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The city of San Diego is about to drop its latest plan to fight climate change, but local unions representing workers in the natural gas industry are worried it could cost them jobs.

Across the state, cities are seeking to ditch gas and require buildings be equipped to run solely on electricity for all energy needs including heating and cooking. And union-represented gas workers are paying attention.

In short, they worry the trend could mean more work for electricians and less work for the people digging trenches or laying and maintaining gas pipes.

“It’s not just a pipeline, it’s a lifeline,” said Joe Cruz, executive director of the California State Council of Laborers, which represents the workers who do heavy digging for pipe laying. “(Natural gas) creates many good-paying jobs. The ban on natural gas and decarbonization efforts in California will have a major impact on laborers across the state, including San Diego if that moves forward.”

Staff in the city of San Diego’s Sustainability and Mobility Department know the city has to cut planet-warming emissions from buildings somehow — 20 percent of the city’s emissions came from natural gas-use in homes and businesses in 2019. But the city is moving more slowly than San Francisco, for instance, where county supervisors banned natural gas in new buildings last year.

While San Diego works on a potential plan, staffers are conscious of the livelihoods attached to the industry and hired the same consultants San Francisco County used before passing its policy to study the potential impacts to the workforce.

“These aren’t just jobs, but people and their families,” said Alyssa Muto, the city of San Diego’s director of sustainability and mobility.

San Diego, like Encinitas, could decide to require new buildings be equipped to power everything — including stoves, water heaters, air conditioning and heating — with electricity. But new building growth is slow, accounting for just one percent of the building stock every year. The bulk of gas infrastructure is in existing buildings.

The city could be aggressive and require retrofits so buildings run entirely on electricity instead of gas. Or the city could give natural gas another pass under its next Climate Action Plan and focus instead on making buildings more energy efficient.

“I don’t know that building electrification has to be the lever, but you do have to get emissions out of the buildings somehow,” said Ashley Rosia-Tremonti, program manager in San Diego’s sustainability department.

Unions representing gas workers argue that relying solely on electrifying California’s buildings is the wrong answer to the climate crisis.

“We want (policymakers) to put online other affordable, safe and convenient forms of energy that everyday people will get confidence in using before they decide to shut down the natural gas industry,” Cruz said.

He means alternative fuels like so-called renewable natural gas and hydrogen energy. Hydrogen is a carbon-free fuel that can be mixed with natural gas to lower its greenhouse gas emission content, but the technology is only slowly penetrating the U.S. market. San Diego Gas and Electric, owned by a top liquified natural gas exporter Sempra, recently announced efforts to ramp-up production of these alternative fuels to offset the emissions the company generates, a popular climate policy goal dubbed “net zero.”

Gas worker unions view these new technologies as guaranteed jobs, whereby workers would retrofit natural gas-fired power plants to run on hydrogen or build new hydrogen fuel plants, said Sean Ellis, an organizer for San Diego’s Local 230 pipefitters union.

“The time to pick a winner and loser here is long gone,” Ellis said. “If we’re going to take fighting climate seriously, we have to have every option on the table.”

This puts local unions at odds with environmentalists who see anything short of electrification as strategies to perpetuate fossil fuels.

“It’s going to be important for us as climate justice advocates to work with our friends in labor to find the right solution and make sure nobody is left behind in this transition,” said Mat Vasilakis, co-director of the Climate Action Campaign. “But we have to get rid of methane gas infrastructure if we want a climate safe and ready future.”

But if San Diego goes electric, it could end jobs for one group of union workers, while creating new opportunities for workers represented by a different union.

That’s because unionized laborers — whether gas, electric or plumbing workers — are trained and certified for a specific type of work. This is partly how unions try to divide work fairly among construction trades.

“That eliminates the Laborers’ opportunity to deliver energy when you purely electrify,” Cruz said. “Electricians have jurisdiction, especially in California, in making wire connections. A laborer can’t perform that function. It requires certification.”

Unions representing San Diego’s electrical workers, IBEW 569 and 465, declined to comment for this story.

This series of pipes makes up part of the North City Pure Water Facility, a plant that converts wastewater to drinking water. / Photo by Megan Wood

Energy sector union labor around the world is fighting for a so-called “just transition” of the workforce as countries seek to curb climate change: If policymakers take gas work away, they would have to help those workers find different jobs — ones that pay and provide the same quality of life or cover the gap in wages with government money.

“The challenge here is that both policymakers and labor leaders are really trying to figure out how to thread the needle on an actual just transition,” said Carol Kim, business manager of the San Diego Building Trades Council, which represents unions from these sometimes-competing trades. “The problem is, environmental policies get passed before that stuff gets put in place.”

One growing job sector in Southern California could provide a bridge: water.

Plumbers and pipefitters pushed back when San Francisco County banned natural gas in new buildings until policymakers struck a compromise. Supervisors agreed to make more pipe work by pushing new water-recycling requirements, like one requiring large buildings to treat and reuse their own wastewater, as the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

San Diego’s got a lot of pipe-related work in its future, too. The city’s stormwater system, which controls where water goes after it hits the ground from rain, needs about $1.27 billion in repair over the next five years. San Diego is also building a multi-billion wastewater recycling system called Pure Water. And there’s a so-far-uncalculated amount of work preparing the city’s water infrastructure to handle climate-induced sea level rise.

Ellis, from the pipefitters union, acknowledged workers could be retrained to do different kinds of pipe projects, but said it’s not that simple.

“You’re essentially asking someone in their 40s to go back to school and retrain and educate themselves, then take a pay cut,” he said.

[Disclosure: Mitch Mitchell, SDG&E’s vice president of state governmental affairs and external affairs, is a member of Voice of San Diego’s board]

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The Bay Area Air Quality Management District Board of Directors (BAAQMD) on Wednesday approved new regulations that will gradually phase out nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions from natural gas furnaces and water heaters in the Bay Area. 

According to the Air District, natural gas building appliances are one of the largest emitters of nitrogen oxides of all stationary sources of air pollution, accounting for a similar amount of NOx pollution as passenger vehicles in the Bay Area.

“The 1.8 million water heaters and furnaces in the Bay Area significantly impact our air quality, resulting in dozens of early deaths and a wide range of health impacts, particularly in communities of color,” said Air District executive officer Dr. Philip Fine. “This groundbreaking regulation will phase out the most polluting appliances in homes and businesses to protect Bay Area residents from the harmful air pollution they cause.”

