So You're Saying There's a Chance?
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I’ve lived in California my entire life. I know the deal here. We technically are able to elect Republicans for governor, and have done so many times. Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon come to mind, but so also do Pete Wilson and George Deukmejian. It used to be doable until, ironically, when we conservatives passed Prop. 187 in 1994, which is the forebearer of what is essentially the Donald Trump immigration and deportation program. If you’re here illegally, you shouldn’t be tapping out state and federal resources. That proposition passed, and was in force for about four seconds until it was challenge in court, ultimately being tossed out. And also tossed out in the process was Republicans having anything substantially to do with the governance of the Golden State. Simply put, Republicans here were about 30 years ahead of MAGA time, but they did not have any media abilities to combat the hundreds of millions spent against them by the unions. And Republicans certainly didn’t have the legal firepower to combat the left-wing slant in the courts.  

The initiative was endorsed by then-Republican Pete Wilson, who won re-election. After that, outside of the Arnold Schwarzenegger mirage following the recall of Gray “Brownout” Davis, it’s been nothing but a one-party state here. And it’s not just in the governor’s mansion in Sacramento. The bicameral legislature in our capital consists of an 80-seat Assembly and a 40-seat State Senate. Both have been controlled by supermajorities of Democrats for years.

Complicating matters of late for Republicans is another proposition, Prop. 14 in 2010, that gave us the jungle primary. The top two people from a combined primary list of candidates, regardless of party, would face off in the general election. In many cases, Republicans have faced state office November votes between two Democrats, which isn’t a whole lot of fun. 

In this state for the last couple decades, you can divide the votes cast into three buckets – L.A. County, largely Democratic, is one bucket. The Bay Area – San Francisco and Oakland, is another bucket. The rest of the state is the third bucket. Democrats swamp the first two buckets every election cycle of late, whether the Republican, if there is one on the ballot, spends $1 dollar or $100 million. The person with the R next to their name in November will usually win the rest of the state regardless of whether anyone has heard of them or not. In the end, Republicans lose statewide somewhere around 65-35. 

The only Republican to break that three bucket model was Schwarzenegger, who successfully brokered his Hollywood charisma in Los Angeles, where he was popular with Latinos, and he reversed that one county and with it, the governorship. Politics here reverted to their dismal normalcy after that. 

Now that I’ve made the entire case why there’s no realistic reason to expect anything different in 2026, here’s why I’m hopeful in a way I haven’t been in a long time. 

Steve Hilton, the former staffer to UK Prime Minister David Cameron, and until very recently a weekend anchor on Fox News, announced he was running for governor. He chose one of the prettiest backdrops in the country as the place to stage his campaign launch. It is also just about the most conservative place left in the Golden State – Huntington Beach. 





Here’s my list of reasons why I am entertaining the possibility that 2026 might surprise a lot of people. 

1. The Pacific Palisades and Pasadena wildfire disasters – They’re both ongoing government-made calamities. The fires happened two weeks before Donald Trump was inaugurated. Donald Trump has dropped hundreds of executive orders, overhauled the staffing of the federal government, and is just warming up. The government in California – city, county, and state, have combined to issue in the same period of time, checks notes, four individual preliminary permits to begin the process of rebuilding. That’s four out of thousands upon thousands who were burned out. And that’s just the first permit, just to get the process started. More permits and inspections and regulations are on tap to make sure those zones look like the hellscapes they are for the next decade. That’s not just going to leave a physical mark, it leaves a political mark as well. All Democrats had to do was not screw this up. Dole out permits like you were a Pez dispenser, and you’d be fine. Instead, they’re incapable of passing up the chance to turn what was formerly the most beautiful residential area in the country into Hong Kong. Angelinos do not want into what the Democrats are going to force upon them. If Hilton can effectively communicate that message, he could break that L.A. County Democratic stronghold enough. Take that and juice the turnout in the rest of the state, and the math is there.  

2. Quantity and quality of candidates running – So far, there’s only one other Republican, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, who has thrown their hat into the race. Bianco is a good sheriff and a great man, but has virtually no name ID in the rest of the state. Hilton is much more media savvy, and has already seemed to coalesce the remaining Republican politicos to clear the field. This isn’t the case with the Democrats. Former HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra is presumably going to get in. Former Congresswoman and UCI housing freeloader Katie “Batgirl” Porter is already in. Former Vice-President Kamala Harris has made noise about jumping into the race, and leads by a wide margin in prospective candidate polling, but the rumor is she doesn’t actually want to work for a living. She wants to run an NGO somewhere where she makes millions of dollars a year for not doing anything, something at which she excels. L.A. Mayor Karen Bass at one point in time wanted the job, but is now toxic. Former L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is contemplating another run for political office. There’s lots of Democrats, including a couple members of Congress who are considering a run. Lots of Democrats and only one or two Republicans in a jungle primary is the reverse of the last few cycles, and it favors someone like Hilton to make it through to the final two for November.

3. Media – Hilton is hands-down the most charismatic candidate running. He is like Donald Trump in the way he knows how to do both retail politics – meeting and talking to people one-on-one, as well as doing the media that’s available and communicating a message effectively. 

4.  The Glenn Youngkin factor – one of the reasons that Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin defied all the odds in the Commonwealth and defeated Terry McAuliffe was because he found a handful of issues that resonated across ideological lines – crime and education being right at the top of the list, and ran a campaign that was positive and winsome. Yes, Youngkin pointed out the negatives of McAuliffe and the results of Democratic governance, but did so in a positive, forward-looking way. This is very much the kind of campaign Hilton is running in his first week. He’s very rough on how disastrous everything in this state is – power, education, water, homeless, fire response, taxes, all issues that resonate broadly, but is doing so firmly believing that California can truly be golden again. That’s the kind of message that could work. 

5.  The British accent – It certainly doesn’t hurt. It gives him a little gravitas that Kamala Harris at her word salad best cannot come close to equalling. 

6. The Trump factor – So far, voices like Charlie Kirk and other MAGA-friendly people are endorsing Hilton, which he’s happily taking, but he’s not putting MAGA at the center of his campaign. He’s keeping his comments on the issues and his vision for the future. Democrats and unions will try to make the election a referendum on Trump. If the tariffs work as advertised, and we have a bunch of new trade deals and a roaring economy by early next year, the Trump effect is going to help Hilton a lot. If we’re in a recession, the Trump effect will hurt him. I’ve learned not to underestimate the President, so I’m willing to gamble that Trump will be a net positive for him. 

7. California’s budget hole – the grim reaper is not just knocking on the door, he’s hovering in the living room. Los Angeles as a city is facing a billion dollar shortfall. Gavin Newsom just borrowed about $3 billion from the state’s general fund, money that technically isn’t there, to pay for the effects of his sanctuary state welfare programs for illegal aliens. And that $3 billion isn’t enough. He needs another $3 billion beyond that. At some point very soon, the money runs out, especially if Donald Trump and Congress closes off the bailout pipeline. When the money is gone and the pensions can’t pay out, and Democrats are the only people in charge of everything, Hilton’s got a pretty good case to make. 

The bottom line in all this? If you were to place a Shohei Ohtani-financed wager, you’d put your money on the Democrat, whomever they pick, beating Steve Hilton, the Republican, by a 60-40 margin. That comports with conventional wisdom. But my Spidey-sense tells me that there’s the elements of a perfect storm forming here. Everything would have to play out just right, but I think there’s a chance. 

If Hilton pulls off the upset and catches the car Republicans have been chasing in California for so long, what is he going to do with it now that he’s caught it? Well, that’s another column for a different day. Let’s see how the campaign develops.