When a new legislative leader takes charge, the biggest changes are usually to the internal power structure rather than to policymaking.
So Thursday, state Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire, who was sworn in this week as head of the chamber, unveiled his reshuffling of the leadership team and committee assignments. The shakeup rewards key allies who helped the Healdsburg Democrat pull together the votes last summer to secure his office — but also several rivals he beat in the process.
That includes Sen. Lena Gonzalez, a progressive Long Beach Democrat, who will succeed McGuire as majority leader, his deputy in charge of wrangling the Senate’s ideologically diverse supermajority Democratic caucus. Gonzalez’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Sen. Monique Limón, a Santa Barbara Democrat whose name was also batted around last year as in the hunt to become pro tem, will continue as Democratic caucus chairperson.
Sen. Angelique Ashby, a Sacramento Democrat who was a major player in whipping support for McGuire, will be one of two assistant majority leaders and take over the business, professions and economic development committee. She said in a statement that receiving those appointments “in my second year is beyond humbling.”
Perhaps in recognition of the challenging optics of a straight, white man heading an increasingly diverse Legislature, five of the seven members of McGuire’s leadership team are women and five are people of color.
“We couldn’t be more excited to get to work for California, tackling the tough issues facing our communities,” McGuire said in a statement. “The members of the California State Senate — who are more representative of the Golden State than ever before — are ready to keep us moving forward, all of us, all together,”
McGuire appointed another close ally, Sen. Anna Caballero, a Merced Democrat, to chair the powerful appropriations committee, which determines the fate of every bill with a significant fiscal impact during the semiannual suspense file process.
Sen. Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat, will now oversee the budget committee as California navigates a projected multibillion-dollar deficit. A major advocate for increasing housing construction and public transit, he could serve as a bulwark against significant funding cuts that have been proposed to those programs this year.
“Our state has made real progress on critical priorities in recent years, and it’s vital we protect that progress,” Wiener said in a statement.
Overall, McGuire kept more than half of the two dozen Senate committee chairpersons intact. Other changes include swapping Sen. Nancy Skinner, a Berkeley Democrat who led the budget committee for three years, to head the housing committee, replacing Wiener; elevating first-term Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas, a Los Angeles Democrat, to lead the labor committee; and splitting the governance and finance committee into two separate committees on local government and on revenue and taxation.
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