A News Café endorses incumbent Mary Rickert for Shasta County District 3 Supervisor.
Farewell MAGA! Adios Los Tres Pendejos! The 2024 Presidential Election is at hand and we have a few October surprises up our sleeves! This guide has been prepared at the last minute specifically for last minute voters who haven’t made up their minds, presuming such creatures still exist. There’s no time to waste, so let’s get started!
For the uninitiated, MAGA refers to former president Donald Trump and his openly fascist “make America great again” movement that aims to take the United States back to 1798 so the convicted felon can charge his critics with violating the Sedition Act and have them jailed or executed. That’s not hyperbole. Trump’s been literally saying that at his increasingly unhinged and under-attended rallies, including last Sunday’s racist fiasco at Madison Square Garden.
Los Tres Pendejos refers to the Shasta County Board of Supervisors’ current MAGA-board majority, comprised of District 1 Supervisor Kevin Crye, District 4 Supervisor Patrick Jones and District 5 Supervisor Chris Kelstrom. For the past two years they’ve made national news for destroying Shasta County’s public services one department at a time, relentlessly gnawing away at the Registrar of Voters and the Department of Health and Human Services resulting in a mass exodus of administrators and employees through resignations , early retirements and dismissals.
The common theme here, as fresh-out-of-prison Trump advisor Steve Bannon likes to say, is the destruction of the modern administrative state and the services it provides to the public. Los Tres Pendejos have done their fair share of the destruction. The trio have surrounded themselves with yes-men, including County CEO David Rickert and County Counsel Joe Larmour, to provide cover for their continued dismantling of Shasta County government institutions.
Breaking up this gang of vindictive self-serving authoritarians is imperative if Shasta County as we know it is to survive beyond this election. It’s not a hopeless cause. Local voters have already signaled they’ve had enough of Los Tres Pendejos’ destructive actions by voting 60 percent to 40 percent to replace rightwing firebrand Jones with the relatively moderate Bethel Church attendee Matt Plummer in the March primary.
District 4 Supervisor Patrick Jones leaves office Dec. 31.
Another nonpartisan moderate, Allen Long, a retired RPD detective, won the run-off for the District 2 supervisor seat in the March primary by winning more than 50 percent of the vote against two MAGA candidates, election denier Laura Hobbs and Simpson University professor Dan Sloan, each of whom gained slightly less than 20 percent of the vote.
The March primary set up a showdown between incumbent District 3 Supervisor Mary Rickert and local businessman Corkey Harmon for the District 3 seat. Both candidates in the nonpartisan race are Republicans; Rickert is what was known as a mainstream conservative Republican before Trump seized control of the party in 2015. Now, in the eyes of our local Trumpers, she’s a Republican in Name Only, a RINO.
Harmon owns three construction-related Shasta County businesses, Stimpel Wiebelhaus and White Rock Trucking and Mountain Gate Quarry . Despite Harmon’s association with the Red, White and Blueprint movement co-founded by his good friend and neighbor Carlos Zapata, Harmon remains something of an enigma politically.
As A News Café has reported, Los Tres Pendejos have been openly grooming Harmon from the dais and on the campaign trail, but it’s fair to ask who’s grooming whom? The naïve MAGA board ideologues or the gravely voiced quarry owner and road-building contractor who’s been cutting deals in Shasta County for three decades?
At stake is the MAGA board majority’s hold on Shasta County. If Rickert defends her seat and wins a third term, she, Plummer and Long will form a 3-2 moderate majority against Crye and Kelstrom, breaking MAGA’s grip.
That’s why Rickert’s race against Harmon for the District 3 seat is the most important contest on the ballot—but you only get to vote if you live in District 3: east Redding, Palo Cedro, Millville, Bella Vista, Oak Run, Whitmore, Round Mountain, Montgomery Creek, Hat Creek, Cassel, Burney, Fall River Mills, Big Bend, McArthur and Pitville.
A News Café endorses Rickert for the Shasta County Supervisor District 3 seat, for reasons that will be explained in greater detail below. Long story short, voting for Mary Rickert and upending the board’s MAGA majority is too important to take a chance on by voting for the wildcard Corkey Harmon.
A Minor Detour into Public Education
When the term “moderate” is used in this last minute guide, it refers to what used to be known as moderate Republicans or centrist Democrats, the cozy middle where the majority used to get along together. That’s gone up in smoke now that Trump has taken over the Republican Party, including right here in Shasta County, where religious fanatics are taking over seats one-by-one on the Shasta County Republican Central Committee.
