Professor Pruitt Talks to the Bee About City Councils' Pushback on Health Mandates

Professor Lisa R. Pruitt spoke to the Sacramento Bee for a Nov. 24 story on recent pushbacks on health mandates by Northern California city councils, including Oroville’s. In November, the Oroville City Council declared the city a “constitutional republic.” Read the story.

“These local officials are playing to their constituents,” Pruitt told the Bee. “They are, I think, often in agreement with their constituents, but also understanding they don’t have any power as a local government entity to really resist the state in any meaningful way. So they make these statements.”

Lisa R. Pruitt, Martin Luther King Jr. Professor at UC Davis School of Law, is a scholar whose recent work explores the legal relevance of rural spatiality, including how it inflects dimensions of gender, race, and ethnicity.  Pruitt's work also considers rural-urban difference in transnational and international contexts. She is the recipient of the law school’s 2020 Distinguished Teaching Award.