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By Paul Levikow
September 2, 2025 (East County) – California Attorney General Rob Bonta and health care activists from the nonprofit Protect Our Care California held a virtual news conference Tuesday regarding the “ongoing Trump-GOP health care emergency,'' which they say puts 28 hospitals and 15 nursing homes at risk of closure statewide.
Pioneers Memorial Hospital in Brawley in Imperial County is the closest facility to East County that was identified by Protect Our Care California as at risk of closing due to healthcare funding cuts in Trump's "Big Beautiful" budget bill, according to Bonta.
“Since Jan. 20, Trump has flooded the zone with a deluge of unlawful, unconscionable and un-American acts. He’s broken the law, he has violated the constitution, he’s reached far beyond the bounds of the presidency,” Bonta said. “Sadly, Republicans in Congress have been all too willing to stand by and let him. Republicans in Congress are sitting cozy in Trump’s back pocket and together they’re demolishing so much of what makes our country great, including the hard-fought progress we’ve made to provide affordable, accessible healthcare for all.”
Bonta has taken Trump to court 39 times in the first 32 weeks of the President’s second term.
“We can’t sit on our hands while Trump and his Republican lackeys attack the Affordable Care Act, raise healthcare costs, kick millions of Americans off their insurance and shutdown hospitals, clinics and nursing homes,” Bonta said. “I refuse to stand idly by while Trump threatens our people.”
President Trump signed a law in February establishing the Make America Healthy Again Commission, chaired by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The Commission has four main policy directives to reverse chronic disease, according the White House website.
They include empowering Americans through transparency and open-source data and avoid conflicts of interest in all federally funded health research; prioritizing gold-standard research on why Americans are getting sick in all health-related research funded by the federal government; work with farmers to ensure that U.S. food is the healthy, abundant and affordable; ensure expanded treatment options and health coverage flexibility for beneficial lifestyle changes and disease prevention.
“We don’t want to put at risk any Californians who could benefit from science and medicine including vaccines that can prevent harm to their health and risk their life,” Bonta said. “Of course, California would examine all options to ensure we are following the science, following the medicine, following the facts to protect and lift up the public health of our community consistent with the law.”
ECM asked Bonta if California will take steps to assure that the COVID
-19 vaccine will be available for Californians of all ages, now that Kennedy has banned the booster for anyone who isn’t over 65 and doesn’t have preexisting conditions.
“We will explore all of our options here in California to lawfully protect the public health in our state including our vulnerable seniors and those with preexisting conditions,” the state’s Attorney General said.
Efforts to get comments from Rep. Darrell Issa (R-East County) were unsuccessful.
View the virtual news conference here.
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