In the muddled California gubernatorial race, Democrats are simultaneously growing more confident and more uncertain.
Compared with just weeks ago, Democrats are far more optimistic they will avoid a one-two GOP finish in the June primary that would ensure a Republican governor next year in the nation’s biggest blue state.
But at the same time, they have even less clarity about which of their party’s candidates is most likely to crack the top two and proceed to the general election, where any Democrat will be a prohibitive favorite over any Republican. Democratic strategists generally agree that self-funding billionaire Tom Steyer has the inside track — but might still be overtaken.
This rapid reconfiguration of the race is the result of two seismic jolts that seem unrelated, but have had an unexpectedly reinforcing effect.
The first was President Donald Trump’s perplexing decision to endorse Republican Steve Hilton on April 6. Trump’s move increased the odds that Hilton would pull away from his GOP rival Chad Bianco, but diminished the chances they would evenly split the limited GOP primary vote, which is the only way they could finish one-two in the June primary and block Democrats from the ballot in November.
The second big event was the instantaneous collapse of Rep. Eric Swalwell’s campaign last weekend after CNN and the San Francisco Chronicle published detailed accounts from women who alleged that he raped or otherwise sexually abused them. The fall of Swalwell — who had shown signs of edging ahead of the other Democrats in both polling and institutional support — increases the pool of Democratic-leaning voters available to the other candidates, which further reduces the fear that the party could be locked out from the general election. But his demise also left the Democratic side of the contest without a clear front-runner.
After Trump’s endorsement, the risk of Republicans locking out Democrats from the general election “probably takes care of itself,” said Garry South, a Democratic strategist who has worked on four California gubernatorial races. “The real question is what Democrat elevates up the ranks into a No. 1 or 2 position. And I think that’s an open question at this point.”
The biggest question looming over the June 2 primary has been whether Democrats could be locked out of the governorship under the state’s top two primary, in which all candidates run in a single primary, with the two highest finishers proceeding to the general election. Democrats faced that risk because their voters were fragmenting across a large field while Republican voters — though likely only around one-third of the total primary electorate — were dividing between only two serious contenders.
But Trump’s endorsement of Hilton, a former Fox commentator and adviser to the British Conservative Party, over Bianco, the Republican sheriff of Riverside County, has greatly eased Democratic fears.
Analysts in both parties believe that Trump’s endorsement has positioned Hilton to consolidate a bigger share of the limited Republican vote over time, lowering Bianco’s likely ceiling. That in turn will reduce the risk of a lockout by decreasing the vote total any Democrat needs to reach the top two.
“Everybody was so panicked about … this two-Republican thing,” said John Emerson, a longtime Democratic activist and fundraiser in Los Angeles who served as the White House liaison to California for former President Bill Clinton. “Then Trump goes and endorses Hilton, and people are saying, ‘Well, I guess that solves that problem.’”
Dan Schnur, a former Republican adviser who now teaches political communication at the University of Southern California and the University of California at Berkeley, said Trump may have wanted to ensure one Republican reaches the general election to encourage turnout for a voter identification ballot initiative conservatives are hoping to place on the November ballot. But in the process, Schnur says, “for all practical purposes Trump’s endorsement ensured there will be a Republican on the ballot in the fall, but a Democratic governor next January.” Which Democrat is best positioned to seize that opportunity, though, remains far from clear.
Probably the most famous quote ever about California politics came from Robert Shrum, a longtime former Democratic strategist who is now director of the Dornsife Center for the Political Future at the University of Southern California. During a 1986 Senate race, Shrum memorably told the Los Angeles Times that “a campaign rally in California is three people around a television set.”
Reached this week, Shrum told me that he would now update that assessment — slightly. “I would say a political rally in California is three people around a television set and one person holding up their iPhone,” he said.
Shrum’s maxim reflects the difficulty candidates face attracting attention from voters in the nation’s largest state. Even for the most talented and compelling candidates, becoming known in a state so large, distracted and expensive to advertise in is an enormous challenge. And no one would describe this field as particularly talented or compelling.
“Nobody has galvanized the voters,” says David Binder, who has polled for former Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Gavin Newsom, and is not working for any of the current contenders. “If you look at the candidates who have gathered momentum and excitement around the country on the Democratic side, they are generally younger people who have an element of charisma — (James) Talarico, (Zohran) Mamdani, AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) — those are the ones people are paying attention to. Our California candidates have not yet shown the ability to generate (that) level of excitement.”
This year’s Democratic race has unfolded without an obvious leader, especially after Harris and Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla passed on it. Former Rep. Katie Porter took an early lead among Democrats, but her support tumbled when video surfaced of her berating a television reporter, and she’s never regained that lost ground. Her major early rival, former state Attorney General and federal Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, never generated interest commensurate with his resume, a verdict that also applies to former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, former State Controller Betty Yee and current state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond.
The weakness of that field prompted late entries from Swalwell, Steyer and San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan. Before Swalwell imploded, he showed signs of separating himself from the other Democrats, for instance by winning endorsements from the powerful Service Employees International Union and the California Teachers Association.
With Swalwell gone, most Democratic analysts give Steyer the edge. That’s primarily because of his overwhelming financial advantage. As of Wednesday, he had spent nearly $116 million in television and digital advertising, according to data from AdImpact tracked by CNN. That’s about three-fourths of the money spent on advertising by all the candidates from both parties.
