Six Democrats and one Republican on the stage in Newsom’s hometown of San Francisco took direct aim at the governor’s record on homelessness, efforts to ban the sale of new gas-powered cars and opposition to an anti-crime ballot measure that Californians overwhelmingly passed two years ago.

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who unsuccessfully ran against Newsom for governor in 2018, pointed to state spending on homelessness as an example of ineptitude.

“We spent $24 billion at the state, along with billions more from the counties and the cities throughout the state, and homelessness went on,” he said. “We cannot be afraid to look in the mirror.”

The televised debate revealed the schism between the moderate and progressive Democrats hoping to replace Newsom, as well as efforts by Steve Hilton, the sole Republican who took part, to coalesce the conservative vote.

Hilton, a former Fox New commentator and British political strategist, called on his top GOP rival, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, to drop out of the race.

“My Republican colleague Chad Bianco is not here tonight to face these Democrats or his record in 2020, during the Black Lives Matter riots,” Hilton said at the event, which was co-sponsored by the nonprofit Black Action Alliance, which was founded to give Black voters a greater voice in the Bay Area.

Bianco “took a knee when told to by BLM, now he says he was praying,” Hilton said. “Chad Bianco has got more baggage than LAX.”

Bianco was invited to the debate but said he was unable to attend because of a scheduling conflict. His campaign did not respond to requests for comment about Hilton’s attacks.

The, at times, feisty debate came amid a gubernatorial race that thus far has lacked sizzle or a candidate on either side of the aisle who has excited Californians. Public opinion polls show that most voters remain undecided.

Seven of the dozen prominent candidates running to replace Newsom participated in the gathering at the Ruth Williams Opera House in front of a live audience of about 200 people. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) was scheduled to participate but canceled, citing the need to go back to Washington, D.C., for congressional votes. Former Rep. Katie Porter (D-Irvine) also did not attend the debate.

The two-hour clash, at times plagued by audio issues, was hosted by two local Fox News affiliates and moderated by KTVU political reporter Greg Lee and anchor André Senior, as well as KTTV’s Marla Tellez.

Five takeaways from the debate:

Making California affordable again

When grilled about how they planned to tackle the high cost of living in the state — gas prices, rent, utility bills and other day-to-day financial challenges — most of the candidates prefaced their answers by talking about growing up in struggling households, often with immigrant parents who worked blue-collar jobs.

Former U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said he would stabilize rents and freeze utility and home insurance costs “until we find out why they’re increasing.” California Supt. of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond said he would raise taxes on billionaires and create tax credits to help families afford the high cost of living.

Villaraigosa and Hilton said they would lower gas prices by cutting regulations on California’s oil refineries.

Hilton blamed the state’s high cost of living squarely on Democratic policies. “They’ve been in power for 16 years,” he said. “Who else is there to blame?”

Billionaire hedge fund founder turned climate activist Tom Steyer said he favors rent control. Steyer and former state Controller Betty Yee said they would prioritize zoning and permitting reform to build more housing, particularly near public transit. Both Steyer, a progressive, and San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, a moderate, spoke about using new technology such as pre-fabricated homes to build more affordable housing.

Protecting immigrants

In the wake of the Trump administration’s chaotic immigration raids that started in Los Angeles in June and have spread across the nation — recently resulting in the shooting deaths of two people by federal agents in Minneapolis — the Democrats on stage unanimously voiced support for immigrants who live in California. Some pledged that, if elected, they would use the governor’s office to aggressively push back on President Trump’s immigration policies.

“We’ve got to say no to ICE, and we’ve got to take on Trump wherever he raises his ugly head,” Villaraigosa said.

Steyer, whose hedge fund invested in a company that runs migrant detention centers on the U.S.-Mexico border, and Thurmond both said they support abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and Thurmond and Mahan said they support a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

Politicians politicking

Amid the debate’s dodging, weaving, yammering and spicy back-and-forth, there were a few moments when the candidates rose above the din.

