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For Immediate Release
June, 09 2020, 12:00am EDT
Tuesday June, 09 2020, 12:00am EDT
Contact:
Alexandra Nagy, (818) 633-0865, anagy@fwwatch.org
Exposed: 3,000% Increase in Aliso Canyon Use Under Gov. Newsom - Despite His Promises for "Expedited" Shut Down
“If Governor Newsom truly prioritized health, safety and our environment, he would reverse course immediately and begin the expedited shutdown of this dangerous, polluting facility.”
WASHINGTON
WASHINGTON - Food & Water Action has analysed data compiled over the last four years and found that the use of the infamous SoCalGas Aliso Canyon gas storage facility - home to the largest gas blowout in U.S. history - has increased by about 3,000% under Governor Gavin Newsom's administration. This comes despite Newsom's repeated pledges to expedite the shutdown of the facility.
In contradiction to downward shifts in natural gas use, mild winters with low peak demand, and excess pipeline capacity, data shows that SoCalGas withdrew from Aliso Canyon on 56 days over the winter 2019-2020 season, and 38 days over the winter 2018-2019 season, representing a combined total of 34.668 billion cubic feet (Bcf). This compares to nine days of withdrawals for winter seasons 2016-2017 and 2017-2018, for a combined 1.190 Bcf.
"It seems clear that Governor Newsom is prioritizing SoCalGas profits over public health and safety, plain and simple," said Alexandra Nagy, California Director of Food & Water Action. "After the worst gas blowout in this country's history, Newsom granted SoCalGas's wish to bring Aliso Canyon back to normal use - and much more - despite any logical need for it. Independent studies, including one commissioned by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, show that Aliso Canyon is not necessary for energy reliability and can be shut down immediately."
"If Governor Newsom truly prioritized health, safety and our environment, he would reverse course immediately and begin the expedited shutdown of this dangerous, polluting facility," Nagy continued.
Drastically increased usage of Aliso Canyon is a direct result of the California Public Utilities Commission's (CPUC) weakening of the Aliso Canyon withdrawal protocols, regulations that previously mandated Aliso Canyon as an asset of last resort to meet energy demand under emergency conditions only. Under the new withdrawal protocols, Newsom's CPUC removed the "last resort" and "emergency" restrictions to use Aliso Canyon, essentially giving SoCalGas unrestricted access to withdraw from the facility as the company sees fit. As a result, the data shows that in addition to a huge increase in volume withdrawn form Aliso Canyon, the facility is often utilized as an asset of first resort, supplying more than half of the total gas withdrawn regionally on any given day.
On June 1st Food & Water Action sent a letter to Governor Newsom, signed by 33 organizations, detailing the failure of Newsom's administration to hold SoCalGas accountable on Aliso Canyon. It cites the letter Governor Newsom wrote last November to the CPUC directing the agency to study the "expedited" shut down of Aliso Canyon, indicating an interest in a faster shut down timeline than Governor Brown's previous 10 year shutdown directive. Food & Water Action along with thirty-two organizations call on Governor Newsom to define "expedited" by issuing an Executive Order by the end of 2020 for a one-year timeline for the shutdown of Aliso Canyon. Organizations also urge Newsom to reverse the withdrawal protocols making Aliso Canyon an asset of first resort, back to an asset of last resort.
The community surrounding this noxious facility repeatedly flocks to social media to report increases in bloody noses, dizziness, rashes, itchy skin, nosebleeds, heart palpitations, headaches, migraines, nausea and an increase in sulfur odors in their neighborhoods during withdrawal periods at Aliso Canyon, showing a direct relationship between the increase use of this facility and increase public health problems.
Food & Water Watch mobilizes regular people to build political power to move bold and uncompromised solutions to the most pressing food, water, and climate problems of our time. We work to protect people's health, communities, and democracy from the growing destructive power of the most powerful economic interests.
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Big Business Rejoices as Trump Scraps Biden Order Combating 'Excessive Concentration of Industry'
One critic called the president's move a "signal to monopolists that they have a clear path."
Aug 15, 2025
US President Donald Trump continued taking a hatchet to his predecessor's antitrust legacy this week by rolling back an executive order that affirmed the federal government's responsibility to "enforce the antitrust laws to combat the excessive concentration of industry, the abuses of market power, and the harmful effects of monopoly and monopsony."
