Prop 47 Reform 'Dirty Tricks' Accusations

Good Morning, it’s Tuesday, June 11.

Here are a few of the stories we are working on:

✔ A clean energy company started clearcutting 3500 Joshua Trees for a desert solar project, so we did a little digging of our own.

✔ Sacramento ‘Dirty Tricks’? Governor Newsom and Democratic leaders don’t want you to vote on Prop 47 reform. See what happens when they are asked why.

✔ Bay Area Mayhem: 200 cars spinning on the street, fires, fireworks, vandalism, yet no arrests?

✔ Apple enters the AI chat, and they come out with a strong Emoji game.

Have a great day!

Netter News Team

JOSHUA TREES CLEAR-CUTTING

What can unite Democrats, Republicans, and environmentalists in California?  Turns out, don’t mess with our beloved Joshua Trees.

There’s growing outrage over a Los Angeles-based company’s plans to clear thousands of iconic Joshua trees in the Mojave Desert. Why would they do that you ask?  To make way for a solar project.

What We Know:

• Reports indicate that 3,500 Joshua trees will be cleared.

• The project aims to generate electricity for nearly 180,000 homes in coastal neighborhoods, not nearby communities of Boron and Desert Lake in Kern County.

• Residents' concerns were reportedly ignored by Kern County officials.

• The land where the solar facility will be located is also home to endangered desert tortoises.

Catch Up Quick:

✔ Los Angeles-based Avantus — founded in 2009 and formerly called 8minute Solar Energy — was an early utility-scale solar developer.

✔ It was founded by a man named Tom Buttgenbach, a Caltech scientist turned business mogul.

✔ Private equity firms KKR and EIG invested $1 billion into Avantus in 2023.

✔ Buttgenbach and 8minute Solar Energy are named in a $1.2 Billion fraud lawsuit with the state of California.

Billion Dollar Lawsuit Details

What is this billion-dollar fraud lawsuit about? UC lawyers accuse Mr. Buttengenbach of an “engineered financial crisis” after receiving a $150 million investment. It appears to be ongoing.

POLITICS, ECONOMY, EDUCATION & SCIENCE

Should Elon Musk Pocket $56 Billion for His Performance as Tesla CEO?

On Thursday, Tesla shareholders face a monumental decision at the company's annual meeting: should Elon Musk receive a staggering $56 billion payout for his tenure as CEO?

How We Got Here

📌Musk's compensation package, the largest ever for a corporate executive in America, was initially approved in 2018.

📌However, a Delaware judge nullified the award earlier this year, deeming it unfair to shareholders.

📌As the vote approaches, Musk and his supporters have ramped up their campaign on social media to rally support.

What’s Next

• Some major Tesla investors, including Norway’s $1.7 trillion wealth fund, have declared they will vote against the massive payout, during Thursday’s meeting.

• The outcome of this pivotal vote remains uncertain.

APPLE ENTERS THE AI CHAT

Apple is getting into the AI game, launching what it is calling  “Apple Intelligence.” It’s getting help from a Bay Area friend, OpenAI, to integrate ChatGPT into the tech giant’s products.

What We Know:

More Personalized Siri with AI: Will act as an iPhone user guide and pull info from ChatGPT, perform tasks across apps such as texting photos from a specific event to a contact, playing a podcast that a friend recommends over a text.

Other AI features:

• Rewrite texts, emails, or notes to adjust the tone

• Summarize emails and rank them by importance

• Gesture control for Airpods (you will be able to decline a call with a nod of your head- this could get annoying, IMHO)

If you aren’t interested yet, this will get you….

AI-generated emojis. Apple Intelligence will allow us to create personalized emojis with text prompts in iMessage, as well as to generate non-photorealistic images to send in conversations.

Finally…..

Apple Intelligence won’t appear on your device unless you have an iPhone 15 Pro or 15 Pro Max, An iPad or Mac with the newest M1 chips

BAY AREA MAYHEM

In Oakland and San Francisco, multiple reports of so-called “side shows” - residents couldn’t believe what they were seeing overnight. Fireworks, cars set on fire, and vandalism. Neighbors reported watching as many as 200 cars spinning through the streets.  

Despite what went on for what seemed like hours, San Francisco police did not make any arrests.

STATE GOP LEADERS: DEMS PLAYING ‘DIRTY TRICKS’

A major political fight over public safety in California is heating up in Sacramento.

Democratic leaders are scrambling to keep a measure to reform Proposition 47 off the November ballot. Prop 47, passed in 2014, reduced penalties for drug and theft crimes and is now blamed for the state's surge in theft.

Governor Gavin Newsom and some Democratic lawmakers oppose this reform effort. Instead, they doubled down on their efforts yesterday, backing new public safety bills aimed at tackling organized retail theft and car break-ins. They want these bills, not the Prop 47 reform, to be put to voters.

Take 2 minutes to watch KCRA’s Report, as reporter Ashley Zavala presses Democrats on why they don’t want this on the November ballot.

California Assembly Republican Leader James Gallagher blasted Democrats for the plan and said voters should get their say come November.

HOT TAKES

🚨 MORE UCLA PROTESTS: UCLA Police were forced to declare an unlawful assembly Monday night after hundreds of anti-Israel protesters refused to disperse and tried to set up another encampment. Dozens more were arrested.

🚨 HUNTER BIDEN TRIAL: Jury deliberations resume today in Hunter Biden’s federal gun trial in Deleware. If found guilty, he would be the first son of a sitting president convicted in a federal court.

🚨 SOCIALITE SENTENCED: The wife of a prominent burn doctor in Southern California is sentenced to more than 15 years to life for the hit-and-run deaths of two young brothers in a crosswalk in Southern California. Rebecca Grossman was speeding when she struck and killed Mark and Jacob Iskander in Westlake Village in September 2020.

🚨 LAKERS SNUBBED: Los Angeles Lakers thought they had their new coach, but the front-runner turned down the new gig. UCONN head coach Dan Hurley said no to the 70 million dollar offer, leaving fans wondering if he didn’t want to deal with Lebron and Co.

🚨HOMELESS DUMPING: Los Angeles City Council President accuses nearby cities and their police departments of dumping homeless people on the streets of Los Angeles. And he releases video to backup his accusations.

GOLDEN STATE GLOW

🌴A big win for SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, as the Super Heavy booster made a gentle landing in the Gulf of Mexico. We have to say the camera work is pro!

🌴  The San Francisco Gate checks out what some say is the largest gas station in the Golden State. And Cali-Texan transplants quickly point out it’s not as big as the smallest Buc-ees…

🌴This one is California-adjacent, but just too weird not to share. A rare, mysterious, and massive fish has washed up on an Oregon beach.

 🗓THIS DAY IN CALI-HISTORY

June 11

On this day in 2002, "American Idol" premiered on FOX-TV, featuring its original judges Simon Cowell, Paula Abdul, and Randy Jackson. The show became an instant hit, revolutionizing the landscape of reality TV and music competitions.

We can’t forget this day in 2012 when the Los Angeles Kings made history by defeating the New Jersey Devils 6-1 to win their first Stanley Cup title in the franchise's 45-year history. The Kings clinched the championship in Game 6 of the series, delighting their fans who had long awaited this victory.

On this day in 2019, officials finally revealed the true damage from a June 2008 fire at Universal Studios that destroyed the original masters of up to 500,000 songs from singing legends such as Chuck Berry, Louis Armstrong, and Ella Fitzgerald.