Gov. Gavin Newsom is turning to a trusted adviser to steer his climate agency through troubled waters.
Lauren Sanchez, Newsom’s 36-year-old senior climate adviser and a Biden administration alum, will take the helm of California’s powerful Air Resources Board next week. She’ll step into a position on the front lines of a reckoning over the state’s ambitious climate goals and persistently high cost of living that Newsom will need to balance as he eyes national ambitions — all while President Donald Trump is slashing the agency’s regulatory authority.
“CARB is at a crossroads,” said Dan Sperling, director of the Institute for Transportation Studies at UC Davis and a former agency board member who helped craft the state’s original electric vehicle rules. “The old paradigm, aggressive regulation, is no longer a tool available to them. At the same time, they’ve got to deal with the affordability narrative.”
Sanchez will replace current Chair Liane Randolph, who resigned last week with more than a year left in her term, saying she was “exhausted” after leading the agency for over four years.
