Part 166: Lifestyles and Rate Increases – Understanding California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara

Published April 13, 2025.

Apr 13, 2025

Photo of a destroyed block on Lake Avenue in Altadena, CA, as seen on March 21, which was afflicted by the Eaton Fire on January 7 by author (GoPro Hero 11 Black).

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By Zachary Ellison, Independent Journalist

A blooming spring scandal is threatening the position of one of California’s most powerful and well-connected Latino politicians. California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara is drawing scrutiny for his travel destinations and lavish meals, much of it paid for by campaign donors. ABC 7 journalist Stephanie Sierra broke open the story on March 24, reporting that Lara, who was elected to the position in 2018 after service in both the California Assembly and State Senate since 2010, had taken a whopping total of 46 cross-country and international trips, including at least 11 for business purposes on the taxpayer's dime. With destinations such as Bogota, Toronto, Paris, Dubai, and Singapore on his passport. No surprise that Lara was in Bermuda on March 12 for the Senate’s first insurance committee meeting of the year, one of only a few annually. Lara claims the trip and others were justified as part of his role securing insurance policies for California homeowners.

Having made his political career in large part on advocacy for undocumented immigrants, Lara perhaps should have known better. The son of a father who swam across a frigid canal to get to California before becoming an agricultural worker and a housekeeper, Lara, before holding elected office, worked for Kevin de León as an aide. About Lara’s career path, then State Senator De León told the Los Angeles Times in 2013, "Nothing was handed to Ricardo…He had to work very hard to get where he is." Lara previously represented areas including Bell Gardens and Long Beach. He’s faced past questions about his acceptance of political donations from the insurance industry, including a California Fair Political Practices (CFPP) investigation. Lara is no stranger to political corruption. In 2011, he told Capitol Weekly in an interview, “When we were in South Gate things had been sweltering for some time, and we were aware. Unfortunately, these issues are not new to the district.”

Should Lara have known better? Or did he reach the point of just not caring anymore? The CFPP is still investigating De León over donations from a food nonprofit (Case No. 2024-00482) since April 2024 following an anonymous whistleblower complaint. Lara himself is still under investigation over his 2022 campaign (Case No. COM-05192022-01526) after a complaint by Consumer Watchdog Executive Director Carmen Balber, who told KFBK-AM in September 2024 about his handling of California’s delicate dance with home insurance providers, “That’s simply a lie,” accusing him of having “cut a deal” with the insurance industry and making “false promises” about fire coverage. Many homeowners lacked insurance or were underinsured when the Palisades and Eaton Fires struck on January 7. The non-profit previously unsuccessfully sued Lara under the California Public Records Act over failure to provide records related to his dealings, accusing him of “pay-to-play” practices (Case No. 20STCP00664). The request was further denied on appeal in December 2023.

Ricardo Lara is now facing an audit into his travel and dining. The San Francisco Standard journalist Josh Koehn reported on April 10 that Lara, using a campaign committee setup to run for lieutenant governor in 2026, had been “using what appears to be a shell campaign committee to pay for nearly $30,000 in meals and drinks at some of the country’s fanciest restaurants and bars.” The guest for at least one dinner on January 14, 2024, was Raul Vargas, CEO of Farmer’s Insurance. Lara’s shell committee has at least $227,000 on hand, but it’s only one of “30 active candidate campaigns for lieutenant governor in 2026 and 2030.” Kevin de León has one of these open still too. KDL is hardly the only powerful Latino political figure to have impacted Lara’s career trajectory. Lara in the past has been connected to powerful politicians such as former Assembly Speakers Fabian Nuñez and John Perez, as well as former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who is shamelessly running for Governor of California.

Ricardo Lara also worked for the late Marco Firebaugh, who died of liver failure and influenza at age 39 in 2006. Firebaugh told the Los Angeles Times in 2006 about his lifestyle: “I drank like a fish, ate like a pig, stayed out till wee hours of the night and never slept.” Fabian Nuñez also had fairly similar issues in 2007 over $300,000 funneled through a charity from donors, telling the Times about the donations for events featuring his name: “It’s appropriate to request of corporations to be good corporate citizens, especially if you can put those monies or resources in the hands of the neediest Californians, absolutely.” Ricardo Lara didn’t make the audacious “The political trees of Latino Los Angeles” charted by Times columnist Gustavo Arellano in 2024, but arguably, as the only statewide-elected Latino politician, he’s the most powerful representative of a political class that for decades now has struggled in balancing money with power. Nor has anyone managed to secure a prison interview with José Huizar yet to date, which would be assuredly quite revealing.

