Broadband for All and a Train to Nowhere

[Secular Sanity]

While Newsom doesn't get a direct check, the powerful industries that benefit from these federal-funded projects are among the largest donors to his political campaigns and his wife's nonprofit.

A major broadband drilling project in Southern Humboldt was shut down after a contractor (Direct Drilling) illegally dumped thousands of gallons of raw drilling mud (bentonite slurry) into unpermitted pits on private land. The slurry leaked, polluting Redwood Creek and the South Fork Eel River, threatening protected salmon habitats.

The project is part of Governor Newsom's $3.25 billion "Broadband for All" initiative. Because the project faces a strict federal funding deadline of December 2026, the state fast-tracked it by exempting it from traditional CEQA environmental reviews, creating immense pressure on contractors to move fast.

State regulators approved the drilling without ensuring a waste management plan was in place. Because Humboldt County has no local facilities that accept liquid slurry, contractors were supposed to truck it 220 miles south or solidify it on-site. Instead, they cut corners and dumped it locally.

Humboldt County has issued a stop-work order. Drilling cannot resume until the contractors present a legal, approved plan for waste disposal, putting the project's strict 2026 deadline in serious jeopardy.

https://kymkemp.com/2026/06/10/drilling-...k-resumes/

https://www.gov.ca.gov/2026/04/02/govern...-internet/

https://youtube.com/shorts/FLVrwINBYQM?s...bEeG_CSksr

[C C]

While Newsom doesn't get a direct check, the powerful industries that benefit from these federal-funded projects are among the largest donors to his political campaigns and his wife's nonprofit.

A major broadband drilling project in Southern Humboldt was shut down after a contractor (Direct Drilling) illegally dumped thousands of gallons of raw drilling mud (bentonite slurry) into unpermitted pits on private land. The slurry leaked, polluting Redwood Creek and the South Fork Eel River, threatening protected salmon habitats.

The project is part of Governor Newsom's $3.25 billion "Broadband for All" initiative. Because the project faces a strict federal funding deadline of December 2026, the state fast-tracked it by exempting it from traditional CEQA environmental reviews, creating immense pressure on contractors to move fast.

State regulators approved the drilling without ensuring a waste management plan was in place. Because Humboldt County has no local facilities that accept liquid slurry, contractors were supposed to truck it 220 miles south or solidify it on-site. Instead, they cut corners and dumped it locally.

Humboldt County has issued a stop-work order. Drilling cannot resume until the contractors present a legal, approved plan for waste disposal, putting the project's strict 2026 deadline in serious jeopardy.

https://kymkemp.com/2026/06/10/drilling-...k-resumes/

https://www.gov.ca.gov/2026/04/02/govern...-internet/

https://youtube.com/shorts/FLVrwINBYQM?s...bEeG_CSksr

Yep, formal-wear sermonizers are saints on the political mount as long as we don't follow the opportunistic self-interests and money trails behind their moral elite posturing.

But it's also a Golden State fetish: Taxpayers wearing the traditional bondage-collar gear. With the local lord protector holding the animal leashes and thumping fist vigorously on the social justice pulpit at the latest outrage that must be remedied. A tad reminiscent of those WWII barrage balloons hovering over London that blithely accepted their fate (doom).