When 2025 came at us like a wrecking ball—with mass ICE kidnappings, National Guard threats, safety net destruction, and devastating fires—ACCE didn't wait to see what would happen. We moved immediately—into the streets, knocking on doors, putting ourselves on the line before the dust had even settled. This moment called for bravery, and we brought it. We met uncertainty with action, fear with courage, and chaos with the disciplined organizing our communities needed to survive and fight back.

This year demanded that we stretch in three directions at once: protect our communities from immediate harm, defeat Trump's authoritarian agenda, and build the future we deserve. And ACCE members across California showed up with courage.

We protected communities under siege: We hosted over 200 Immigrant & Tenant Know Your Rights workshops reaching 5,000+ people. We led LA's Rapid Response Network with 130+ trained responders across South Central. We defended tenants facing illegal intimidation, fraudulent charges, and unsafe conditions—from Oakland tenants organizing against landlords threatening to call ICE, to expanding LA's Tenant Anti-Harassment Ordinance enforcement. We organized in Bakersfield against Medicaid cuts, expanding into the Central Valley. We won eviction protections for LA fire survivors and helped raise nearly $1 million for grassroots relief.

We took the fight to the billionaire class: We launched the People Over Billionaires campaign, shut down Palantir offices and Thiel Capital with direct action, marched on billionaire row in San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego with hundreds of people, and our viral content reached over one million views. We built out campaigning infrastructure and launched our Mass Organizing Project to scale toward the 3.5% we need to turn back authoritarianism.

We fought for the future: We cut LA's rent cap from 8% to 4%—one of the biggest tenant victories in the country. We brought hundreds to Sacramento for AB 1157 to cut the state’s rent cap and are gearing up for the fight ahead. We launched new chapters, trained over 100 ACCE spokespeople, trained dozens of members to become volunteer organizers who are now leading their own communities campaigns, and seeded groundbreaking work on social housing, code enforcement, climate justice, and utility affordability.

This wasn't a year of easy wins. But it was a year of building power, testing new strategies, and proving that communities can organize at the scale this moment demands.

Read the full 2025 ACCE Impact Report to see how we're meeting this authoritarian moment with defiant, joyful, disciplined organizing—and preparing for even bolder campaigns in 2026.

When we fight, we win. And we're just getting started.

In solidarity,

Christina Livingston, Executive Director of ACCE Institute

ACCE is proud to release our Housing Justice Narrative Report, documenting how our community-led campaigns have advanced the narrative around housing justice in California over the past 7 years. 

During this period, ACCE has led efforts to secure groundbreaking tenant protections in 11 cities across California and helped secure the largest expansion of tenant rights in recent U.S. history with the 2019 Tenant Protection Act.

The contributions of our communications and narrative work speak for themselves:

- Featured in 11,500 articles, reaching 25.4 billion people

- Email pitches capturing journalist attention at nearly 20% above industry average

- Trained over 300 directly impacted residents as media spokespeople since 2020

- Grown our social media platforms by 10K%.

[CHECK OUT THE REPORT HERE]

2024 was a year of significant victory and experimentation for ACCE. We made major strides toward protecting tenants in the cities where we organize, and dipped our toes into the worlds of climate and transit justice -re-establishing ACCE as a multi-issue organization nimble enough to take on campaigns on a myriad of topics. We made progress in aligning our work to our organizing north stars, and built out our organizing capacities with stronger communications, data, and finance teams. And we lived into our values of supporting workers unions by finalizing our first ever ACCE Union collective bargaining agreement. We certainly had a lot to celebrate.

Yet, despite our progress and victories, the country faces serious threats in the coming year with promises of mass deportations, massive budget cuts, and an economy that continues to leave too many struggling to make ends meet, not to mention the climate catastrophes and deep social divisions we are already experiencing. We are at a crossroads. There is a path prioritizing the wealthy few -paved with tax cuts for the ultra-rich, scapegoating of marginalized communities, and repression- that is being laid out before us. Alternatively, there is a path that we have been dreaming up and fighting for - a path defined by respect, equity, and dignity -that redirects our governing systems and our social life towards care and community. The battle for which path will win out is afoot. In this year of impending threats, we see pivotal organizing opportunities. Protection and mutual aid will be needed - but alone they are altogether insufficient.

