By Levi Sumagaysay, CALMATTERS
https://calmatters.org/economy/2026/07/wildfire-liability-battle
If you live in California, chances are you’ve seen the ads that say “Home insurance rates skyrocket” and “The FAIR Plan is broken.”
They urge you to contact your state representative to ask them to “fix our wildfire problem to make California more affordable.”
Those ads are connected to what Los Angeles fire survivors, consumer advocacy groups and the insurance industry say is a secretive, last-minute attempt by Gov. Gavin Newsom to help utilities reduce how much they pay for wildfires they cause.
With the legislative session set to resume next week and run through the end of the month, the governor’s staff has been talking with state lawmakers about addressing challenges around wildfire recovery and rising catastrophic risk in California, a spokesperson for his office confirmed.
Lawmakers have not released the text of the proposals. Newsom spokesperson Anthony Martinez would not say whether the legislation will do the following, as alleged by fire survivors and a consumer advocacy group:
- Limit compensation for fire victims’ pain and suffering.
- Eliminate insurance companies’ right to recover wildfire costs from utilities or other corporations.
- Cap attorneys’ fees, making it harder for fire survivors to get representation.
Every Fire Survivors Network, a group started by survivors of last year’s Eaton Fire, and Consumer Watchdog, a consumer advocacy group that focuses on insurance and other issues, say the bills would shift recovery costs from utility companies to insurance policyholders. Insurance industry representatives agree. The strange bedfellows are calling out the late political maneuvering known as “gut-and-amend,” which lawmakers use to create bills by gutting other pending bills and replacing their language for a different purpose and are meant to be fast-tracked.
The groups are speaking out against the purported bill package, which appears to align with the goals of Wildfire Survivors First, a campaign funded by utilities that, despite its name, has no wildfire survivors groups among its supporters.
“Californians deserve a government that works in the open, not behind closed doors,” said Joy Chen, leader of the Every Fire Survivors Network, in a press conference last week. She urged the governor to “choose democracy over corporate special interests.”
In an open letter to the governor, Chen laid out how she said Newsom has, over the years, already helped utilities shift responsibility for wildfires they cause.
The state’s three major utilities, San Diego Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas & Electric, have tremendous influence in California. They have what seems to be an unlimited number of names, entities and affiliates; donate to campaigns by Democrats and Republicans; and together employ hundreds of lobbyists who advocate for hundreds of bills every session. In the 2025-26 session, their donations to sitting legislators totaled more than $1.2 million, according to CalMatters’ Digital Democracy Database.
Martinez said the discussions between the governor’s office and California lawmakers are informed by a report released in April by the California Earthquake Authority, which under Senate Bill 254 was tasked with studying how the state should “responsibly and equitably allocate the burdens from natural catastrophes.”
That bill — rewritten so late last year that it required the Legislature to extend its session — also allows utilities to shift additional wildfire costs to consumers if their costs exceed a wildfire fund created in 2019 through legislation also backed by the governor. The three major utilities paid half of the $21 billion fund. Californians paid the other half through monthly surcharges on their electric bills. Eaton Fire survivors have sued Edison over what they say is negligence that led to the fire; the cost of claims from the fire are expected to exceed what’s in the fund.
Among the April report’s many recommendations is to put more money in the wildfire fund by increasing the surcharge on utility customers by $8.50 a month, bringing the total to $11 a month.
Nathan Click, a spokesperson for Wildfire Survivors First, said the campaign is calling on lawmakers to “urgently implement” many of the conclusions in the SB 254 report, which he said “highlighted how payouts to financial middlemen — like trial attorneys, hedge funds and insurance companies — are often paid out before wildfire victims receive a single dollar for rebuilding.”
Click did not answer CalMatters’ question about why there are no fire survivors groups on the list of more than 200 organizations that support the effort. Most are local chambers of commerce or business groups.
CalMatters contacted nearly a dozen of the organizations. Ten did not respond or would not make their executives available for an interview.
But the chief executive of one of them, Jennifer Gray Thompson, said she changed her mind about participating once she realized the coalition did not include fire victims groups. Her organization, After the Fire, which helps support leaders in communities around the country that have experienced mega fires, was briefly on the list but was removed promptly at her request, she said.