Villaraigosa, the former two-term mayor of Los Angeles and a former speaker of the California Assembly, insisted that the moderators call him “Antonio” instead of Mayor Villaraigosa.

“It’s my name, everybody. I’m just a regular guy,” he said, prompting a laugh.

Mahan, on the other hand, tried mightily to portray himself as being above the dirty business of politics.

“The truth is that our politics has been oversimplified,” he said. “It’s become this blood sport between populists on both sides, and you deserve real answers, not the easy answers.”

Yee, who has been running on her background as controller and a member of the California Board of Equalization, cast herself as the financial savior the state needs in trying economic times of budget deficits and federal cuts.

“We have not been accountable or transparent with our dollars for a long time,” she said. “Why are we right now and [in successive] years spending more than we’re bringing in? This is where we are. So accountability has to be a tone set from the top.”

The rich guy and the new guy

Steyer, who paints himself as a repentant billionaire devoted to giving away his riches to make California a better place for all, did not directly answer a question about his position on a controversial proposed ballot measure for a new tax on billionaires to fund healthcare. But he said he supported increasing taxes on the wealthy and boasted of having the political backing of bus drivers, nurses and cafeteria workers because he was the rich guy willing to “take on the billionaires for working families.”

Mahan, the latest major candidate to enter the race, wasn’t impressed.

“Tom, I’ve got about 3 billion reasons not to trust your answer on that,” he said, an apparent reference to Steyer’s net worth.

Although he supports closing tax loopholes for the wealthy, Mahan said he opposes the billionaire tax because “it will send good, high-paying jobs out of our state, and hard-working families, in the long run, will all pay more taxes for it.”

Money also spoke Tuesday

Although the battle over campaign fundraising didn’t overtly arise during Tuesday’s debate aside from Mahan’s comment about Steyer, it still was getting a lot of attention. Campaign fundraising disclosures became public Monday and Tuesday.

Unsurprisingly, Steyer led the pack with $28.9 million in contributions in 2025, nearly all of it donations that the billionaire spent on his campaign. Other top fundraisers were Porter, who raised $6.1 million; Hilton, who collected $5.7 million; Becerra, who banked $5.2 million; Bianco, who received $3.7 million in contributions; Swalwell’s $3.1 million since entering the race late last year; and Villaraigosa’s $3.2 million, according to documents filed with the California secretary of state’s office.

Money raised and spent by gubernatorial candidates

Bar chart of money raised and spent by the crowded 2026 California gubernatorial race. In 2025, Tom Steyer raised $28.9 million (including loans from himself) but has already spent $27.4 million. Katie Porter, has raised the second most, at $6.1 million

Mahan, who recently entered the race, wasn’t required to file a campaign fundraising disclosure, though he is expected to have notable support from wealthy Silicon Valley tech honchos. Former state Controller Betty Yee and state schools chief Tony Thurmond were among the candidates who raised the least, which spurs questions about their viability in a state of more than 23 million registered voters with some of the most expensive media markets in the nation.

Yee defended her candidacy by pointing to her experience.

“All the polls show that this race is wide open. You know, I think voters have had enough. I’ve been around the state. I’ve spoken to thousands of them,” she said. “Enough of the lies, the broken campaign promises, billionaires trying to run the world. You know, look, I’m the adult in the room. No gimmicks, no nonsense, straight shooter, the woman who gets things done. And we certainly can’t afford a leader who thinks grandstanding is actually governing.”

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News of the lawsuit spread quickly through chat groups of parents of transgender kids, LGBTQ organizations and the broader transgender community. It was the first major action the state has taken against a hospital that had severely limited or ended transgender health services.

Many in the community see this move as a major step towards protecting transgender health, but some still question why the state’s legal claims don’t rest on broader civil rights questions. Instead, the key argument relies on the state’s corporations code — a provision governing business transactions — to try to compel Rady into continuing gender-affirming care.

The claim filed against Rady alleges the health system violated a merger agreement signed last year when Rady took over Children’s Hospital of Orange County and Children’s Hospital of Mission. That agreement requires Rady to maintain existing services, including transgender health care.