The moment calls for BOLD demands and even BOLDER action. At ACCE we do not intend to hide from that call. We are prepared to take on bigger and more audacious battles, move more people into action, and forge even stronger and broader ally relationships than ever before. We know power concedes nothing without a demand, so we will spend 2025 organizing impacted people to make big demands, and building power across the movement to win them because when we fight, we win!

READ THE FULL REPORT HERE!

In power and solidarity, 

Christina Livingston, Executive Director of ACCE Institute

Private Equity Stakeholder Project (PESP) and the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) have published an analysis of private equity giant Blackstone’s profit-seeking practices in California as residents suffer amidst one of the nation’s worst housing crises. “Helter Shelter: How Blackstone Contributes to and Profits from California’s Broken Housing System,” examines how Blackstone has profited from rent hikes and ramped up evictions, and even depends on the continuation of the affordable housing crisis for sustained profits. According to the report, Blackstone has touted to investors multiple times how the firm’s real estate investments benefit from declining new supply of housing, a key driver of the affordable housing crisis. 

In 2021, Blackstone acquired 5,800 rental units in the San Diego area. Since then, the report shows, Blackstone has increased the rent at these properties 38% — almost double the 20% average rent increase for all apartments in the San Diego market during this period. The increase at some Blackstone-owned buildings has been especially high – up to 79%.

The report also outlines how Blackstone used over $14 million of investor capital – including from California public employee pension funds and the University of California – to lobby against regulation to limit rent increases in California.

Wow! What a year of organizing and winning for everyday Californians. This report contains dozens of successful organizing campaigns, policy fights, and infrastructure growth, but the reality is that ACCE members won so many more victories in 2023 than can fit in this brief summary. We took meaningful steps toward our north star of winning a housing system built on the value that everyone deserves a safe and affordable place to call home. We began to organize around climate justice and pension divestment from Blackstone. We launched two new movements in Rise Up/Levantate CA and California Common Good, and we helped incubate Movement Legal (formally ACCE legal) to add to the state’s tenant movement infrastructure. Our staff and budget grew as we took on new challenges and issue areas, and we engaged in the struggle, together with allies at the local and state level, to create more alignment and capacity for our movements.

This year comes with its own challenges and opportunities that we are gearing up for. The national election gives us the chance to “campaignize” the election -putting our member’s issues and solutions front and center while exposing the money and agenda that big real estate and big oil are moving through our democratic processes. It also comes with the threat of a violent and bigoted base of anti-black, anti-immigrant, anti-lgbtq+ individuals and groups being activated as the country battles between creating a true democracy and falling into fascism. All of that while we continue to make progress on creating a housing system that works for us all, and saving the planet from climate disaster. That may sound daunting, but what we at ACCE know is that the only thing that can save us, is US. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. So, we will roll up our sleeves and keep working to construct the California, the country, and the planet we deserve.

On a personal note, 2024 marks my 20th anniversary as an organizer, which both begs the question - when did I get so old? and generates a desire to reflect on where I’ve been and where I’m headed. I can think of many successes and defeats, regrets and moments of pride, but when I put the last 20 years together, one thing that I can say for sure is that I have met the most dedicated, courageous, righteous, and special people in my life through my work at ACCE. Many of those people are ACCE members and staff, some are mentors, and some are allies and supporters. Every one of them has left a mark on me - made me wiser, more strategic, more caring, more steadfast. So, thank you all for how you have changed me, and for how you’ve changed the course of history! I’m still in this fight, in part, because of you, and I’ll keep fighting hasta la victoria.

With Love and Solidarity,

Christina Livingston, ACCE Institute Executive Director

Read the full report here.