Sacramento Bee: CA Leaders, Newsom Want Constitutional Right To Abortion 
California leaders are calling for an amendment to the state constitution guaranteeing abortion rights as the U.S. Supreme Court appears poised to overturn federal protections. Gov. Gavin Newsom, Senate Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, D-Lakewood, on Monday night issued a statement pushing for the amendment in response to a draft Supreme Court opinion showing justices could overturn Roe vs. Wade. (Holden, 5/3)

CapRadio: California Leaders Vow A Constitutional Amendment To Enshrine Abortion Rights If Roe V. Wade Is Overturned 
California’s elected leaders were quick to condemn a draft opinion showing the U.S. Supreme Court plans to vote to overturn Roe v. Wade and pledged to double down on efforts to protect the right to get an abortion in the state.Senate President pro Tempore Toni Atkins (D—San Diego) announced she will introduce a constitutional amendment “that will make it crystal clear that reproductive rights in California — including and specifically abortion — are enshrined in our constitution. “We will not back down, we will double down,” she said. (Nixon, 5/3)

CalMatters: With Roe In Limbo, California Vows To Protect Abortion Rights 
“California will not sit back. We are going to fight like hell.” That was Gov. Gavin Newsom’s initial response to Politico’s explosive Monday night publication of a draft U.S. Supreme Court majority opinion that suggests justices are poised to strike down Roe vs. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that guaranteed the federal constitutional right to an abortion. (Hoeven, 5/3)

Modesto Bee: CA, Newsom Had Prepared For Supreme Court Ruling On Abortion
Immediately following a report that United States Supreme Court justices would overturn Roe v. Wade, Gov. Gavin Newsom and other California leaders announced that they would work on putting the right to an abortion in the state Constitution. But California has been bracing for the Supreme Court to dump the 1973 precedent long before Politico published the leaked draft. (Brassil, 5/4)

San Diego Union-Tribune: Local Leaders Prepare For Fight Over Abortion Rights
San Diego County politicians geared up for battle after a leaked draft opinion revealed that the U.S. Supreme Court may overturn the landmark ruling Roe v. Wade, ending federal protection for abortion rights. The draft opinion, published Monday by Politico, revealed that the court appears poised to reverse the landmark 1973 opinion Roe v. Wade, which upheld a woman’s right to abortion without government restrictions. (Brennan, Riggins and Moran, 5/3)

KBAK-TV: How Potential Overturn Of Roe V Wade Could Impact Bakersfield And The Central Valley
There have been approximately 62-million reported abortions in the U.S., since Roe v Wade in 1973. Even though California is a blue state, people Eyewitness News spoke to say California will be impacted because many people will come here for abortions. (Kaplan, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: Why Overturning Roe V. Wade Could Make It Harder To Get Abortions In Certain Parts Of California
California residents have better access to abortion services than just about any other state in the country, but even here disparities exist based on geography and socioeconomic factors, and overturning Roe v. Wade could worsen their situation, according to experts in reproductive care and policy. About 40% of California counties — mostly rural places, accounting for about 3% of the population — have no clinics that provide abortion, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy group that advocates for abortion rights. Even in urban areas, access to abortion is more challenging for women of color and those who are lower-income due to deeply embedded health inequities. (Allday, 5/3)

KQED: Even In California, Abortion Services Can Be Hard To Find
A majority of the Supreme Court plans to strike down Roe v. Wade, according to leaked documents obtained by Politico. In California, most public officials have pledged to double down on our state’s protections for abortion rights. But that doesn’t mean getting access to an abortion is always easy. An estimated 40% of mostly rural counties in California — home to hundreds of thousands of people in the state — have no clinics that provide abortions. (Guevarra, Orr, Esquinca and Montecillo, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: Roe Vs. Wade In California: How Overturn Would Create A Public Health Crisis
Gov. Gavin Newsom and other California leaders doubled down on efforts to defend abortion access and welcomed people from other states to have the procedure here after news broke Monday that the U.S. Supreme Court is poised to overturn the Roe v. Wade decision protecting abortion rights nationwide. The court has not yet acted to repeal Roe, but a draft opinion leaked to Politico revealed a majority of justices is preparing to do so. That would let individual states decide whether to ban the procedure within their borders. (Bollag, Fracassa and Bulwa, 5/3)