“We have anti-discrimination laws on the books. We have legal protection of gender-affirming care on the books. But if Rob Bonta does not feel confident in his ability to win a case on the basis of those laws do we really have those laws?” said Kanan Durham, executive director of Pride at the Pier, an Orange County group organizing opposition to Rady’s announced transgender clinic closure.

Durham said he was in a room full of trans people when the news of the lawsuit broke. People cheered, he said. But many were conflicted about the narrow application of the claim.

California’s civil rights law — the Unruh Civil Rights Act — is the backbone of the state’s guarantee of equal access to transgender health services, which can include puberty blockers, hormones, surgery and therapy, said Megan Noor, a staff attorney at the Transgender Law Center. The law prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. 

Noor said that means, for example, if a hospital offers puberty blockers to a cisgender child who is starting puberty too young, they cannot deny access to that same treatment to a transgender child even if it is for a different purpose, such as giving the child more time to explore their gender identity. 

Other laws require insurers to cover gender-affirming care and protect the privacy of transgender patients and their doctors.

In a press release, Bonta said “We will fight to uphold the law and ensure Californians can access gender-affirming care without facing unfair roadblocks.” His office, in an unsigned statement, said it had no comment on enforcement of the state’s civil rights law.

Ben Metcalf, a spokesperson for Rady Children’s Health, said in a statement that the organization could not comment on pending litigation, but called the decision to shutter gender-affirming care services “very difficult.”

“That decision was guided by our responsibilities as a nonprofit pediatric health care system to continue serving all children and families across our communities, including through participation in essential federal programs,” Metcalf said.

Rady notified parents of transgender children in mid-January that it would be closing its Center for Gender Affirming Care on Feb. 6.

Hospitals under pressure

Over the past year, transgender youth and their parents have watched with growing fear as California’s largest health systems retreated from providing transgender health services to people under the age of 19.

Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles was the first to stop care. Then Stanford Medicine, Kaiser Permanente, Sutter Health and most recently Rady limited or announced plans to terminate care. Sutter had told parents in December that it would stop providing services to their children, but quietly backtracked under fierce public pressure.

Hospitals say their hands were forced by an unfriendly federal government that does not recognize the existence of transgender people. 

On his first day in office, President Donald Trump issued an executive order characterizing transgender health procedures as “chemical and surgical mutilation” and directing agencies to defund any supportive programs. 

Since then his administration has intensified the pressure against health care organizations. Over the summer, federal investigators issued subpoenas to clinics and hospitals around the country, alleging fraud and seeking medical records. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in November published a self-described peer reviewed report “on the medical dangers posed to children” of gender-affirming care.

Rady, in a statement issued prior to the state’s lawsuit, confirmed the Health and Human Services inspector general was investigating the hospital, and said “the environment around gender-affirming care has changed dramatically.” 

The American Medical Association, American Academy of Pediatrics and dozens of independent scientific studies reject the claim that gender-affirming services are harmful to children with gender dysphoria. Instead, they conclude that “trans and non-binary gender identities are normal variations of human identity and expression” and having access to supportive health care positively impacts youth mental health and decreases suicidality.

Most recently, the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is considering proposed rules that would eliminate government funding for hospitals that provide transgender health care to minors. If formalized, the rules would effectively create a near-total national ban on gender-affirming services for young people because nearly all hospitals in the U.S. receive more than 50% of revenue from Medicare and Medicaid payments, according to the American Hospital Association.

Advocates, legal experts and parents say that even with this existential threat hanging over health providers, for now, it’s just that: A threat.

“Nobody needs to stop this care at this point. It is a policy that has been announced. There has not been a law passed, nothing has been finalized,” said Kathie Moehlig, executive director of TransFamily Support Services based in San Diego. “We have to resist.”

Parents and advocates look to leaders to uphold state protections

Bonta has sued the Trump administration multiple times in an effort to protect transgender patient care, but some parents and advocates say his office needs to do more to uphold state law. 

