 ”I still talk to several of the teachers that were in my group,” Mateo said.

She’s continued to refine her craft. This year, for example, she’s incorporating more “loose parts” into her classroom. The idea is to let students create with random odds-and-ends like corks, gems and wooden shapes rather than instructing them to build a specific object.

While Mateo’s instruction at Noble Avenue Elementary may evolve, she says her students’ enthusiasm is a constant.

“For the most part, nobody's coming in with a negative experience in school because they're just starting,” Mateo said.  “They may be having a negative feeling like crying because they miss their parents. But other than that, they haven't developed any kind of bad feelings about school.”

That’s why every year, she has the same message on her classroom bulletin board: “Welcome to TK, the happiest place to learn.”

An East Hollywood nursing home that nearly lost its license this year because of repeated state citations for deaths of residents at the facility was cited again last month after another person died.

The California Department of Public Health cited Brier Oak on Sunset after a 92-year-old resident bled to death on Sept. 27. Staff members had continued injecting her with blood thinners over a 40-hour period in violation of clinical guidelines.

It’s an AA citation, the most severe the department issues when violations of care standards are determined to be a substantial factor in someone’s death. The facility faces a $120,000 fine.

These kinds of citations are rare. The department has recently issued, on average, fewer than 20 AA citations yearly across more than 1,200 skilled nursing facilities in California.

Brier Oak has received three AA citations for patient deaths since late 2022.

State regulations require authorities to suspend or revoke the licenses of any facilities that get two AA citations within a period of 24 months.

The state Public Health Department began that process with Brier Oak in May based on resident deaths in 2022 and 2024. But officials dropped that effort later because they say they determined the two patient deaths had occurred 26 months apart — just outside of the two-year window.

A spokesperson for the company that owns Brier Oak told LAist it has appealed the first two citations and is considering whether to appeal the third.

Advocates for nursing home residents say the recent death could have been avoided if the state had taken action.

“There were red flags, and a lot of these red flags existed prior to the death of this poor resident,” said Tony Chicotel, senior staff attorney with  California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform.

The state said Brier Oak has until Dec. 19 to notify the department if it intends to appeal.

What led to the patient deaths?

In the recent death at Brier Oak cited by the state, multiple communication and technical failures by nursing staff led to the patient bleeding out over a period of 40 hours, according to the citation.

The 92-year-old patient was immobile and had been prescribed a blood thinner called heparin to help prevent blood clots from forming. But once a patient is bleeding, those injections make bleeding worse, and potentially fatal.

When nursing staff found bright red blood in the resident’s diaper the day before she died, Brier Oak failed to follow established processes for documenting the bleeding or communicating it to a nurse practitioner or medical doctor, according to the citation.

Nurses told state authorities they delayed informing physicians because they “get mad” when contacted in the middle of the night.

The facility’s staff also failed to fully assess the patient to determine the possible causes of the bleeding and or to properly monitor the issue during crucial periods, according to the citation.

She suffered four internal bleeding episodes over 40 hours and continued to receive blood thinner injections.

The citation says a nurse practitioner at Brier Oak told state licensing authorities later that if she’d been informed about the patient’s ongoing bleeding, she would have stopped the blood thinner and sent her to a hospital.

In 2022, Brier Oak received a AA citation after a 62-year-old woman died from respiratory failure in part because nurses hadn’t been trained to operate her breathing machine.

In 2024, the nursing home got another AA citation. This time, a 63-year-old woman with paraplegia and severe obesity fell from her bed and died while a nursing assistant was changing her. The assistant was alone, even though the woman’s care plan required two staff members.

Who owns Brier Oak?

Brier Oak on Sunset is primarily owned by Genesis Healthcare, a publicly-traded nursing home operator that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July.

Once the largest nursing home operator in the U.S., Genesis was facing billions in debt when it declared bankruptcy, according to court filings. That includes millions in potential damages from lawsuits related to patient care failures.

In a brief statement to LAist, a company spokesperson said it's still considering whether or not to appeal the recent citation at Brier Oak.

The citation should trigger a suspension or revocation of the facility's license, according to state regulations. The latter means it would have to close its doors. The two most recent deaths and citations at the facility occurred within the two-year window.