SCRCC member and Shasta County Board of Education trustee Authur Gorman is a prime example. A self-proclaimed Christian nationalist and member of Moms for Liberty Shasta County, Gorman is at the forefront of the local “parental rights” movement. This profoundly anti-LGBTQ, anti-DEI book-banning faction believes it knows what’s better for your children than you, school administrators, teachers and other trained professionals. Like their MAGA board cohorts, their goal is to destroy secular institutions, in this case public education.
No fewer than four parental rights candidates are following Gorman’s lead by running for Shasta County Board of Education seats this election: Rich Gallardo, Jackie LaBarbera, Teresa Roberts and Michele Dyson. Gallardo’s erratic gun-toting behavior is well known in Shasta County. As the current president of the Anderson Union High School District board of trustees, LaBarbera has already demonstrated how divisive and destructive the Moms for Liberty ideology can be. News Café strongly advises voting against all four of these candidates .
News Café endorses Michael Orlicky for the Shasta County Board of Education Area 1 seat, incumbent Cindy Vogt for the 2-year Area 2 board seat, and Jessica French and incumbent Amy Cavalleri for the two four-year term board seats in Area 2.
Michael Orlicky
Cindy Vogt
Amy Cavalleri
While we’re still on the subject of education, in previous weeks, A News Café covered every school board race in Shasta County to provide information to voters on these often-overlooked contests. Follow the link to your district: Gateway Unified School District , Fall River Joint Unified School District , Anderson Union High School District, Cottonwood Union School District and Grant Elementary School District and Cascade Union Elementary School District, Enterprise Elementary School District, Happy Valley Union School District and Junction School District .
While A News Café didn’t endorse candidates in the above articles, we’re happy to report that unlike the Shasta County Board of Education, there was not a concerted effort by parental rights candidates to seize control of individual school districts this election. In fact in many open races, incumbents went unchallenged, providing continuity appreciated by administrators who have little time for grandstanding trustees such as Gorman and Labarbera.
We believe that next to the District 3 Supervisor race, the Shasta County Board of Education races are the most important local contests on the ballot. The choice is simple. If you don’t want to break the Shasta County Office of Education, vote Michael Orlicky for the SCOE Area 1 seat, incumbent Cindy Vogt for the 2-year SCOE Area 2 board seat, and Jessica French and incumbent Amy Cavalleri for the two full term SCOE seats in Area 2.
Former President Trump wearing the Proud Boy colors at Madison Square Garden hate fest.
Back to the Top
Now back to your last-minute ballot. At the top you’ll find Trump and Sen. JD Vance cresting a list of presidential challengers that includes Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz, the Peace and Freedom Party’s Claudia De La Cruz and Karina Garcia, the Green Party’s Jill Stein and Rudolph Ware and him and behold fresh off yet another extramarital affair Robert F. Kennedy Jr., still on the ballot even though the noted roadkill enthusiast withdrew from his campaign and threw his support behind Trump months ago.
A News Café understands the futility of endorsing anyone but Trump in Shasta County. We live in hardcore Trump Country; the dark side of the force is strong here, Luke. In Shasta County, Trump beat Hillary Clinton 64 percent to 28 percent in 2016. Trump beat Biden 65 percent to 32 percent in 2020. Those are the kind of numbers that make you thankful voter turnout is low. What if two-thirds of all your neighbors were Trumpers? Would you feel safe?
There’s at least one potential crack in this near supermajority wall of support for Trump in Shasta County. In the March Primary Election, 85 percent of local Republicans voted for Trump, but 12 percent voted for Nikki Haley, 4,031 voters, a not insignificant number. Is it plausible that MAGA’s misogynistic act is wearing thin with at least some local Republican women, who’ve seen their reproduction rights stripped away with the 2022 Dobbs decision as MAGA spokesman advocate removing even more rights, including the right to vote?
Since President Joe Biden dropped out on July 21 and was replaced by Vice President Kamala Harris, the mainstream media has been gushing about the “vibes” of the race . At the time Democrats were deeply depressed by Biden’s weak June debate performance against Trump but too afraid to change candidates with just four months to go before the election. The overwhelmingly jubilant public response to Harris’ sudden candidacy was an unexpected boost in party morale bordering on euphoric.
All previous doubts about Harris were wiped away as Democrats suddenly grasped the obvious: the former Attorney General and Senator from California was more than a match for Trump, who at age 78 was now the oldest candidate to run for the executive office, forced to excuse his incoherent borderline senile ramblings as a deliberate rhetorical tactic called “the weave.” Harris kept the joyous campaign vibe going by totally trouncing Trump in the Sept. 10 debate.
