Gavin Newsom’s proposed $25 million anti-Trump war chest, which the California governor announced Monday, will stop the president-elect from “breaking the law,” the state’s Attorney General Rob Bonta told CNN’s Jake Tapper later that evening.
Asked while on “The Lead” Monday what the special budget legislation requesting $25 million would be used for, Bonta detailed the number of ways that President-elect Trump is anticipated to break the law, from not following the processes of the Administrative Procedures Act, to violating the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause, to misallocating funds for projects that they’re not meant for and more.
Watch a clip of the segment below:
California AG prepares for legal battles with new Trump WH
— The Lead CNN (@TheLeadCNN) December 2, 2024
Watch the full video here: https://t.co/KUmIc30xGr pic.twitter.com/Yv8371oKKq
“If history is an indicator of the future, if the statements made by Mr. Trump, his inner circle, Project 2025 are any indicator, we will need to go to court to stop him from breaking the law, from violating the Constitution, from breaking federal law, from overreaching his enumerated, limited, delineated executive authority and make sure he stays within his actual sphere of given lawful jurisdiction,” Bonta explained. “So, in short, if he breaks the law, we’re going to court to stop him.”
“What do you mean breaking the law?” Tapper pressed. “Like, give me more of an example there, because that’s quite a preemptive accusation.”
That’s when the attorney general broke down the possibilities — many of which he said were seeds planted in the former president’s first administration from 2016–2020.
“If he violates the Equal Protection Clause by going after LGBTQ+ communities in ways that are in violation of the Constitution; if he goes outside his actual federal authority and doesn’t follow the processes of the Administrative Procedures Act, where you need notice and comment and you can’t do things that are arbitrary and capricious — he violated that quite a bit in Trump Administration 1.0; if he tries to use funds for a project or for a purpose that they’re not supposed to be used for, like building the border wall — he did that in Trump 1.0,” he said. “Those are all varied examples of how he broke the law.”
“He was pretty creative in the ways that he did it,” Bonta added. “He likes to do what he wants, when he wants, how he wants, regardless of the Constitution or federal law, and if he does that, we will be there to stop him.”
Newsom first introduced the proposed $25 million in funding to prepare for legal battles against the Trump administration on Monday, the first day the governor held a special session of the state’s legislature to prepare such safeguards ahead of Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration. Anticipated court battles, Newsom laid out, include legal developments around reproductive rights, environmental protection and immigration.
“The new litigation fund will help safeguard critical funding for disaster relief, health care and other vital services that millions of Californians depend on daily,” Newsom wrote in his proposal, adding that California intends to “defend against unlawful federal actions that could jeopardize not only tangible resources and the state’s economy” but social causes including abortion rights and equality.
Watch the clip from CNN above or in full here.
