Sacramento appears in The Bob Zadek Show chiefly as the setting for legal and political events in California, rather than as a subject discussed for its own sake. The excerpts mention the city in connection with litigation over California’s high-speed rail project and, separately, as the source of a newspaper article about federal property seizures. No excerpt describes Sacramento’s government, population, economy, or history.
High-speed rail litigation
Judge Quentin Kopp, described by Bob Zadek as the original sponsor of Proposition 1A and as a participant in litigation over the project, states that a lawsuit he is part of is the subject of a hearing in Sacramento County Superior Court. The suit concerns a bill introduced by an assembly member from San Mateo County that would take $715 million from the California High-Speed Rail Authority and give it to San Mateo, San Francisco, and Santa Clara counties. Kopp says the bill passed and was signed by the governor notwithstanding its unconstitutionality, and that the reason it is unconstitutional is that there is no authority for the transfer in the 2008 $9 billion bond issue; changes to what was passed in November 2008 can only be made by the voters of California, not the California legislature. Let’s Talk About California’s “High-Speed” Rail (2018)
Kopp also states that he is co-plaintiff with the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association in a lawsuit that they won in December in Sacramento Superior Court on the same legal point — that something was done which violates what the voters approved. He describes the pending Sacramento County Superior Court matter as having a pretrial motion the following week that will be informative with respect to its result. Let’s Talk About California’s “High-Speed” Rail (2018)
The rail discussion places Sacramento alongside other California locations named in the excerpts. Kopp says the first part of the system starts in the Central Valley, running as a diesel system from Madera to Wasco in Kern County, and that passengers would take a shuttle bus about 30 miles into Bakersfield. He also says state legislation prohibits high-speed rail from having its own right-of-way on the San Francisco Peninsula between San Francisco and San Jose. Let’s Talk About California’s “High-Speed” Rail (2018)
Forfeiture and a Sacramento newspaper
In a separate episode, Brian D. Kelly cites an article from the Sacramento Bee, sent to him by his brother, about federal seizure of 100 homes. Kelly says the homes were involved in marijuana grow operations, that the article values them in the hundreds of millions, and that near the end it says rather casually that no arrests have been made. He offers the article as an illustration of civil asset forfeiture. Brian D. Kelly on the False Promise of Policing-for-Profit (2019)
The same episode discusses forfeiture more broadly without further reference to Sacramento. Kelly distinguishes forfeiture from the seizure of contraband, saying that seizing $20 million worth of cocaine is not $20 million of forfeiture but zero dollars of forfeiture. He describes a Florida pattern in which northbound traffic carrying drugs was allowed to proceed while southbound traffic carrying cash was stopped, and a South Carolina highway interdiction program on I-85 and I-26 called Rolling Thunder. Bob Zadek frames these as examples of public choice theory, naming James Buchanan. Brian D. Kelly on the False Promise of Policing-for-Profit (2019)
Across episodes
Sacramento is touched on in two episodes: the 2018 discussion of California high-speed rail, where it is the venue for litigation, and the 2019 discussion of policing-for-profit, where it is the source of a newspaper article. The excerpts show no development between the two treatments, and no speaker addresses Sacramento as a topic in its own right.
What the sources do not cover
The excerpts do not state which state Sacramento is in, nor do they describe its government, officials, or finances. They do not name the specific bill transferring rail funds, the case numbers or holdings of the Sacramento lawsuits, or the constitutional provisions at issue beyond Kopp’s general reference to the California Constitution. The Sacramento Bee article is described only through Kelly’s summary, and the excerpt breaks off mid-sentence before the passage is complete.