Los Angeles Times: Supreme Court Draft Turbocharges Midterm Abortion Activism 
Activists on both sides of the abortion debate have spent months planning for a blockbuster Supreme Court ruling this year on Roe vs. Wade. None of those plans anticipated the particular jolt on Monday night, when a leaked draft opinion signaled a decisive end to the decades-long precedent. The disclosure accelerated plans already in the works for the upcoming midterm elections, especially in states holding marquee gubernatorial and Senate races, such as Georgia and Arizona. While Republicans have been more effective in rallying supporters around abortion in the past, Democrats believe the reality of Roe’s seemingly imminent reversal may galvanize their voters to avoid steep losses in November. (Mason and Mehta, 5/3)

Sacramento Bee: How California Democrats Could Benefit From Abortion Battle
Suddenly, abortion has the potential to figure prominently in the races for California’s swing House districts–and maybe in which party controls Congress after the November midterm elections. “One possible outcome is that voters in blue/bluish states and districts could become a little less willing to cross over and vote for a Republican,” said Kyle Kondik, managing editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball, a nonpartisan political analysis firm.California has five House districts, three now held by Republicans and two where GOP candidates are favored, that are regarded as winnable for Democrats. Republicans need a net gain of five seats nationwide to win control of the House. (Lightman, 5/4)

California Healthline: Historic ‘Breach’ Puts Abortion Rights Supporters And Opponents On Alert For Upcoming Earthquake
An opinion published by Politico confirms what many who have followed the abortion debate already suspected: Roe v. Wade is soon to be no more. But the question remains: How will the public respond? (Rovner, 5/3)

San Francisco Chronicle: We Spent The Day With California Sen. Alex Padilla In The Wake Of The Leaked Abortion Ruling. Here’s How It Unfolded
It was 10:42 a.m. and Sen. Alex Padilla was already on his fourth interview of the morning about Roe v. Wade. The California Democrat was squeezing in this one, with a reporter from USA Today, as he had a minute of downtime before heading into the Senate chamber to preside for an hour, a task that falls to junior members of the Senate majority like him. (Kopan 5/3)

Los Angeles Daily News: L.A. County Area Political Leaders Sound Off On Roe V. Wade ‘Draft Decision’
Los Angeles-area congressional leaders sounded off on what appears to be the U.S. Supreme Court’s imminent strike-down of the nearly 50-year-old right to abortion, as Democrats signaled a re-energized battle in Congress to defend such rights. It wasn’t long before local elected leaders sounded off Monday and Tuesday as news spread that the Court’s majority had penned an opinion in a case before it — Dobbs v. Mississippi Department of Health — that reversed its landmark opinion, Roe v. Wade, in 1973. (Carter, 5/3)

Los Angeles Times: Roe Vs. Wade Built On A Shaky Legal Foundation 
Roe vs. Wade, the Supreme Court’s best-known decision of the last 50 years, is also its most endangered precedent.It gave women nationwide the legal right to choose abortion, but the backlash reshaped the country’s politics. The landmark ruling may well be overturned by conservative justices appointed by Republican presidents to do just that. What went wrong with Roe? Why did the court’s effort to resolve the abortion controversy in 1973 lead instead to decades of division? (Savage, 5/3)

Los Angeles Times: Red States Are Already Chipping Away At Roe Vs. Wade 
This week’s leak of a draft opinion that would overturn Roe vs. Wade came as more than half of U.S. states are poised to outlaw abortion if the Supreme Court does strike down the 1973 decision. In those states, many in the South and Midwest, it already feels like the landmark decision is being overturned bit by bit as restrictive new laws have been taking effect. “This is a region of the country where it’s not just an abortion desert — it’s a healthcare desert,” said Rebecca Tong, co-executive director of Trust Women, which runs clinics in Kansas and Oklahoma. “Many of these states did not expand Medicaid. These states have terrible maternal and infant mortality. It’s two separate countries.” (Hennessy-Fiske and Jarvie, 5/4)

CapRadio: Here's What Could Happen If Roe V. Wade Is Overturned 
Nearly 1 in 4 women in the U.S. are expected to get an abortion at some point in their lives, according to a 2017 study. If Roe v. Wade is struck down, as a leaked draft memo from the U.S. Supreme Court suggests it could be, it will have a major impact in states across the country that have already signaled their intention to restrict or ban abortion. (5/3)