The attorney general must review nonprofit hospital transactions, and can impose conditions to preserve patient care. 

Dannie Ceseña, director of the California LGBTQ Health and Human Services Network, said it was meaningful that Bonta did that in Rady’s merger, adding language protecting gender-affirming and other specialty health services for 10 years. 

“What about all of the other hospitals and families that don’t have this protective clause? They are still violating families’ civil rights. They are still stopping access to care,” Ceseña said. “Why isn’t the attorney general doing more in regards to this issue?”

Last February, the California Department of Justice sent a letter to Children’s Hospital Los Angeles warning that its refusal to serve transgender minors would violate the state’s civil rights law. In July, the hospital permanently closed its transgender health clinic.

Ceseña says he feels the state has been inconsistent in its support of the trans community. He and other LGBTQ advocates expected the state to sue Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and others well before the Rady lawsuit. And specifically, to protect civil rights for trans children. 

“We need to stop with the letters. We need to stop with the announcements. We need to see action,” Ceseña said. “Our kids are suffering.”

Others say it’s significant that the state stepped in at all after months of “despair.”

Arne Johnson, a Bay Area parent and organizer with Rainbow Families Action, acknowledged that many members of the community had “complex feelings” about the  latest lawsuit.

But he said he cried after hearing of the lawsuit against Rady. 

“The thing that is so powerful for so many of us who have been working so hard and crying out for someone to do something is that it’s the first time the state has recognized our children are valid members of society and worthy of protection by the laws of this state,” Johnson said. “That’s all we’ve been asking for.”

Parents are fighting back 

Parents of transgender kids say they have been moved to action by the steady erosion of gender-affirming care in the state. In December, hundreds of Northern California parents protested Sutter Health’s initial decision to stop gender-affirming care.

Last month, more than 600 people rallied outside of Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego while another 100 protested at the system’s affiliate Children’s Hospital of Orange County.

Ceseña said this marks a “huge change” since the start of the Trump administration among families who have transgender children and had previously kept their heads down in hopes that the issue would blow over.

That includes Todd, a San Diego native and father to a 15-year-old transgender boy. He asked to be identified by his middle name only to protect the identity of his son.

Before Rady informed parents it would stop services, Todd hadn’t been too involved in the transgender community. But he attended the protest and is looking to do more; Rady’s decision felt like a “betrayal,” he said.

“It felt like people who said ‘you can trust us’ were now collaborating with the people trying to hurt us,” Todd said. 

Todd’s son came out to his parents when he was 11. He saw a therapist for two years before going to Rady’s where, for more than a year, the family spoke with doctors and counselors to “help him understand himself” and “find the words and language to explain to himself what he was feeling.” 

The process looks different for every child and family, Todd said. Some kids think surgery is important to them, while others don’t; some want puberty blockers and hormone therapy, while others just want to be in an environment that is supportive. The process – broadly supported by the American Academy of Pediatrics and other leading medical societies – is often lengthy and involves the whole family, Todd said.

“If you’re not dealing with it personally, you don’t have to know those details, but what you do have to do is allow doctors and families to do the correct things to make their families healthy,” he said. 

Todd said he’s optimistic the state’s lawsuit will help Southern California families and build momentum.

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The administration has hailed the project by Houston-based Sable Offshore Corp. to restart production in waters off Santa Barbara damaged by a 2015 oil spill as the kind of project President Donald Trump wants to increase U.S. energy production.

The state oversees the pipelines that run through Santa Barbara and Kern counties, said Democratic Attorney General Rob Bonta.

“The federal administration has no right to usurp California’s regulatory authority,” he said at a news conference. “We’re taking them to court to draw a line in the sand and to protect our coast, beaches and communities from potentially hazardous pipelines.”

But the U.S. Transportation Department agency that approved Sable’s plan pushed back on the lawsuit.

“Restarting the Las Flores Pipeline will bring much needed American energy to a state with the highest gas prices in the country,” said a spokesperson with the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

Sable did not respond for comment on the lawsuit.