Many illnesses, including coughing, wheezing, difficulty breathing, asthma, and increased susceptibility to respiratory infections have been linked to NOx exposure, while asthma and other respiratory conditions, neurological disease, heart attack, stroke, lung cancer, and premature death have been linked to exposure to particulate matter.

The new amendments will avoid up to $890 million annually in health impacts due to exposure to air pollution.

However, the Air District added that the rule amendments will apply only to new appliances and do not mandate the immediate change out of existing appliances, nor will they apply to appliances used for cooking, such as gas stoves. The Air District expects the new regulation to reduce NOx emissions by 90% and improve air quality significantly in the Bay Area.

Information for this briefing was found via the Bay Area Air Quality Management District Board of Directors, and the sources and companies mentioned. The author has no securities or affiliations related to the organizations discussed. Not a recommendation to buy or sell. Always do additional research and consult a professional before purchasing a security. The author holds no licenses.

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The city hoped like-minded cities and states would join in the effort to pressure states to overturn discriminatory laws. The support never materialized.

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) — San Francisco appears likely to once again allow bids from contractors from states with anti-LGBTQ laws and bans on abortion after its Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to repeal a law that banned the city from pursuing construction contracts from businesses in states with discriminatory laws. 

“The intent behind 12x was good and correct and I think Supervisor, now Senator Wiener, had hoped that a coalition would come together that would pressure states that were doing offensive and horrible things to stop doing those things. I think the evidence is as a strategy, that does not work. It has not worked over the time 12x has been in effect,” said District 8 Supervisor Rafael Mandelman at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting. 

Then-Supervisor Scott Wiener proposed Chapter 12X in 2016 as a way to exert influence over states which had begun enacting increasingly draconian anti-LGBTQ laws following the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, which held marriage is a fundamental right guaranteed to same-sex couples. The hope at the time was that other like-minded governments would join in to exert even more pressure on the states to repeal their discriminatory laws. Since then, states across the country have passed laws that target transgender people, drag performers, and access to abortion and other medical care. 

The Board of Supervisors voted 7 to 4 to repeal the ban, with Supervisors Myrna Melgar, Dean Preston, Connie Chan, and Shamann Walton voting against. 

District 6 Supervisor Matt Dorsey said the law “lets us pretend we’re doing something important to move the ball on LGBTQ equality or voting rights or protecting reproductive rights” but hampers the city’s ability to seek competitive construction bids for building housing and other city projects. 

“We have made competitive bidding less competitive, and I think San Franciscans would be angry if they knew the amount of hoops that have to be jumped through and the added costs to city contracting,” Dorsey said. 

The repeal will have to be voted on again during next week’s Board of Supervisors meeting. If it passes again, it goes to Mayor London Breed’s desk for her signature or veto. 

If the repeal passes, the city will be free to seek bids for construction from companies from across the country. 

Along with not wanting to indicate that San Francisco is backing down from its fight against discriminatory laws in other states, Walton said he’s also worried how the repeal would affect small businesses in the city.

“There can be so many unintended consequences if we repeal this bill,” Walton said. 

Walton suggested the board take more time to analyze how repealing the law will affect small businesses in San Francisco. 

While agreeing that there is a performative aspect to 12x, Supervisor Melgar said it does have meaningful support from LGBTQ residents of San Francisco, and small businesses. 

“Do I think it will make things easier and cheaper to administer? Yes. Are we ready for it? I’m not quite sure,” Melgar said. 

Mandelman said LGBTQ people in San Francisco could be helped by the repeal of the law.  

“It’s not achieving the goal we want to achieve, it’s making our government less efficient. We have incredible needs for vulnerable populations right here in San Francisco. Queer folks, trans folks in San Francisco who are experiencing incredibly high levels of violence, economic dislocation, homelessness, but other populations as well. The better we can make San Francisco government work for our folks, the more good we can do,” Mandelman said.  

District 9 Supervisor Hillary Ronen said the travel restrictions in the law actually restrict the ability of politicians in San Francisco from acting in solidarity with politicians in other states trying to repeal their discriminatory laws. District 1 Supervisor Connie Chan agreed.

“In the event that it does pass, colleagues I actually do intend and have been working on identifying ways to change this and really figure out ways to accomplish the intent,” Chan said.

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The ban was enacted earlier this year

By Chris Hippensteel, Times Union

ALBANY — A group of businesses, trade associations and labor unions filed a federal lawsuit Thursday challenging the legality of New York’s ban on gas stoves and furnaces in new residential buildings — a central pillar of Gov. Kathy Hochul’s push for green energy. 

The first-of-its-kind statewide ban, which includes several carve-outs, was enacted earlier this year as part of the governor’s $229 billion state budget. It is slated to take effect for new buildings below seven stories in 2026, and for taller structures in 2029.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Albany, asserts that a decades-old federal statute — the Energy Policy and Conservation Act — preempts any state or local regulations on energy consumption by appliances, and thus negates the New York law. A ruling in the plaintiffs’ favor could carry ramifications for national energy policy and cast doubt over local gas bans across the country, including one in New York City. 

“EPCA reflects Congress’s decision that the nation’s energy policy cannot be dictated by state and local governments,” the petition states. “Such a patchwork approach would be the antithesis of a national energy policy.”

The lawsuit also repeats points raised by Republican lawmakers who oppose the gas stove ban, including that it could put greater strain on the state’s electric grid, financially burden consumers and drive businesses out of New York. Democrats in the state Legislature have pushed back on those arguments. 

“The ban is set to go into effect for buildings under seven stories beginning Dec. 31, 2025, but it already is causing irreparable harm to plaintiffs today,” the petition states.  

The state Department of State, named as a defendant in the lawsuit, declined to comment, citing pending litigation.

The legislation to phase out fossil fuels in new construction came amid the release of studies that found chemicals released by gas stoves have adverse health effects, including asthma. Ensuing debates over banning gas stoves briefly became a culture-war flashpoint.

The lawsuit’s plaintiffs include local, state and national trade associations representing builders, developers, plumbers and stakeholders in the gas and propane industry, as well as a collection of unions and small businesses affected by the ban. 

“Our clients are strong supporters of the state’s climate goals, but the ban puts our clients and their members at risk, for little to no environmental benefit,” Sarah Jorgensen, the plaintiffs’ attorney, said in a news release. “It poses a serious threat to the livelihoods of thousands of New Yorkers.”