“I’m from Sonoma,” Thompson told CalMatters. “I’m a national advocate for fire victims. I’m definitely not on their side,” she added. Former state Sen. Bill Dodd, a Democrat whom she said did a lot of good for fire survivors when he was in office, was among those who contacted her to solicit her group’s support for the effort, according to emails she shared with CalMatters.
Dodd did not return a phone call and text message from CalMatters.
The Bay Area Council, another supporter, counts PG&E among its member businesses. Spokesperson Rufus Jeffris said the council “generally supports sensible policies and investments that reduce wildfire risk and increase community wildfire resilience and balance the diverse needs of business, consumers and residents.”
A Consumer Watchdog analysis of utilities’ required financial disclosures shows that 66% of the non-governmental organizations on the list have received utility-industry contributions, grants, sponsorships and more worth about $7.3 million from 2023 to 2025.
Click called Consumer Watchdog a “shadow lobby firm for trial attorneys” and said “it should come as no surprise that they are trying to protect a system that prioritizes trial attorneys over wildfire victims.”
Spokespeople for PG&E, Edison and SDG&E referred CalMatters to the Wildfire Victims First campaign regarding the campaign and the legislative proposal.
What state lawmakers are saying or not saying
Sen. Ben Allen, a Democrat from the Los Angeles area whose constituents include survivors of the Palisades Fire, attended the Friday press conference.
“Any solutions that we have have to (hold) the responsible parties accountable,” Allen said in a room full of fire survivors.
Who’s responsible for the costs of wildfire recovery is important to both Allen’s current job and possibly his future one: He is chair of the Senate energy and utilities committee, and is running for insurance commissioner.
Allen’s spokesperson, Ben Cheever, said the senator was not available for an interview about the specifics of the legislative package.
But he sent the following statement from Allen: “I will carefully review any proposal put forth to ensure we hold responsible parties accountable while meaningfully reducing risk to improve affordability. We should not simply shift around the costs consumers pay without addressing this more holistically.”
Fellow Democrat Sen. Sasha Renee Perez, who represents Eaton Fire survivors, said in an interview with CalMatters that if a legislative package contains the proposals fire survivors suspect they do, she would have a “tremendous issue” with them being presented at the last minute. She also said she has talked with other members of the Legislature who “are very upset with what’s taking place.”
Perez said she would oppose any proposal that limits non-economic damages for fire survivors: “I represent Altadena. I have a friend who lost his sister in the fire. How do you put a price tag on losing your sibling?”
The senator also said she was “so frustrated and shocked” that SB 254, which started off as a bill intended to reduce profits for investor-owned utilities, ended up helping utilities instead during the last three days of last year’s session.
“That’s not the way government should work,” she said.
CalMatters also contacted several other lawmakers or their offices, especially ones who lead related committees. The following Democratic lawmakers’ offices did not respond: Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas; Assemblymember Lisa Calderon, who leads the insurance committee; and Assemblymember Cottie Petrie-Norris, who leads the utilities and energy committee.
Spokespeople for Senate President Pro Tem Monique Limon and Sen. Josh Becker responded with emailed statements similar to that sent by Newsom spokesperson Martinez: “The current system is unsustainable and not working for fire survivors, utility customers, or insurance policyholders.”
The insurance industry’s concerns
Insurance industry representatives say if insurance companies can’t recover wildfire costs from utilities, also known as subrogation, they will inevitably raise premiums.
“We don’t think it’s fair to make insurance policyholders pay more to bail out utility shareholders,” said Denni Ritter, a vice president at the American Property Casualty Insurance Association.
Ritter also pushed back against the assertion by the utilities’ campaign that insurance companies usually recover their costs from utilities before paying out claims to their policyholders: “It’s not like AAA goes, ‘OK, we’ll pay you once we’ve recovered from the utilities’.”
Rex Frazier is president of the Personal Insurance Federation of California, which represents the largest insurers operating in the state. He said this campaign is the latest attempt by utilities to chip away at their industry’s possible liability for wildfires. Sometimes, the insurance industry has had conversations with utilities, he said. That’s not happening this time, he said.
Now he, like other Californians, is seeing the ads from the Wildfire Victims First campaign, whose website says it’s funded by PG&E, SDG&E and SCE shareholders and three other organizations.
“We’re trying to understand why they’re talking about the insurance market,” Frazier said. “We can’t get a clear answer about what they have in mind.”
Jeanne Kuang contributed reporting.
