California Governor Gavin Newsom is attempting to shore up his left-wing street cred prior to a 2028 run.
While Newsom is associated with the limousine liberal wing of the state's Democratic politics -- heavy on left-wing cultural messaging, while eschewing radical economics -- he has recently called for a nationwide billionaire tax, while opposing a similar statewide measure that the state will vote on in November.
According to Newsom, working-class Americans "[...] did everything right, and the system still has nothing for them. What stands in their way is the federal tax code, a corporate code, and an inheritance code written for a different set of Americans."
Like previous Democratic support for hiking California's minimum wage, it's unclear how these kinds of specific policies would change the state's economic structure. San Francisco, for instance, is economically stratified due to the predominance of high-paying tech and AI companies, a fact that won't be altered by a new wealth tax.
More to the point, though, the move appears to be a case of Newsom having his cake and eating it too. He has defended his opposition to the California wealth tax appearing on November's ballot, saying that affected billionaires could simply move to another state. He isn't wrong -- California's high-tax and regulatory policies caused Elon Musk to move Tesla operations from California to Texas in 2021. However, Newsom is surely aware that a national billionaire tax would have a low chance of passing. And if such a tax would be damaging to California's business environment, why would a national tax not similarly harm the country's economic prospects?
Much like Democratic leaders feeling the heat from their most left-wing constituents on Israel, Newsom's move simply looks like an attempt to save face against future primary opponents accusing him of being too beholden to corporate interests. It's an easy symbolic stance to take, but Kamala Harris tried to similarly pivot to the left during the 2020 Democratic primary, and she failed miserably. Time will tell if American voters see through Newsom's inauthenticity once the 2028 presidential election revs up.
