Gray Davis
Gray Davis
Joseph Graham "Gray" Davis, Jr.is an American politician who served as the 37th Governor of California from 1999 to 2003. A member of the Democratic Party, only months into his second term, in 2003 Davis was recalled and removed from office, the second state governor successfully recalled in U.S. history. Prior to serving as governor, Davis was chief of staff to Governor Jerry Brown, a California State Assemblyman, California State Controllerand the 44th Lieutenant Governor of California. Davis holds a...
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth26 December 1942
CityBronx, NY
I am calling on everyone in this state to put the chaos and the division of the recall behind us and do what's right for this great state of California.
There's no question that California, in the last three or four years, has been privileged to add disproportionately to the economic growth of America, and to contribute to its technological productivity.
I'm doing my part, building plants at a record rate, having historic conservation levels. The only people not doing their part is the federal government that is siding with the energy companies against the interests of the people of California.
Well, there's no question that the law passed in 1996 was flawed. It deregulated the wholesale market, meaning the price that the utilities had to pay energy companies for power, but not the retail market.
There is only one governor, and his name is Gray Davis.
So it was flawed in that it didn't require California to have a first claim on the power plants. It deregulated part of the market, but not all of the market.
Why? Because we're very well down this process as it is - flawed as it is - and we're counting on getting more power plants on line by the end of 2003 so we have a surplus of power.
We're going to march on Washington with a host of Republicans, Democrats, business leaders, legislators.
One thing that has become clear over the last several days is that we no longer have 135 choices to make, .. It's really one choice likely to emerge from question number two, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and that leaves the voters with a clear choice. They can retain Gray Davis as governor, or they can elect Arnold Schwarzenegger and his crew from Pete Wilson to run the governor's office.
We need an opportunity for the markets to stabilize so that consumers in our states don't have to bear the disproportional burden of rising natural gas prices or undue profiteering,
The people did decide that it's time for someone else to serve and I accept their judgment.
There is no easy solution, ... But, if I have to use the power of eminent domain to prevent generators from driving consumers into the dark and utilities into bankruptcy, then that's what I'll do.
Whatever is done has to be done in a fair and objective manner,
We can buy it in the five to the five and a half cent range, ... That will stabilize the energy market, allow utilities to have some breathing room to pay off their creditors, and we will do all of this without raising rates to California customers.