The EPCA, enacted in 1975 and amended since, sets national guidelines and standards for appliances’ energy efficiency.

The plaintiffs’ argument echoes a recent ruling from a three-judge panel in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which struck down a similar ban in Berkeley, Calif., citing the EPCA’s authority. It’s unclear whether that precedent will hold, however, as the city has filed a petition for a rehearing of the case with a larger 11-judge panel, and the administration of President Joe Biden has submitted an amicus (friend of the court) brief backing the city.

In that brief, the Biden administration contends the ruling is overbroad, and wrongly strips states and localities of their long-held authority to pass laws regarding health and safety. The administration argues that just because gas appliance bans may have “indirect” effects on the usage of products covered under federal law they are not preempted by the EPCA.

In the Berkeley case, the city also argued that it wasn’t regulating appliances’ energy efficiency, but the type of fuel they use — a rationale the trio of judges discarded. 

“We are in full support of a green economy, but we should talk about how to transition without ruining lives,” Jimmy Russo, president of the Plumbing Contractors Association of Long Island, said in the plaintiffs’ statement released in conjunction with the court filing. “Our message to the lawmakers who passed this bill without thinking of our 600 members and their families on Long Island: enough is enough.” 

New York’s ban was one of several measures passed in the state budget aimed at bringing the state closer to its ambitious emissions-reduction goals. Also among them was a “cap-and-invest” program that will require businesses to pay for emitting greenhouse gasses beyond an ever-decreasing threshold.

Gas appliance bans have taken off in cities across the country — including San Francisco, Denver, and Seattle — as well as in Washington state. In response, a number of Republican-controlled states have advanced legislation preventing municipalities from passing their own bans.  

A ban on gas stoves in new construction in New York City is set to take effect later this year for buildings below seven stories.   

If the court sides with the plaintiffs and shuts down New York’s ban, it could open others across the country to similar challenges, strengthening the precedent set in the Berkeley case. Officials in Washington have already voted to delay that state’s rule mandating electric heat pumps in new construction following the Berkeley ruling.

Food & Water Watch Northeast, a group championing the New York legislation, called the lawsuit “an archaic assault,” and urged the governor to stand strong against it. 

“New York’s landmark ban on fossil fuels in new buildings is a victory for our communities, health and climate,” said Alex Beauchamp, a regional director of the group, in a statement. “Efforts to reopen this done and dusted issue amount to nothing more than a last-ditch effort to keep fossil fuels relevant in a changing world.”

The Gas Free NY coalition, which represents several organizations that supported the ban, also decried the new litigation in a statement Thursday. 

“It hasn’t even been two weeks since fossil fueled flooding completely shut New York City down, marking the end of a summer defined by extreme heat and toxic orange skies,” the group said. “Don’t believe the wealthy fossil fuel industry’s lies – lives, livelihoods, and wallets are already hugely impacted by climate change, and the All-Electric Buildings Act is critical to protecting all of these for New Yorkers.”

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San Francisco could soon ban right-hand turns on red lights, making it the second-largest city in the country to adopt the traffic rule.

The proposal, supporters said, could make the roads safer for bicyclists and pedestrians, encourage more people to walk, and cut down on the number of serious injuries in car accidents.

“Allowing turns on red results in deaths, injuries and collisions, as well as cars blocking or driving through crosswalks, making it more dangerous and stressful to cross the street,” said San Francisco Supervisor Dean Preston as he introduced the measure last week at a Board of Supervisors meeting. “We should be expanding no turn on red to every neighborhood.”

Advocates for pedestrian safety have applauded the resolution, saying the proposed law could have a significant effect on reducing the number of pedestrians who are seriously injured by cars. Although some advocates said they were hopeful San Francisco would institute the rule, which New York previously adopted, the chances of a similar measure taking root in Los Angeles are slim, at least for now.

L.A. is “so car-centric” that people would think it was “the end of the world if we tried to implement this in Los Angeles,” said Damian Kevitt, founder of Streets Are for Everyone, a nonprofit that pushes for safety improvements for pedestrians, bicyclists and drivers.

In Los Angeles, advocacy groups have pushed to hold pedestrian-friendly events to get across to the public the need to walk more and drive less, as well as advocating for lowering speed limits on some streets and other measures to improve safety. But even the most ardent supporters are doubtful that a push to ban right turns on red lights would gain any traction in the county, at least for now.

“This is something that’s going to take years of work to even get to the point where it would be considered in L.A.,” Kevitt said.

Drivers in San Francisco, on the other hand, have already gotten a taste of what a ban on right-hand turns would look like.

In the fall of 2021, San Francisco banned right-hand turns on red lights in more than 50 intersections of the Tenderloin neighborhood.

According to an early assessment of the program from the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, the ban reduced the number of “close calls.”

The agency found that about 92% of vehicles were observing the rule, and the number of cars blocking crosswalks during a red light decreased by 70%.

After the initial program, SFMTA recommended expanding the rule to business districts. Preston’s resolution asks the agency to look at the possibility of expanding it across the city.

“It’s an important step in the right direction,” Preston said during the board meeting. “It’s a step we need to take in the city.”

Preston’s resolution comes after a 4-year-old in a stroller was killed in August by a driver making a right-hand turn on a green light at the intersection of 4th and King streets.

The tragedy raised questions about pedestrian safety at that intersection and citywide. Shortly after the incident, San Francisco Mayor London Breed called on SFMTA to identify changes that could be made to the intersection, including removing one of its two right-turn lanes, and changing the traffic signal to show a yellow arrow, instead of a green light, to encourage drivers to yield to pedestrians.

According to one study by Jerry, an insurance comparison company that drew on data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the number of pedestrians killed in car crashes reached a four-decade high across the country in 2021, reaching more than 7,000 people.

Another study, from Streets Are for Everyone, found that in the city of Los Angeles there were 159 pedestrians killed in car crashes in 2022, a 20% increase when compared with 2021.

In San Francisco, the city in 2022 saw 39 traffic deaths, including 20 pedestrians killed — the highest number of fatalities in 15 years.

San Francisco and Los Angeles chalked up those alarming numbers despite adopting Vision Zero, a commitment from city officials to eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.

Officials have taken steps to reduce the number of fatalities. In February of last year, the Los Angeles City Council approved a plan to reduce speed limits on 177 miles of road by 5 mph. According to the Los Angeles Department of Transportation, the project is underway.

Excessive speed is a leading factor in collisions, advocates said.