Villaraigosa also isn’t alone in seeking the governorship in 2026, when Lara will be exiting after two terms as Insurance Commissioner. Former Biden administration Health and Human Services Secretary and California Attorney General Xavier Becerra has announced his run for the top position in the state. Becerra is 67 and has spent 35 years in public office, in contrast to Lara’s youthful 50 and 14-plus years in elected positions. When Becerra was confirmed, Lara issued a statement saying, “I offer my congratulations on his confirmation and my ongoing commitment to our shared goals.” Only two years prior, Consumer Watchdog had asked Becerra to investigate Lara over his “seemingly illegal and fraudulent payments from taxpayers for Lara’s second home,” as reported in Politico, with Becerra’s AG office declining to respond or prosecute.

In response, Ricardo Lara claimed that the studio apartment was cheaper for taxpayers than a hotel room. Lara has also declined to implement a directive from Governor Gavin Newsom to end telework arrangements for state employees, with Newsom noting, “We’re public servants,” in an interview with the Sacramento Bee, insisting, “I think it’s important to show up for each other, for ourselves, connect with folks.” As of yet, despite the negative news coverage over his travel and dining, not a single public official in California has called for Lara to resign before his term ends in January 2027. The SF Standard investigation found that he has favored one high-end Indian restaurant in Los Angeles, which serves a cleverly named “Slumdog Millionaire” cocktail after the 2008 box office hit based on a 2005 novel that features a young man from Mumbai who makes it onto the Indian version of “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?” In 2023, Lara made $179,214.96. He apologized in 2019 over the apartment matter, vowing greater transparency in his future public service.

No one has argued that politicians shouldn’t earn a salary, but the question becomes at what point they’re unlawfully monetizing their positions. Such actions earned Mark Ridley-Thomas a prison sentence for bribery, fraud, and corruption, with an appeal still pending with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals after a November hearing. As of yet, Lara is facing no criminal investigation at any level of government over his travel and dining much less his cozy relationship with the global insurance industry.

Nor is it clear anyone will come to his rescue, but there are signs that he should have learned his lesson a long time ago. In 2017, both Ricardo Lara and Kevin de León were nearly pulled into a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) probe into brothers Ron Calderon and Tom Calderon, then a State Senator and Assemblyman, respectively, over soliciting bribes, including from an undercover FBI agent. They received 42 months and 10 months in federal prison for their actions. Ron Calderon was represented by attorney Mark Geragos, who now represents Kevin de León in his civil case over the leak of the LA Fed Tapes, with Geragos at the time complaining in court over the affidavit in the case having been leaked to the news media.

It’s not clear if Ricardo Lara has retained an attorney at this time in regard to the allegations over his travel and dining. Back in 2013, Calderon maintained that the leak of the FBI’s affidavit was in retaliation after he refused to participate in wearing a wire against Darrell Steinberg and Kevin de León, the latter of whom maintained that “There is nothing more important than protecting the integrity of our governing process.” The FBI agent had posed as a film producer, and at the time, Calderon was chair of the State Senate Insurance Committee.

Whether the FBI has gotten involved in any of the pending California Fair Political Practices Commission probes into Lara and De León is unknown, but clearly the two longtime associates have been and continue to walk a fine line in their private and personal dealings. De León is now in political exile. Lara was a donor to De León in 2024 as he sought re-election to the Los Angeles City Council. De León also even pulled in a donation from Norm Langer, much-publicized proprietor of Langer’s Delicatessen, a dining destination that seems unlikely for Lara to visit anytime soon.

The FBI, as a matter of policy, doesn’t comment on investigations, nor is it clear they would have jurisdiction. As State Insurance Commissioner, Ricardo Lara oversees California’s insurance rates, and it would seem equally unlikely that the California Attorney General’s Office under Rob Bonta would investigate his dealings. Bonta’s and Lara’s offices can conduct joint investigations. FPPC cases can take years to resolve; a CalMatters analysis in October 2024 found grave inconsistencies in the conduct of its investigations, finding that “In some cases, investigations lasted so long that the politician in question had left office or won an election, sometimes even several elections, before the cases were adjudicated.”

In short, the FPPC is perhaps the least serious enforcement agency in California with one of the most important jobs: keeping California politics clean under the Political Reform Act of 1974. The bipartisan, independent agency is charged with, as its website describes, regulating what “many considered politics to be similar to the ‘wild west’ where lobbyists could give gifts to members of the legislature without restriction, and campaign contributions could be made in cash without disclosing the source.”

