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Angelides tells his supporters to ignore polls Insisting he was "undaunted and unbowed" two days before an election he is widely expected to lose, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides dashed from one end of the state to the other on Sunday, hoping to spark the surge of momentum that has eluded him throughout his campaign. "I want you to ignore what the polls say," Angelides told about 100 union workers at a labor hall in Burlingame Sunday afternoon. "Arnold Schwarzenegger thinks he's got this thing locked away." Afterward, he added, "I think you're going to see a big surprise." Schwarzenegger...

A judge refused Thursday to halt the state's impending plan to begin shipping inmates to out-of-state prisons to relieve an overcrowding crisis in the California corrections agency. Sacramento Superior Court Judge Patrick Marlette said he saw no evidence that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's plan to ship out the prisoners to private facilities in four other states would result in any immediate, irreparable harm to the plaintiffs in the case, the California Correctional Peace Officers Association and the Service Employees International Union Local 1000. Marlette set a Nov. 22 court date to resolve the merits of the suit.

The Schwarzenegger campaign circulated a letter today from Joe Weider, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's longtime patron and friend (see photo), who recently appeared with the governor at a bodybuilding contest at Muscle Beach in Venice. The campaign is rounding up support for the governor after state Treasuter Phil Angelides said he once defended the apartheid regime in South Africa. Weider wrote today: "In 1975, during the height of apartheid in South Africa, the country wanted to host the Mr. Olympia competition and the world amateur bodybuilding competition. Participants from 60 countries were set to compete. "Arnold Schwarzenegger was so opposed to...

Governor Schwarzenegger today announced that he has signed legislation that will benefit California veterans, military personnel and their families. "Our brave men and women in the military and our veterans are incredible and we owe them our deepest gratitude for taking extraordinary risks and making tremendous sacrifices in defense of freedom and democracy," said Governor Schwarzenegger. “This legislation will provide important benefits for California’s veterans and military personnel.” Specifically, Gov. Schwarzenegger signed the following bills: Assembly Bill 2884 by Assemblymember Baca (D- Rialto) makes the California Military & Veterans Code consistent with federal law with respect to health care coverage...

The governor takes a commanding lead, with many Democrats and independents saying they support him. A key issue is leadership skill. Just over five weeks before election day, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger holds a commanding lead over his Democratic challenger, state Treasurer Phil Angelides, who has built scant support beyond a core base of liberals, according to a new Los Angeles Times Poll. If the Nov. 7 election were held today, likely voters would favor the Republican governor over Angelides 50% to 33%. The survey found an abundance of grim signs for Angelides, including a failure to match Schwarzenegger's success in...

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept 29 (Reuters) - California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill on Friday that would have required retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) to prepare reports for local officials on the effect of proposed superstores on existing retailers in the same market. A number of local California officials have sought to block the expansion of the world's largest retailer in the state and some lawmakers have sought to help with state legislation aimed at the company. California's celebrity Republican governor said he vetoed the bill because it "effectively sends a message to retailers and...

NWN has learned that the Phil Angelides for Governor campaign has sent a letter to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger demanding that he release all those audio tapes on the Governor’s Office computer system by October 4th. Or else, they will. You’ll recall the infamous backfiring tape flap earlier in the month. Using a cyber trick that Democratic spinners couldn’t explain for an agonizing period of time, Angelides opposition researchers surreptitiously came up with a tape of a private Schwarzenegger discussion with top staffers in which he mused about ethnology. Which they then leaked to the Los Angeles Times, which promptly slapped...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has a commanding 17-point lead over Democratic rival Phil Angelides with just six weeks to go until the November 7 election, according to a just released Public Policy Institute of California poll. Forty-eight percent of likely voters support the Republican governor, with just 31 percent saying they would vote for Angelides, who is currently the state treasurer.

As the candidate fights to clarify his message, donations fall short. Unions may decide to spend their campaign money elsewhere. With just over six weeks left in the race for governor, the troubles facing Democrat Phil Angelides have intensified, and his political allies are expressing rising concern over his campaign's failure to gain momentum. Hindering his drive to oust Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger are Angelides' slow pace in raising money, his tepid support from organized labor and his difficulty defining himself clearly for voters, Democratic strategists say.

