Primary Source: Legislative and Litigation Updates 6.19.25
I’m back! There has been so much going on in California and beyond I fell behind in my updates. Every time I’d sit down to write a post, everything I said was already old news. However, there are many critical issues that require careful attention right now, and an absence of balanced reporting and primary source material in the media. It can feel very overwhelming to look at X and Instagram and see inflammatory rhetoric that is patently false. Most of this is coming from Governor Gavin Newsom and his “press office” (aka, taxpayer-funded humorless trolls). So, I will do my part to provide you with evidence-based facts on issues of importance in California.
1. Girls Sports: Title IX, Newsom’s Lawsuit, and Skrmetti
Issue: Newsom is suing USDOJ to demand male participation in girls sports.
The response to my viral CNN appearance tells me society has had enough pretending boys are girls and therefore entitled to play girls sports and use girls spaces. It’s a facially absurd notion, yet we have to contend with the issue in court because radical activists have codified gender ideology into law and demanded male access to girls’ spaces. I laid out a summary of what’s been happening in an interview with Will Swaim for the National Review Radio Free California Podcast (starting around 1:13:45).
On May 29, the USDOJ sent letters of legal notice to California Attorney General Rob Bonta, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, Jurupa Unified School District, and the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) that it is opening an investigation to determine whether Title IX is being violated by AB 1266, a state law permitting males to participate on female sports teams at state schools. The investigation will determine whether California, its senior legal, educational, and athletic organizations, and the school district are engaging in a pattern or practice of discrimination on the basis of sex.
Huge side note: the new US Attorney for the Central District is former Assemblyman Bill Essayli, who introduced AB 844 before resigning from the Legislature. He is absolutely crushing this job.
Simultaneously, the Justice Department filed a statement of interest in federal court in support of the Save Girls Sports v. Thurmond lawsuit filed by female athletes to advance the appropriate interpretation of Title IX to ensure equal educational opportunities and prevent discrimination based on sex in federally funded schools and athletic programs.
On June 2, the Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice sent a letter to every CIF-member school district in California demanding that they certify they will not comply with CIF Bylaw 300D, because that bylaw violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. In response, Tony Thurmond sent a letter back to the DOJ on behalf of all California school districts stating, “[t]he Equal Protection clause does not require that athletic teams be segregated by biological sex."
On June 9, Newsom sued the USDOJ to demand male access to female sports and spaces, invoking two 9th Circuit cases that say prohibiting males who identify as females from participating in girls sports violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution. (Doe v. Horne, 115 F.4th 1083, 1109-10 (9th Cir. 2024), petition for cert. filed; Hecox v. Little, 104 F.4th 1061, 1088 (9th Cir. 2024), petition for cert. filed). These cases are pending review by the United States Supreme Court.
Newsom states in the lawsuit that prohibiting boys who identify as girls from playing in girls’ only sports violates their rights under the Equal Protection Clause.
On June 18, the United States Supreme Court published their opinion in United States v. Skrmetti. For a detailed analysis of the decision, read my friend Sarah Parshall Perry’s explanation. Long story short, Skrmetti upholds Tennessee’s ban on sex transition treatments for minors. The Court held that neither of the ban’s classifications—age of the patient, and medical use for the treatment—are based on sex. In addition, the Court held the ban was not based on “transgender status,” and the Court therefore did not address whether “transgender status” amounted to a “suspect or quasi-suspect class.”
Herein lies the problem for us in California. We need this clarified due to 9th Circuit case law.
The Court also distinguished its 2020 decision, Bostock v. Clayton County, in which it held that firing an employee for being gay or “transgender” violated Title VII’s prohibition on discrimination because of their sex. This was because, as Justice Gorsuch then wrote, “homosexuality and transgender status are inextricably bound up with sex.” But the Skrmetti Court declined to consider whether Bostock applied beyond Title VII to Equal Protection claims and determined that its reasoning would not have altered its conclusion in the case regardless. California activists love to invoke Bostock when demanding male access to female spaces.
In a concurring opinion, Justice Barrett, joined by Justice Thomas, noted that while the Court had failed to analyze whether “transgender” is a suspect class, she would find that transgender individuals do not constitute a suspect or quasi suspect class. She argued “transgender status is not marked by the same sort of ‘obvious, immutable, or distinguishing characteristics’ as race or sex,” and that the “transgender population” was not a discrete group but diverse, large, and amorphous. To classify that group as a suspect class, she wrote, would “require courts to oversee all manner of policy choices normally committed to legislative discretion.”
