🍊 🇺🇸 OC Conservative Brief - 4.7.23

Good morning, happy Friday (the first Friday of April!), and welcome to your weekly edition of the OC Conservative Brief, your run down of Orange County's local politics from a conservative perspective. If you like what you read, please make sure to subscribe and forward to your friends. 

This week, we have new Q1 fundraising numbers from candidates for Orange County's 47th District battleground House race (who led the pack out of the gate may surprise you!) and a headline-making visit abroad by OC's Rep. Young Kim (China wasn't pleased with where she went). But first, our gaze falls right here in Irvine, where the Left's war on gas has opened up a new front...

IRVINE BANS GAS STOVES... The Democrats insist that the "war on gas stoves" is made up by conservatives, but that's not the case in Irvine. 

The Irvine city council unanimously voted last week (with an abstention from the lone Republican, Mike Carroll) that all new buildings constructed in the city must be all-electric, joining more than 70 cities across the state of California that have passed similar ordinances. That means no gas-powered water heaters, no gas grills, no gas-powered furnaces, and - you got it - no gas stoves.

• City officials said the new ordinance will help Irvine reach its goal of being carbon-neutral by 2030 because one third of Irvine’s greenhouse gas emissions come from buildings.

• Irvine is expected to build thousands of new housing units in the next several years as part of its "Regional Housing Needs Allocation" mandated by Sacramento.

There are a few exceptions - though not a lot. Commercial kitchens that utilize "traditional" cooking methods over an open flame (like Korean BBQ where patrons grill meat at the table, Chinese kitchens that utilize woks, or Indian restaurants that use tandoori ovens) are given a pass, as are multi-family homes water heating systems. (Tough luck if you want a "traditional" grilled steak.)

• Other suggested exemptions for pool heaters, outdoor fireplaces, and even medical buildings were all jettisoned by the city council.

So what to make of this? First, don't believe anyone, including the Biden Administration, who tells you the Left isn't gunning for your gas appliances. They are, and if they can, they will, because they have fanatically convinced themselves that stopping Americans from using natural gas by any means necessary is the only way to "save the planet."

• Read further: Kimberly Strassel wrote an excellent piece in the Wall Street Journal exposing the coordination between well-funded climate change activists and the Biden Administration and the lengths they will go to destroy natural gas appliances.

To the climate-change obsessed Left, gas appliances are a pillar of America's usage of fossil fuels - which means they simply have to go. All of them. And not just in new new buildings. Bay Area regulators have already mandated that every existing building, residential or commercial, must replace their gas-powered water heaters or furnaces by 2027. 

Irvine, with its new 4-1 Democrat majority on the city council, is the climate change lobby's latest ripened target. But what's so insidious about the climate change lobby's push to ban gas appliances city-by-city is how easy it is for them to do it out of the public and media's eye, where their climate change radicalism can fully flourish and where they needn't worry about opposition that they would find at the national or even state level. 

• To give you a window into the way they think, one Sierra Club leader, who cheered the Irvine ordinance but even opposed the exemption for traditional kitchens, fretted that workers will still "have to work in extremely hot kitchens with temperatures exacerbated by global warming."

There is no shortage of takes online about how crazy the war against gas stoves is, so I will spare you. Instead, think for a moment about how alarming it is that such a massive change in energy policy could be pushed through via a city council with scant media coverage and without any serious buy-in from the community at large. Indeed, the only reason traditional Asian kitchens got an exemption was because of a desire to "celebrate diversity," not because the new ban might destroy someone's business. This is how Irvine is setting energy policy?

In conclusion: I'd bet most Irvine residents don't know this is going on, and that if they knew the facts - not just the one-sided spin from the climate lobby - they'd push back. If you live in Irvine, call your city council member. If you live somewhere else, make sure your city council knows you won't take such a ban lightly. If we don't pay attention, our towns could be next.

OC HOUSE BATTLEGROUND UPDATE... The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), the Democrats' House campaign arm, released a list this week of the 31 GOP-held House seats it believes will be in play in 2024. Readers will remember the Republicans released their own target list of 37 Democrat-held seats last month.

No surprise that Orange County features prominently on the DCCC's list. The Democrats have their sights set (again) on defeating OC Republican Reps. Michelle Steel (CA-45) and Young Kim (CA-40). The list also includes the 47th District which, while currently held by Democrats, will be open in 2024 due to Rep. Katie Porter's decision to run for Senate.

