It’s a ‘Day Without Immigrants’; L.A. Should Look to Maui for Post-Wildfire Lessons–Coachella Valley Independent’s Indy Digest: Feb. 3, 2025

Indy Digest: Feb. 3, 2025

The Indy Digest was created almost five years ago, as the pandemic shut-downs began. The goal of the newsletter has always been:

• To bring you all of the Independent’s great local content.

• To share state/national/international news that may affect you, or may interest you.

• To put news in the proper context.

• To do all of this with a personal, community focused touch.

Since Jan. 20, I’ve been struggling with properly balancing those last three objectives, because there’s been a veritable firehose of impactful news, primarily regarding the actions taken by the Trump/Musk/Project 2025 administration. If I had the time and the desire, I could send daily newsletters chock-full of links to news—much of it potentially horrifying—that may affect you. Just today alone, news broke that Trump is moving to eliminate the federal Department of Education, that the tariffs against Mexico and Canada have been delayed, that more than 1,100 Environmental Protection Agency employees have been told they could be fired—and much more.

But there are also things to cover that have nothing to do, at least directly, with the federal government. I also realize that some of you are feeling significant news fatigue regarding the Trump White House.

So here’s what we’re going to do: Moving forward, I’ll strive to focus on the Trump administration’s actions in no more than one of the two regularly scheduled Indy Digest intros each week. (I reserve the right to make exceptions, of course.) As for the news links below, I’ll always make sure that at least a couple of them have nothing to do with the federal government.

These are truly terrifying times, and we here at the Independent will cover them as best we can. If you have any feedback, as always, hit reply.

—Jimmy Boegle

More News

• Businesses nationwide, including some in the Coachella Valley, have been closed for all or part of the day due to the Day Without Immigrants protests. Some students have also taken part; NBC Palm Springs reported that Palm Springs Unified School District had “a notable drop-off in attendance today.” Elsewhere in SoCal, KTLA reports: “Protesters have gathered in Southern California for the second straight day as a nationwide ‘Day Without Immigrants’ movement got under way Monday. Dozens of people waving mostly Mexican flags and some American flags while carrying pro-immigration signs gathered at City Hall in downtown Los Angeles before starting their march. … The Los Angeles Police Department posted on X that the demonstrators were blocking traffic at West Olympic Boulevard and South Figueroa Street, then at Grand and Cesar Chavez avenues and then at Grand Avenue and Temple Street. By about 1:15 p.m., protesters were spotted in ‘the area of Arcadia to Aliso from Spring to Los Angeles,’ and ‘demonstrators have posted up over the 101 Freeway,’ police said. ‘Expect long delays in the area,’ police added.”

• Wired magazine reports that pronouns are being forcibly removed from government employees’ email signatures. Sigh. The lede: “Following a White House edict effectively banning federal employees from disclosing their personal pronouns in email signatures, sources within multiple federal agencies say pronouns are now being systemically blocked across multiple email clients and other software. WIRED confirmed various automated efforts with employees at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the General Services Administration (GSA), the US Department of Agriculture, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).”

• And the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is ordering its researchers to pull back all papers being considered for publication in external scientific publications. Really. Reuters says: “The review is aimed at removing language to comply with President Donald Trump’s executive order saying the federal government will only recognize two sexes, male and female. Officials from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to a request for comment. The withdrawal order, first reported by the Inside Medicine Substack, goes beyond an initial directive on Jan. 21 that federal health agencies pause their own public communications to allow for a review of those materials by Trump appointees.”

• Meanwhile, in disconcerting journalism news, the Los Angeles Times is in the midst of a controversy involving its owner, an op-ed writer and RFK Jr. NPR reports: “(Los Angeles Times owner Dr. Patrick) Soon-Shiong Soon-Shiong has posted repeatedly in support of President Trump’s pick to oversee the Department of Health and Human Services. That would be Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a vaccine skeptic who has spread false claims about public health. … Soon-Shiong dismissed accounts that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. worked to undermine support for vaccines in American Samoa right before a measles outbreak, calling them ‘misinformation.’ In 2019, under Soon-Shiong’s ownership, one of the paper’s columnists wrote that Kennedy had been ‘a walking health hazard’ there. … On Friday, however, the author of an opinion piece on Kennedy said the L.A. Times had edited his draft in such a way that, when published, reflected favorably on Kennedy—something he did not intend. The piece, featuring a photo of Kennedy, was entitled, ‘Trump’s healthcare disruption could pay off—if he pushes real reform.’ The author, Eric Reinhart, had initially proposed a very different headline: ‘RFK Jr.’s Wrecking Ball Won’t Fix Public Health.’“

• Speaking of the Los Angeles Times … it’s reporting that State Farm has asked for an emergency rate increase in California: “State Farm General, California’s largest home insurer, asked state officials for an emergency rate hike averaging 22% Monday, saying the Los Angeles County fires have put the company in dire financial straits. The insurer, a subsidiary of State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. of Bloomington, Ill., said the company has already received at least 8,700 claims and paid more than $1 billion to customers. It expects to pay out ‘significantly more,’ with the fires being the costliest natural disasters in its history. ‘As the insurance commissioner, you can have a very significant impact on (State Farm General’s) ability to continue operating in California by immediately approving the requested interim rate changes,’ the company said in a letter to state Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara.”

• Related: Capital and Main reports that L.A. should look to Maui to avoid problems the island continues to deal with following the devastating wildfires there: “After the (Maui) fires, state officials moved swiftly to freeze most rents on the island and issued emergency orders halting evictions. But the measures failed to curb an alarming trend. Maui residents who lived or worked in the burn zone have seen rent increases of roughly 50% in the months following the disaster, according to research from the University of Hawaii. Some landlords took advantage of the crisis, evicting tenants to make way for higher-paying renters. A year later, homelessness in Hawaii had nearly doubled. Hawaiian housing advocates and researchers say Maui’s experience is a cautionary tale for L.A., highlighting the need to pass—and then enforce—renter protections after a natural disaster disrupts an already tight rental market. How Los Angeles leaders respond is still an open question, and a battle is currently being fought between activists and politicians over strengthening renter protections.”

• Today’s recall news involves … Walmart broccoli! The Hill shares some serious news about an upgraded recall: “The Food and Drug Administration has upgraded its classification of a broccoli recall initially reported in late December, labeling it as ‘Class I’—the agency’s most serious recall category. Braga Fresh, of Salinas, California, had initially issued an ‘advisory’ for a specific lot of Marketside Broccoli Florets in late December, after Health and Human Services workers discovered Listeria monocytogenes in ‘multiple samples’ from a Texas Walmart. … Class I, the FDA says, involve ‘a situation in which there is a reasonable probability that the use of, or exposure to, a violative product will cause serious adverse health consequences or death.’” California is one of the 20 states where the broccoli was sold.

• And finally … let’s go to TMZ for a headline and a story about an accident in L.A. that, uh, scrambled traffic this morning. The headline: “Egg Truck Crashes: NO YOLK FOR GROCERY PRICES AND & L.A. TRAFFIC!!!” A few details: “The Monday morning commute ain’t going over easy in L.A., where hundreds of eggs—already a precious commodity—are scattered on a busy freeway after a messy delivery truck accident. The scene on the 5 Freeway in East L.A. is enough to bring tears to your eyes … not because of the traffic, but because all those eggs are going to waste! CHP officers, who scrambled to the scene, say the truck clipped an overpass, sending the eggs flying across the lanes.”

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