That was more than a month ago, and it’s fair to say the Harris and Walz vibe was subsiding somewhat until Trump’s Madison Square Garden racist, misogynist, fascist shitshow last Sunday reminded American voters just what an abomination Trump and the MAGA movement have become. Spike that outrage injection with the still seething anger at the Dobbs decision and its not hard to imagine American women pushing Harris and Walz over the top.
That’s why A News Café is endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris to be the next president of the United States. Don’t waste your vote on a third-party candidate who doesn’t have a chance of winning. Your vote counts toward California’s 54 electoral college votes, which will almost undoubtedly go to Harris, and the national popular vote.
We can do this.
The next president of the United States?
Races for the Senate, the House, the State Senate and State Assembly
Moving down the ballot brings us to the race to be the next senator from California between Rep. Adam Schiff and baseball legend Steve Garvey.
There’s a reason besides anti-Semitism that Trump calls California Rep. Adam Schiff “Shifty-Schiff.” As chair of the House Intelligence Committee from 2019 to 2023 Schiff got under Trump’s thin spray-tanned skin and made the cable news channels nightly with damaging revelations about Trump. Schiff defeated A News Café’s preferred senatorial candidate Katie Porter in the March primary.
Steve Garvey was a stud on and off the field for the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres from 1969 to 1987. Unfortunately, when it comes to politics Garvey’s not quite the player he used to be. Polls show Schiff leading Garvey by 57 percent to 35 percent in the race to be the next senator from California.
A News Café is endorsing Schiff, even though Garvey will easily win a majority of Shasta County’s votes. Schiff will demolish Garvey statewide, further highlighting the California Republican Party’s failure to produce viable candidates for statewide contests.
Going down the ballot, A News Café endorses Democratic Party candidate Rose Penelope Yee in her race to take the 1st Congressional District from long-serving incumbent Rep. Doug LaMalfa. Imagine if Shasta County was represented by someone who wasn’t an insurrectionist who believes the moon landing was faked, like LaMalfa admitted he does on CNN , right after refusing to certify the 2020 election.
Chris Cuomo’s face when Doug LaMalfa expressed doubt about the moon landing.
Barring a miracle, LaMalfa will win a seventh two-year term, although it’s difficult to discern what exactly the anti-food stamps millionaire rice farmer known to hoover up millions in federal farm subsidies delivers to anyone in his district besides his cronies in Big Ag and Big Timber.
The race to replace terminated Republican 1st District State Senator Brian Dahle presents a messy quandary. Brian’s wife, termed-out District 1 Assemblywoman Megan Dahle, is attempting to follow her husband’s footsteps into the state senate. She’s running against Chico entrepreneur David Fennell.
According to Action News Now , Fennell claims that Dahle is still recovering from a stroke last December and is not capable of fulfilling the duties of her office. Assemblyman James Gallagher defended Dahle in the story, saying she’s made tremendous progress since returning to the Legislature in June.
Meanwhile, a Butte County judge has granted the FPPC’s request for an injunction against Fennell, who according to the FPPC “has a history of failing to comply with California’s campaign disclosure laws and has not filed the required campaign statements for the upcoming election.”
The judge ordered Fennell to file the required documents by 5 pm on Nov. 5, election day. Apparently, there will be a financial penalty if Fennell doesn’t comply.
Chico entrepreneur David Fennell in hot water with FPPC.
“The FPPC’s proactive pre-election program is designed to ensure that voters have the information they need to make informed decisions at the ballot box,” said FPPC Enforcement Chief James Lindsay. “While our goal is compliance, not punishment, we are fully prepared to seek court orders to compel candidates to fulfill their legal obligations, when necessary, as we have done today with Mr. Fennell.”
The FPPC’s action follows its recent decision to fine outgoing District 4 Supervisor Patrick Jones and his campaign treasurer Lyndia Kent $10,000 for accepting illegal cash contributions during his campaign for the AD-1 seat in the 2019 special election that was ultimately won by Megan Dahle.
AD-1 Assemblywoman Megan Dahle with then Redding Mayor Erin Resner in 2022.
News Café is inclined to endorse Megan Dahle for SD-1. Despite recovering from a stroke she managed to file all the proper campaign documents without requiring an FPPC injunction. That’s the bare minimum required to run for office but somehow Fennell can’t be bothered. We hope Mrs. Dahle’s recovery from the stroke continues to progress.
Dahle’s ending out creates a vacuum in AD-1 and into the void sweep Redding City Councilwoman and Mayor Tenessa Audette and Heather Hardwick, a farmer, emergency manager, teacher, wife and mother from Modoc County.
