Why Democrats are panicking about losing California

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1:56in American politics, may well one day want to be president as a result of being a household name. But with a lot of Californians unhappy and big name Democrats ruling themselves out of the race, could the party seriously lose control of the state? Are the Republicans, as they were back in the days of Schwarzenegger and further back in the days of Ronald Reagan, are they about to get the governor's mansion in their grip again? Welcome to AmeriCast. AmeriCast. AmeriCast from BBC News. You hear that sound? Oh, I think when I hear that sound, it reminds me of money. We didn't start this war, but under President Trump, we are finishing it.

2:38This is a big cover-up, and this administration is engaged in it. This guy has Trump Arrangement Syndrome. I have four words for you. Turn the volume up.

2:52Hello, it's Justin in the worldwide headquarters of AmeriCast in London, England. It's Sarah here in the BBC's Washington Bureau. And it's Anthony, along with Sarah, right here in Washington, D.C. And we are going to be joined by California royalty today. Christine Pelosi is going to join us. The long-time Democrat knows the state very well. Running herself, actually, is a candidate, isn't she, in the California state Senate. Senate. She was a party political strategist for a long time. But of course, she is also the daughter of Nancy, who is the very, very long serving Democratic leader in Congress, Speaker of the House and all time kind of, I don't know, fixer of Democratic successes down the years, it's fair to say, isn't there?

3:38So Christine Pelosi, not only a big figure herself in California politics, but also very much attached to a family that knows the California scene. And the reason we're doing that, guys, is that we're going to concentrate on California. And the reason we're concentrating on California, Sarah and Anthony, is that it's a mess, actually, isn't it? We've got this race coming up for the governor's house. It's such an important race. It's such an important position. You think of Ronald Reagan, you think of Schwarzenegger, And you think of Gavin Newsom, actually, who's using it as a springboard to the presidency, he hopes.

4:14But this time round, huh? Yeah, it is. It is a mess. And none of the prominent names that people kind of expected might jump into the California race did so. That includes Kamala Harris, the former senator, former Democratic nominee for president in 2024 after Joe Biden dropped out, former vice president. And she decided not to run. Alex Padilla, who is the sitting senator from California, was rumored to have been Gavin Newsom's pick to be his successor, also said he wasn't going to run for it. So what has been left is kind of a grab bag of California politicians, each with their own strengths, but also very distinct weaknesses.

4:59Katie Porter, a Democratic congresswoman, was a rising star for a while, but she kind of imploded after allegations that she was cruel to her staff. Of course, Eric Swalwell, we've talked about another congressman from California. He was starting to become a front runner and he collapsed because of multiple allegations of sexual impropriety, harassment, even allegations of assault. He resigned from Congress and dropped his California bid. So that leaves a few other folks who all been kind of jockeying for position, but no one has really emerged from the pack on the Democratic side. And that's even more dangerous in the Democratic Party than it would be normally because of what happens in California, which is called a jungle primary.

5:42So instead of the Democrats having their own primary to pick a candidate and the Republicans doing the same, they're all in the same electoral contest. So on the same day in June, voters pick which candidates they want in the runoff election in November. And it could be two Democrats. It could be two Republicans. It could be one of each. It's just whichever two candidates come to the top of the pile in this jungle primary. So that's particularly messy and or exciting. But I mean, in this California jungle, it is remarkable that there are no real big beasts, as Anthony was saying there. There's no silverback, no jaguar striding through.

6:20It's like a little... I love the imagery. I know. It's like a kind of chattering troop of chimpanzees, isn't it? All arguing with each other over who should get the nomination and who should be the governor. But, I mean, Justin, it is astonishing. You were saying how many high-profile governors there have been. Just think about California if it was a country. It's got like 40 million people living in it. You know, that's not far off a decent-sized European country. It's got a larger economy than most of them. It's the fourth biggest economy in the world. It's bigger than the United Kingdom. It's got deep billions of money in venture capital.

6:54It's got all the excitement of Silicon Valley. They're busy inventing the future there in California. And yet, yeah, just some chattering chimpanzees wanting to run the state. Mind you, one of them might eventually be a big figure. And we should, I always think of the primary that I went to when Hillary Clinton was running against Barack Obama way back when. So this is in the run up to 2008. And it was, I can't remember where it was. I think it was South Carolina. And a journalist said, you know, this is like Gladys Knight and the Pips. She said, in other words, it's Hillary Clinton and all these kind of other figures.

7:28And, of course, one of those other figures, one Barack Hussein Obama, eventually became rather more than an unnamed pip. So we should genuflect, mildly at least, to the fact that one of the figures we're going to be talking about might one day become something. But it's certainly true that they're not something at the moment. And, of course, worth saying as well, isn't it, Gavin Newsom can't run. He's term limited in any way. He wants to be president. He needs to do other things. I do want to say also, you know, it seems crazy, this idea of a jungle primary and top two. There was a reason why California did it.