Trump signed an executive order on the first day of his second term to reverse former President Joe Biden’s ban on future offshore oil drilling on the East and West coasts. A federal court later struck down Biden’s order to withdraw 625 million acres of federal waters from oil development.

The federal administration in November announced plans for new offshore oil drilling off the California and Florida coasts, which the oil industry has backed for years.

But critics say the plans could harm coastal communities and ecosystems.

Bonta said one of the pipelines Sable wants to restart burst in 2015, spilling oil along the Southern California coast. The event was the state’s worst oil spill in decades. More than 140,000 gallons (3,300 barrels) of oil gushed out, blackening beaches for 150 miles (240 kilometers) from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles. It polluted a biologically rich habitat for endangered whales and sea turtles, killing scores of pelicans, seals and dolphins, and decimating the fishing industry.

The drilling platforms were subsequently shuttered.

Sable has faced a slew of legal challenges but has said it is determined to restart production, even if that means confining it to federal waters, where state regulators have virtually no say. California controls the 3 miles (5 kilometers) nearest to shore. The platforms are 5 to 9 miles (8 to 14 kilometers) offshore.

“It’s crazy that we are even talking about restarting this pipeline,” said Alex Katz, executive director of the Environmental Defense Center, a Santa Barbara group formed in response to a catastrophic 1969 California oil spill.

The federal government’s approval to restart the pipelines ignores painful lessons the community learned from the 2015 oil spill, said California Assemblymember Gregg Hart, a Democrat representing Santa Barbara.

“California will not allow Trump and his Big Oil friends to bypass our essential environmental laws and threaten our coastline,” he said in a statement.

California has been reducing the state’s production of fossil fuels in favor of clean energy for years. The movement has been spearheaded partly by Santa Barbara County, where elected officials voted in May to begin taking steps to phase out onshore oil and gas operations.

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His comments indicate that if Biden gives into calls to step aside, the California governor will not challenge Harris, a front-runner in conversations about who should replace the president on the November ballot, if she seeks the nomination.

“Of course,” Newsom said when asked whether he stood by comments he made last year about not running against Harris. “Yes.”

Newsom’s vow would avoid a potentially ugly political battle for the party and its donors. Newsom and Harris rose up in Bay Area politics to become the state’s two most prominent elected officials. As vice president and Biden’s 2020 running mate, Harris would be the presumed Democratic front-runner to lead the ticket if called upon.

Newsom reaffirmed his stance during a news conference about California’s wildfire response at Sacramento McClellan Airport after returning from a swing-state tour on behalf of the Biden campaign.

Newsom campaigned for Biden in New Hampshire and Michigan as part of his effort to shore up support for the president after his poor debate performance against former President Trump in Atlanta in late June. The governor, who attended the debate as a surrogate for Biden, has attempted to swat down concerns about the president’s mental capacity and attested to the president’s abilities based on their personal interactions.

He’s continued to back Biden even as other Democrats question his ability to run.

On Wednesday, Newsom said he hadn’t read the full breadth of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s comments about Biden on MSNBC that morning.

“It’s up to the president to decide if he is going to run,” Rep. Pelosi (D-San Francisco) said. “We’re all encouraging him to make that decision because time is running short.”

Newsom said he had also not read an opinion piece written by actor George Clooney calling for a Democrat to replace Biden.

Biden repeatedly has said he intends to remain in the race and even challenged Democrats who think they can beat him to step up.

“I think I’ve had 100 media outlets asking the same question, and I think that I’ve amply answered my support for the president and the support I saw on the ground was demonstrable,” Newsom said Wednesday.

He referenced Biden’s support for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and compared the president with Trump, who Newsom said “didn’t even know what NATO was.”

In the past, he’s said the vice president would be naturally lined up to run if Biden ended his campaign. In New Hampshire, Newsom said he thought Harris could beat Trump.

“I have no doubt about that,” Newsom told reporters. “If it comes to that, but I don’t expect it’s going to come to that.”

Staff writers Noah Bierman and Seema Mehta contributed to this report.

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