GOP proposal for splitting California into two states is dead on arrival | Opinion

If you’re a resident in the San Joaquín Valley, what isn’t there to like about Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher’s two state plan to cleave the eastern part of California into a separate state? It would leave Fresno as the largest city – and possibly the capitol – of the yet-unnamed new state.

“The people of inland California have been overlooked for too long,” Gallagher said in a statement before his Wednesday press conference to tell the world he has come up with a surefire way to offset Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to ask voters to approve mid-decade congressional maps in response to Texas’ plan to add five GOP-leaning seats at President Donald Trump’s request. “It’s time for a two-state solution.”

Gallagher would have better luck asking Newsom to switch parties. There are dozens of reasons Fresnans won’t wake up one morning and find themselves residents of Trumpfornia or West Texas.

First, it would be easier to get the sun to rise in the west than passing the bill in a Democratic-controlled Legislature and delivering it for Newsom’s signature.

Second, such a move would need the consent of Congress. There’s no telling how easy that approval would be granted in a fractured House of Representatives.

Gallagher and his Republican colleagues – who hold only 19 of 79 seats in the Assembly and 10 of 40 in the state Senate – would be more productive building strategies to gain more seats instead of resorting to pipedreams.

“Gavin, let my people go,” said Gallagher during a 20-minute press conference Wednesday in Sacramento to announce AJR 23, the bill that would create two states. His call echoes what Moses told the Egyptian pharoah when the Israelites were stuck in slavery.

Gallagher, whose district lies just north of Sacramento, outlined his grievances against the Democratic-run state: too little water for farming, the introduction of wolves that has caused headaches for cattle ranchers, the effort to get diesel truck owners to switch to more clean electric engines, high housing costs, the country’s highest utility rates and high cost of gasoline.

“These are the people that have been forgotten, and that I have long been a voice for in this Legislature,” said Gallagher, who said Democrats “don’t care about those people and they don’t care because they don’t have to.”

The two-state proposal, said Gallagher, will give inland county residents representation and self-determination.

Orange County, a GOP stronghold that has turned purple, would not be included with the inland counties. Gallagher said the map is not set in stone and that the county could be added. However, that would leave San Diego County as an island.

Gallagher has no name for the new state, but said that is not important right now.

How the two states match up

If – that’s a big IF – Gallagher gets his way, all California counties that voted for Trump in 2024 would be part of the new state. The Kamala Harris-supporting counties of Alpine and Mono would also be part of the new state.

The coastal counties would have a population of 28.3 million based on the 2024 Census estimates. That would make it the second-largest state by population in the country, behind Texas’ 31 million. That would qualify it for 38 congressional seats.

The inland counties, which would not include Sacramento or Yolo, would have a population of 11.2 million, making it the ninth-largest state behind Georgia. It would have 14 congressional seats.

A major problem is that the coastal state would still generate the biggest chunk of California’s gross domestic product, a key indicator of the state’s economic health. Of the state’s $4.1 trillion GDP, the coastal counties account for more than $2.9 trillion. That figure would still lead all the states.

The inland counties generate $1.17 trillion in GDP, which would still rank among the top 10 states. However, pockets of poverty in the Central Valley and the Inland Empire would remain.

Gallagher is not the first person to ask that California be split. There have been at least 220 attempts to split the state since it gained statehood in 1850, according to state records.

In 1859, Assemblymember Andrés Pico wanted the counties south of Big Sur be lumped into the Territory of Colorado because the region’s residents were overtaxed and underrepresented. His proposal was approved, but the Civil War nixed that plan.

Gallagher’s stunt shouldn’t get as far as Pico’s plan. His anger should be pointed at Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for groveling to Trump’s request for five additional Republican-leaning congressional districts.