City officials also have pushed for more pedestrian-friendly events in recent years, such as CicLAvia, as a way of promoting walking and urging residents to drive less.

But taking up a fight to ban right turns on red lights in Los Angeles would be an uphill fight, advocates said.

“Our city is moving in that direction,” said John Yi, executive director of Los Angeles Walks, a nonprofit that works with communities of color to advocate for pedestrian-safe infrastructure. “Is there a chance for this? I think so. But is it going to be easy? I don’t think so.”

Advocates, including Los Angeles Walks, have considered seeking this ban in Los Angeles but have decided to focus on other efforts that they believe could have a more significant effect, Yi said, such as reducing speed limits.

“Any time you try to restrict movement of cars, you have an entrenched electorate that pushes back on that,” he said. “But this is part of a larger ecosystem of changes that need to happen.”

There are some signs of change. In West Hollywood, for example, city officials are looking at a plan that would ban right-hand turns at red lights at the city’s busiest intersections.

“The county as a whole may not be ready, but there should be places where this isn’t a debate anymore,” said West Hollywood Councilmember Chelsea Lee Byers, who proposed the plan.

City officials, at this early stage, haven’t heard opposition to the idea, she said, which she credits in part to the city’s small, pedestrian-friendly size and measures it has already taken to encourage walking.

Still, she agrees that implementing a similar rule countywide would be a challenge.

“It completely speaks to the challenges of breaking through car culture,” she said. “It’s why I see West Hollywood as part of that leadership of mobility justice,” she said, referring to a movement to make streets safer for pedestrians and public transit more accessible.

The city expects to see a report on the measure from city staff and a consulting firm by next year, and she said she hoped the city would extend the proposed ban to other intersections in the future if the level of traffic at those sites increases.

Byers, who said she hadn’t owned a car herself in seven years, said she’d seen firsthand the need for such a measure.

“My right of way as a pedestrian is often challenged by vehicles,” she said. “I’m jealous of San Francisco.”

Right-hand turns on red lights came to be through the 1975 Energy Policy and Conservation Act, Kevitt said, which required states to allow the turns to receive federal funding.

Although the practice has never been found to reduce emissions or gas consumption, the measure was adopted as a way to cut down on idling cars at red lights during the 1970s oil crisis.

“But what we do know is that pedestrians are the ones that are most being hit and killed in traffic violence,” Kevitt said.

It could be a while before a similar measure could be viable in L.A., but Kevitt said it’s time the idea is considered. Smaller cities, such as West Hollywood, would be a start, he said.

“The right to drive is considered more senior than the right to live,” he said. “That needs to change.”

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A panel of federal judges has denied part of San Francisco’s request to amend an injunction that restricts the city from moving homeless encampments without first offering inhabitants a shelter bed.

The injunction, issued by U.S. Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu in response to a lawsuit filed against the city by the nonprofit Coalition on Homelessness, temporarily banned enforcing laws that prohibit sitting, lying down or lodging in public spaces against involuntarily homeless people. 

The coalition filed the lawsuit alleging the city had violated federal precedent by displacing and destroying homeless encampments without offering shelter. 

READ MORE: Gavin Newsom Joins Chorus of Opposition to San Francisco Homeless Sweeps Ban

The city appealed the injunction in a motion to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that Ryu’s ruling didn’t provide a clear definition of an involuntary homeless person.

In a filing released Tuesday, three judges from the Ninth Circuit Court denied part of the city’s motion to amend the injunction, finding that the two parties agree on what defines an involuntarily homeless person. That question was the subject of extensive discussion at an Aug. 23 hearing before the panel.

While that request was denied, City Attorney David Chiu said in a statement he was pleased the court agreed that people who deny shelter can’t be considered involuntarily homeless. 

“We look forward to the court’s decision on the other substantive issues raised in our appeal,” Chiu said. 

Zal Shroff, acting legal director Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area and an attorney representing the Coalition on Homelessness, said he also considered the panel’s filing a “huge win.” 

Shroff pointed to wording in the Ninth Circuit’s memo, which clarified that a person can’t be considered involuntarily homeless as long as they’re given a “specific” offer of “available shelter.” Shroff said the motion might ultimately shed light on the city’s lack of shelter beds.

“We’ll see what the city does with that,” Shroff said. “That’s going to be a win for San Francisco and all San Francisco residents because it means we’re going to see actual exits from street homelessness.”

Over 4,000 people sleep on the city’s streets on a given night while San Francisco maintains just over 3,000 shelter beds at somewhere between 90% and 95% capacity to make room for emergency admissions. 

The shelter waitlist has grown to nearly 500 people as the city struggles to connect with those who have made reservations by the time a bed is available. However, the city has argued that the shelter shortage shouldn’t restrict them from moving homeless encampments when a bed is offered. 

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Unprotected homelessness is a public health disaster. In King County and Seattle, homeless people are dying every day, it’s getting worse and preventable. Providing adequate housing or shelter for all homeless people is an essential step in turning.

However, after decades of regional dialogue and failed plans, the gap between adequate housing and the thousands of homeless people in King County is still widening. The King County Regional Homelessness Authority estimates we will need 18,000 additional temporary shelters or shelters by 2027.

Meanwhile, the city of Seattle has become obsessed with “removing” tent and vehicle camps, better known as “sweeps” — more than 900 of which took place in 2022 — even when shelters aren’t available.

Seattle’s Services not Sweeps coalition has launched a campaign to ban sweeping during winter and extreme weather conditions, when outdoor survival is most difficult. Similar to the Seattle winter eviction ban that was enacted prior to the COVID-19 crisis in 2020, this policy would extend eviction protections to homeless people.

As the University of Washington School of Public Health, which has taught, researched, and developed policies on homelessness, we fully support a winter sweeping ban. We also advocate a year-round sweeping ban, at least until Seattle has enough dignified and suitable indoor space for all vulnerable people. Until then, a ban in winter and extreme weather conditions is a health-promoting first step.

Searches do little more than shift visible reminders of homelessness from one neighborhood to another and then shift them back again. However, raids also push people deeper into the shadows, farther from the regions they are familiar with, cutting ties with care providers and road workers. Searches risk losing IDs, paperwork, medication, and social connections. Imagine trying to get out of homelessness, facing constant challenges like this one, and on top of that, the constant threat of losing your flimsy tent, bed covers, or car and everything you own.

