California dreaming: who is running to succeed Gavin Newsom as governor?

Katie Porter

Former congresswoman Katie Porter, who represented Orange county, emerged as an early frontrunner. She made a name for herself as a consumer advocate in Congress, grilling corporate executives and pushing for lower drug prices, using her signature whiteboard. In 2024, she ran for Dianne Feinstein’s Senate seat, a race she lost to her colleague in Congress, Adam Schiff. 

Her campaign was rocked in early October after a series of unflattering videos: the first capturing a confrontation with the CBS reporter Julie Watts, during which Porter threatened to walk out of an interview; shortly after, a video surfaced of her berating a staffer. Though her support has slipped, she still commands significant name recognition because of her high-profile work in Congress.

Xavier Becerra

Xavier Becerra held elected office in California continuously from 1990 to 2021 – first as an assemblyman, then a congressman and finally as attorney general. The last post often cast him in the national spotlight for repeatedly suing the federal government during Donald Trump’s first term. Becerra spent the last four years serving as Joe Biden’s secretary of health and human services.

Like most Democrats, he has centered his messaging on the issue of affordability. But his campaign hit an early speed bump in November, after his former chief of staff Sean McCluskie pleaded guilty to federal criminal charges for conspiracy to steal money from Becerra’s campaign account in 2022. Becerra has not been accused of wrongdoing, but his opponents have pounced on him.

Antonio Villaraigosa

Antonio Villaraigosa boasts a career that took him from Chicano student activist, to teachers union rep, to speaker of the assembly and mayor of Los Angeles. Though he still describes himself as a progressive, he has presented himself as more of a centrist, playing up his history of cutting taxes, boosting police numbers and reining in crime. He came in third the last time he ran in the gubernatorial primary, back in 2018.

Eric Swalwell

Congressman Eric Swalwell has served as a member of Congress representing California’s East Bay since 2012. He gained a national profile in 2020, as one of the more than two dozen Democrats to take a stab at winning the party’s presidential nomination. The next year, he helped manage the impeachment case against Donald Trump in the House. Swalwell is playing up his history of challenging the president, while stressing the increasingly urgent issue of affordability.  

Tom Steyer

Tom Steyer, the billionaire financier turned climate change activist and liberal political patron, also gained national attention for his participation in the crowded 2020 Democratic presidential primary. Though best known as an environmentalist, Steyer’s top campaign issues are pressing corporations to pay more taxes to fund public schools, breaking up utility monopolies and banning corporate political action committee money from state elections.

Betty Yee

Former California state comptroller Betty Yee, a San Francisco native, has less name recognition than many of her Democratic colleagues, but points to her background in finance as a major strength for imposing accountability and confronting affordability challenges and the growing cost of housing. As comptroller, Yee says she has identified more than $4bn in misused funds, according to the Los Angeles Times. She also served for two terms on the state’s board of equalization, which oversees taxes on property, alcoholic beverages and insurers.

Tony Thurmond

Tony Thurmond, the superintendent of public instruction, has struck perhaps the most pro-labor stance in the field, calling for an increase to the state minimum wage and a teacher pay boost, in addition to echoing the chorus for more affordable housing. The former assemblyman won election to his current office with the backing of the California Teachers Association and other unions.

Ian Calderon

Ian Calderon, a former state assembly member, positions himself as the candidate of generational change, often pointing out that he served as California’s first millennial state legislator and its youngest majority leader. He left politics five years ago to focus on raising his family, saying the experience highlighted – you guessed it – the growing problem of affordability, especially soaring housing prices. Though he hails from a prominent southern California political family, Calderon emphasized his political independence in a campaign video, saying he doesn’t “take marching orders from anyone – and I certainly don’t always agree with my party”.

Chad Bianco

The Riverside county sheriff, Chad Bianco, stands out as the most prominent Maga candidate to join the race. Known for defying Covid-19 mandates and presiding over a uniquely deadly jail system, Bianco is running as an immigration hardliner in the mold of Donald Trump. Despite the fact that registered Democrats outnumber Republicans in California by two to one, Bianco’s name recognition coupled with the relative lack of candidates for conservatives to choose from raises the possibility that Bianco could advance to the general election.  

Steve Hilton

Former Fox News host Steve Hilton, once an adviser to the then British prime minister, David Cameron, is the other major Republican candidate. Despite that résumé and his support for Trump, the English-born former advertising executive is leaning less into culture war issues and more into the old-school conservative mantras of cutting taxes, regulations and government spending. His campaign says he aspires to make it possible for every Californian to afford a single-family home. Hilton is so far polling well behind the better-known Bianco.