• Read further: The Washington Examiner explains how Porter's decision to give up her seat in Congress is giving House Democrats "political headaches," on account that open seats are usually much harder to defend than a race with an incumbent.

As for the 49th District in south Orange County? The DCCC added Democrat Rep. Mike Levin (CA-49) to its "Frontline" list of vulnerable incumbents around the same time the Republicans added him to their target list.

So buckle your seatbelts: Democrats and Republicans have made it clear that they're going to fight to the death over nearly every seat in Orange County (the 46th District, which contains Santa Ana and Anaheim, voted Democrat by over 20 points last year and is not contested by either party). 

Speaking of House races, the end of March marked the end of the first quarter of 2023, meaning campaigns' Q1 fundraising numbers are trickling in. Candidates for federal office aren't required to report their Q1 fundraising and spending reports until April 15, but that doesn't mean they won't release their numbers earlier if they have a good haul they want to share!

In the race for California's open 47th Congressional District, Democrat Harley Rouda led the pack with a sizable $1.25 million haul. Republican Scott Baugh came in second with $528,000, followed closely by Democrat Katie Porter protege David Min with $520,000. Democrat activist Joanna Weiss raised $420,000.

YOUNG KIM TOUCHES DOWN IN TAIWAN... A small, bipartisan congressional delegation of Washington lawmakers toured East Asia this week to reaffirm American military and economic support for regional allies.

The delegation, which included Orange County Republican Rep. Young Kim, met with foreign government, military, and business leaders on the multi-country swing, while visiting the U.S. 7th Fleet in Japan and having lunch with American soldiers at the DMZ on the border of North and South Korea.

The trip culminated in a historic visit to Taiwan to discuss the U.S.-Taiwanese "economic and defense relationship" and strategies for the independent island to counter the rise of China. (Just hours before, Speaker Kevin McCarthy met with Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen at the Reagan Library in California).

• Given that the U.S. does not officially or diplomatically recognize Taiwan as an independent country, high-profile visits from U.S. officials are a big deal. Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a visit to the island last August, becoming the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit in 25 years, and McCarthy's meeting with Tsai Ing-wen provoked an angry response from China. 

In the middle of the delegation's visit, China announced Thursday morning it would start patrolling the Taiwan Strait and ordered any passing ships to stop to Chinese authorities for inspection and even boarding - an announcement that Taiwan told it's ships to ignore.

Kim, who sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has used her position to become a vocal critique of the growing threat from the Chinese Communist Party and advocate for broader U.S. national security.

• Watch Kim on Fox News Live last month discussing Trump, the banking crisis, and Russia and China.

BTW: Wondering what Orange County's other Republican Congresswoman is up to? Rep. Michelle Steel is leading the House GOP's fight against Biden's nominee for Labor Secretary, California's Julie Su: 

• "Deputy Secretary of Labor Julie Su’s record of continual failure and her nomination to become Secretary of the Department of Labor is deeply concerning," Steel told Fox News.

• "During her time at the Labor Workforce Development Agency, Ms. Su did nothing but harm California’s workforce, oversee billions of dollars in fraudulent benefit payments, and further exacerbate the supply chain crisis."

• "I urge President Biden to immediately rescind his nomination of Ms. Su for this important position. Americans cannot afford another leader who is not up to the task of healing our economy and bolstering our workforce."

WAIT, THERE'S MORE...

🤣 Governor Newsom's war against Walgreens has hit a snag after he learned federal law will not allow him to cut the pharmacy retailer out of the state's massive Medicaid program. 

🇺🇸 Dozens of Trump supporters rallied in Laguna Hills on Tuesday to show solidarity with the former President after his indictment. 

🗳️ Costa Mesa Republican Hengameh “Henny” Abraham announced she is running for Assembly in the 73rd District against Democrat Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris.

❄️ As of this week, California's state-wide snowpack of 237% of normal levels is currently tied with the all-time record-high set in 1952 and since records first started in 1950.

⛴️ The OC Register covered the plight of the Balboa Island Ferry this week and its request for an extension on the costly mandate from state regulators to convert to electric engines. 

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Have a tip on a news item in Orange County conservatives should know about? Drop me a line at [email protected]