Yesterday’s Senate Judiciary Hearing was a horrifying show of just how bad California politics have gotten. In response to our thorough legal analysis of the dangerous, unconstitutional pitfalls created by Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo and Senator Scott Wiener’s Assembly Bill 665: Minors: consent to mental health services, which includes citations and references in support (all of which were submitted through the Portal, emailed to the Committee, provided to each of the Judiciary Members prior to the hearing, and printed out and personally hand-delivered to them, again, at the hearing) neither of the authors were willing to or did provide any substantive response to our claims. Additionally, even though Senators Wilk and Allen asked questions about our arguments – specifically, that amending the Welfare & Institutions Code to strike one word, “not,” would authorize Medi-Cal to cover mental health services for 12 year olds – they allowed the authors’ witness speak, but not us to reply (even though Lord knows I tried! [Fast-forward to 13 minutes]). Umberg also allowed Wiener to “move the bill forward for vote” even though both Allen and Wilk wanted to hear more from the witnesses and Wiener and Carrillo to accuse us of being bigoted, transphobic, alt-right extremists who want kids to die, and of spreading “misinformation,” “as proven” by an Associated Press article we have since rebutted line by line.

As a result, AB665 passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee down party lines, with @ScottWilkCA and @SenRogerNiello standing for kids, health, families, reason and the law, and @SenatorUmberg @BenAllenCA@MariaEDurazo @SenJohnLaird and @Scott_Wiener standing for lies, party politics, and bill sponsorships. Shockingly, three members with whom we have had excellent meetings with and who said they were attending the hearing – @CASenCaballero, @SenHenryStern and @AngeliqueAshby – did not show up, but voted “No” after the hearing, outside of the watchful eye of their constituents. @DaveMinCA was another no-show, although we had zero expectations that he would.

REMEMBER:

1. We were NOT expecting to kill this bill in Committee. It is extremely difficult to kill any bill in a policy committee (e.g. Education, Health, Agriculture, Transportation, etc.), but it is especially difficult to kill a bill in a policy committee when its author is on the committee. (e.g. here, Wiener is “co-author” of AB665 and also a Senate Judiciary Committee member).
2. THIS HAPPENED WITH SB866, too. Despite serious backlash and public opposition to the bill, 866 passed out of the Senate Judiciary along party lines but was, ultimately, killed on the last day of the Legislative session.

SO WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? WHAT NOW?

We kill #AB665… and #AB957 too.*

HOW?

You RISE. It’s really that simple. RISE UP and KILL THE BILLS. The only thing is…

YOU HAVE. TO DO. THE WORK.

If you are waiting for Tara, Denise, Erin Friday, Jennifer Kennedy, @PERK-Group, Harrison, Geneva, Patty, Lance, Kasia, or me, to kill these for you, you are in for a rude awakening. The way we killed SB866 in the “height” of a “pandemic,” when jabbing children was all the “rage,” was all of us working together at the same time in everysingle way possible – from calls to emails, to one click campaigns, Advocacy Days, local meetings, etc. – to make our opposition heard:

SO HOW DO WE DO THAT, NOW?

1. Email your Senator and Assemblymember today asking for a 20 min ZOOM meeting to discuss AB665 and AB957.
   1. https://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov
   2. Monday through Thursday at Capitol / Sacramento Office
   3. Friday at District / local office
   4. Saturday and Sunday at local events
   5. You have to reach out to both Assemblymembers and Senators because the bills were amended since being passing out of their “house of origin” (Assembly) so they need to get passed out of the Senate and then back to Assembly to vote on the bills as, now, currently written.
   6. This means we have two more opportunities to kill these bills: Senate Floor and Assembly Floor.
2. Call your Senator and Assemblymember every day until the meeting is set.
3. Gather 5/10/15+ constituents – that means neighbors, family members and friends in the area – to be on the ZOOM, and go to the meeting and local events with you.
   1. Remember: strength in numbers. These people are human beings, parents, grandparents, and elected representatives who want to get elected, again.
   2. To that end, do not stop demanding that your elected reps, also known as “public servants,” actually represent and serve you!

WHATS TIMING ON THIS?

Immediately, if not sooner. We do not know when these bills will be heard and voted on on the Senate Floor, then head back to the Assembly Floor for the “concurrence vote.” If you recall, SB866 was on the Agenda every day the last 2 weeks of session until the last day when Wiener pulled it. We will be checking the Senate Floor agenda every day until then.

That being said, just to be clear…

We need SB866 “engagement” TODAY because AB665 is 2023’s SB866.

AB665 has nothing to do with mental health services, parity, equity or access and everything to do with stripping away parental rights and emancipating minors. As per usual, Scott and his minions are attempting to “empower” children to (1) turn and run away from their parents (literally and figuratively) to (2) make irreversible decisions without their family’s knowledge, consent, or involvement. AB665 – and AB957 – are about setting children up for failure so they become lifelong state medical patients and/or wards of the state. Do not be fooled by the LGBQT / trans / minority / immigrant / indigenous / access / parity rainbow-colored Trojan Horse in which, this year, they are attempting to ram through theirextremist, unconstitutional, anti-family, deadly bills.

DON’T LET THEM FOOL YOU.

But most importantly….

DON’T LET THEM GET AWAY WITH IT.

Get together. Get to work. RISE UP so we can KILL THESE BILLS, TOO.

*I am not confident we can kill AB223. The reps do not understand how bad it is or what it even means, despite Erin Friday, Jennifer Kennedy and my efforts to educate them, and Jennifer’s phenomenal testimony at the hearing last week.