7:58It was a good government measure that went along with electoral redistricting reform, which we've talked about in the past. And that is so that in a state like California that the Democratic Party generally dominates, you wouldn't have a choice in the November election between a Democrat who is definitely going to win and a Republican who had no choice. There could be times when you'd have a choice between two Democrats of different flavors. So maybe you'd have a centrist Democrat and a liberal Democrat in some of these congressional districts and some of these down ballot races. It would allow for voters to have better choices.

8:35Yeah. And the Republicans would say that the reason why big Democrats, big name Democrats don't want to do it. And the reason why it's all a bit of a mess is that actually is also in many respects a rather unhappy place, isn't it? I mean, I know people who are Democrats, actually, wealthy Democrats, but Democrats who are themselves leaving the state now, partly, I think, because they want to pay less tax, but partly also because the places they live. And you think particularly of the crime ridden nature of a lot of San Francisco, but also other cities as well, less well-known cities and places like Oakland, which aren't fancy places that tourists go to.

9:14California has real problems. I only mentioned Los Angeles as well, which is having its own mayoral election, isn't it? Which is quite something. But there is a sense, isn't there, in California, among Californians themselves, that all is not well. California does have problems. And they're very real problems that the Democratic leadership and Gavin Newsom in the state have struggled to address. And I think the biggest one is cost of living. It's just expensive to live in California right now. The price of real estate is really high as a result. The taxes are higher. And to be able to buy a house in California anywhere near where you work is really difficult.

9:53And I think that is one of the main reasons why people are leaving the state, although the tax rates are higher there as well. So you can go to a place like Texas or Nevada or Arizona where the cost of living is lower, property values are lower, taxes are lower. And there's a certain amount of attractiveness to that. You know, the crime rates, California's aren't by population close to the highest in the country. There are other states that are much higher. But in some of the urban areas, there is a problem with homelessness, again, related to cost of living. There is a problem with crime, as there is in many big, big cities.

10:31And, you know, I was talking to a political analyst for a story I did last year, and he said California is just a difficult state to govern. It has so many different constituencies, so many different interests. It's such a big state that it is impossible to make all the people happy all the time. It's impossible to make a majority of the people happy all the time. So when you come into the state as a leader, you are having to make tough decisions that are going to anger some constituency or another. And it is essentially a thankless task. There are some problems, though, aren't there, Anthony, that nobody can say are not something that needs to be urgently gripped.

11:08and the homelessness that you mentioned there. I mean, that's what most AmeriCasters that were to visit California would be really, really struck by, whether you're in Los Angeles, San Francisco, some other places. It's really quite disturbing to see the levels of people sleeping rough that there are, often abutting some very, very fine, some of the most expensive property in the world, probably. And you were saying, Justin, you know, some wealthy people who've left the state. I mean, I've got friends who have left certainly San Francisco, largely because the neighbourhood they were in was becoming unlivable with homeless encampments encroaching pretty much on their garden gates to the point where, yeah, it just wasn't feasible to carry on and bringing up a family there.

11:51So, I mean, there are some in-your-face problems in California that everybody in this race says need to be tackled. Everybody's identified, the homelessness, the cost of living, affordability as the big issues that they're running on. They just have some slightly different ideas about how to fix them. We're going to go through the Democratic candidates who we think have got a chance of winning in just a second. And we assume still, I think, don't we, that a Democrat is going to win in the end. It would be quite something if they weren't to in this day and age and with the balance, the political balance of California, as we know.

12:22Just worth mentioning, though, before we get to them, largely because he's a Brit, is that the Republican frontrunner is probably not a Brit anymore, is he, Anthony? has probably changed. But Steve Hilton used to work for David Cameron in Britain when Cameron was prime minister. He was a big figure here, actually, a well-known political figure, certainly in Westminster circles. He's gone out to California, largely actually because his wife got a very good job in the tech world out there. But he's, well, like previous people, Anthony, gone to California. He's made something of himself. Yeah, a Fox News host, a prominent kind of television person in conservative circles, and he's used that as a platform.

13:07As many Republicans in California have, it helps to have a media personality, some sort of media visibility in order to be able to launch a political career there because it's such a big state. But he has used that in order to volunteer himself to the top of the pack in this jungle primary. He's in the maybe high teens to low 20s, but with a divided Democratic field, that puts him at number one, at least for now, and certainly ahead of any other Republicans in the field. So, yeah, he's an interesting character. You probably know more about him based on his political background in the UK than I do.

