SACRAMENTO, Calif. —
Former California Governor Jerry Brown is California's longest serving governor and held office for part of the first Trump Administration.
ABC10 To the Point host Alex Bell sat down with the former governor to discuss what he thinks could be at stake under a second Trump administration.
Brown addresses issues and policies such immigration, climate change and criminal justice reform.
Q: You were in office during the first Trump presidency before Governor Gavin Newsom was sworn in back in 2019. What were your interactions like with then-President Trump?
A: Well, in personal contact, the only interaction was when President Trump came to visit the city of Paradise and look at the after effects of those terrible fires. So, he came up and also, he went down to Malibu. So, I had a chance to meet him at the at the air base in Yuba City, flying by helicopter near Chico, I guess it was.
Then we went back in Air Force One, the first time I was ever in (it), and we went down to the Malibu fires. So when I was in (it), I had a few minutes to spend with him in Air Force One and he showed me around. (He) showed me in front of the plane, the back of the plane, went to see where the press was, and I called my wife and she said hello to President Trump, and that is the extent of my interaction. Maybe he called me once, I don't know.
Now, we had other things like fighting him on climate change where he tried to take away the waiver that allows California to impose a stricter and unique regulations on tailpipe emissions and a few other things like the water projects. His scientists came up with a biological opinion that was subsequently dismissed and debunked by the scientists in the Biden administration. So, I have a hunch we're going to go back to where we were before, fight the same battles. I would say that climate will be at the forefront of the conflict between California and the Trump administration.
Q: Why do you think Trump ended up winning the election and where does the Democratic Party go from here?
A: Well, remember, he won the election by 1.5 points, so it's almost a tie. Half the country, slightly more than half, wanted Trump and slightly less than half didn't want him. So, the country is profoundly divided. Why he won, now we're speculating on the opinions, the thinking of tens of millions of people. Some people voted for one reason, voted for another.
But I would say just a generalization, people saw Trump. I mean, there's a vulgarity. He tells lies, he has a history of philandering and all sorts of things, but they preferred him to the Biden/Harris administration. The inflation, the specter of so many people coming across the border, the social changes in culture, the homelessness on the streets, the retail theft and all that - that created in millions of people enough of a distaste, discomfort, dislike that they say, 'OK, we want Trump. We want somebody to disrupt. It's so bad, we're going to go for this guy.'
So I think it's telling us not just about Trump, but about America and a lot of Americans are not happy with what they're seeing or what they're experiencing, so they're betting on Trump ... I think many people, not all, but a number that don't particularly like all the things about Trump, but they didn't like, they liked even less, what Harris and the Democrats stood for.
Q: California is seen as a democratic leader. With a supermajority in the legislature there is an opportunity to pass progressive legislation. Under a second Trump administration, what do you think are going to be California's biggest challenges?
A: Well, I think the challenges of California are the challenges of the country. I think inflation is starting to come under control, but there's millions of people who can't afford to buy a home, spend a tremendous amount of their money on rent, uncertainty in their job prospects. If they don't have health insurance, they're really in trouble.
So, there are conditions that are experienced by people throughout America. In fact, in many ways, California for many is better, but for millions, it is not. So the same problems, but they won't quite have the same helping hand that they got under Biden. Biden enacted well, under Obama, we got Obamacare and it was enhanced by President Biden. On the climate front, which is more long range in its implications, Biden was extraordinary and Trump's going to go the other way.
Q: Immigration is a big concern for many people living in California. You signed SB-54, the so-called “sanctuary state law." Some people allege that California is not following federal immigration law and believe California should have their federal funding revoked. What is your response to that?
A: Well the bill that I signed had a number of exceptions, so it was people who were convicted of violent crimes or even not always with serious crimes, were not getting any benefit of any so-called sanctuary. So, it was a matter of having state officials handle state-level matters and not try to play like they do in Texas if they're federal officials.
Subsequent legislation, I think, is taking it broader and some of the cities like San Francisco have gone way, way beyond in their effort to create a wall, almost a separation of state and federal government. I think that is going to prove difficult but now Democrats are responding saying we need to control the border, we need a more regular process to bring immigrants in.