Los Angeles Times: LAPD, Protesters Clash Downtown After Rally Against Overturning Of Roe Vs. Wade 
Police and protesters briefly clashed in downtown Los Angeles on Tuesday night after a rally protesting the possible overturning of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Roe vs. Wade decision made its way from a federal courthouse to Pershing Square. The brief clash came after roughly 400 people gathered in front of the federal courthouse at 1st and Broadway earlier Tuesday night, less than 24 hours after Politico obtained a draft U.S. Supreme Court opinion that seemed to signal the court was poised to overturn the landmark 1973 decision legalizing abortion nationwide. (Campa, Yee and Solis, 5/3)

San Francisco Chronicle: Abortion Rights Demonstrators Gather In Oakland, San Francisco And Vow To Put Up A Fight
The leaked decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn Roe vs. Wade was met with protests at the federal buildings in both San Francisco and Oakland on Tuesday afternoon and evening. Shortly before 5 p.m., several hundred people gathered in front of the Phillip Burton Federal , many of them holding homemade signs bearing slogans such as, “We won’t go back,” “You can only ban safe abortions” and “My body, my choice.” (Picon, Said and Whiting, 5/3)

Bay Area News Group: Abortion Rights Supporters Hold Protests Amid Leak Of Supreme Court Opinion
Vowing to “fight back,” abortion rights groups rallied and marched Tuesday evening across the Bay Area after a leaked document suggested the Supreme Court could overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortion across the country. The protests — which included rallies in San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose and Dublin — came as abortion rights supporters organized gatherings across the U.S. to decry the possible end to nearly 50 years of nationwide access to abortion. (Rodgers, 5/3)

Bay Area News Group: Redwood City Wants County Supervisors To Set Up Protest Buffer Zone Outside Planned Parenthood
The Redwood City Council is urging San Mateo County supervisors to set up a buffer zone around a mid-Peninsula Planned Parenthood to keep anti-abortion protesters from getting too close to patients seeking to end their pregnancies. In a unanimous vote April 25, council members agreed to send a letter to the county Board of Supervisors asking them to put in a buffer zone around the Mar Monte Planned Parenthood on El Camino Real, which is technically just one block outside the city limits. (Toledo, 5/3)

The Desert Sun: Abortion Supporters Protest Supreme Court Draft Opinion In Palm Springs
Roughly 50 people gathered in front of Palm Springs City Hall on Tuesday to protest the potential rollback of abortion rights following the leak of a Supreme Court draft opinion that indicates justices are preparing to overturn Roe v. Wade. The rally, which was organized by the activist group Courageous Resistance of the Desert, was one of several held across the country Tuesday in response to the leaked opinion that indicated a majority of the court's nine justices plans to overturn the landmark 1973 ruling that stopped state governments from banning abortion. (Coulter, 5/3)

The (Santa Rosa) Press Democrat: Protests Across Sonoma County Focus On Supreme Court’s Draft Opinion To Overturn Roe V. Wade
If the U.S. Supreme Court does overturn Roe v. Wade and allows individual states to set their own right-to-life laws, abortion would likely remain legal in California. But the impact would still roil the state. California could see a 3,000% increase in the number of women coming to the state to seek an abortion, which could overwhelm the state’s reproductive health care system, according to a study by the Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy organization with offices in Washington, D.C., and New York that is committed to advancing international sexual and reproductive health and rights. (Minkler, 5/3)

The (Santa Rosa) Press Democrat: Protesters Rally In Santa Rosa Against Possible Anti-Abortion Court Decision
Pro-choice Sonoma County residents joined others nationwide on Tuesday to demonstrate their objections to a leaked draft of a possible U.S. Supreme Court decision that would overturn Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion. The 5 p.m. rally of about 150 people at Santa Rosa’s Courthouse Square consisted of people holding up homemade and printed signs with messages like “If abortion access disappears, women will die” and “Listen!! My Body, My Choice” as drivers going on 3rd Street honked in support. (Coates, 5/3)

San Francisco Chronicle: Apparent Anti-Abortion Activist Arrested After Climbing San Francisco’s Salesforce Tower
A man who scaled the 60-story Salesforce Tower in San Francisco was arrested Tuesday morning, according to the San Francisco Police Department. Officers were flagged down on the 400 block of Mission at 9:21 a.m. and spotted the man on the side of the building attempting an ascent under his own power. The streets were sealed off as officers attempted to make contact with the man in order to remove him safely from the building. Medics were summoned to the scene. (Whiting, 5/3)