13:46Well, yeah, I mean, I don't know much about him now. I think he's been on a journey. Isn't that the phrase you use? He's been on a journey. Yes, I think so. His politics have changed somewhat, Justin, from when any of us used to know him around Westminster, when he was a pretty liberal conservative, wasn't he, working for David Cameron. No, he'd arrived in California where a lot of people turned left and instead he started embracing Brexit and a much more right-wing persona. You know, a cynic would argue that that was what helps get you prominence on Fox News. But it's very much the politics he espouses now.

14:19And the result is that he has won the endorsement of Donald Trump, which in a lot of races is what Republican candidates absolutely crave. You know, he can make or break your candidacy in a primary, whether or not Donald Trump supports you. Different question in California as to whether it's a massive electoral advantage to have the president behind you. Obviously, Donald Trump is still popular among Republicans in California. And there's still a lot of Republicans. California's a big state, 40 million people, as we talked about, and maybe 40 percent of those are Republicans. So that's a sizable chunk of people.

14:51And it has helped him cement his position as a Republican frontrunner. There was a little concern that Donald Trump weighing in on this race actually hurt the Republican Party because then all the Republicans rallied around Hilton rather than boosting someone like Chad Bianco, who is a sheriff, also very Trumpy, anti-immigration, has raised concerns about election fraud in the state, the kind of guy that probably would have gotten more Trump supporters if Trump hadn't endorsed Hilton. And I think the most tactical move for Trump would have been to stay out of it, hope that Hilton and Bianca both got roughly the same amount of support in the state.

15:28And that would put him at the highest level to be able to sneak past all the other Democrats. But I guess Trump really liked Hilton. Again, Trump likes people who are on Fox News and Fox News talking heads. So it's no surprise he endorsed him, I suppose. But it has come with complications for the Republican cause in California. And what does Steve Hilton himself make of it? He was on CNN, asked if that endorsement helped him now, but harms him later. We've had one party rule for 16 years already, and it's given us the highest poverty rate, the highest unemployment rate, many other things where we're the worst performing state in the nation.

16:05It is time for change in California. There's all these pundits and the Democrat machine that arrogantly assumes that yet again, the Democrats are going to run away with it because that's what happens in California, because they've got money from the government unions and all this advantage of the machine that they've built over the years. That is so arrogant. It takes the electorate for granted. People are desperate for change. If you look at the polls, there's a majority who think the state's going in the wrong direction. Why would you vote for a Democrat if you want change, considering they've been in power for all these years?

16:38So I just don't buy any of that argument at all. God, he sounds posher than me. My ears aren't tuned to British accents, so I'm going to have to take your word on that. I did check Justin Hilton is a U.S. citizen now. He got a citizenship in 2021 and renounced his British citizenship just a year ago. So, yes, he is now full-blooded American. Even if the accent doesn't quite sound like it. But I will fact check a couple of things he said there. The first, California has close to the highest unemployment rate, maybe a percentage off a place like Delaware, certainly below Washington, D.C., which is a state.

17:17But still, the poverty rate, California is, you know, six or seventh down the list behind even big states like Texas. So it's it's more middle of the pack. But I think he is touching on, as we discussed earlier, some of the dissatisfaction, some of the frustration that California residents have with the direction of the state and the problems that the state has. We should get to the Democrats now, shouldn't we? Who should we start with, Sarah? Who do you think we ought to bring people's attention to first? Because they really are. I mean, these are not household names, are they? They're hardly household names in California, actually, let alone outside.

17:53No, probably the best known is Javier Becerra. And that seems to be where the Democrats are coalescing around since Eric Swalwell dropped out. So he is now narrowly, but is now leading polls of all the candidates. And he's definitely the highest polling Democrat. That could change. There's still very high numbers of undecideds in these polls that are being taken. But he is relatively well known comparatively with the others and a bit more experienced. He was the Health and Human Services Secretary under Joe Biden for four years. So that's why he's getting tagged as being the Biden candidate, which you might not think is necessarily the best advertisement for somebody, although it does speak to your politics to a certain degree, as well as your association with an elderly president.

18:39He's been the attorney general in the state as well, where he's kind of aggressively pursued legal actions against the Trump administration. So he's somebody who can say he's got experience at all different levels of government, who's reasonably moderate in his politics, and is probably somebody who it would be harder to object to, do you think, Duranth? We make a very positive push for Javier Becerra. I'm not doing very well. No, I mean, he has a well-rounded resume. He also was a member of Congress representing California. So he's been around California politics for a while. I mean, he is, let's say, he's Hispanic, which I think is a benefit campaigning in California, particularly as we saw in 2024, Republicans and Donald Trump making some inroads into Hispanic votes in other parts of the country.