Even worse: kill sweeps. A recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) examined 23 cities, including Seattle, and found that continuous “involuntary displacement” significantly increases hospitalizations and deaths. That’s the last thing Seattle needs. The number of homeless deaths in King County has already doubled that of Washington state. In 2022, they increased even further, and in 2023, so far, they are even higher than in the same period last year.

As public health professionals, we are not the only ones demanding services and accommodation, not cleaning services. The American Public Health Association’s Caucus on Homelessness has spoken out against the forced dismantling of homeless camps without readily available shelters or suitable shelters. The editorial of the JAMA study summarized involuntary displacement as “a worsening of a bad situation”. The lead author of the JAMA study bluntly stated: “Sweeping people is not a solution to #homelessness, it is a form of (costly) state-sponsored violence.”

The King County Board of Health declared in 2018 that homelessness is a public health crisis and poses an imminent threat to the health and survival of vulnerable people. The board urged all King County jurisdictions to quickly provide enough emergency shelters to support all homeless people who are homeless.

In addition, federal jurisprudence has repeatedly required that adequate shelters be in place before removing tents or belongings of those not sheltered. This was confirmed by Ninth Circuit Court judgments against Boise and Grants Pass, and by a December federal court order in San Francisco. Also this week, a King County Superior Court judge ruled that Seattle’s camp clearance policy is unconstitutional in cases where the city uses its overly broad definition of “disability” to mandate the removal and destruction of property without Justify advance notice or accommodation offer – where there is no real disability or imminent danger.

Seattle and King County are nowhere near, and nowhere near, those goals. The Regional Housing Authority’s most recent five-year plan, for example, does not provide a specific timeline to meet current or projected housing needs. Still, Seattle continues its frightening pace of destocking.

You may be wondering: what about all those homeless people who are “denying” housing? hmm First, most Seattle searches are conducted without notice or offers of housing. Second, the City of Seattle’s own statistics confirm that most campers accept offers when it comes to “enhanced” and “non-shared” accommodations, such as tiny house villages or motel accommodations.

Although a mat on the floor of a “shelter” meets the courts’ minimum expectations, it is not enough to help people make the transition from homelessness. Simple “communal” housing offers minimal sanitation and weather protection—usually along with barriers to entry (e.g., exclusion of mates and animal companions), overcrowded sleeping quarters, no privacy, limited possessions, and morning evictions onto the streets. These attitudes are neither healthy nor dignified. Not surprisingly, campers in Seattle often opt out of such accommodations.

To help people stabilize and find proper housing, housing is best when it has 24-hour access and privacy, is open to whole family units and partners, including animal companions, and has connections to case management , health and social services. This is the type of shelter prioritized by both the regional homelessness agency and the health department.

Homelessness stems from unaffordable housing, unlivable minimum wages, disabilities, the impoverishment of medical debt, institutional racism, and other economic system failures. Sustainable solutions require transformative strategies, costly investments and time.

Fortunately, we live in a city with some of the wealthiest people in world history who, if taxed, are able to support solutions. We also have many vacant units that could be made available for residential use.

In the meantime, however, we should at least stop sweeping camps during the coldest and hottest months, when displacement is doing the most damage.

Bill Daniell is a physician, epidemiologist, and associate professor emeritus at the UW School of Public Health. He was a member of the King County Board of Health for seven years.

Amy Hagopian is a professor at the UW School of Public Health, where she taught the school’s homelessness course. She is the elected Chair of the Editorial Board of the American Journal of Public Health.

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California Highway Patrol Sgt. Ryan Burns was leaving a routine drunk-driving bust on Polk Street Monday when a beat-up Chevy Camaro two blocks away started racing through the Tenderloin. 

One of Burns’ motorcycle officers had tried to pull the driver over for a flat rear tire and heavily tinted windows, and instead of stopping, the driver gunned it.

“Start me a second unit!” the officer yelled over the radio. Burns hit the gas to join the chase and the driver careened to a stop several blocks later on Gough Street. The officer wedged his bike at the car’s front window, whipped out his pistol and pointed it at the driver’s face, yelling, “Show me your hands!” 

Burns’ partner, Officer Andrew Barclay, dashed over, saw something in the driver’s mouth and ordered him to spit it out. Out flew a tightly folded dollar bill filled with what looked like crack cocaine. Two San Francisco police narcotics officers who happened to be nearby arrested the man for drug possession and evading police. 

The scene outside of CHP Sergeant Ryan Burns car in the Tenderloin in San Francisco, Calif., on Monday, June 12, 2023.Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle

Traffic stops like this are what CHP officers said they’re hoping will tamp down the rampant, open-air drug trade in San Francisco in a coordinated federal, state and local push that began May 1. That’s when Gov. Gavin Newsom deployed six to 10 CHP officers a day to patrol the Tenderloin and South of Market and 20 California National Guard analysts to gather intelligence for drug-trafficking investigations.

But the crackdown has brought questions, including whether arrests can make a difference in a crisis driven by addiction and whether it’s appropriate to turn loose CHP officers not subject to the city’s oversight. 

In the first six weeks of the operation, the CHP seized 5.5 kilos of drugs and made 92 felony and misdemeanor arrests for alleged crimes related to possession of fentanyl and illegal guns, driving under the influence and domestic violence, among others, the governor’s office said Wednesday.  

The biggest change has been in drug arrests. Citywide data from the District Attorney’s Office analyzed by The Chronicle shows that CHP officers presented 12 narcotics arrests to the D.A. in May alone — more than the total number they’d presented over the past 12 months combined.

CHP officer Arellano finds drugs wrapped in a dollar bill which was discovered in the car of a man who was trying to flee from CHP on Gough Street in San Francisco, Calif., on Monday, June 12, 2023.Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle

To do so, state law enforcement officers are employing an old-school investigative technique that San Francisco wants to limit its own police from employing. CHP officers told The Chronicle they can pull people over for minor infractions like broken tail lights or overly tinted windows — something Barclay, who is a public information officer, likened to fishing.

“You start there and work your way up through information you learn,” he said. “That’s why it’s important to make these stops.”

The San Francisco Police Commission, supported by reform advocates, voted in January to restrict local officers from making so-called pretextual stops, pointing to data showing that such stops cost significant police time and money, seldom prevent crime, and disproportionately target people of color. 

The policy is not in effect yet because it’s tied up in negotiations between the city and the police officers’ union, said police commissioner Max Carter-Oberstone, who authored the policy. 

