Trump falls to new California approval low

Only one in four Californians think President Donald Trump is doing a good job in the Oval Office, a poll released Wednesday found — the lowest approval rate in the state so far in Trump’s sixmonth presidency.

Previous polls conducted by the same organization, the Public Policy Institute of California, found Trump at 30 percent approval among adult residents in January, 31 percent in March, and 27 percent in May.

Nationally, 37 percent of respondents to the latest national Gallup tracking poll approve of Trump’s job performance.

Survey respondents said in follow-up interviews with the Bay Area News Group that they weren’t surprised Trump was so disliked in the Golden State.

“I can’t disapprove enough,” said Jennifer Loring, 50, an application designer in Alameda, citing Trump’s work towards ending the Affordable Care Act and his decision to yank the U.S. out of the CO2 emission-limiting Paris agreement. “I’m surprised there’s even one in four, I don’t know how anybody could approve of what’s happening right now.”

Virginia Purcell, 22, an intern in Oakland, said she’d been watching the deepening investigations into possible collusion between Russia and Trump’s campaign, and thought Trump was “deteriorating our country.”

“Trump can’t say this is just fake news anymore,” Purcell, a Democrat, said.

Among likely voters, however, Trump did considerably better, with 34 percent saying this month they approve of his job performance.

Part of the reason why is the stark partisan divide in opinions on Trump: Just 9 percent of California Democrats approve of him, while 68 percent of Republicans approve. Republicans are more likely to be registered voters, older and have higher incomes, which means they’re more likely to be counted as likely voters, said Mark Baldassare, the president and CEO of the Public Policy Institute.

Baldassare said he couldn’t remember any previous president who racked up such poor approval ratings so early in his first term, although George W. Bush had a 19 percent approval rating in California at the height of the 2008 economic crisis.

Trump scored just a single percentage point better than the U.S. Congress, which had a 24 percent approval rating in California.

Meanwhile, Gov. Jerry Brown saw strong approval ratings, with 53 percent of Californians saying they support the job he’s doing. 50 percent of state residents, and 45 percent of likely voters, approve of the California legislature.

The poll, which was conducted between July 9 and 18, surveyed 1,708 California adult residents in English and Spanish. The margin of error was 3.4 percent at the 95 percent confidence level. local government leaders.

They’re there to share and learn alike.

“We are considered a model county when it comes to some of the things we’ve done,” said Board President Cortese. “The resolution against a Muslim registry, the immigration issues task force, the half-million we’re investing in legal representation for undocumented immigrants who face deportation. … Some of these governments haven’t begun to take on those kinds of work plans.”

Cortese was on a Saturday panel to talk on the topic of sanctuary cities.

“Austin is reeling,” he said. “The Texas legislature passed a bill that said if a local official does not cooperate with ICE they can be immediately removed from office. It’s the opposite of things we’re doing here.”

Chavez will be talking about Santa Clara County’s lawsuit and win against the Trump administration trying to strip federal funding from sanctuary cities. She said she’s looking forward to talking with colleagues about emerging issues, such as the anticipated ICE hiring surge and a lack of interest from the top in investigating civil rights violations.

Cortese said he’s interested in what’s happening in New York City, where they’ve reduced some criminal violations to civil violations for quality of life crimes. Those steps, taken last year, soften penalties for crimes such as public drinking and urination, littering, noise violations.

Cortese said he’s interested in looking at county rules that could have “unintended consequences” because someone who commits a minor offense could end up on a Department of Justice list. law prohibits board members from engaging speakers and discussing issues that weren’t on the posted agenda.

One parent pointed out that the school board agreed to pay a legal firm — Fagen Friedman & Fulfrost of Oakland — without a contract and without knowing the charges for work on responding to a critical state audit of the district. The parent wanted to know how much the district was going to pay the firm.

“When they invoice us we’ll have a bill,” Tran said.

When the parent pointed out that it might be a large amount, Tran said that the superintendent. Hilaria Bauer, would scrutinize the charges.

“I want to set the record straight,” the parent began.

“What do you mean by setting the record straight?” Tran asked.

All in all, Tran interrupted eight times, including claiming that all the district’s lawyers were paid the same rate (a statement contradicted by others), and that the quality of services was the same among law firms.

At one point, the board’s attorney, Luis Saenz, stood up with a reminder: “We went over at the last meeting that you can briefly answer questions,” he admonished Tran. “This is the public’s time to speak.”

But the irrepressible Tran interjected three more times, even when the parent thanked Tran for changing his mind and discontinuing the Fagan contract.

“I changed for a reason,” Tran replied.

Asked about his meeting comments, Tran appeared to blame the speakers. “There have been many interruptions, campaigning and misrepresenting facts in the board room from the usual suspects,” he wrote in an email. “I am just trying to tame the chaos.”

The exchanges aren’t the main reason board meetings stretch to five and six hours. But they do make meetings seem a lot longer.

“We recently passed a county law that made road rage a crime,” he said. “Those are the kinds of things we need to go back and look at, if someone is picked up on a county ordinance and placed in a database, are we playing into ICE’s hands?”