California Healthline: On The Steps Of The Supreme Court, Tears And Glee, Bitterness And Smiles
In the nation’s capital, abortion activists and lawmakers weigh in on the leaked ‘Roe v. Wade’ draft court opinion. (Knight and Norman, 5/3)

Sacramento Bee: Report Card: Sacramento County ‘B’ Grade On COVID Spending
Sacramento County received an overall B grade for its handling of the latest round of federal COVID-19 relief funding, but got poor marks for its slow distribution of money and its limited efforts to promote racial equity. It’s one of 11 county score cards the California Pan-Ethnic Health Network will release in an official report Thursday on how officials spent American Rescue Plan Act dollars. The statewide advocacy group reviewed four main criteria, including how well county officials engaged community members and whether financial records were accessible online.Each county reviewed received more than $100 million in federal pandemic recovery funding, with Sacramento County receiving more than $301 million. (Yoon-Hendricks, 5/3)

VC Star: Ventura County's COVID Cases Keep Rising, Hospitalizations Stay Low
Ventura County's COVID-19 case rate has nearly doubled in less than two weeks but severe illnesses and hospitalizations remain low, a sign the surge remains manageable, a public health official said. State data released Tuesday show 9.7 infections per 100,000 people in the county, compared with a rate of 5.1 cases reported on April 22. The case rate is calculated on an eight-day lag. A USA Today Network analysis showed 636 cases reported in the week ending Sunday, a jump of nearly 50% over the previous week and mimicking a rise being seen across the nation. (Kisken, 5/3)

The Desert Sun: Coachella Valley Cases Up 41% As Music Festival Season Ends
Music festival season has wrapped up in the Coachella Valley, and along with the grass at the Empire Polo Club being trampled, another significant impact to the area seems to be an increase in COVID-19 cases. Thousands of festivalgoers came to the area for the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival and Stagecoach country music festival throughout the month of April. COVID-19 cases have been gradually increasing in the area since the first weekend of the festivals, which took place April 15 through 17. (Sasic, 5/3)

Los Angeles Times: California Controller Betty Yee Pushed For A COVID Mask Deal 
In the frantic first weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, three companies promised California officials that they could secure millions of protective masks in exchange for $1.6 billion in no-bid government contracts. Each effort ended badly for the state. Two years later, lawsuits stemming from the failed contracts provide a glimpse into the dealmaking — including how California Controller Betty Yee, a two-term Democrat with no formal role in the contracting process, worked behind the scenes to help a pair of political operatives land a deal that turned out to be one of the state’s most flawed. (Gutierrez, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: COVID In California: UCSF’s Dr. Bob Wachter Says He’s Masking Up Again
Dr. Bob Wachter, UCSF chair of medicine and a prominent voice on pandemic issues, said Monday he is resuming rigorous masking as coronavirus cases spike in San Francisco. He said the city’s asymptomatic test positive rate, a reliable proxy for community prevalence given the downturn in citywide testing, shows cases are surging. About 1 in 30 San Franciscans may have COVID-19 without knowing it, he said. “If you’ve decided you’re OK getting COVID ... then fine to keep mask off in crowded indoor spaces,” he tweeted. “If you’d prefer to avoid COVID & have become less cautious, it’s time to re-think.” Wachter cited his concerns about long COVID and other virus-related risks (”heart/neuro/diabetes”). For masking: “I’ll now do 100% N95 in crowded indoor spaces.” People should keep their “eyes open” because “there’s a lot of COVID out there,” he warned. (Vaziri, Beamish and Ho, 5/3)

Los Angeles Daily News: LA County’s Ferrer Warns Of New – Potentially More Dangerous – COVID Variants
The average number of daily new COVID-19 infections in Los Angeles County has jumped by about 200% over the past month, but while the increase hasn’t translated to rises in local hospitalizations or deaths, the public health director warned on Tuesday, May 3, that rapid spread of the virus is leading to more rapid emergence of new and potentially more dangerous variants. Speaking to the Board of Supervisors, county Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said the emergence of variants is becoming more frequent, with new COVID mutations being detected around the globe. (5/3)

Los Angeles Times: BA.4, BA.5 Coronavirus Variants Reinfecting Omicron Survivors 
A pair of new Omicron subvariants has emerged, raising the possibility that survivors of earlier Omicron strains can get reinfected. BA.4 and BA.5 have gained increasing attention in South Africa as weekly coronavirus cases tripled in the last two weeks, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. (Lin II and Money, 5/3)