Carter-Oberstone told Police Chief Bill Scott in a commission meeting on May 3 that he was concerned that CHP officers conducting traffic enforcement related to narcotics “sounds a lot like pretext stops.” Scott, who does not oversee the CHP deployment, responded that “we have not asked them, nor do we expect them to go out and do pretext stops.” He said the CHP was aware of the city’s pending policy and added, “I don’t think the commission will be disappointed with that piece.”

CHP officer M.Garcia (center) arrests a man for a DUI in the Tenderloin in San Francisco, Calif., on Monday, June 12, 2023.Gabrielle Lurie/The Chronicle

Carter-Oberstone questioned the efficacy of focusing on pretextual stops given that “every high quality and respected study on this issue has shown that pretext stops are an incredibly inefficient way to discover contraband.”

A Chronicle analysis conducted last year found that from mid-2018 to mid-2022, SFPD officers were 10.5 times as likely to stop Black people than white people for low-level pretextual infractions. 

Barclay, however, said the technique as used by the CHP is deployed carefully — and has been effective. “We don’t racially profile,” he told the Chronicle. “We don’t look at people. We look at violations, and we can have a lot of reasons to stop people.” 

A spokesperson for Newsom, Izzy Gardon, said in an email that CHP officers’ ability to use pretextual stops was “absolutely not (a) factor” in calling them into the city. Gardon said Newsom’s intention was to “crack down on crime linked to the fentanyl crisis, hold the poison peddlers accountable, and increase law enforcement presence to improve public safety and public confidence in San Francisco.”

Evan Sernoffsky, a spokesperson for the city police force, said Wednesday, “The SFPD is working with the Police Commission to implement a policy restricting pretextual stops. In general, our policies do not apply to other law enforcement agencies.” 

Mayor London Breed, who asked Newsom for help to combat drug dealing, said when the deployment was announced that the intention was to do “something different,” enforce accountability and send a strong message to criminals “holding communities hostage.” 

Breed supported the move to limit San Francisco police using pretextual stops, in which police use minor offenses to search for other criminal activity, but not an outright ban on pulling drivers over for various relatively minor traffic infractions, arguing that would jeopardize safety. Her office did not respond Wednesday to whether she supported the CHP using pretextual stops to enable drug busts. 

CHP officers have seized more than 4.2 kilos of fentanyl in the Tenderloin and the surrounding neighborhoods, along with 1.3 kilos of meth, cocaine and heroin combined, the governor’s office said. The Drug Enforcement Administration estimates that at least 2 mg of fentanyl is potentially lethal, meaning the amount seized could have killed 2.1 million people. 

“I’m proud of the CHP and CalGuard’s lifesaving efforts to shut down the Tenderloin’s poison pipeline and hold drug traffickers accountable,” Newsom said in a statement. “These early results show promise and serve as a call to action: we must do more to clean up San Francisco’s streets, help those struggling with substance use, and eradicate fentanyl from our neighborhoods.”  

Neither CalGuard or CHP have said how long they would be deployed. CHP said it has used existing resources from the San Francisco office for the operation and is supplementing regular patrol duties with staff from its Golden Gate division. 

Despite an increase in enforcement, residents, business owners and people who use or sell drugs told The Chronicle they have yet to feel much of a difference on the streets. The head of a federal task force working on the operation told the Chronicle that seeing the first improvements would take at least a year’s worth of work. 

Scott told The Chronicle last week that CHP’s presence “is disruptive to people committing crimes.” 

He also said the CHP’s help has freed up his officers to enforce Breed’s new push to arrest some drug users under public intoxication laws in an effort to get them into treatment — a tactic decried by many health experts as ineffective and harmful to people with addiction. The CHP was training his officers on how to recognize people under the influence last week, Scott added. 

“The fact that they’re here gives us a little bit more flexibility to do this type of work,” he said. “It’s very helpful.”  

The governor’s office did not provide a breakdown of CHP arrests within SoMa and the Tenderloin alone. But data from the District Attorney’s Office, which includes all arrests presented by CHP to the D.A. citywide for possible charging, shows the CHP presented more drug arrests than in past years.  

The CHP’s citywide arrest count of 75 in May isn’t historically high: Before the pandemic, the agency regularly presented that many or more arrests in a month to the D.A.’s office.

Johnny Harris, who uses fentanyl and lives outside, told The Chronicle in late May that the CHP has been visible in Tenderloin hotspots where he buys his drugs, but that the officers’ presence hasn’t made a difference. 

“They’re not really messing with us,” he said between puffs of his drug, adding that he can always tell undercover cops by their nice dress shoes. 

He said the ramped-up patrols won’t prevent him and his street cohorts from simply dispersing their groups when the CHP or police roll or walk by, then reassembling when the coast is clear.

“Not a chance in hell they’ll make a difference,” he said. “They would have to kill everybody to stop the drug trade around here. This is the most God-less place in the world.”   

Supervisor Dean Preston, who represents the Tenderloin, said that “nobody wants folks dealing drugs out there,” but doesn’t believe that sweeps of street-level dealers will make a dent without addressing demand. Supervisor Matt Dorsey, who represents SoMa, welcomed more policing geared at trying to shut down open-air drug markets. 

Residents and business owners interviewed by The Chronicle reported uneven impacts, with fewer dealers on some blocks and more on others. 

“This is definitely an added resource for the city, for the police department, and I’m really happy that this is happening. However, the issue and the challenges are still here,” said Azalina Eusope, owner of Azalina’s restaurant on Ellis Street and a member of the Tenderloin Business Coalition that prompted Breed to add police in the neighborhood this year. 

“I know everybody is doing the best that they can. I just hope we can just buckle down and continue the effort. With that, hopefully we’ll see some results. I have faith,” Eusope said. 

Tracey Mixon, a longtime Tenderloin resident and organizer with the Coalition on Homelessness, an advocacy group, said she noticed fewer dealers on Eddy Street last week. 

“It was the first time where I was able to walk places and not hear, ‘Mama, what you need? ’ she said. ‘That was finally a little bit of changing, but not a whole lot is going to change, because they have been selling drugs out here for years.’  

Mixon doesn’t want dealers to bother her or her 13-year-old daughter, but as a Black woman, she said she has been concerned about being racially profiled by law enforcement. 

Both Mixon and Del Seymour, a business owner and founder of nonprofit Code Tenderloin, called the CHP deployment a “dog and pony show.” Seymour said he’d seen patrols ramp up and dealers and users moving as far north as Post Street, above Geary Street, but didn’t believe it would change the drug trade. He did, however, support state coordination to go after high-level drug suppliers. 

