Rob Bonta Floats Changing Violent Crime Definition

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If this week is any indication, Attorney General Rob Bonta is on a mission.
On Wednesday, he announced that his office would conduct an independent investigationinto last year’s redistricting in the city of Los Angeles following the explosive publication of a secretly recorded meeting in which three city council members and an influential labor leader could be heard making racist comments, insulting their colleagues and plotting how to draw city council district boundaries to consolidate Latino political power.

• Bonta said in a statement: “The decennial redistricting process is foundational for our democracy and for the ability of our communities to make their voices heard — and it must be above reproach. The leaked audio has cast doubt on a cornerstone of our political processes for Los Angeles.” 
• Nury Martinez, who stepped down as council president on Monday, announced her resignation Wednesday. Gov. Gavin Newsom applauded the move, but stopped short of calling on Kevin de León and Gil Cedillo, the other council members present at the meeting, to resign. The governor’s reticence marks a sharp departure from other top Democratic officials: President Joe Biden on Tuesday said all three council members should step down. 

Also Wednesday, Bonta issued an update on his office’s efforts to limit the spread of fentanyl, a super-powerful synthetic opioid largely responsible for record-high fatal overdoses in California. Since April 2021, Bonta said, his office has seized more than 4 million fentanyl pills and nearly 900 pounds of fentanyl powder and performed more than 200 arrests. 

• The update may have also served as an implicit clapback at Nathan Hochman, the Republican former federal prosecutor running against Bonta for attorney general. Hochman has repeatedly slammed his Democratic opponent for failing to act aggressively on fentanyl, including in a campaign ad that says California has seen a 2,100% uptick since 2016 in the number of residents under age 24 dying from fentanyl poisoning.

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