Democratic leaders, the 2025 game plan is this: Make California Affordable Again | Opinion
As we turn the calendar into a new year, my unsolicited advice for Democratic leaders in Sacramento is to print up some hats with this slogan emblazoned on them:
Make California Affordable Again.
Yes, it is a blatant rip-off of MAGA sloganeering. But putting such a mantra atop the foreheads of Democrats in the Assembly, state Senate and even the governor’s mansion (though Gov. Newsom has moved his family to Marin County) might get the political leaders to actually work on this defining issue.
And it might just keep them in office longer than ignoring or avoiding the elephant in the room, namely how it costs too much to live in California.
Two recent news reports highlight why the famous James Carville line of the Clinton-era — “It’s the economy, stupid” — must become the top priority of California’s leaders, even more than opposing whatever policies soon-to-be President Trump puts in place.
The San Jose Mercury News analyzed the Bay Area’s voting patterns in the November presidential election. What the analysis showed was that the lowest-income cities in the Bay Area — San Pablo, Richmond, Antioch, Oakland, San Leandro, Pittsburg and East Palo Alto — “all tallied at least 50% more Trump votes in 2024, while the highest-income cities and towns showed the least change overall.”
To be sure, Democrat Kamala Harris was the overall winner in the Bay Area, long recognized as a liberal stronghold. But gains for Trump and the GOP were notable.
Mike Madrid, the Sacramento Republican consultant who studies voting patterns among Latinos in particular, told The Mercury News that such results are about one thing: the cost of living.
“Overwhelmingly, this is an affordability issue,” he said. “It’s not a jobs issue, it’s not a taxes issue, it’s not your standard Republican perspective on the economy.”
California’s affordability crisis
Madrid’s comments support what he has just posted on his Substack blog off a poll he helped conduct.
He was joined by polling firm David Binder Research to learn what Latino voters are thinking in the aftermath of Trump winning back the White House.
As reported by Sacramento Bee staff writer Andrew Sheeler, Madrid and Binder surveyed 600 Latino California voters, in English and Spanish, by phone and online, between Nov. 18-21.
The findings? Affordability was a top issue for California Latino voters. They were either extremely or very concerned about the price of housing (86%), groceries (87%), gas (75%), and electricity and utilities (80%). Another 74% were extremely or very concerned about high taxes in California.
“Nearly everyone surveyed (90%) said they were extremely or very concerned about the price of everything,” Sheeler reported. “That’s more than homelessness (86%), immigration (71%), jobs (81%), crime (87%) or climate change (63%).”
Democrats face cost challenges
That last point is critical. Trump is about to embark on large-scale deportations of undocumented people, which will have a major impact in California. Trump also promised in his campaign to undo actions President Biden took to reduce oil dependency and electrify the nation to reduce greenhouse gases. Already Newsom is promising to offer buyers of electric vehicles in California a $1,500 tax rebate if Trump does away with that at the federal level.
Any of those headline-grabbing issues could easily distract statehouse Democrats away from the pocketbook concerns that Madrid found to be uppermost among the state’s Latinos.
They aren’t the only group burdened by high prices; everyone feels it. California continues to have the nation’s second-most expensive gasoline. Only Hawaii beats the Golden State for gas costs.
There is also the price of electricity as charged by Pacific Gas and Electric. As Sacramento Bee staff writer Ari Plachta notes in a recent story: “PG&E’s average residential electricity rate is $0.397 per kilowatt-hour, higher than San Diego Gas & Electric’s $0.383 and Southern California Edison’s $0.338. The utility’s customers pay about 80% more than the national average.”
Then there is the biggest expense: housing. California has the nation’s second-most expensive housing market, behind only Hawaii. Writer Eric McConnell reported the state’s median home price crossing the $900,000 mark in early 2024. McConnell recalled how there once was a time in California when teachers, firefighters, police officers “and working people could buy a $200,000 house with FHA financing and only put $6,000 down.”
Here is another data point to consider: Trump did not win Fresno County in 2016 or 2020. But he did this past November, getting 50.8% of the votes. Fresno County is the center of the San Joaquin Valley, one of the lowest-income regions in the nation.
Newsom is a Democrat, as are all of the state’s other executive officers. Both the Assembly and state Senate are in Democratic supermajorities. Whether a red tide toward the GOP continues in coming years remains to be seen.
But the voters’ messaging is unmistakable for whichever party is ruling in Sacramento: Make California Affordable Again.