19:25He is not an engaging public speaker, let's put it delicately. He's not the most charismatic guy. And there was some talk around Biden circles when Becerra started to move up in the polls as like that guy of all the people in Biden's cabinet to make a move to a more prominent political position. He was kind of considered a lightweight or someone who really didn't accomplish all that much. But what do we hear from him talking this week and what became one of the more viral moments of the campaign recently? By the way, this is a profile piece. This is not a gotcha piece, right? Well, look, I think these questions are fair.

20:07It's in order to learn about you as a candidate. So long as about the profile. I don't know how you define profile, but I'd like to begin the interview. The way I describe profile is you talk about all the things that I've done, things I want to do, and along with some tough questions, but not only tough questions. Yeah, so that was Becerra being interviewed on KTLA's Inside California Politics by the journalist Annie Rose Ramos and trying to set the rules of the game, which is not terribly flattering for him. It shows a bit of naivety in terms of dealing with the press. It's not nearly as bad as Katie Porter's clashes with the press, though, is it?

20:42So she's the former congresswoman Democrat who's also running, who got absolutely furious with a journalist for asking her tough questions once. And that clip got out there. We've also asked the other candidates, do you think you need any of those 40 percent of California voters to win? And you're saying, no, you don't. No, I'm saying I'm going to try to win every vote I can. And what I'm saying to you is that. Well, to those voters. OK, so so you. I don't want to keep doing this. I'm going to call it. Thank you. you're not gonna do the interview with us nope not like this i'm not not with seven follow-ups to every single question you ask every other candidate has i don't care i don't care i i want to have a pleasant positive conversation which you ask me about every issue on this list and if every question you're going to make up a follow-up question then we're never going to get there and we're just going to circle around i am an amazing i've had to do this before ever You've never had a conversation with the reporter?

21:38To end him in order. Okay, but every other candidate has done this. What part of, I'm me, I'm running for governor because I'm a leader. So I am going to make... So you're not going to answer questions from reporters? Okay, why don't we go through, I will continue to ask follow-up questions because that's my job as a journalist, but I will go through and ask these, and if you don't want to answer, you don't want to answer. So nearly every legislative... I don't want to have an unhappy experience with Hill. Yeah, she was considered one of the top potential candidates early on, and that just torpedoed her poll ratings.

22:13And so when, as we mentioned, Swalwell dropped out because he was starting to rise in the polls, there was a scramble, and no one went back to Porter. Some people started to gravitate towards Becerra because as milquetoast as he is, he at least seems to be a safer pick. Right Milk toast I love that phrase And I still have I've looked it up before I know it's got a Q In the middle of it Somewhere in the middle Yeah I still can't work out What it means And it always makes me think Of dipping a piece of toast In a glass of milk The way you might do A chocolate chip cookie Or something What does it really mean I mean I think that's The best kind of definition I can come up with That it just means Very bland And unchallenging If you are milk toast you're not generally worth$2.4 billion.

23:03But our next runner and rider is worth$2.4 billion, which is a sizable sum, even in American politics, even for the kind of people trying to be American politicos. And I suppose it's extraordinary that he's a Democrat too. JB Pritzker in Illinois is also worth a ton of cash, isn't he, and is a Democrat. So it's not necessarily something that's completely outside the orbit of what is normal. But tell us a bit, Anthony, about Tom Steyer. Tom Steyer, he's been on my radar, at least because he ran for president in 2020, self-financing his campaign. He poured a ton of money into it, campaigning primarily on environmental issues.

23:47That's the big thing that he has cared about over the course of his political career. I will say, milk toast is another good way to describe Steyer. He's not the most engaging personality, but he is pouring also vast resources into California. He's on television all the time. It's an expensive state. So having a lot of money to campaign helps. And he not only is also focusing on the environment there, he's focusing on wealth inequality. He talks about being the billionaire who will tax other billionaires and is talking about addressing the economy and the cost of living in California as well. I'm the billionaire who wants to tax other billionaires.

24:31I'm the billionaire who's taking on the electric monopolies and trying to break up their power. I'm the billionaire who wants to tax the oil companies and make polluters pay. So when you say I'm the only billionaire in the race, yes, but I'm the person who is the change agent in this state. I'm the person who's taking on the funded corporate interests who are driving up costs for Californians in every place. No one wants to take them on. I'm doing it. All of his money might come in handy because this is turning out to be a really, really expensive race. And that is because people like the corporate interests that Stairsess is taking on are pouring millions into really vehement attack ads.

25:10And this is happening to all the candidates. They're all being attacked. So a ton of negative publicity. Where his money comes from is one of the things that they're really having a go at him about, saying that actually he was invested in fossil fuels and other less environmentally friendly things. And that was why he became so rich in the first place. But it's quite remarkable, actually, the level of negativity that there is. So we've pointed out what the attacks on a lot of the Democrats are. We need to go back to our friend Steve Hilton, who's in a lot of trouble over a taco. Tacos are at the centre of American politics these days, aren't they?