Merritt Farren, California insurance commissioner candidate, 2026 primary election questionnaire

Ahead of the June primary election, the Southern California News Group compiled a list of questions to pose to the candidates who wish to represent you. You can find the full questionnaire below. Questionnaires may have been edited for spelling, grammar, length and, in some instances, to remove hate speech and offensive language.

Name: Merritt Farren

Current job title: Consumer Advocate and Attorney

Age: 65

Political party affiliation: Republican

Incumbent: No

Other political positions held: None

City where you reside: Pacific Palisades, ahead of the fire; now, Westwood, Los Angeles.

Campaign website or social media: merrittfarren.com/

Why do you want to become the insurance commissioner? What does a commissioner do? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

I’m a Pacific Palisades fire survivor, father of two amazing sons, and a former senior lawyer with Amazon and Disney with over 30 years of experience in business, tech, and law.

I’m in this race for two reasons: to use my experience to solve our insurance crisis, and to demonstrate to my sons that the best response to tragedy is to create positive change from the tragedy that serves the community and protects others from what you’ve just experienced.

I’m also motivated by my Christian faith, which teaches that we are here not just to serve ourselves, but to serve others with courage and compassion.

After the fire, I saw firsthand how broken our insurance system is. To help my community, I joined the State Farm rate-increase proceedings representing consumer interests, giving me an inside look at what’s driving our insurance crisis.

What’s our crisis look like? Millions of us can’t get the coverage we need. Those who can are facing skyrocketing costs. Yet consumer treatment worsens.

The Insurance Commissioner has enormous influence over costs and coverage across home, auto, business, and health insurance. To succeed, the role requires deep experience in business, tech, and law. I have that experience. None of my competitors do.

I want to bring my experience and the customer-centric innovation I learned at Amazon and Disney to insurance reform — real reform that expands options, lowers costs, keeps families safe and business in operation.

That’s why I’m running.

When it comes to wildfire risks, how would you balance consumer protection with a functioning, competitive market? What would you have done differently to reform homeowners’ insurance following efforts to help L.A. rebuild from the wildfires? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

I come from two of the most innovative, customer-centric companies in the world—Amazon and Disney—companies that understand that customer service and business success go together.

As Insurance Commissioner, I’ll bring that perspective to create a win-win for consumers and insurance companies.

I’ll lead a technology-driven reinvention of our insurance regulations to allow insurers to innovate and deliver more options at affordable prices. No tinkering with a broken system or layering new rules on top of ones that already fail.

I’ll pursue bold, from-the-ground-up reform—like the kind I helped deliver at Amazon, including on the team that launched Kindle and eBooks.

My reforms will help bring a technology revolution to insurance, similar to what we’ve seen in banking—think Apple Pay and similar innovations that benefit both businesses and consumers. And that revolution will be driven by companies located in California – bringing needed jobs.

I’ll also take decisive executive action to resolve issues that delay claim payments after disasters. For example, questions around smoke damage arose within days of the Palisades and Eaton fires, yet 14 months later, the current Commissioner has taken no action beyond forming a committee and proposing legislation. The result: consumers left struggling.

Had I been Insurance Commissioner, I would have taken the Amazon approach: study the issue quickly and come out with a solution within days, not 14 months.

The state’s Department of Insurance says it is holding insurers accountable with its new “sustainable insurance strategy.” SIS allows insurance companies to increase rates based on the growing threat of climate change, passing on to their customers costs for insuring high-risk homes. In exchange, insurance companies are expected to write more polices in fire-prone parts of the state, where they’ve ended coverage for hundreds of thousands of homeowners over the past decade. The goal of SIS is to help transition property owners off the FAIR Plan. Tell us why you do — or don’t — support this strategy. (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

The Department’s Sustainable Insurance Strategy (SIS) hasn’t worked. Studies show the designation of “high-risk fire zones” was flawed, allowing insurers to check compliance boxes without actually moving families off the Fair Plan. It’s another example of rulemaking that fails to solve our insurance crisis.

We do need to move homeowners off Fair Plan—and quickly—but this isn’t the way to do it.

If elected, I’ll eliminate the need for Fair Plan by implementing CAL Reinsure, a plan I developed with both consumers and insurers in mind. CAL Reinsure shifts community wildfire risk off insurers and onto a state-organized reinsurance authority, allowing insurers to write policies statewide without fear of catastrophic losses from major fires.

