CTA President David Goldberg said the suit seeks to protect Proposition 98, the 1988 voter‑approved constitutional requirement that makes the state budget the primary source of operational funding for California’s public schools.
The lawsuit alleges that Newsom and lawmakers held back $3.9 billion in the current budget and an additional $1.9 billion from the previous year’s budget, funds that must eventually be released under the constitutional mandate.
State officials have been grappling with a multi‑year deficit that totals roughly $125 billion, creating what the Legislature’s budget analyst Gabe Petek calls a “wall of debt.” Rising salary costs and declining student enrollment have left many districts in financial distress despite recent increases in overall school funding.
The filing coincided with CalMatters reporting that legislators added $1.3 billion in “pork‑barrel” projects to the budget at the last minute, including $29 million for a gym renovation in a Santa Barbara college district, $13 million for a farmers market in affluent Marin County, and $3 million for a minor‑league baseball stadium in Santa Clara County.
A separate CalMatters investigation cited an inspector‑general report showing the High Speed Rail Authority spent nearly $600,000 on travel to locations such as gyms, a nightclub, an escape room, a tiki bar and a cigar lounge—expenses deemed unallowable and unrelated to the agency’s rail‑project mission.
Critics argue that while the governor and legislators are withholding billions meant for classrooms, they are simultaneously approving large, often opaque expenditures for projects and travel that benefit wealthier districts and unrelated agencies, raising questions about fiscal priorities in a state facing a massive budget shortfall.