On Saturday, Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill which would have offered striking workers unemployment benefits, which had drawn strong support from labor unions and from Democrats in the state legislature.

Newsom noted when he vetoed the bill that the California unemployment trust fund is already nearly $20 billion in the red.

In a statement explaining his veto, the governor wrote, “Now is not the time to increase costs or incur this sizable debt.”

In September, amid several high profile strikes, the California legislature, which has a Democrat majority, passed the bill in a show of solidarity with union workers. Twelve days later, Hollywood writers ended their nearly five-month walkout, however Hollywood actors and Southern California hotel workers both remain on strike.

The bill was designed to make workers who were on strike for two weeks or longer eligible to receive unemployment checks. Most states, with the exceptions of New Jersey and New York, do not allow striking workers to collect unemployment checks.