The fact is that we very much depend on immigrants, but we should have a process, and the Republicans have disrupted that. Now, under Trump, they'll probably, we may have hoped to get a good process by which people can come into America, be screened and do it in a lawful way. And the numbers are going to have to be restricted substantially. And this is not just an American thing. In Germany there's been - the German government just fell in part because of fears of the changing of the society because of the influx of immigrants. That's happened all over Europe. So, it's a worldwide phenomenon that the hardships in one place are leading people to move to a place that they believe would be much better. But the people in those places that are better don't want to risk it by sharing it with so many newcomers. I think they'll share it with some, but not with the numbers that were coming in the last few years.
Q: But for people that are saying California is not following federal immigration law, do you think that's accurate? Do you think that California should lose federal funding?
A: No, first of all I can't speak for every local government, but certainly at the state level the state follows its laws, and the federal government has its own immigration service, its own FBI, its own Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) they can do what they're supposed to do. Certainly there is a level of cooperation, but we're not handing people over to the federal government, but the federal government certainly can show up wherever they want to show up and if someone is not here legally, then they're subject to deportation. I'm hoping that Trump is going to be far more limited than his hyperbolic rhetoric might suggest.
Q: Prop 47 has been top of mind for Californians. It was passed by voters back when you were governor. Did you support Prop 47?
A: No, I did not support 47 because I think it went too far. I supported Prop 57, which enabled individuals who have been incarcerated in our prisons for a long period of time to have the opportunity to go before the parole board. It also created the system of good credits so that if people follow the rules, stayed out of gangs, and try to improve themselves by skill training or some other rehabilitation program, they could get out earlier. That's Prop 57.
Now, the next two years later, a group of activists came up with 47 and that - I think it went too far, but then the courts and the district attorneys, then they stopped following misdemeanors. Misdemeanors became something they never deal with. So theft, retail theft, shooting up with heroin, that's a felony, or methamphetamine or fentanyl, it's going on in these big cities, Sacramento, San Francisco, LA. So that specter really got people excited and unfortunately the bill that got rid of 47 went beyond. But I think 47, the legislation should have seen the writing on the wall and just put a simple repeal on the ballot, but there it is.
I do think it's a little strange that people can basically sell heroin, take heroin, shoot up against the law. It is against the law and a misdemeanor can be a year in jail. If you have a retail theft, whether it's $500 or $300 or before, if you do a couple of them, you get $900 you would go to jail for two or three years, but no one did and so they're arrested. They don't have bail anymore if they're poor because they can't afford it, so they immediately leave and go commit another crime. They're arrested and a few minutes later, they're let out and then the public defenders keep it delayed, so they come and then people say, 'Well, the jails are bad, so we don't like jail.' Well, that's a problem. So Prop 36 came along, repeals 47 and provides a hammer.
By the way, the hammer can be helpful because then people could, as that measure says, you go to rehabilitation, or you go to prison, or you go to the local jail. And that could be helpful because the rehabilitation programs have been losing - been diminishing. People say, 'Why go to rehabilitation? I can just go take my heroin, do whatever I want to do,' so the people were fed up with that. They voted 36 overwhelmingly and I understand why they did it because the existing law was just ignored massively and I still can't get an explanation for it. I've asked judges and district attorneys, why didn't you use the misdemeanor sanction? So, you needed $900, but there's other things. They have dope, they have other offenses, they could have been arrested and the whole system just basically broke down and Prop 36 - it's not a perfect thing at all. It's got real flaws, but it's a reaction to something that was overkill and went too far.
Q: The bullet train and the high-speed rail. You led the effort to start the construction on the high-speed rail which runs from Los Angeles to San Francisco. The first route is from Merced to Bakersfield. The project has since been described by some people as a financial mess, and it does rely partially on federal funding. Congressman Kevin Kiley and Elon Musk have come out and said that they want to stop this project. What is your response to their efforts in trying to stop this?