The model draws on successful programs in Florida for hurricanes and in the UK for flood risk. It will enable insurers—large and small—to reenter the California market and expand coverage.

CAL Reinsure will also speed recovery by requiring payment of the full insured amount within 30 days after a total loss. Fast payouts are essential not only for families but for rebuilding entire communities.

CAL Reinsure will eliminate the need for Fair Plan, stabilize the insurance market, bring insurers back to California, expand access to affordable coverage, and end the delays and denials consumers face today.

State Farm teetered on insolvency in the state after the L.A. wildfires. Everyone’s homeowners’ insurance policies rose this past year due to the consumer bailout of State Farm and the FAIR Plan, both of which sought huge rate increases. Is this fair to consumers who don’t live in fire-prone areas? Tell us why or why not. (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

Insurance is fundamentally about creating a large risk pool so that those contributing can receive help in the unlikely event of a loss. Property insurance protects not just individuals, but entire communities, because rebuilding is hindered when those who suffer losses lack the resources to recover. While pricing should reflect relative risk, it will never be perfect.

My own home, completely destroyed in the Palisades fire, was not considered to be in a fire risk zone. It sat in a suburban neighborhood like suburban neighborhoods up and down our state. Thousands of homes stood between my home and the natural space where the fire began. Those homes all burned. The destruction was driven not by location, but by failure: the reservoir meant to have water to put out fire was left empty, hydrants quickly ran dry.

My home and all those around it were left to burn with no firefighters around to help.

The massive scale of the losses suffered by homeowners, business owners and insurance companies in the Palisades fire was caused by the incompetence of state, county and city leaders, not by people building in fire-prone areas.

Catastrophe modeling is a computer-based process that simulates thousands of potential natural or man-made disasters to estimate potential financial losses. Do you believe California could utilize catastrophe modeling that could lead to rate increases for homeowners? Why or why not? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

I support insurance reform that allows our marketplace to function correctly and efficiently, including reform allowing catastrophe modeling. Restricting the use of business tools isn’t a good way to keep prices low. It distorts the marketplace, drives companies out of the state, reduces the competition in the market and serves to drive prices up, not down.

But we shouldn’t assume that marketplace reforms allowing more flexibility will necessarily drive prices up. The opposite can be true. The tech-centric reforms I’ll introduce will be designed to allow more insurers and more insurance products to enter the market and to bring costs down.

Among other things, the reforms will allow modeling that better aligns the risk consumers and businesses need to offload through insurance with those on the backend willing to put capital at risk. That will allow more capital to come into the system and lower insurance costs.

More generally, there’s no doubt that we are experiencing catastrophic losses at a higher rate than we’ve seen before. That’s true locally in California and elsewhere around the world. As a society, we need to better understand the risks we face through good modeling and use our understanding to take steps, large and small, to better prepare and better protect our communities from harm.

The California FAIR Plan is the state’s insurer of last resort. Is it fair for the plan to charge people to recover losses on a $1 billion assessment to pay for L.A. fire claims, even when these same people weren’t living in the wildfire areas? Please explain why or why not. (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

The recent Palisades and Eaton fires were largely urban/ suburban fires. The enormous losses were due mostly to the loss of homes and business structures not located in “wildfire” areas.

Both fires were caused by mistakes that should not have happened, which were completely out of the control of those who suffered losses and lost their lives. So, the question “should those who don’t live in fire-prone areas pay higher insurance costs due to the fact that some do” really doesn’t present itself in this case.

Insurance is meant to pool risk. It’s always the case that those who don’t suffer losses will pay for those who do.

That said, insurance policy pricing should be allowed to reflect relative risk, and if that risk points to higher pricing for those living in fire-prone areas, then insurance companies should be allowed to adjust rates up in those areas.

At the same time, we need to be mindful, when making any adjustment to regulations allowing rates to rise, of the financial crisis a sudden rise in insurance costs can create for families and businesses. We should have, in permitting changes that allow prices to increase, rules that limit the speed of increases under individual policies, to reduce the pain felt by those whose prices will rise.

Shouldn’t major insurers like State Farm and Allstate be permitted to cancel policies and leave the marketplace? Why not just let them leave? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

The insurance crisis we’re in is largely attributable to a misdirected belief that we can force insurance companies to “do what we want.” That approach may have some positive effects for a very short while, but doesn’t work at all over the long term.

