Alejandra Reyes Velarde

Alejandra is a California Divide reporter writing about inequality in Los Angeles. She previously covered breaking news, the pandemic and Latino communities for the Los Angeles Times. She earned her bachelor’s degree from UCLA and is pursuing a master’s degree in legal studies at the university’s law school.

Hydrogen-powered trucks at IMC headquarters in Compton on Oct. 29, 2024. Photo by Carlin Stiehl for CalMatters

California has a fallback plan for Trump’s clean car attacks. Does it go far enough?

August 21, 2025 at 6:06 a.m.

California regulators, responding to the Trump Administration’s attacks on the state’s climate policy, propose to fight back in part by asking lawmakers to backfill electric vehicle incentives, recommending more private...

FILE – Ken Honeycutt demonstrates charging his Kia Soul electric vehicle in San Lorenzo, Calif., Nov. 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File)

US Senate blocks California’s electric car mandate in historic vote

May 22, 2025 at 3:39 p.m.

The U.S. Senate voted Thursday to block California’s landmark mandate phasing out gas-powered cars, dealing a substantial blow to the state’s aggressive transition to electric vehicles.

California is planning to be the first in the nation with new rules that ramp up sales of zero-emission motorcycles in its quest to clean the air and battle climate-warming gasses. (File photo- LAKE COUNTY PUBLISHING.)

California plans to rev up sales of electric motorcycles

October 30, 2024 at 6:03 a.m.

In a nationwide first, California is planning new rules that ramp up sales of zero-emission motorcycles in its quest to clean the air and battle climate-warming gasses.

Alexis Reyna, 20, works at Chalio Mexican Restaurant in East Los Angeles on May 26, 2021. Photo by Lucy Nicholson, Reuters

Though critical to the economy, California’s young workers toil in low-wage work

November 9, 2023 at 1:51 p.m.

More than 2 million people ages 16 to 24 are working in California — about the same as the population of Houston — making up 12% of the workforce. They...

Construction workers on site of a tiny homes village in Goshen on June 2, 2023. Poverty rose to 14% among construction workers in spring 2023. Photo by Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local

More working Californians slipped into poverty as pandemic aid expired

October 30, 2023 at 12:02 p.m.

California’s poverty rate climbed in the first quarter of 2023, the latest quarter measured by the Public Policy Institute of California. Poverty increased from 11.7% in 2021 to 13.2%, the...

Sheryl Paiz, 11, holds her baby sister Hanna at the Immigrant Defenders Law Center in Los Angeles on Sept. 19, 2023. She and her family immigrated to the United States from Guatemala in June 2023. Photo by Lauren Justice for CalMatters

From Texas’ border to California: A tale of two cities’ response to migrants arriving unexpectedly

October 25, 2023 at 6:47 a.m.

Aura Silva was among 36 migrants who in early June were driven from Texas’ border to New Mexico and then flown to Sacramento. She had no family there to take...

Burger King employee Yolanda Santiago cheers “¡Si Se Pudo!” or “Yes, We Could!,” with fellow workers before Gov. Gavin Newsom signs legislation supporting the rights of fast food workers and boosting wages to $20 an hour during a press conference at SEIU Local 721 in Los Angeles on Sept. 28, 2023. Photo by Alisha Jucevic for CalMatters

Gavin Newsom signs law boosting minimum wage for fast-food workers. Is $20 enough?

September 30, 2023 at 6:41 a.m.

More than half a million fast food workers, mostly minorities and women, will earn higher minimum wage because Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a fast food bill Thursday. But some say...

A member of TODEC loads a crate of bottled water into a resident’s vehicle outside Oasis Mobile Home Park in Coachella Valley on Aug. 24, 2023. Photo by Adriana Heldiz, CalMatters

Coachella Valley farmworkers lost hundreds of dollars during storm Hilary. Financial aid options are slim.

August 31, 2023 at 12:48 p.m.

Before dawn on a recent morning, as the mud coating Coachella Valley farm fields began to crisp, Entrika Zacarias made her first attempt to drive back to work at a...

Members of the the Domestic Workers Alliance join the actors and writers strike at the Warner Brothers Studio in Burbank, on July 19, 2023. Photo by Zaydee Sanchez for CalMatters

‘Staggering solidarity’: How California’s summer strikes broke down wealth, class barriers

August 15, 2023 at 12:57 p.m.

In Los Angeles it’s rare to see actors and housekeepers standing shoulder to shoulder on picket lines, or TV writers standing behind UPS drivers fighting for better pay.

All Stories