“I would say traditionally this race is over because Steyer’s money will cancel anything else out,” said Lara Bergthold, a Los Angeles-based communications consultant for liberal causes and former executive director of the Hollywood Women’s Political Committee. “In a big field like this, money and name recognition means that when the regular voter gets into the polling place and looks at the choices they will go, ‘The only name I recognize here is Steyer.’” But Bergthold, like other Democratic strategists, added, “I don’t feel like it’s cooked (for Steyer) at all.”
Steyer skeptics note that all his spending has only raised his support into the low double digits. South compared him to Al Checchi, another super-wealthy political newcomer who spent lavishly but lost the California Democratic nomination for governor in 1998. Steyer “has done what multimillionaire, self-funded candidates often do, which is he’s overexposed himself,” South said. “You can’t watch TV without seeing a Steyer ad every three minutes. You have to wonder if he’s worn out his welcome, as Al Checchi did.”
Steyer, a former hedge fund executive, has also defined himself as an unabashed progressive, basically a billionaire version of Sen. Bernie Sanders. He’s endorsed a single-payer Medicare for All state government takeover of the health care system, pledged to criminally prosecute federal immigration agents, and said he will vote for a controversial wealth tax if its supporters qualify it for the November ballot.
That aggressive positioning gives Steyer a base on the left but exposes him to two risks. One is that he may have trouble extending his reach beyond the party’s most liberal elements — only about one-fourth of Democratic voters identify as “very” liberal in PPIC polling — even as Porter remains a formidable competitor for that support. “If one of them was not running, the other would be a very strong favorite right now,” said Schnur, referring to Porter and Steyer. “But they split the progressive vote, which may end up creating an opportunity for another alternative.”
The bigger risk for Steyer may be attacks on his liberal bona fides that frame him as an opportunist and a hypocrite. A group of business interests opposed to him is airing ads slamming investments he made during his finance career in private prisons, companies involved in ICE detention, and fossil fuels. Steyer has parried with what some neutral observers consider an effective response ad, but given that voter impressions of him are so shallow, few discount the risk from a sustained attack on these grounds.
Other than Steyer, Mahan, the San Jose mayor, has the most money, and probably the clearest lane in the race — though little support in polls so far. Mahan has positioned himself as the moderate alternative, pledging to reassess state regulations; take more aggressive steps to reduce the homeless population; and freeze taxes until the state better monitors its existing spending. That’s established a beachhead for him among centrist Democrats.
“In my political circle — the people who think we should do something comparable to what Clinton did in 1992 crowd — everyone is talking about Mahan,” Emerson said. “But I don’t know if that circle is still relevant in California politics.”
With Porter, a former legislator, and Steyer, a former finance executive, as Mahan’s main Democratic competitors, an independent committee backing the mayor will stress his executive experience in an upcoming ad blitz, said Mike Murphy, a longtime GOP strategist and critic of President Donald Trump who is working for the group.
“He has a message about actually doing stuff on affordability,” Murphy said. “He’s not a Washington congressman and not a Wall Street tycoon, which is an ad you may hear.”
But others believe Mahan is leaning too heavily on achievements in San Jose that may not impress voters elsewhere. Some question his pointed criticism of Newsom — on CNN recently, for example, Mahan said his grade on the governor’s tenure is “probably in the C range” — at a time when Newsom’s approval rating among state Democrats in PPIC polling exceeds 80%.
Mahan’s biggest vulnerability, though, is the flip side of his biggest strength: the millions he has raised from Silicon Valley interests, including some around Peter Thiel and other wealthy executives who are close to Trump. If Mahan “starts to rise,” South said, “the next move that Steyer makes in my mind is to go after the guy with all guns blazing.” Steyer has already dinged Mahan as my “tech-bro-funded opponent.”
Bergthold said if Swalwell’s collapse encourages a kind of flight to safety, Becerra, with his impressive resume, might get a second look from more voters. “If the Swalwell thing becomes a pox on all their houses and I just want somebody who is calm and steady and can do the job, then Becerra could be that,” she said.
Likewise, since women will likely cast almost 60% of the Democratic votes in June, Porter might get a late look among female voters disgusted by the Swalwell scandal. If Mahan stalls, business groups might even find Porter more acceptable than Steyer, predicted Rob Stutzman, a GOP consultant. “I repeatedly hear from (business groups), ‘I can’t believe I’m saying this, but she was really impressive, she was prepared, she knew her stuff,’” he said.
Yet Bergthold, like others watching the race, said the limited funding available to everyone except Steyer and Mahan will make it very difficult to emerge from the pack in a race that has generated so little engagement from voters. South framed the challenge for the field even more starkly: “I doubt that any of these other candidates have a shot at being in the runoff other than Steyer unless Nancy Pelosi comes out and endorses somebody.”
Steyer is a candidate with big vulnerabilities. Democratic insiders generally doubt he has the skills to master Sacramento, and in this populist moment some voters will question the sincerity of his billionaire-Bernie persona. But most strategists find it easier to list reasons why his Democratic rivals will not overtake him than to envision scenarios where they do.
The California Teachers Association’s decision late Tuesday to quickly shift its endorsement to Steyer may be a leading indicator that more of the state Democratic establishment is accommodating itself to him as the most likely next governor. With county officials due to mail ballots to voters beginning May 4 — and a CNN debate among the contenders scheduled for the next night — crunch time is approaching for the other Democratic contenders to prevent that assumption from hardening.
CNN’s David Wright contributed reporting.
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