CalGuard has sent 14 analysts to the federal High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA) task force, and later in the month sent another six to the San Francisco Fentanyl Task Force. 

Major General Matthew Beevers told The Chronicle CalGuard has assembled thousands of pages of analytics on drug networks in San Francisco. The guard’s role is to assemble a detailed schematic of who’s dealing dope where, how and to whom in San Francisco — so authorities can then crush that network. 

Northern California HIDTA Director Mike Serna said people are coming from all over the Bay Area to buy drugs in San Francisco and estimated the number of dealers at “hundreds.” In order to squash the drug trade, he said, “we have to continue the push for years.” 

CHP officers said they’re leaving it to analysts to determine if they’re making a difference. But, as Barclay said: “Personally, I’d like to think we have.” 

Reach Mallory Moench at mallory.moench@sfchronicle.com; Susie Neilson at susan.neilson@sfchronicle.com; and Kevin Fagan at kfagan@sfchronicle.com; Twitter: @KevinChron

The post CHP making drug arrests in S.F. with tactic metropolis is making an attempt to ban appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

Illustration: by Zak Tebbal

On February 7, Vitus Spehar, the host of a popular TikTok newscast, was invited to the White House for a State of the Union watch party. After Joe Biden concluded his address to Congress, Spehar stuck in their earbuds, cinched their blue tie, and started to livestream to TikTok from their iPhone. “Oh my God. Hi, friends, we’re here,” Spehar said. “This is the real East Room of the real White House.” Soon, Jill Biden dropped by to take a selfie with Spehar and the other social-media personalities there for the party. With a mischievous eyebrow flex, Spehar slipped into a hallway to check out some presidential portraits at the foot of the stairway up to Biden’s private quarters. “If I never get invited back,” Spehar said, “I was here three times.”

Spehar, 40, is a politically idiosyncratic nonbinary ex-caterer with a pompadour hairstyle and statement eyeglasses. Through some combination of plainspoken charm and algorithmic magic, their bright, chatty takes on current events — usually delivered from a spot under a desk in their home office in Rochester — took off on TikTok. They now have nearly 3 million followers and an audience in the White House. Before the 2022 midterms, Spehar shot a get-out-the-vote spot with Barack Obama. On another occasion, they visited the Oval Office. They now refer to President Biden as “Joe” in casual conversation, and it’s easy to see why the president might want to be on friendly terms. For reelection, Biden, 80, will be depending on enthusiastic support from young voters, millions of whom avidly consume — and are influenced by — TikTok.

When Biden returned to the White House, Spehar and the rest of the group were waiting to greet him on his doorstep. He stepped out of his limousine and offered them a deep, exhausted bow. Biden’s political solicitude, though, was at odds with his national security agenda. Even as he beckoned TikTok with one hand, he was considering whether to snatch it away with the other.

In his speech that night, Biden had warned that China, an increasingly aggressive geopolitical rival, “intends to be dominating” the technologies of the future. And though he didn’t explicitly mention it, his administration was focusing intense scrutiny on TikTok, an app developed by ByteDance, a private company of Chinese origin. TikTok may well be China’s most visibly successful software export. But American law enforcement and intelligence agencies were concerned it posed more than a competitive threat. For years, they had been warning that the app might be put to use for spying, spreading disinformation, or sowing discord. Chinese leaders have been open about their aim to strengthen what they call their nation’s “international discourse power,” rebalancing what they see as America’s advantage in defining cultural and political values. TikTok is capable of shifting the discourse with the flick of a thumb. As president, Donald Trump had tried to ban TikTok outright, only to be halted by a federal court.

For Vitus Spehar, who goes by “V,” it was easy to write off the idea of banning TikTok as xenophobic, conservative fearmongering. After Trump’s defeat, the issue had been picked up by his right-wing followers in states like Alabama and Texas, where governors have banned TikTok from government devices and public universities have kicked it off their Wi-Fi networks. Last year, at the instigation of the Missouri Republican senator Josh Hawley, the federal government enacted its own ban for its devices. But these largely symbolic attacks did little to slow TikTok’s growth as a business and cultural force. TikTok is now used by 150 million Americans, if you accept the company’s figures, and Spehar figured it was too big to ban. “It would be anti-democratic; it would be against the First Amendment,” Spehar told me on the phone in February, shortly after the State of the Union. “We are not a country that does that kind of stuff.” But then Biden and the Democrats started to surprise them by sending hawkish signals too.

For the better part of two years, the federal government had been engaged in a secretive negotiating process with TikTok’s corporate management. The public didn’t yet know it in February, but those talks were breaking down, leaving the Biden administration in the same place where Trump left off: trying to figure out if it could drive TikTok out of existence in the United States. In Congress, bills to restrict or outlaw TikTok were flying, garnering bipartisan support, with the two parties separated only by the degree of their suspicion. There was a showdown looming in March, when the platform’s Singapore-based chief executive was scheduled to stand alone before a Republican-controlled House committee for a hearing. The spectacle was sure to be punishing; one think-tank expert likened the dynamic to a “human sacrifice.”

You could trace the route to execution back to missteps by TikTok’s ownership, or to China’s confrontational foreign policy under President Xi Jinping, or to unresolved tensions in the relationship between the world’s two strongest nations. But if you were only paying attention on TikTok, it might look, in retrospect, like it had all started with the balloon. The weekend before the State of the Union, a Chinese surveillance craft blew over the U.S. After President Biden ordered the military to shoot the balloon down, he was asked if he might do the same to TikTok. “I’m not sure,” Biden replied. “I know I don’t have it on my phone.” Before long, the new Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee rammed through his own bill and called TikTok a “spy balloon in your phone.” The bipartisan agitation against China appeared, to Spehar, “outrageously cordial.” They were starting to rethink their comfortable assumptions.

“Now,” Spehar told me, “I’m in a position where I’m like, Fuck, they might ban this app.”

By March, the momentum for draconian restrictions was starting to look unstoppable and Spehar was moved to act. They started to defend TikTok in videos that received millions of views. When TikTok’s embattled chief executive testified, they sat right behind him, often popping into the camera frame over his right shoulder. Spehar would go from visiting the East Room to a place of cynical distance in the span of a few news cycles. “This whole idea of banning TikTok based on threats you can’t prove and information you won’t share, that doesn’t fly,” they told me. “That makes me feel like you think I’m not smart enough.” To them, the betrayal felt personal. They had just been over to the president’s house.