Audette, a Bethel Church member, has become well known locally as one-third of the “Bethel Juggernaut” on the Redding City Council comprised of outgoing councilwoman and Bethel elder Julie Winter and Jack Munns, a former student of the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry where Audette teaches a class on religion and the constitution.
AD-1 candidate Tenessa Audette.
Coined by former Redding Mayor Michael Dacquisto, the Bethel Juggernaut came into being last year after Audette took advantage of the 3-2 Bethel board majority and elbowed city councilman Mark Mezzano out of his rightful turn as Redding mayor. The juggernaut ran into a buzzsaw of opposition earlier this year when she unsuccessfully attempted to dismiss Planning Commissioner Aaron Hatch.
Hardwick the farmer is the former Deputy Director of Modoc County’s Office of Emergency Services, a former school board president and a former teacher. Despite their different backgrounds, Audette and Hardwick’s closing candidate statements have a remarkably similar ring:
“I will fight to protect the 2nd amendment,” Audette states. “I’m pro-life. I stand for parental rights, school choice, and the removal of sexually explicit material from schools. I ask for your vote to advocate for common-sense policies restoring hope in our beautiful state.”
“I believe in parental choice and letting local school boards govern their districts,” Hardwick states. “I am pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, pro-property rights, and pro-parental rights.”
It’s too close for A News Café to call. But apparently the Dahles have endorsed Hardwick.
Outgoing District 1 State Sen. Brian Dhale endorses AD-1 candidate Heather Hardwick.
Whither the Bethel Juggernaut?
We’ve already covered the Shasta County Board of Education and the individual school district board races above, so next on the ballot are the eight candidates running for Redding City Council, if you’re a voter within Redding city limits.
Just five of the eight Redding City Council candidates, David Backues, Dr. Paul Dhanuka, Mike Littau, Erin Resner and Anthony Spengler responded to A News Café’s questionnaire . Ian Hill, Joshua Johnson, and Mark Mezzano did not respond to A News Cafe’s invitation.
Of the five who responded, only Baukues, a real estate broker, mentioned he was running against the Bethel Juggernaut.
“I noticed that the Bethel-majority council was heading in a direction contrary to where community members were asking it to go,” Backues said. “A council that does not listen to the people needs to change and I hope to be that change to bring the power back to the people in Redding.”
Backues is running against Dr. Paul Dhanuka, Ian Hill, Joshua Johnson and Mike Littau for two open four-year seats on the Redding City Council.
Dr. Dhanuka is board certified in gastroenterology and an ultra-conservative Republican who ran unsuccessfully for AD-1 and was outspoken about relaxing mask mandates, especially for children, during the COVID-19 pandemic. He has ambitious plans for Redding, including a proposed medical school.
Redding City Council candidate Dr. Paul Dhanuka.
“My common-sense plan empowers police with the authority and resources to combat crime, makes it easier for businesses and jobs to stay local, lowers your local taxes and fees, and makes housing more affordable,” Dhanuka said. “I will also champion a local medical school and residential facility for mental health and drug rehabilitation.”
Backues, Dhanuka and Littau expressed support for providing the Redding Rodeo Grounds with a long-term lease but were more ambivalent about the Riverfront Specific Plan.
Not only with Erin Resner, who’s running against Mark Mezzano and Anthony Spengler for a 2-year city council seat being vacated by Dacquisto.
“When Councilmember Michael Dacquisto announced his decision to step down due to personal health matters, I felt compelled to act,” Resner said. “I knew I could contribute by bringing my budget expertise and seeing through initiatives from my previous term, like the riverfront specific plan, that still needs finalized and implemented. I felt a responsibility to see those projects through.”
While on the Redding City Council in early 2022, Resner drew fire for her participation in a closed session vote that temporarily blocked the Redding Rancheria’s access to its proposed casino relocation project in Strawberry Fields. The vote was illegal and overturned by court order. Later that year, Resner lost the race for Shasta County District 1 Supervisor to Kevin Crye by 100 votes.
Resner’s campaign for the two-year city council seat is a return to where she first gained her political footing, where she’s accused of being part of the Bethel Juggernaut even though she’s not a Bethel member. Thanks to a lawsuit filed against Shasta County alleging the 30-year agreement brokered by the MAGA board of supervisors to provide county services to the Redding Rancheria is a sweetheart deal, The Tribe’s casino relocation project is once again a salient issue .
Rendering of the Redding Rancheria’s proposed casino relocation project in Strawberry Fields.