Trump's revocation of former President Joe Biden's 2021 order drew enthusiastic applause from the largest corporate lobbying organization in the United States.
Sean Heather, the US Chamber of Commerce's senior vice president for antitrust, declared that by repealing the Biden order—which was titled "Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy"—Trump "has rightfully chosen vigorous competition that entrusts American consumers to pick winners and losers in the marketplace, not more government bureaucracy."
One anti-monopoly advocate, Matt Stoller of the American Economic Liberties Project, mockingly congratulated Trump for "securing the approval of the US Chamber of Commerce in repealing Biden's executive order saying competition is good."
The American Prospect's David Dayen called the president's move a "signal to monopolists that they have a clear path."
The president's decision was also welcomed by officials within the Trump administration who are tasked with enforcing the nation's antitrust laws, including Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Andrew Ferguson and the head of the Justice Department's Antitrust Division, Gail Slater.
Ferguson claimed in a statement Thursday that the Biden order reflected the previous administration's "undue hostility toward mergers and acquisitions"—an assertion that Open Markets Institute legal director Sandeep Vaheesan refuted in a social media post, citing recent trends in merger enforcement actions.
Andrew Ferguson's claims re Biden admin are disconnected from the truth
- "Top-down competition regulations" were agencies reviving dormant statutory powers granted by Congress
- "Undue hostility toward M&A" is just not reflected in numbers on mergers and enforcement activity https://t.co/eHFyBm9tVk pic.twitter.com/PvCcsmvV8q
— Sandeep Vaheesan (@sandeepvaheesan) August 14, 2025
Biden administration antitrust officials—principally former FTC Chair Lina Khan and former DOJ Antitrust Division head Jonathan Kanter—drew praise across the political spectrum for combating corporate abuses and unlawful consolidation.
But during the first six months of his second term, Trump and his handpicked agency heads have settled or dropped key merger challenges brought by the Biden administration, ceding repeatedly to well-connected corporate lobbyists and allowing giant companies such as UnitedHealth to continue absorbing their competitors.
According to a newly updated tally by the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, Trump administration agencies have thus far dropped enforcement actions against at least 165 companies.
"Pro-monopoly and pro-concentration of corporate power and control. Those are the policies the Trump admin has espoused in firing fair competition enforcers and revoking an executive order to revitalize fair competition across markets," the Open Markets Institute said Thursday. "And prices are still sky high. No surprise."
'We Are Fighting to Stop It': DC Attorney General Sues to Block Trump Takeover of City Police
"The administration is abusing its limited, temporary authority under the Home Rule Act, infringing on the district's right to self-governance," said the Washington, DC attorney general.
Aug 15, 2025
Washington, DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb on Friday filed a lawsuit to block United States Attorney General Pam Bondi from taking over the US capital city's police department.
The lawsuit accused the Trump administration of violating the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, a 1973 law that delegated certain powers over the city once held by the federal government to local government officials.
Schwalb argued in the lawsuit that the Home Rule Act gives the president of the United States a very limited set of powers over the governance of the city's police force, as it states that the president may commandeer the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) if he "determines that special conditions of an emergency nature exist" that require the MPD to help fulfill "federal purposes."
Schwalb further noted that the timeframe for this authority is extremely limited. In all, the president can take command of MPD for just 48 hours unless he sends proper notice to the US Congress, after which he will have command over it for a maximum of 30 days.
"For the president to obtain MPD's services for longer than 30 days—even in the face of an ongoing emergency—Congress must pass a joint resolution permitting the extension," Schwalb argued.
The DC attorney general then poked holes in Trump's claims that a federal takeover of MPD was necessary due to a crime emergency.
"The president did not identify any new or unusual exigency that justified the invocation of [emergency powers]," Schwalb alleged. "Instead, he claimed that violent crime in the district is 'increasing,' when, in fact, it has fallen 26% since 2024. The president also did not limit the scope of his order to specific 'federal purposes,' instead directing the mayor to provide any services the attorney general deemed necessary to 'maintain law and order in the Nation's seat of Government.'"
Schwalb also claimed that the Trump administration flatly broke the law when it appointed Terrance Cole, the current administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), to serve as MPD's "interim commissioner." He said that this action would greatly harm MPD's ability to enforce the law and maintain public safety.