“You put all this effort into building trust,” Spehar said. “Tell me, Joe, why are you doing this?”

President Biden greets Spehar and their fellow TikTokers at the White House on October 25, 2022.
Photo: Adam Schultz/White House

Biden has shown no eagerness to answer their question. The White House declined to offer any substantive comment about TikTok, though a spokesman denied there was any contradiction between embracing it as a communications medium while also attempting to suppress it. Since 2020, when a judge halted Trump’s sloppy effort to ban TikTok on procedural grounds, the issue has been in the hands of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, a body made up of representatives of Cabinet departments including Treasury, Defense, and Justice as well as intelligence agencies. The committee—known to policy obscurantists as CFIUS—oversees transactions that are deemed to impact national security, making recommendations to the president, who possesses nearly unchecked power to disallow investments or unwind mergers. Most CFIUS reviews are quick and quiet, and they seldom rise to the level of a president’s attention. The case of TikTok, though, has placed Biden square in the middle of an irreconcilable dilemma.

To one side, the president has his national security advisers, who are expressing concern about what China could do with a technology in the pockets of 150 million Americans. To the other, the president has his political advisers, who are looking ahead to yet another election where it looks like everything will be on the line. The White House and Democratic campaign organizations — including Biden’s own — are eager to use TikTok as a messaging vehicle, and some political operatives are reluctant to sacrifice such a potent tool. “From a purely political perspective, while it’s nice to sound tough on China, there’s a lot of ways to sound tough on China,” says a Democratic digital media consultant with ties to the Biden campaign. “This is an app that every young person in America uses. We have to use it, or we will lose there.”

One spring afternoon, I met a social-media talent manager named Daniel Daks at a café on the Upper East Side. He painted TikTok’s potential impact on the democratic process in grandiose terms, telling me, “A world where campaigns are forced to directly partner with these individuals is a world where the political Establishment needs to meet the needs of people.” Daks is a preppy 32-year-old entrepreneur who started and sold one tech company before getting into the social-media-agency business. His firm, Palette Media, now represents more than 100 content creators and influencers, connecting them with advertisers like Wal-Mart for product-endorsement deals. Palette also has a marketing-consulting wing, which has carved out a niche in Democratic politics, with Daks acting as an emissary between TikTok and Washington. He represents Spehar, handling their brand relationships and public speaking, and served as a go-between when White House officials were putting together their State of the Union event with social-media influencers.

This is an app that every young person in America uses. We have to use it, or we will lose there.

That event was part of a broader campaign to cultivate TikTokers, whom the White House has courted with Zoom briefings and access to the president at ceremonial and private events. Axios recently reported that Rob Flaherty, the White House director of digital strategy, is attempting to recruit what the publication described as an “army of influencers” as part of its effort to deliver Biden’s messages to young voters. Daks said his own professional involvement with Democratic politics went back to 2020, when he worked with Biden’s organization, which was innovative in creating a team solely devoted to engaging social-media influencers. As both the platform and his client list have grown, Daks says he has stayed in regular contact with White House staffers who handle the administration’s social-media relationships, which are poised to play an even larger role in the reelection campaign. In October, the Democratic National Committee paid $200,000 to Palette Media for its services during the midterms.

Daks helped to arrange for some of his clients to attend a series of Washington events, including meetings with top Democratic congressional-campaign staffers and an audience with Obama, at which Spehar filmed their TikTok. Daks says that none of his clients, including Spehar, were compensated by the DNC for the videos they made. The $200,000, he says, was for strategic consulting services. But social-media endorsement deals — sometimes for pay — are an increasingly important element of political advocacy. TikTok does not accept political advertisements. (They’re off-putting to viewers, its corporate leadership says.) “We don’t use TikTok at the White House,” a Biden spokesperson said, in response to questions posed for this article. But it hardly matters when TikTokers are already inside the building. Instead of posting to the platform via their own accounts, candidates tend to find content creators to spread their message, either via direct relationships or by hiring someone like Daks. “This is kind of the next wave of paid advertising,” says a second Democratic digital media consultant. “It picked up steam last cycle, where a campaign, usually through an intermediary agency, will pay a certain amount of money to subcontract influential people on a social-media platform.” Spehar, for instance, has worked with Vocal Media, an agency founded by a former Hillary Clinton 2016 staffer, on campaigns to promote adult education and to raise awareness about the federal child tax credit.

To TikTok viewers, it may not always be clear where heartfelt advocacy ends and shilling begins. Although sponsored content is supposed to be labeled as advertising on TikTok, the rules are not well enforced. But Daks says TikTok messaging is effective because it is authentic, involving real people speaking directly to audiences that trust them, and that none of his clients would jeopardize that bond by voicing political opinions they don’t genuinely believe.

Daks said if TikTok were banned, his clients could always move over to Instagram or YouTube, which have introduced knockoff products, but that would mean rebuilding their audience in a new place, with different tech, which might not reward their videos the same way. He said that his clients were, by nature, an anxious and superstitious lot. “Imagine if your entire livelihood was at the mercy of an algorithm,” he said. And now there was this added uncertainty blowing in on the geopolitical winds. The anxiety was starting to filter into the content creators were posting. “Explain to the people what you’re going to fucking do,” a TikTok creator named Alex Pearlman screamed in a viral rant, addressed to Biden, “or you’re going to end up with a lot more people looking angry as fuck, like me.”

At first, the backlash didn’t receive much notice in official circles in Washington. Only a handful of politicians use TikTok regularly. But many of their staffers do, and the political operatives most attuned to TikTok’s usefulness as an instrument of persuasion were in no rush to disarm unilaterally. “The next generation of politically active people,” says Teddy Goff, the digital director for Obama’s 2012 campaign and the co-founder of the firm Precision Strategies, “is going to need to understand that what it means to be politically engaged is to be involved in an information war that is not happening exclusively on TikTok but mostly on TikTok.”

Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo — who has endorsed a bipartisan bill designed to empower her department to regulate TikTok — was unusually frank in expressing reservations about the downside. “The politician in me thinks you’re gonna literally lose every voter under 35, forever,” she told Bloomberg News in March. “However much I hate TikTok — and I do, because I see the addiction in the bad shit that it serves kids — you know, this is America.”

Rep. Ocasio-Cortez and former President Obama have both gone under the desk to connect with voters and constituents