Harmeet Dhillon Just Told California Its Gay Certification Program Is Done

June 21, 2026 Cat2, The Media
Andrea Izzotti via shutterstock

California thought it could quietly hand out $633 million in contracts to state-certified gay businesses.

Now Harmeet Dhillon just told them the DOJ is watching.

And she just told California ratepayers they've been paying inflated utility bills to fund a program that requires contractors to prove their sexuality on government paperwork.

California Built a Program That Requires You to Prove You're Gay Enough

This isn't a fever dream from a late-night comedy show.

The California Public Utilities Commission – the agency that oversees PG&E, SoCal Gas, and every major utility serving California's 39 million residents – has been running a formal program to certify businesses as gay-owned since 2014.

The utilities that participate spend more than $43 billion a year on outside contractors.

The state's goal is that 1.5% of that procurement goes exclusively to businesses run by certified LGBT owners – which amounts to $633 million per year if utilities hit their targets.

To get certified, a business owner submits an application to the Supplier Clearinghouse and checks at least one item on a 13-point eligibility list.

Ways to prove it: a letter from an LGBT organization vouching for the owner's sexual preferences, three personal references written on company letterhead confirming homosexual orientation, or documentation of same-sex "family building efforts" like IVF or surrogacy.

Business owners who falsely represent their company as gay-owned face up to a year in county jail.

Read that again – California created a government program that requires you to prove your sexuality under penalty of imprisonment.

Dhillon Tells California Ratepayers the Bill Is Coming Due

City Journal's Christopher Rufo and Austen Hufford broke the story Tuesday, and the response from the Trump administration was immediate.

Dhillon went on Glenn Beck's podcast the same day.

"I don't know how who somebody sleeps with is relevant to their provision of utilities-related support services," she said. "That's rhetorical. I think we know it isn't. It's nonsense, it needs to stop, and it's illegal."

She followed that up on X Wednesday with an official statement from her DOJ Civil Rights Division account.

"Affirmative action for 'Eskimos' and 'LGBT people?' The California Public Utilities Commission's 'Supplier Diversity Program' has gone off the rails," Dhillon wrote. "This may be news to California, but race and sex discrimination violate federal law. @CivilRights will take any appropriate action."

"How does that help the ratepayer – everybody who consumes utilities in the state of California – get the best rates? It doesn't," Dhillon said. "Obviously, when you have set-asides and special contracts like that, you have inflation because people know that their status is a commodity that they can actually sell."

Dhillon encouraged companies that lost contracts because they lacked the right identity boxes to consider legal action against the state.

California Has Been Running This Program for 40 Years While Expanding It Deeper

California started the Supplier Diversity Program in 1986 under Republican Governor George Deukmejian – originally aimed at women- and minority-owned firms.

Democrats expanded it steadily over the decades, adding LGBT businesses in 2014 and then formally setting escalating gay procurement targets in 2022 – targets that ratcheted up annually until hitting 1.5% in 2024 and beyond.

Gay advocacy groups had pushed the CPUC hard to implement the expansion.

A 2021 letter from the state's legislative LGBTQ caucus warned that any reduction in gay procurement targets would be "an insult to the LGBTQ+ community."

California Democrats controlled the legislature throughout – and they never asked the consumers paying those utility bills whether they wanted the arrangement.

What Dhillon just did is use the exact same civil rights law that Democrats have wielded for 60 years and point it back at them.

Sex discrimination is sex discrimination whether you're discriminating against someone for being gay or for being straight.

The contractors who lost business every year because they couldn't check the right identity boxes now have a federal civil rights investigation on their side – and a legal action path that Dhillon personally suggested they pursue.

California built a system so inverted that you go to jail for lying about being gay.

Dhillon just made that system the federal government's problem.

Sources:

  • Harmeet K. Dhillon, X (formerly Twitter) post, @AAGDhillon, June 18, 2026.
  • "California comes under DOJ scrutiny for program boosting gay-owned contractors," The Washington Times, June 17, 2026.
  • Christopher F. Rufo and Austen Hufford, "Inside California's Gay-Certification Program," City Journal, June 17, 2026.
  • Glenn Beck interview with Harmeet Dhillon, The Glenn Beck Program, June 17, 2026.
  • California Public Utilities Commission, "Supplier Diversity Program," CPUC.ca.gov, accessed June 18, 2026.