"Imposing a new command structure 'effective immediately' will wreak operational havoc within MPD," he wrote. "The new command structure will create confusion for MPD personnel, who are required under district law to respect and obey the chief of police as the head and chief of the police force."
He emphasized that "this will also inevitably lead to delays and confusion as MPD personnel... are forced to run their directives by an 'Emergency Commissioner' who is unfamiliar with MPD procedures and the local communities MPD serves," before warning that "there is no greater risk to public safety in a large, professional police force like MPD than to not know who is in command."
Schwalb concluded his complaint by asking the court to vacate Bondi's order of the federal takeover of MPD, and also to permanently block DEA Administrator Cole from assuming "any position of command" within the department.
In a statement separate from the lawsuit itself, Schwalb charged that "the administration's unlawful actions are an affront to the dignity and autonomy of the 700,000 Americans who call DC home" and "this is the gravest threat to home rule that the district has ever faced, and we are fighting to stop it."
"By declaring a hostile takeover of MPD," said Schwalb, "the administration is abusing its limited, temporary authority under the Home Rule Act, infringing on the district's right to self-governance and putting the safety of DC residents and visitors at risk."
Plastics Treaty Talks End in 'Abject Failure' as US, Other Big Oil Allies Sabotage Progress
"The vast majority of governments want a strong agreement, yet a handful of bad actors were allowed to use process to drive such ambition into the ground," said one environmentalist.
Aug 15, 2025
Negotiators in Geneva adjourned what was expected to be the final round of plastics treaty negotiations on Friday without reaching an agreement, a failure that environmentalists blamed on the Trump-led United States, Saudi Arabia, and other powerful nations that opposed any effort to curb plastic production—the primary driver of a worsening global pollution crisis.
The Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC) on Plastic Pollution agreed after 10 days of talks to resume negotiations at a yet-to-be-announced future date. Lobbyists from the fossil fuel industry swarmed the negotiations, working successfully to prevent a binding deal to slash plastic production. More than 99% of plastics are made from fossil fuel chemicals.
"The inability to reach an agreement in Geneva must be a wake-up call for the world: ending plastic pollution means confronting fossil fuel interests head-on," said Graham Forbes, Greenpeace USA's Global Plastics Campaign lead. "The vast majority of governments want a strong agreement, yet a handful of bad actors were allowed to use process to drive such ambition into the ground. We cannot continue to do the same thing and expect a different result. The time for hesitation is over."
The high-stakes talks marked the sixth time international negotiators have convened in an effort to craft a plastics treaty as production continues to grow and toxic pollution damages oceans, waterways, and communities across the globe. Talks in December similarly concluded without a deal.
The latest round of negotiations faltered after nations refused to rally around a pair of draft treaty documents—but for different reasons.
Supporters of a strong agreement—including Fiji, France, and Panama—objected to the exclusion of any binding plastic production cuts in the drafts, while the US, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and others balked at the scope of the proposals and argued any treaty should focus primarily on waste management.
The proposal unveiled Friday in a last-ditch attempt to reach consensus acknowledged that "current levels of production and consumption of plastics are unsustainable" but did not include any binding limits.
Under the current process, every nation must agree on a proposal's inclusion in treaty text.
Countries that want a treaty must now leave this process and form a treaty of the willing. And that process must include options for voting that deny the tyranny of consensus we have watched play out here.
Agnès Pannier-Runacher, France's minister of ecological transition, didn't attempt to hide her fury at the outcome of the latest round of talks, calling out the "handful of countries" that "blocked the adoption of an ambitious treaty against plastic pollution" because they were "guided by short-term financial interests rather than the health of their populations and the sustainability of their economies."
"The scientific and medical evidence is overwhelming: plastic kills. It poisons our oceans, our soils, and ultimately, it contaminates our bodies," said Pannier-Runacher. "I am angry because France, together with the European Union and a coalition of more than 100 countries from every continent—developed and developing, determined and ambitious—did everything possible to obtain an agreement that meets the urgency of the moment: to reduce plastic production, ban the most dangerous products, and finally protect the health of our populations."
David Azoulay, who led the delegation for the Center for International Environmental Law in Geneva, called the talks "an abject failure" and warned that any future negotiations will end similarly "if the process does not change."
"We need a restart, not a repeat performance," said Azoulay. "Countries that want a treaty must now leave this process and form a treaty of the willing. And that process must include options for voting that deny the tyranny of consensus we have watched play out here."
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