Has Newsom Moved on From California?

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom was last seen in New Hampshire, where he was touting President Joe Biden’s reelection in a Democratic-leaning swing state. Whatever the political merits of the governor’s visit, it left Californians wondering about Newsom’s...

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SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom was last seen in New Hampshire, where he was touting President Joe Biden’s reelection in a Democratic-leaning swing state. Whatever the political merits of the governor’s visit, it left Californians wondering about Newsom’s plan for dealing with the many crises that have been piling up in Sacramento. Many observers — and not just conservative ones — have concluded that Newsom has psychologically moved on from his current job.

The Democratic primary for governor — and that’s the only primary that matters for statewide office in California — isn’t until June 2026, yet Newsom recently decamped from the capital city. He moved his family out of his 12,000-square-foot suburban Sacramento estate back to Marin County, the wealthy liberal enclave north of San Francisco. He cites schooling issues for his children. Family first, but this hardly instills confidence in his commitment to governing.

“I think the governor has made it very clear that he’s bored with his job here. And frankly, he’s underwater with his popularity in the state,” said long-time Democratic consultant Steve Maviglio. “More people think negatively of him than positively and I think part of that reason is he’s too busy running for president and not too busy being governor.”

He couldn’t even bother to give his annual State of the State speech on time or in person. He offered a pre-recorded video. The talk led CalMatters columnist Dan Walters to ask the obvious question: “[W]as it truly a State of the State address, or the opening event of his 2028 campaign for president of the United States?” Instead of reporting on conditions here, Walters said Newsom told the nation to follow “the policies and programs that he and the Legislature have wrought.” 

That would be an odd course. Before he left for his Biden campaign tour, Newsom flubbed perhaps the most significant issue that’s come before the Legislature this year: crime. Despite Newsom’s Pollyanna view of California, the media has been awash in news stories about skyrocketing property crime. Criticism has centered on Proposition 47, the 2014 statewide ballot measure that reduced penalties for lower-level crime, including retail theft.

There’s been widespread frustration at the governor’s and Legislature’s failure to address the matter. It’s mostly the result of progressive lawmakers who dominate the Assembly Public Safety Committee and refuse to toughen up sentencing. Their basic view is they won’t do anything that increases over-incarceration. But they even battled efforts to toughen up penalties for serious crimes involving fentanyl, child rape, and domestic violence.

Public pressure has mounted. Amid a wave of shoplifting and high-profile smash-and-grab robberies, a group of district attorneys, conservatives and retail companies have qualified for the November ballot a measure called the “Homelessness, Drug Addiction and Theft Reduction Act,” which directly reworks some elements of Proposition 47. It’s somewhat of an overreaction, but Newsom and legislative Democrats have been tone-deaf to widespread concern about the crime wave.

Pushed into action by the looming and seemingly popular initiative, lawmakers crafted a wide-ranging package of crime bills that address the matter without gutting Prop. 47, but they overplayed their hand. They included “poison pills“ in the legislation that would invalidate their bills if voters approved the above-mentioned DA-backed initiative. Even some Democrats were aghast at the cynicism of this move and berated their caucus.

“It is clear that the only purpose of this novel legislative maneuver is to equip opponents of the ballot initiative with a talking point — to be used on the campaign trail, and likely even on the ballot itself — to confuse voters and undermine the will of the people of California,” wrote a group of Republican members of Congress, per a Center Square report. Again amid public outrage, Democratic lawmakers backed away from the amendments.

But they weren’t done playing games. Newsom and his allies introduced an alternative ballot measure that seemed designed to muddy the waters on the ballot. One typical ploy to stop a measure is to qualify a similar-sounding measure to confuse voters, thus reducing the likelihood that the other measure will pass. In our initiative-happy state, voters often vote “no” on everything when they are unclear about the distinctions.

“Despite these efforts and having the votes necessary to pass the measure, we are unable to meet the ballot deadline to secure necessary amendments to ensure this measure’s success and we will be withdrawing it from consideration,” Newsom said before he left California. Per Courthouse News Service, Senate GOP Leader Brian Jones of San Diego chided the governor: “For once, Californians benefitted from having a governor that cares more about national politics than his job in Sacramento.”

Had Democrats been willing to negotiate in good faith, they could have spared themselves the embarrassment. Their crime package wasn’t bad and both sides agreed on the need for, say, a measure that allows prosecutors to charge serial thieves who steal under the $950 felony limit at one store and then do so at other stores — thus avoiding prosecution. It’s hard to understand how such gamesmanship can be any model for the nation. There’s no reason they couldn’t have negotiated a solution.

As I noted in my Orange County Register column, Newsom has prattled about democracy, but has used his powers to limit public say on crucial governing issues. Recently, he succeeded in a state Supreme Court challenge to a business-backed initiative that would have limited tax increases. Newsom and other state leaders convinced the court to pull the measure based on the argument that it amounted to an improper constitutional revision. So much for defending democracy.

Meanwhile, the state continues to endure a variety of policy crises, including a collapsing property insurance market, growing homelessness concerns, spreading wildfires, and soaring utility and home prices. It might be nice to have a governor who was more engaged in the problems at home rather than dancing on the national political stage, but perhaps his mind just isn’t on the job.

Steven Greenhut is Western region director for the R Street Institute. Write to him at sgreenhut@rstreet.org.

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