The California Department of Public Health confirmed it cited Brier Oak on Nov. 26.

The department said the facility submitted a required written response before a Dec. 6 deadline, showing how it will fix the problems and prevent them from happening again..

The department determined Brier Oak was back in compliance during an onsite visit last week, a representative told LAist.

Brier Oak on Sunset currently houses about 150 patients, according to state records.

A bankruptcy judge has stalled the proposed sale of Genesis Healthcare to an affiliate of one of its investors.

Experts say it’s unclear whether the state would revoke the license of an owner who is actively trying to sell and turn over operations to someone else.

It’s been a rough start to ski and snowboard season for California mountain towns. Snowfall is well below average, but Christmas could come with some of the white stuff. Here's where things stand:

Hmmm. Didn’t we just have a record storm?

Yes. That big atmospheric river that hit Southern California last month made it one of the wettest Novembers on records. But since then, it’s been unusually warm and dry, which is not good for mountain towns that depend on snow, and the outdoor enthusiasts that flock to them.

How bad is it?

California’s snowpack is about 20% of normal for this time of the year, according to the state’s snow-tracking website. Southern California isn’t quite as bad off — we’ve gotten about half our normal snowfall so far.

As for the resorts, only about 20% of the terrain at Bear Mountain in Big Bear is open. About 35% of Mammoth Mountain is open.

Can’t they just make snow?

They are, but the unusually warm temperatures have curbed resorts’ ability to make enough snow to open more terrain. “If you're blowing water into 40-degrees, it's going to stay water,” said Justin Kanton, a spokesperson for Big Bear Mountain Resort. “ So as much as people probably would want us to just crank the snow guns all day, every day up here and just get things moving, that's not really possible.”

But there’s a silver lining!

The dry weather has allowed Caltrans to make good progress toward opening Highway 38, said Evan Engle, who chairs the board of the Big Bear Chamber of Commerce. The road typically handles up to 40% of traffic up to the mountain town, Engle said. But it’s been closed since September when it got washed out by Tropical Storm Mario.

Getting it open as soon as possible is key to keeping visitor traffic manageable, and getting supplies to Big Bear.

What’s the snow outlook?

SoCal mountains are likely to see some precipitation around Christmas, said Kyle Wheeler, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. But with temperatures not expected to drop much, it’s uncertain how much of it will be white, Wheeler said.

If you go to Big Bear: 

• If you plan to hit the slopes, get on it early, when the snow is at its best given the warm conditions. 
• No snow? There’s more to do than ski and snowboard. Check this list of winter fun events.  
• Worried about traffic? Consider going up earlier in the week. If you can’t do that, consider taking Highway 18 through Lucerne Valley. It’s a longer route if you’re coming from L.A., but less traveled, and less likely to make you car sick (fewer tight curves). 

The Los Angeles Police Department used more than 2,400 crowd control munitions in response to protests from June 6 to 14, according to a new report.

Officers used a total of 2,431 less-lethal projectile rounds and 35 canisters of tear gas over the nine days, according to LAPD reports. The department recorded 12 injuries officers caused with those weapons.

The LAPD released the missing report last week after LAist identified the use of crowd control weapons on four different days in June that had not been reported according to state law. Assembly Bill 48, which went into effect in 2022, limits when and how crowd control weapons can be used, and requires law enforcement agencies to publicly release reports on their use within 60 days.

A 30-day extension for these reports can be granted in some cases, but the LAPD released this report about three months late even if an extension was justified.

Officials acknowledged they were out of compliance on Dec. 10 before releasing the report, saying the delay “stems from the extraordinary volume and complexity of incidents” over that time.

This report is different from others

It is unusual for a crowd control report to include more than one day, and the report for June 9 through 14 covered six days and “45 sepearte [sic] non categorical use of force incidents.”

It does not describe any of those use of force incidents specifically, and the LAPD has not yet responded to LAist’s request for more detailed descriptions of those incidents.

The report also considered the entire six days to have been one continuous protest, though it included several anti-ICE protests over the week and the national “No Kings” protest on June 14.

Two reports released earlier this year for June 6 and 8 covered single days and provided more detailed descriptions of incidents where the LAPD used less-lethal munitions against protesters.