California Republican lawmakers are calling on Attorney General Rob Bonta to investigate Gov. Gavin Newsom’s ties to a billionaire Panera Bread franchisee and the restaurant’s exemption from the state’s $20 minimum wage.
The Democratic governor had pushed for the exemption, which allows restaurants baking and selling bread as a standalone item to continue paying the current rate of $16 to its employees. That means Greg Flynn, a longtime donor to Newsom, stands to save hundreds of thousands of dollars a year for each of his company’s two-dozen Panera Bread franchise locations in California.
On Monday, 16 additional Republican lawmakers joined the call for Attorney General Bonta, requesting that he “initiate an independent and unbiased investigation into the matter.”
In a joint letter, the signatories noted that the carveout exemption, “puzzled industry experts, as it appears to lack any justification based on the unique characteristics of such restaurants.”
They noted that in the months surrounding the passage …