California Governor Gavin Newsom just took out his veto pen.
Newsom stunned union members by shooting down legislation that would have paid them unemployment during strikes.
Newsom gets a lot of money from unions, so this veto was a bit of a surprise.
No Money
California’s unemployment fund was crushed during COVID, now about $18 billion in debt.
Now, if you recall, during the GOP debate, Sean Hannity had Newsom on and he was bragging about a budget surplus.
Yet, his reasoning for shooting down a bill that came via a Democrat-dominated legislature was no money.
He stated, “California employers fund UI benefits through contributions to the state’s UI Trust Fund on behalf of each employee.
“The UI financing structure has not been updated since 1984, which has made the UI Trust Fund vulnerable to insolvency.
“Any expansion of eligibility for UI benefits could increase California’s outstanding federal UI debt projected to be nearly $20 billion by the end of the year and could jeopardize California’s Benefit Cost Ratio add-on waiver application, significantly increasing taxes on employers.
“Furthermore, the state is responsible for the interest payments on the federal UI loan and to date has paid $362.7 million in interest with another $302 million due this month.”
Unions were backing this legislation, which was authored by Democratic state Sen. Anthony Portantino.
Both Portantino and the unions stated that most strikes last less than two weeks, so the impact on the fund would have been minimal.
In fact, over the last decade, there have been only two of the 56 strikes that lasted longer than two weeks.
This is not a good look for a man, or the party, for that matter, that fills his campaign coffers with union money.
It will be very interesting to see how they react to this veto.
Source: New York Post
