The Democrats are in danger of giving away one of the most important perches in American politics, particularly with a radical Republican like Donald Trump in the White House, and one that they should easily own: the California governorship. The party’s lack of strong internal leaders, ideological divides, and inept handling of issues of race and identity have combined to create a chaotic mess with dire potential consequences. Democratic leaders, both in California and across the country, must immediately start working on a path to ensure that at least one of the candidates who qualifies for the general election in the California governor’s race is a Democrat.
The California primaries are officially on June 2, but voters receive and can mail in their ballots as soon as May 5. That’s just six weeks from now. Instead of primaries for each party, California is one of the states where the top two candidates go to the general election. And the polls suggest that if the election were held today, the two candidates who advance might be Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco and former Fox News host Steve Hilton, both Republicans. And Bianco and Hilton aren’t Arnold Schwarzenegger-ish moderate Republicans, but true conservatives who want to implement Trump’s vision in California.
California is a heavily Democratic state (Kamala Harris received 59 percent of the vote compared to 38 percent for Trump in 2024), so what the hell is going on? Democratic dysfunction. Of the ten candidates running, eight are Democrats. Bianco and Hilton are each near 20 percent, essentially splitting the statewide GOP vote. Meanwhile, the eight Democrats are all getting a chunk of the state’s Democratic vote, leaving the entire field stuck in either single digits or the low to mid teens. Polls also show from 15 to 25 percent of the electorate saying that they are not sure who they will vote for. That likely consists of Democratic voters unable to sort through their eight choices.
The three leading Democrats, former Representative Katie Porter, billionaire venture capitalist Tom Steyer, and Representative Eric Swalwell, are all close to Bianco and Hilton in the polls. But at this point, there is no guarantee that any of those three will make the general election.
How did we get here? Part of the problem is that there is no clear heir apparent to outgoing Governor Gavin Newsom. Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis started running for the top job, didn’t get much support, and then shifted to the state treasurer’s race last August. Senator Alex Padilla chose to stay in Washington, despite pleas from some party officials. Harris opted against a run as well. The field does include some figures with strong resumes. Xavier Becerra was in the House leadership in Washington before stints as attorney general of California and Health and Human Services secretary in the Biden administration. Antonio Villaraigosa was the speaker of the state assembly and the mayor of Los Angeles. But in more than a year of campaigning, none of the Democratic candidates have broken out from the rest of the field.
Some California Democratic leaders are very aware of this issue and have been trying to fix it. Earlier this month, Rusty Hicks, the chairman of the California Democratic Party, released a public letter urging some of the lowest polling candidates to get out of the race before the formal filing deadline on March 6, to ensure that their names were not on the ballot. No one dropped out. Hicks last week publicly released a poll funded by the state party that showed Hilton at 16 percent, Bianco at 15, Porter, Steyer and Swalwell at 10 percent, and the other Democrats even further back. Hicks, to his credit, is not being subtle.
But the situation is actually getting worse. The University of Southern California and KABC-TV Los Angeles were due last week to host a debate that was supposed to include only the top candidates in the race. To select which candidates would qualify, a USC political science professor came up with a formula that assessed the candidates’ fundraising and polling. This process was not perfect, because the formula resulted in the inclusion of the five candidates who have consistently polled the highest (Bianco, Hilton, Porter, Steyer and Swalwell) but also a sixth, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, who is way down in the polls. The formula assessed how long a candidate has been in the race, so it essentially rewarded Mahan for entering the race late (January 29) but with strong fundraising. Mahan is a moderate and has signaled he would be less antagonistic toward tech companies and other wealthy interests in California, so they have poured millions into his campaign. I don’t think Mahan should have been included.