In his bid for re-election as governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger has a comfortable lead over Democratic challenger and state Treasurer Phil Angelides among the state's "high propensity" voters, according to a report released on Tuesday. These voters also back two of four general obligation bond measures that lawmakers put on the November 7 ballot that seek billions of dollars in debt issuance for public works. The celebrity governor, a Republican, has the support of 53.6 percent of high-propensity voters, compared with 31.4 percent backing Angelides. Another 11.4 percent of these voters favor other candidates and 3.6 percent are undecided,...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed legislation Wednesday that proposed an instant fix for students failing to meet California's standard for proficiency: redefine proficiency. Schwarzenegger concluded that changing a few words won't solve academic woes. "Redefining the level of academic achievement necessary to designate students as 'proficient' does not make the students proficient," his veto message said. Assemblywoman Loni Hancock, D-Berkeley, called the governor's veto of her Assembly Bill 2975 a "missed opportunity" that ultimately will hurt students. "Schools will be labeled as failing schools even if they are making progress and improving their test scores," she said. AB 2975 argued that...

SACRAMENTO Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill Wednesday that would have barred textbooks from using language that would be discriminatory to gays, saying the state's education laws already prevent discrimination. The bill's author, state Sen. Sheila Kuehl, called the veto "inexplicable." Kuehl's bill initially would have required California's social science textbooks to include the historical contributions of homosexuals, but the state Assembly amended it at her request in an effort to avoid a veto from the Republican governor. The final version of SB 1437 would have prohibited any negative portrayal of homosexuals in textbooks and other instructional material, expanding current...

Schwarzenegger Squashes Religious Freedom Thomasson: “Arnold Schwarzenegger has two faces. He speaks at churches and says he believes in religious freedom and family values, yet he’s stabbing pro-family Californians in the back.” Sacramento, California – Campaign for Children and Families is shocked and dismayed that California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed SB 1441 (Kuehl). Today’s disastrous action by Schwarzenegger means Christian and other faith-based colleges in California will be forced to promote transsexuality, bisexuality, and homosexuality if they accept students with Cal Grants. “People of conscience are appalled that Arnold Schwarzenegger has trampled religious freedom to satisfy hyperactive sexual activists,”...

SAN FRANCISCO - Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides said Friday that if he unseats Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in November he would sign a bill legalizing gay marriage in California. Angelides talked about the issue the day after New York's high court upheld that state's one-man, one-woman marriage laws and as a California appeals court prepared to consider whether a trial judge erred in declaring the state's marriage laws unconstitutional. "I would sign the marriage equality bill because I believe if we can get behind people to build a lasting relationship, that is a good thing," Angelides said at a news...

Incumbent Arnold Schwarzenegger is the top contender in California’s gubernatorial race, according to the latest poll by Zogby Interactive. 49 per cent of respondents in the Golden State would vote for Schwarzenegger, while 41 per cent would support Democrat Phil Angelides.

The spending plan is the first completed on time in six years. Criticism of his trimming was muted as Democrats got most of what they had sought. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the state's first on-time budget in six years Friday, after using his veto power to scale back the expansion of environmental enforcement and healthcare programs approved by the Legislature earlier this week. The $131-billion spending plan signed by the governor will use a surge of unanticipated revenue that filled California's coffers this year to pay back billions the state borrowed from schools in recent years as well as to...

Governor Schwarzenegger is in San Diego Thursday, encouraging people to vote for Jessica's Law, which would strengthen punishments for sexual predators. If passed, Jessica's Law would be the toughest sex-predator law in the country.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides said Thursday he would consider using tax breaks to stop Hollywood jobs from fleeing California, even at a time when he has warned of looming budget problems and what he calls unjustified corporate tax loopholes. Angelides, the state treasurer, also accused Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of doing "zero, zip" to slow the exodus of entertainment jobs to other states and around the globe. The Republican governor, a former film star, "talks, he's a showman," Angelides said in an interview with The Associated Press. "This is an area where you would think that this governor, in his...

One of the most promising developments early on in the Schwarzenegger administration was the new governor's willingness to tackle the issue of prison reform – especially in the wake of Gov. Gray Davis' administration, which acted like a wholly owned subsidiary of the ham-fisted state prison guards union. The prison guards, which pumped enormous contributions into Gov. Davis' campaign, received oversized pay hikes and were given undue power over the correctional system, where a code of silence among guards made it impossible to root out abuse and corruption. Under Gov. Schwarzenegger, the state proposed wide-ranging and sensible reforms. But as...

Build highways, freeways and mass transit, he said, "so you don't get stuck in traffic all the time." Expand universities, build new classrooms and modernize old ones "so that our kids have the best place to go." Strengthen the state's levee system "to protect the people of California from a major disaster." But in his stem-winder on the banks of the Sacramento River, the governor mentioned nothing about the housing bond, a key component that helped him win votes from Democratic legislators for the bond package he has touted as a bipartisan triumph. Housing bond supporters such as Assembly Speaker...