Guest Opinion: Joy Chen: Judge to Lara: Survivors Are Not Criminals. They’re Civic Leaders.

If you pay insurance premiums to any company, I have good news.

Last week, you won big. Twice.

At the State Farm billion-dollar rate hike hearings, Judge Karl Seligman issued two rulings in favor of transparency and the rule of law. That matters to us all, because State Farm is California’s dominant insurance company, and the one which Commissioner Lara has admitted receives more complaints than any other.

How State Farm is regulated will strengthen — or weaken — protections for everyone in California.

The Eaton Fire Survivors Network (EFSN) has now collected nearly 500 firsthand accounts from Eaton and Palisades families, mapped them to violations of law, and published them in a document called The State Farm Files.

But Lara has dragged his feet, only launching a market conduct exam after immense pressure from survivors (as the New York Times reported). Then, he went even further.

Lara’s team filed a motion to bar the public from future hearings. Their reasoning? That the “wildfire claimants in the LA area who are expressing frustration with claims handling experiences” pose a personal security threat to CDI staff! Not kidding. Their filing is here.

To really drive their point home, they compared us to Luigi Mangione, the so-called “hot murderer” who stalked and murdered a health insurance CEO.

State Farm quickly piled on, insisting “it behooves the parties to accept [CDI’s concerns] as real.”

Huh??

We’re parents and grandparents. We’re neighbors and taxpayers. Sweet, slightly tired, post-menopausal us — hardly “hot,” and definitely not violent.

That’s us pictured in Judge Seligman’s hearing room. Hello world!

Thankfully, Judge Seligman cut through the nonsense, denying Lara’s motion and giving everyone a civics lesson:

“Both the parties and the public share a vested interest in ensuring that transparency and fairness are upheld; not only in practice, but in perception.”

Then came Round Two. Lara filed a motion to split the case, fast-tracking State Farm’s $1.2 billion rate hike while indefinitely delaying scrutiny of their misconduct.

Judge Seligman denied that motion too.

So one must ask: Why is California’s top insurance regulator — who calls himself the leader of the nation’s largest consumer protection agency — fighting consumers while siding with the company doing the most harm to California policyholders?

Whatever the reason, we hope that after two rebukes from the bench, Commissioner Lara will refocus on his mandate to protect consumers. It’s urgent now, as a Department of Angels survey finds that 70% of insured Eaton and Palisades survivors say delays and denials are derailing their recovery. Every day wasted deepens the trauma.

This week, Assemblymember John Harabedian brought together Senator Sasha Perez, Supervisor Kathryn Barger, Altadena Town Council Chair Victoria Knapp, and 70 survivors, in a remarkable show of force to give Lara a 5-step action list to stop insurer misconduct and enable survivors to access the insurance payouts we’re owed. Watch the press conference.

And the EFSN released a detailed plan that Lara can use to implement those five steps right away.

Survivors are not criminals.
We are the public. And we are civic leaders.

The families of California are counting on Commissioner Lara to enforce the law and make insurance what it was always meant to be: a lifeline in crisis, and a promise that when disaster strikes, we’ll gain the benefits we’ve already paid for in full.

Join me for a live online Q&A with legendary Consumer Watchdog founder Harvey Rosenfield and his dynamite team on September 16. We’ll discuss the State Farm fight, your rights under Prop 103, and how together, we can hold our insurers and regulators accountable. All are welcome! Register for free here.

Joy Chen is CEO of the Eaton Fire Survivors Network and a former Deputy Mayor of Los Angeles. “Join 8,000 of your neighbors to stay updated on our insurance fight – and get the tools you need to recover faster and stronger: efsurvivors.net/newsletter”