Newsletter: Essential Politics: GOP asks Brown for drought plan

I’m Christina Bellantoni, the Essential Politics host today. Let’s get started.

The 14 Republicans in California’s congressional delegation are demanding a government plan to capture, store and transport the water expected from this winter’s El Niño.

Sarah Wire obtained a letter the lawmakers are sending President Obama and Gov. Jerry Brown Thursday asking how the federal and state governments intend to deal with the precipitation amid crippling drought — and if any regulations would be lifted.

"If it does rain this winter and we let it all go to the ocean again like we did three years ago, the whole state is going to run out of water," Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Tulare) told Wire in an interview.

"It's either, or. You show us how you're going to get the water or you show us the impacts and how we're going to deal with the impacts," Nunes added.

The state government is indeed updating its plan for the deluge.

Read the whole story here.

O-U-S-T-E-D

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Los Angeles) lasted four rounds in the National Press Club Spelling Bee pitting journalists and politicians Wednesday night in Washington, Wire reports.

Lieu, the Democratic freshman class president, spelled "bankruptcy," "sufferance" and "capacitor" correctly before he forgot the first "i" in "Louisianian."

On his last word, Lieu was asked to spell "empleomania," which aptly means a thirst for holding public office, but instead spelled "FreeJason" and bowed out. He was referring to Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, who is being held in an Iranian prison.

Journalists spelled the most words correctly as a team, but the overall winner was Virginia Democratic Rep. Don Beyer with "apostasy."

SILICON VALLEY SWITCHEROO

Javier Panzar reports two Democrats have abandoned Rep. Mike Honda and endorsed Ro Khanna as the eight-term congressman defends himself in a rematch.

Santa Clara Vice Mayor Debi Davis and former Milpitas Mayor Bob Livengood made not-so-subtle jabs at Honda in their statements, respectively calling Khanna a "principled" candidate with the "highest ethical standards."

A congressional investigation recently found "substantial reason to believe" Honda and his staff blurred ethics lines and used taxpayer resources to benefit his 2014 campaign against Khanna.

The two are headed for another costly battle after Khanna lost by 3.6 points in 2014. As of October, Khanna had raised $1.64 million and is sitting on a tidy $1.33 million in cash on hand. Honda has raised close to a million dollars with $555,514 in cash available, according to filings.

TODAY’S ESSENTIALS

-- L.A.’s minimum wage increase was a milestone for the nationwide campaign to raise the minimum wage to $15 and arguably the greatest legislative achievement of Mayor Eric Garcetti’s first term. Rather than evangelizing for higher wages statewide, however, Garcetti is currently riding the fence on whether he will support the Fair Wage Act of 2016, a labor-backed ballot initiative that would gradually increase California’s base wage to $15 in a plan that closely mirrors the ordinance passed in L.A.

-- George Skelton weighs in on Gavin Newsom's gun-control pitch.

-- Phil Willon looks at what happened with Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson.

-- The Koch brothers-backed Libre Initiative takes aim at Latinos, Kurtis Lee reports.

-- Donald Trump may say he doesn’t need to raise money for his campaign, but as Mark Z. Barabak and Michael Finnegan found by crunching the numbers, a whole lot of people wanted to give cash to the billionaire anyway.

-- Mike Memoli has the inside details of how grief fueled Vice President Joe Biden's presidential speculation, and Memoli and David Lauter analyze Biden's decision to opt against it.

-- Lisa Mascaro gets all the details of Rep. Paul Ryan locking up support for his speakership bid.

LOGISTICS

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