Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to earmark tens of millions of dollars for legal battles against the Trump administration has not only drawn sharp criticism from Republicans but also from the union representing attorneys in the California Department of Justice.
After the 2024 general election, Newsom issued a proclamation saying that attorneys in the state Attorney General’s Office would need additional resources to litigate what the governor said were “regressive potential actions” by the new administration. Such legal actions would likely be in the area of reproductive rights, clean vehicle policies, immigration policies that lead to family separation and politicized federal responses to disaster aid, according to the governor.
In turn, Democrats in the state legislature have reportedly agreed to allocate $50 million to mitigate the impact of Trump administration policies in California. The deal includes $25 million for Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office and an additional $25 million to fund grants for legal nonprofit groups and centers supporting the rights of immigrants.
Republican lawmakers earlier this month ridiculed the Democrats’ plans, indicating that Newsom’s priorities were misplaced.
“At a time when California should be laser-focused on responding to the devastating wildfires in L.A., Democrat lawmakers’ priority is creating a $50 million slush fund to hire government lawyers for hypothetical fights against the federal government and to defend criminal illegal immigrants from being returned to their home countries,” Assembly Republican Leader James Gallagher (R-Yuba City) said in a prepared statement. “The disconnect between what Californians need and what Democrats are focused on is astounding.”
The plan to provide Bonta with $25 million in additional funds also raised concerns from the leader of the union representing the state’s legal professionals. The union’s president, Tim O’Connor, said the plan may lead to a squandering of taxpayer funds as the state looks to outside attorneys to carry out the work to counter Trump administration policies. Such outside spending occurred when California hired the Lieff Cabraser law firm in 2023 to handle litigation against energy companies over allegations that the companies misled the public about climate change.
“... There are already adequate attorney resources within state service, and the (state Department of Justice) can hire more if need be – that’s our position at CASE (California Attorneys, Administrative Law Judges and Hearing Officers in State Employment),” O’Connor told the Southern California Record in an email. “The money would be much better spent going to our state attorneys already in place and/or hiring more if needed.”
The department now employs 1,100 rank-and-file attorneys and an additional 300 supervisory-level attorneys, he said. Bonta’s office also has the ability to “borrow” personnel from other state agencies as well, according to O’Connor.
“The state’s assertion that the Justice Department doesn’t have the resources to take on the anticipated, yet-to-be-filed Trump-related lawsuits is ludicrous,” he said. “Litigation is litigation.”
Civil litigators are trained to move from one complex case to another, each with a different subject matter, according to O’Connor. Moreover, the cost of hiring outside counsel can reach $1,000 per hour – and up to $1,600 per hour for the work of individual attorneys, he said.
“On any future attempts by the Justice Department to contract with private firms, CASE will go after each and every one of them challenging the hiring of outside counsel,” O’Connor said. “Seems the state would rather overpay outside law firms and waste taxpayer funds than pay for more attorneys with the requisite experience and fairly compensate their current attorneys for the complex and important work they do.”