Newsom’s Lockdowns Leave Taxpayers With $800K Bill

California Governor Gavin Newsom has now cost taxpayers $800,000.

According to The Washington Free Beacon:

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D., Calif.) administration and Los Angeles County quietly agreed to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to a local church in connection to their enforcement of unconstitutional lockdown policies, according to a legal settlement.

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State and local authorities will each pay $400,000 to Grace Community Church and pastor John MacArthur to cover the legal costs wrought by Newsom’s shutdown order, which singled out churches for capacity limits as he eased restrictions on businesses. State officials threatened massive fines and even jail time for the pastor after the church resumed services in the summer of 2020. Local officials went so far as to cancel the church’s five-decade-old lease on a parking lot. MacArthur, in a statement, said the settlement, as well as numerous legal victories, vindicated his stand-off with California Democrats.

“Over the past year, our congregation has seen his hand of blessing in ways like never before, and the Lord’s promise has been realized: ‘I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it,'” MacArthur said.

Newsom’s church restrictions, which covered everything from attendance size to whether parishioners could sing, have proved costly to taxpayers. Los Angeles County spent nearly $1 million in legal fees in connection to the Grace Community Church lawsuit. California paid $2 million in legal fees to two other churches in June in response to separate suits over lockdown enforcement.

Newsom’s lockdowns were some of the harshest in the country.