The lawsuit filed by an anonymous taxpayer’s group seeks to undo the alleged sweetheart deal. The Tribe will fight it tooth-and-nail including at the ballot box. As A News Café has reported , The Tribe donated $20,000 to Jones’ 2020 campaign for District 4 Supervisor, nearly $10,000 to District 1 Supervisor Kevin Crye’s 2022 campaign and successful recall defense and $4900 for Tim Garman’s campaign during the Leonard Moty recall. All three supervisors voted for the deal.
The Tribe continues to donate out thousands of dollars to candidates including Backues, Dhanuka and Mezzano. The Bethel Juggernaut may be withering, giving way to candidates that Resner fears are more in tune with the Shasta County Board of Supervisors MAGA majority’s shoot first, asking questions later style of reasoning.
Sorting through all eight candidates and endorsing three of them for the Redding City Council is crazy-making. A News Café endorses Resner for the two-year seat, if simply to make up for the departure of longtime city councilwoman Julie Winter, a Bethel elder who still managed to vote her own mind most of her time on the council.
Backues’ answers to A News Café’s questions were genuine and earnest; he’d make a great addition to the city council. Dhanuka’s proposal to bring a medical school to Redding is intriguing. Where’s the money going to come from? Read between the lines, maybe you can figure it out.
To be certain, A News Café supports the Redding Rancheria and the casino relocation project. We eagerly await its grand opening, the well-paid jobs it will provide and the increased wealth The Tribe will no doubt share generously with the community. But we also support elected officials who make rational, sound decisions when negotiating big deals. That quite obviously didn’t happen when the MAGA board of Supervisors voted 4-1 to approve the 30-year deal with The Tribe.
Shasta County District 3 Supervisor candidates Corkey Harmon and incumbent Mary Rickert at a recent forum.
There’s Something About Mary
We know the MAGA board whiffed on the casino deal because Shasta County staff researched the deals similarly sized tribal casinos made with their counties and discovered tribes were paying 5, 10, 50 up to 500 times what the Redding Rancheria agreed to pay Shasta County over a 30-year period. The staff’s research is included as evidence in the lawsuit. The MAGA board and Garman voted for the deal anyway.
Shasta County District 3 Supervisor Mary Rickert was the sole vote against the deal with the Redding Rancheria. It’s the kind of gutsy call Rickert has been making for her nearly eight years on the board.
That goes especially for the past 4 years marked by the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic and the rise of anti-mask, anti-vax MAGA know-it-alls who vented their anger in the board chambers, often directing the abuse straight at Rickert herself, who has withstood untold verbal cruelty from these misogynistic maniacs. Not a single MAGA board member said a word to defend her.
Repeated scenes of mistreatment like that made this writer embarrassed to live in Shasta County, ashamed to be a man. As the kids say these days, WTAF.
Rickert has been right all along, voting against the unwarranted firing of Public Health Officer Dr. Karen Ramstrom, voting against the decision to scrap the county’s contract with Dominion Voting Systems, voting against the frivolous county charter approved by Los Tres Pendejos apparently so they could foist self-serving amendments such as Measures P and Q on the voting public.
News Café advocates voting no on both of these measures, which have not been publicly debated and amended a charter that has not yet been enacted. Measure P seeks to limit the county’s use of eminent domain, which is rare enough as it is. There are plenty of pros and cons regarding the use of eminent domain, a major pro being it facilitates the growth of infrastructure that promotes economic development that otherwise wouldn’t get built. The fact is you can’t use eminent domain to facilitate infrastructure growth and boost the economy if you limit it for that purpose, which is exactly what Measure P does.
Measure Q purports to offer the public a choice when elected officials leave office mid-term. It would allow the board of supervisors to appoint a replacement through open recruitment or call for a special election to replace the departed elected official. The key word in that last sentence is “or.” While the measure’s only proponent Kevin Crye claims it will allow voters to select a replacement sooner than present law, there’s nothing in the measure that says the board has to call a special election. They can simply hand-pick the replacement that will serve until the next general election.
Considering the MAGA board’s poor track record hiring replacements, giving the board even more power is just throwing additional fuel on the smoldering bonfire that Shasta County government has become.
Voters can get a head-start by putting the fire out by reelecting Mary Rickert for Shasta County District 3 Supervisor on Nov. 5. Then if Kamala Harris and Tim Walz can just keep the vibe going, we can say goodbye to MAGA and Los Tres Pendejos forever.
We know it’s a big ask, but as Vice President Harris says, we’re not going back.
We just can’t.
