3 Reparations Bills Miss Chance to Help All Californians

Commentary On May 21, the California Senate passed three bills on reparations for black slavery. The bills were recommended by the state’s Task Force to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans. The Task Force was created by Assembly Bill 3121, which Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law in 2020. All three bills are by state Sen. Steven Bradford (D-Gardena), the vice chair of the California Legislative Black Caucus, who recently announced he’s running for lieutenant governor in 2026. I’ve written extensively on reparations and have urged the actions to be constructive, not destructive—especially because the state of California never even had slavery. And it was on the Union side in the Civil War....