A: Well, I understand Elon Musk. He has a competing system. He has this underground boarding system that you can get in some kind of a tube and they can rush you underground, you know, like you're some kind of a rat and bring you up on the other side. So that's the Musk plan. He didn't like the bullet train. In fact, he told Governor Newsom a long time ago, don't be for that bullet train. Well, the fact is, we talked about competing with China. China has 20,000 miles of high-speed rail. I've ridden on it. It's fantastic. Paris has this, Great Britain, Germany. If we want to be great, make America great again, we ought to have a rail system because all these cars on the freeway - I drive I-80 - it's many, many times you are just backed up. We need high-speed rail connecting the major metropolitan areas.
Yes, it costs money, tens of billions. So, a lot of things cost money. They're expensive. So does our intercontinental ballistic missile system it’s going to cost $130 billion and you can't use it because if you fire one of them, the Russians will fire back and we'll all be gone. So, we're building a complete boondoggle called the ICBM nuclear weapons to destroy the world, and we're not even putting the same money.
So I say fewer want, not bullets, we want a bullet train and high-speed rail. Yeah, I know the critics. I know it takes time. I hope the thing gets finished before I kick the bucket. It's not clear that it will. We're talking 2030, so here we go. I'm 86. I'm hanging on until I can get on that high-speed rail and go from Merced to Fresno.
Q: Do you think the high-speed rail is taking too long?
A: Yes, it's taking too long, but everything takes too long. Regulation, I mean, there's a lot of regulations. And they wrote the bill, the authors, they want to micromanage, so they put it in the management couldn't align, move the alignment in response to what they found when they started building it. And then you have local cities like Kings County, they didn't want it, so they sued us. We had hundreds of lawsuits. So, the lawyers had a field day, but that's what it takes to build things and we're moving ahead.
Yeah, Trump will slow it down. He's not going to give any federal money, but we got state money, we got the cap-and-trade funds. It’s something we'll be very proud of. It'll be like the Golden Gate Bridge. I mean, when the Panama Canal was proposed, people said you can't build a canal from the Pacific over to the Gulf, but they finally got it built. Same thing with the Golden Gate Bridge. Same thing with BART, they said you can't do it.
Now, the problem with all these things (is) you need public money. Whereas with cars, you just have people borrow as they get their loan, they get their car but it's far less efficient and it shouldn't be the only option. People can have a car, but they don't have the option of a train ride.
Q: Climate has been a passion of yours still to this day. What climate policies do you think are going to be at risk under a second Trump administration?
A: Most of them. Most of them. Trump has said on day one, it's drill, baby, drill even though we're making, producing more oil in America than any other country in the whole world. So we are the oil barons of the world, but Mr. Trump wants to even be a baron plus.
He will dismantle a large part of the climate regime, the climate laws of America, but I think that is going to galvanize a reaction and build a grassroots climate movement far more powerful than it ever was, because the truth is that even under Biden, although he did more than anybody else, not enough. The climate is warming, the Earth is warming. We're going to get more floods.
We're going to get another flood like we had here in 1856 where the water went from Yuba City to below Modesto. And if that happens, you're talking tens of billions. I mean, it could be the biggest wipeout of all time. And why is that? Because as the Earth warms, you get more moisture and you get more extreme events. So, you get droughts, but you get massive rains, storms and floods. And when those come, Katie, bar the door. So we've got to deal with climate. We have to make ourselves more resilient and we have to reduce the emissions that daily are coming out of America, China and the whole world. So that is just the facts, and Trump can try to stop it for a while, will stop it for a while, but he's not going to stop emissions and therefore the problem and the suffering will occur, and people will react, but we just react a couple of years later.
Q: What advice would you give Governor Gavin Newsom heading into the new year?
A: I don’t like to give advice to a successor. Ronald Reagan preceded me as governor of California, he never gave me advice. Arnold Schwarzenegger preceded me as governor of California, he never gave me any advice. So, I'm not going to give any advice to Newsom. If he wants some privately, he can call me. I have a few thoughts.
Q: Who do you have your eye on for governor of California in 2026?
A: I have my eyes on all of them. I'm not going to tell you who. Well, first of all, it's too early. They have to come out and start talking and see what they have to say. So it's a little early yet, keep our eyes open.
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