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State’s Democrats have
little choice in mapping
Re: “Gerrymandering issue to be decided by voters” (Page A1, Aug. 22).
Rep. Sam Liccardo mentioned, “don’t bring a knife to a gun fight.” Yes, we are in a fight. We now face, compliments of Project 2025 by the Heritage Foundation, what Italy had to contend with 100 years ago, that being the rise of the authoritarian state much on the model of Mussolini’s Italy.
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The Republican Party of today has adopted similar tactics: change the law when it suits you and consolidate power in any way possible. That’s the heritage of the “Heritage Foundation”: not our 240-year-old experiment in representative democracy but a throwback to the more common authoritarian rule by despots.
What to do? The effort by Democrats to temporarily go back to the old ways of allowing parties to pick their voters is unfortunately the only way to fight the Trump administration’s power grab. We are left with no other practical alternative. Sad but true.
Mike Caggiano
San Mateo
California can’t pay
for special election
So, the state of California is currently in the red, budget-wise. However, our leader and governor, along with the other officials, see fit to have an additional ballot in November to override a current regulation concerning the balance of power within the state.
This ballot issue is going to cost the state millions of dollars that the state does not have. Where do you think that money is going to come from? I will tell you, it is going to come from an increase in state taxes. That means it is coming out of your pocket.
If you want to pay taxes in excess of 10%, so that the current leadership can continue to spend money that California doesn’t have, then continue to vote in the current manner. If you want to change this state, please seriously consider each person and each bill that is on all future ballots.
John Hoving
San Jose
SB 79 carries risk
of unintended results
Re: “We need more housing next to mass transit” (Page A6, Aug. 8).
À housing study published by UCLA in December 2024 contradicts the assertion in the op-ed that more homes near transit reduce the risk of displacement. The UCLA study found that increased rents resulting from gentrification near public transit in Southern California resulted in the displacement of lower-income residents and reduced bus ridership, sometimes by more than 20%.
The Urban Displacement Project and other agencies that study displacement indicate that building market-rate housing near transit is a complex issue that needs comprehensive planning by cities to benefit both residents and transit ridership. Several cities, including Sunnyvale and Los Angeles, oppose SB 79. A relentless patchwork of heavy-handed housing directives from Sacramento, such as SB 79, may result in negative, unintended consequences in the long term.
Jean Tsukamoto
Sunnyvale
ICE detention centers
lack basic humanity
Congress has passed $45 billion for detention centers in the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act.” However, the money isn’t being spent to provide decent living conditions within those centers. Rather, Donald Trump wants to upgrade the decrepit Alcatraz Prison in the middle of San Francisco Bay and buy other outdated and abandoned prisons.
These are human beings being housed in these centers. They are living in unsanitary conditions, are being given horrible food, and can’t shower or even brush their teeth. This is horrific inhumanity.
Rosemary Everett
Campbell
D.C.’s worst misdeeds
come from White House
Donald Trump seems to think that the American people will believe that the President who unleashed more than 1,500 violent criminals on our streets wants to make our cities safer. If that were true, of the 30 most crime-ridden big cities In the United States, neither Los Angeles nor Washington, D.C., makes the top 10. There is a crime wave in D.C., and it’s concentrated in the White House.
Trump hates “woke,” but if we don’t wake up and fight back, we will never regain our democracy. When we rally, call and write, it puts wind in the sails of our representatives — then vote.
Sharon Jackson
San Jose
Vote with an eye
toward impeachment
In 2026, we need to retake our democracy from a wannabe dictator. We need our Congress to make a loyalty pledge to our Constitution and not to a cult leader.
All liberty-loving Americans need to vote for a Congress that will strengthen our democracy. Vote for only a member of Congress who agrees to impeach the most corrupt president in the history of our republic.
Full disclosure, I am an unaffiliated voter (disenfranchised Republican) who is concerned with what Donald Trump is doing.
We need a simple majority in the House and a two-thirds majority in the Senate to finally impeach and remove our unconstitutional president.
Let’s make the third time a charm.
John Swan
Los Altos Hills