That said, the debate sponsors were generally acting in a mature, pro-democracy way, trying to provide voters a real discussion between the truly viable candidates. But on the eve of the debate, the excluded candidates started aggressively complaining. And then, shockingly, the leaders of the state legislature in California joined in. The four excluded candidates are all people of color: Becerra; Villaraigosa; Tony Thurmond, the state’s superintendent of public education; and former State Controller Betty Yee. The six candidates who would have been in the debate all are white. So the legislative leaders and the excluded candidates blasted the debate as racially exclusionary. The debate was canceled due to the backlash.
This is nonsense. I wish one of the top polling candidates were a person of color. The whiteness of the leading candidates no doubt reflects racial inequalities in California and the United States—there aren’t a ton of Black or Latino Americans who can spend tens of millions self-financing their gubernatorial run as Steyer has. But trying to winnow the field to the most viable candidates is not racist. This is another example of the Democratic Party being unable to recognize the difference between racist practices that hurt a wide swath of people of color versus individuals invoking their race in self-interested ways.
And this troubling racial dynamic is not just about the debate. Hicks, the party chair, has been noting that the firm conducting the surveys for the party is run by Black and Latino partners—a clear move to rebut potential criticisms that the polling is somehow racially biased.
So now, we’re only weeks away from the start of voting. It’s time for some leadership. Harris, Newsom, and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have all cast themselves as leaders in the fight against Trump and authoritarianism. It’s easy to bash Trump. It’s harder to publicly demand one of your friends and allies end a campaign that they have put their blood and sweat into. But the governorship of California is too important to go to a Republican because Democratic leaders were afraid of offending fellow Democratic politicians. Even if Becerra or Yee stay in the race, I suspect their support will sink even closer to zero percent if prominent Democrats like Harris and Pelosi are urging people not to vote for them.
But that may not be enough. I’m still nervous about Porter, Swalwell, and Steyer canceling one another out, and finishing behind Bianco and Hilton. Two designated Democratic candidates would be best. The most natural process would be for the party’s center-left to collectively endorse one candidate, and the party’s progressive wing to back another. Swalwell is the most moderate of these three and is already getting support from prominent center-left figures in the party, such as Arizona Senator Ruben Gallego and California’s own Senator Adam Schiff. Pelosi and others in that establishment bloc should also endorse him. Alternatively, they could choose Becerra, perhaps the most qualified of the ten candidates. He’s polling terribly now but a collective endorsement from the party’s poobahs would probably lift him to the top of the field.
Meanwhile, groups such as the Working Families Party, progressive officials in the state, and leftist national figures like Senator Bernie Sanders should choose Porter or Steyer. (Representative Ro Khanna has already endorsed Steyer.)
I favor Steyer myself. The billionaire has a progressive platform and is a fairly fresh face in California politics. I respect Porter, who was a strong voice, particularly in hearings, for progressive economic policies when she was in the House. But she just lost the U.S Senate race to Schiff in 2024. And she has a reputation for treating staffers terribly.
I don’t love the idea of Democratic leaders anointing two white male candidates in California, which has only had white male governors throughout its history despite being one of America’s most racially diverse states. But Harris or Padilla would likely have been leading candidates if they had run, so I’m skeptical that the party leadership in the state is ignoring potential candidates of color. That said, if Becerra, Porter, or one of the other candidates who isn’t a white man can get collective party support, great. The key is to consolidate around two Democratic candidates—which ones are less important.
Hicks has called for the low polling candidates to drop out by April 15. That’s a reasonable timetable. It gives the struggling candidates a last chance to show viability, while leaving a few weeks for Democrats to consolidate around a few candidates. But after April 15, it’s really time to get serious. California Democratic leaders have played a huge role in resisting Trump, mostly notably their rapid move to redraw the state’s congressional districts to offset Texas doing the same. Pelosi was an instrumental figure in getting Biden to leave the presidential race after his dismal debate performance. It’s time for the party there to make another tough set of decisions to winnow this field and produce a Democratic governor in California. If they can’t sort this out and they hand the state to a Trumpy Republican, it will be the latest sign that Democratic Party leaders aren’t up to the task of stopping authoritarianism.