Bay Area News Group: Oakland Drops Rule To Show Proof Of Vaccine Indoors
Weeks after many other cities and counties across California had already done so, the Oakland City Council decided Tuesday to stop requiring people to show proof they’re fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or provide negative test results to enter most indoor public settings. The council voted to modify an ordinance it adopted earlier this year that made indoor restaurants, gyms, recreation centers, fitness centers, concert venues, museums, assisted living homes and senior centers off-limits without the necessary proof or test results. The mandate now applies only to assisted living centers and senior centers. (Sciacca, 5/3)

The Guardian: ‘A Longstanding Crisis’: California Workers Fight To Reform Nursing Homes
Now the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 2015, which represents 400,000 nursing home and home care workers in California, the largest long-term care union in the US, is advocating for a proposal to create a statewide Quality Standards Board to oversee the state’s nursing home industry in the wake of the pandemic that has decimated staffing in the industry. The board would include 16 seats, with 10 seats from state agencies, two workers, two seats representing advocates and families, and two representing employers. The board will have authority to set minimum standards for wages, benefits and working conditions for the nursing home industry in California. (Sainato, 5/4)

KBAK-TV: Lawmakers In 19 States Want Legal Refuge For Trans Youth
Democratic lawmakers in more than a dozen states are following California’s lead in seeking to offer legal refuge to displaced transgender youth and their families. The coordinated effort being announced Tuesday by the LGBTQ Victory Institute and other advocates comes in response to recent actions taken in conservative states. (Ramer, 5/3)

The Desert Sun: California Expands Medi-Cal Services To Undocumented Seniors
California on Sunday became the first state in the nation to expand full-scope Medicaid eligibility to undocumented low-income adults that are 50 years of age or older. The expansion builds upon the state’s Healthy California for All strategy, and follows a proposal from Gov. Gavin Newsom to offer access to Medi-Cal to every state resident, regardless of age or immigration status. (Perez, 5/3)

Los Angeles Times: L.A. Supervisors Vote To Create Super Agency On Homelessness 
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to create a new office or department that would coordinate the county’s response to the homelessness crisis in the region. The new entity would have authority over various agencies — including the county’s departments of health services, social services and mental health — and would report directly to the Board of Supervisors. (Vives, 5/4)

San Diego Union-Tribune: San Diego Council Members Propose New Effort To Force People Into Treatment
Two San Diego City Council members are proposing a new city attorney unit that could place more homeless people into conservatorship or programs to treat mental illness or addictions. Council members Jennifer Campbell and Marni von Wilpert on Tuesday said they will ask for an additional $500,000 in the city’s 2022-23 fiscal year budget to fund the Conservatorship and Treatment Unit, which would consist of two deputy city attorneys and one newly hired “person-centered treatment coordinator.” (Warth, 5/4)

Los Angeles Times: Group Shelters Don't Appeal To Many L.A. Homeless People, Study Says 
The Los Angeles mayoral primary has seen candidates throwing big numbers around concerning how much shelter they’d like to see built for homeless people. Rick Caruso wants 30,000 new beds in his first year in office, Rep. Karen Bass says 15,000 new beds in hers and Councilman Joe Buscaino wants 9,000 new beds within 36 months, to name a few of the candidates’ publicized ideas. (Oreskes and Smith, 5/4)

CalMatters: California Housing: Bad Conditions In L.A. Apartment Complex 
Mold, spilled raw sewage, inoperable smoke detectors: these are just a few of the things tenants put up with in recent weeks at Chesapeake Apartments, a massive apartment complex in South Los Angeles. (Tobias, 5/3)

Napa Valley Register: Are There Microplastics In The Napa River? According To Experts, Probably
Plastic seems to be everywhere nowadays, and based on existing research on the greater San Francisco Bay, it is highly likely that the Napa River and its watershed are filled with it, too. “I don’t think most people realize how insidious plastics are,” said Chris Malan, executive director of ICARE, a Napa nonprofit that stands for the Institute for Conservation Advocacy Research and Education. “It is such a huge part of everybody's daily lives, and we don't give it a second thought.” (Jones, 5/4)

California Healthline: Even When IVF Is Covered By Insurance, High Bills And Hassles Abound
Only 15 states require insurance to cover in vitro fertilization, a common path to parenthood for people who have trouble getting pregnant. And even for those whose insurance covers IVF, the expensive procedures and required drugs can lead to unexpected bills. (Galewitz, 5/4)