The way to get Californians the insurance they need isn’t to try to force companies to provide it when the companies don’t want to do so, but to create a regulatory environment for insurance companies in California that will cause them to want to do business here – while also making it easier for consumers to make smart decisions about what insurance they buy and doing a much better job than we do today of ensuring that consumers receive the support they need after tragedy strikes and they need to make a claim.

I come from two of the world’s most consumer-centric companies – Amazon and Disney – and I know that we can do both: create a business environment friendly to innovation that will attract insurance companies and also get consumers better insurance coverage at lower prices.

I’ll use my Disney and Amazon consumer-centric experience to bring Californians the insurance they need at prices they can afford.

As of March, Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara is moving forward with finalizing new regulations to limit public oversight and transparency in insurance rate increases under 7%. A finalized rule effectively curtails public challenges to insurance rate increases by denying compensation to groups like Consumer Watchdog and other advocacy organizations. What do you think of this plan? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

As someone who participated in a rate increase proceeding before the Department of Insurance as an official Intervenor alongside Consumer Watchdog, I have a particular point of view on this question.

My takeaway from my participation in the proceeding: the rate proceedings can and should be made to be more efficient and faster – but intervenors and the rules related to their payment, where they are paid, is not to blame for the time rate approvals currently take. The party to blame is Ricardo Lara himself, who has failed to update the rate approval proceedings to make rate approvals more efficient.

Intervenors provide a key check for consumers on the rate approval system. Their role and right to seek compensation is established by Proposition 103, which created the rate approval requirement.

Ricardo Lara’s attempt to gut compensation for intervenors is inconsistent with the law established by Proposition 103 and is nothing more than an underhanded attempt to shift blame for the insurance crisis away from where it properly lies.

Car insurance rates are skyrocketing in California, with rates jumping over 30% since 2022, driven by expensive vehicles, complex repairs and new safety requirements. What could you do to contain auto insurance costs when a driver has no accidents? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

Increased auto insurance costs are hurting families and businesses and need to be brought down ASAP.

First, we need to find ways to bring more insurance providers into the state. Our inefficient rate approval procedures and other regulatory limitations make California an unattractive place for auto insurance companies to operate. Increased competition between insurers will help bring prices down.

Among other things, we should remove restrictions that currently prohibit insurance companies from using tech to gather safe driving data. Those restrictions force drivers with good driving habits to subsidize the insurance costs of those with bad driving habits. There are legitimate privacy concerns in the collection of any driver data, and those can be addressed with strict rules on what data can be collected, how it is passed on to insurers, how long it is allowed to be kept and how it can be used. Other states that allow the use of driving data have lower rates. More importantly still, providing drivers with data on how safely they are driving saves lives – theirs and others.

Second, we need to go after all of the other underlying costs, including those included in your question and the enormous cost of unnecessary litigation that absolutely has to be addressed if auto insurance rates are to come down.

How do you think taxpayers could better understand the work of this office? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

Of all the elected offices voters will cast ballots on, none will have a greater impact – for good or for bad – on their financial well-being than Insurance Commissioner.

The Commissioner exerts huge influence on property insurance (which even renters pay for indirectly), insurance for vehicles and business insurance.

The Commissioner has a less direct influence on health insurance, given the overlay of federal programs, but under my leadership, will drive forward the reform we urgently need in health care and health insurance.

I’ll work to get insurance costs down in all areas, and will also turn the office into something it hasn’t been to date: a major advocate for safety in our communities. I’ll take an active role to ensure that neglect of community protection of the sort that caused the destruction in the Palisades can’t happen again in California.

Insurance is about physical and financial security. Ensuring that all Californians will be my priority.

What’s a hidden talent you have? (Please answer in 250 words or less.)

I have two hidden talents that have great relevance to my ability to drive the reforms necessary in insurance as Insurance Commissioner:

I’m great at breaking problems down, bringing parties who aren’t aligned together, getting brainstorming going to find solutions of mutual benefit and achieving win-win solutions that others can’t.

I have a strong moral compass that will allow me to find reforms that will bring insurers back into California without abandoning for one second the interests of consumers.

Amazon required me and all other team members to work to make Amazon the most customer-centric company in the world. As Insurance Commissioner, my team and I will innovate as required to get Californians the best insurance possible at the lowest prices and to ensure that every Californian is treated with the care and respect they need when they suffer a loss.

California is one of the largest economies in the world and one of the largest insurance markets in the world but lags today in insurance leadership.

I’ll work to make California the worldwide leader is insurance thought and reform.

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