Lara received what might be the most reluctant endorsement in newspaper history in 2022 from the Los Angeles Times for re-election, with the paper of record concluding, “Lara is fortunate to face an inexperienced and unqualified Republican in the runoff, instead of a principled, thoughtful Democrat.” The editorial board further surmised, “We hope that the large field of challengers he faced for reelection — including from within his own party — will remind Lara that he needs to do a better job serving the public.” As of yet, the newspaper has yet to cover the latest round on travel and dining, even as it has skewered him over California’s suffering home insurance marketplace. A February 19 report by Ryan Fonseca on Lara’s response to the wildfire noted that under his leadership, the price of the California FAIR plan for homeowners whom other insurers won’t cover has “surged roughly 250% between 2018 and 2024.” The article noted that Lara had “received at least $270,000 in campaign contributions from insurance firms” and had held back-room meetings with them on reforms. Lara has taken some quick steps to expedite payouts for those who lost their homes, but you have to wonder about his interests.

One thing is for sure, life isn’t bad if you’re Ricardo Lara. As tens of millions of Californians struggle to pay their bills, and as many more thousands are now without their homes following a catastrophic wildfire, Ricardo Lara recently told State Assembly Insurance Committee members on March 19, according to KCRA journalist Ashley Zavala, "Could I have moved quicker? Absolutely.” Lara further stated, "The last thing I need is for an insurance company to go insolvent, and then we're all on the hook for them." Meanwhile, back in Altadena, crews from contractors and government agencies were hard at work clearing burned-down lots. Dust kicked up into the air as they worked. Since 2023, as noted by Zavala, “seven of the 12 largest insurance companies have either limited or stopped providing policies.” It’s not clear that even if Altadena, much less the Pacific Palisades, is rebuilt, any private company would want to provide insurance again even if Southern California Edison undergrounds most power powerlines.

Families are literally living in front of their burned-out lots in motor vehicles and living off GoFundMe donations. For many, the financial relief is coming too slowly and too late to make a difference. In Oakland, administrative law judge Karl-Fredric Seligman pared back a Ricardo Lara-approved rate increase of 22% to 17% for State Farm Insurance Mutual. As reported by CalMatters journalist Levi Sumagaysay, the insurer, which has a 20% market share in California, has secured “$400 million in a surplus note from its parent company, State Farm Mutual, and promised no new non-renewals of any more policies through the end of the year.”

Before the hearing, Lara, writing in the San Francisco Chronicle, promised “all of this would be revealed” at the April 8 hearing and, moreover, that “under this proposal, the company must do its part — not just expect its customers to shoulder its costs.” So far, Lara has defended his trip to Bermuda, claiming that “he got some reinsurance companies to agree to expedite payments to wildfire survivors and that they agreed to work with the state on expanding earthquake insurance.” So far, Lara has avoided the latest questions about his travel and dining expenses in any further detail.

In fairness, it’s not even just Lara who, as State Insurance Commissioner, has struggled with the ethical line. Republican Chuck Quackenbush, who held the position from 1995 to 2000, took even more money from those associated with the insurance industry. Life in general is good if you’re a California politician, and why not? After all, it takes work and elections to get to such positions. Should Californians expect better, or should we just accept business as usual from our politicians?

If nothing else, Ricardo Lara can’t be accused of having bad taste in selecting dinner at San Laurel in Downtown Los Angeles: “jamón Iberico, pan con tomate, sea urchin, lobster salpicón, wild mushrooms, a rack of lamb, Andrés’ signature gambas al zahara, a $16 grapefruit, and chocolate mousse” all sound pretty good to me! To date, Lara hasn’t been seen anywhere near the disaster zones serving free meals alongside Chef José Andrés. It must be nice to be there, and especially if you’re Ricardo Lara.

Link: Bogotá and Paris? CA insurance boss takes series of taxpayer-funded trips, raising concerns

Link: Insurance chief lives large on campaign cash as homes burn

Link: Sen. Ricardo Lara, point man in the push for immigrant rights

Link: Novice Republican or Democrat embroiled in controversy? Voters to pick next insurance commissione

Link: State watchdog agency is investigating donations to Kevin de León’s reelection campaign

Link: KFBK-AM (Radio) – Sacramento, CA: Carmen Balber Discusses The Breakdown Of Ricardo Lara’s Lies

Link: Lawmakers demand to know 'government purpose' of CA insurance boss's taxpayer-funded travel

Link: LA Council member Kevin de Leon’s ballot measure shell game

Link: Marco A. Firebaugh, 39; Ex-Assemblyman Was an Advocate for Those of Few Means

Link: Nunez used a charity to funnel donations

Link: The political trees of Latino Los Angeles

Link: Former federal health chief Xavier Becerra announces run for California governor