Justice Thomas separately concurred, arguing why Bostock should not apply beyond Title VII cases, and explaining the “problems with appealing and deferring to the authority of the expert class” when evaluating the constitutionality of statutes. Discussing the World Professional Association of Transgender Health’s (WPATH) standards for “gender medicine,” Justice Thomas noted that “WPATH itself recognizes that evidence supporting the efficacy of puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgical intervention for treating gender dysphoria in children is lacking.” He continued that the case “carries a simple lesson: In politically contentious debates over matters shrouded in scientific uncertainty, courts should not assume that self-described experts are correct.”
Justice Alito concurred separately to explain that he would have held that “neither transgender status nor gender identity should be treated as a suspect or ‘quasi-suspect’ class.”
Here is the ultimate question to which we don’t yet have a judicial answer in California: Does allowing males into girls competitions and girls’ intimate spaces violate girls’ rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution? I contend the answer is yes.
If girls’ rights to girls’ only sports and spaces are protected under the Equal Protection Clause, and males’ (who identify as girls) rights to girls’ only sports and spaces is also protected under the Equal Protection Clause (which I do not believe SCOTUS will uphold), then which group wins? The concurring opinions in the Skrmetti case lead me to believe SCOTUS will side with girls, and likely find that the “large, diverse, and amorphous” “category” of “transgender” individuals is not a protected suspect class.
Check out this 2019 resource from the Womens Sports Foundation regarding why girls’ only sports are so important.
2. Immigration Enforcement, Insurrection Against Law Enforcement, and Propaganda
Issue: Los Angeles and California repeatedly fail to enforce the law and maintain order, jeopardize law enforcement and federal assets, and double down on propaganda when the National Guard is called in.
I won’t get too detailed because this is already too long, but I am deeply concerned about the amount of propaganda spewing like raw sewage from Governor Gavin Newsom, Mayor Karen Bass, and an assortment of elected officials (and hopefuls like Rick Caruso).
First, watch both of these videos from Bill Melugin, taken on June 7, 2025 before the National Guard was called in: One and Two. These videos show inside a United States Border Patrol vehicle as it is pelted with rocks while the officers attempt to leave an anti-ICE protest in Paramount, CA. You can hear and see the windows and windshield breaking with each hit. This attack could have killed one of the Border Patrol agents or caused a serious crash. The rocks broke clean through the windshield, leaving a gaping hole. It doesn’t just look like a war zone — it is a war zone.
So how did the anti-ICE protest in Paramount begin? Please read this excellent explanation from Its Meseidy. Long story short, a state legislator (yes, one of our own Sacramento geniuses) spotted ICE vehicles while getting on the freeway in Paramount. He thought they were raiding Home Depot, but they were simply staging at their office facility across the street—a routine operation at a building they use regularly. That did not stop him from getting on Instagram Live and posting hysterical updates about how he is “literally shaking.” I’m dead serious. He actually said that.
Ultimately, the President made the correct call to bring in the National Guard to protect federal buildings and personnel, which proved to be the correct choice as Newsom’s own California Highway Patrol officers were trapped under an overpass on the 101 and pelted with Molotov Cocktails, rocks, and Lime scooters. I am informed by someone with direct knowledge of the attack that at least one officer was injured, and I wish him a full and speedy recovery and protection from future negligence by the political “leaders” in our state.
As I watch this violence unfold, I am also witnessing one of the most aggressive propaganda campaigns I’ve seen since Covid. The entire Democrat party is now pushing the narrative that the President is an evil tyrant for sending the feds in to protect federal buildings and people, and for sending ICE to worksites and homes to nab criminal illegal aliens. It is almost too stupid to believe, but people are falling for it.
As US Attorney Bill Essayli so eloquently stated, the fears and complaints around ICE enforcement actions would be almost entirely eliminated if California and Los Angeles axed their sanctuary policies. If local law enforcement cooperated with ICE, then ICE could collect and deport criminal illegal aliens directly from court and jail. No worksite or home enforcement actions needed, drama averted.
What I find most disturbing is the dramatic new strategy by leftists to boldly interfere and impede law enforcement—while staffers’ film for the big media moment—and try to get arrested. They are really hoping to build a narrative that the President is an authoritarian tyrant going around and arresting his political enemies. In reality, as any thinking person can see, the dramatic actors of the Democrat party are showing themselves to be true insurrectionists, setting a very dangerous standard for civic engagement going forward. Taunting law enforcement, rushing cabinet members, and engaging in theatrics for clicks and views is not the way.