Saturday, August 29, 2026

Eaton Fire Survivors Await Sacramento Deal as Newsom’s Subrogation Push Falters

Legislative leaders have refused the governor’s terms on insurance recovery from utilities, and the session ends Monday with no published bill text

Gov. Gavin Newsom and Senate Democrats entered the final weekend of the legislative session without an agreement on wildfire liability, after the governor’s push to eliminate insurance subrogation collapsed in a late-Thursday-night closed-door meeting.

The stakes are local in Altadena and Pasadena, where state and Los Angeles fire investigators found that Southern California Edison’s equipment — a decades-old decommissioned transmission tower — was responsible for igniting the blaze.

Subrogation is the legal right of insurance companies that pay homeowners’ claims after a utility-caused fire to recoup a portion of those costs, typically 40 to 60%, from the responsible utility.

Newsom’s stymied package sought to limit or eliminate it as part of a broader effort to reduce the liability of California’s three investor-owned utilities: Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric.

Every Fire Survivor’s Network and Consumer Watchdog praised the California Senate and Assembly today for rejecting Newsom’s plan which it said would have resulted in insurance policyholders paying more for fires caused by utilities.

Lawmakers rejected the Governor’s plan to limit subrogation payments and refused to cap the damages wildfire victims can recover.

The Governor’s proposal to limit how much insurance companies could recover would have cost policyholders hundreds of dollars per year and homeowners in high-risk areas thousands of dollars per year, the local groups said.

“We are profoundly grateful to the legislators who stood up for the real fire survivors,” said Joy Chen, Executive Director of Every Fire Survivor’s Network. “They have rejected nearly all of the Governor’s original bailout terms, including his attacks on survivors’ rights to recover economic and noneconomic damages and his devastating proposal to deny recovery to smoke-damage survivors outside an artificial fire-perimeter line. Preserving these rights is an enormous victory for all Californians.”

Eaton Fire survivors organized under Every Fire Survivors Network traveled to Sacramento multiple times in August, and dozens chanted outside the Governor’s Mansion on Aug. 24 during an end-of-session legislative reception.

A Newsom spokesperson said Friday afternoon that negotiations were ongoing and that the governor’s office had sent the Legislature a new offer addressing subrogation concerns. The terms of that offer have not been made public.