California Democrats in Full-Blown Panic Mode as Republican Sweep Looms in Governor’s Race

The unthinkable is happening in deep-blue California: Democrats are staring down the barrel of total elimination from their own governor’s race, and party leadership has erupted into desperate pleas for candidates to abandon ship before it’s too late.

California Democratic Party chair Rusty Hicks fired off an emergency open letter Tuesday that reads like a white flag of surrender, frantically begging his party’s candidates to drop out immediately. The reason? Two formidable Republican candidates—former Fox News host Steve Hilton and ex-Riverside Sheriff Chad Bianco—are positioned to capture both slots in the state’s top-two primary system, potentially locking Democrats out of the November general election entirely.

Let that sink in. In California—the supposed progressive fortress of American politics.

The Democratic Clown Car Problem

The Democrats’ predicament is entirely self-inflicted. Nine separate Democratic candidates are cannibalizing each other’s support while Republicans have consolidated around two strong contenders who actually connect with voters fed up with California’s decline.

Hicks’ letter amounts to a public admission that his party’s bench is embarrassingly weak and fatally divided. “First, so much is at stake in our Nation and so many are counting on the leadership of California Democrats to stand up and speak out at this historic moment,” Hicks wrote with barely concealed desperation.

Translation: We’re about to lose California, and we have no idea how to stop it.

The polling tells the brutal story. Hilton leads the packed field, with Democratic Rep. Katie Porter trailing and Bianco surging in third. The remaining Democratic candidates—a rogues’ gallery of failed politicians and bureaucratic retreads—are drowning in single digits.

A Roster of Democrat Losers

Consider the Democratic lineup that has Hicks begging for withdrawals:

Former Attorney General Xavier Becerra is polling at a pathetic 5% despite his name recognition. Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, recycled from past failures, can’t break through. Rep. Eric Swalwell—yes, the congressman who had a relationship with a suspected Chinese spy—thinks Californians want him running the state.

Billionaire activist Tom Steyer is trying to buy the race and failing spectacularly. Former State Controller Betty Yee, San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, Superintendent of Schools Tony Thurmond, and former assemblymember Ian Calderon are all statistical noise, each registering 5% or less in the latest Public Policy Institute of California survey.

This isn’t a primary field. It’s a vanity project convention where ego trumps electoral reality.

Christine Pelosi Sounds the Alarm

Even Christine Pelosi, Democratic Party activist and daughter of Nancy Pelosi, has broken through the polite veneer to scream the obvious truth. “GET REAL,” she posted on X, warning that “9 Democrats risk handing top 2 slots to Republicans in June.”

When a Pelosi is publicly panicking about California going Republican, you know the Democratic Party is in genuine crisis.

The Top-Two System Backfires Spectacularly

Democrats championed California’s top-two primary system as a way to moderate politics and reduce partisanship. Now that very system threatens to obliterate them from the state’s most important race.

Under California’s jungle primary rules, all candidates compete on a single ballot regardless of party, and the top two vote-getters advance to November—even if they’re from the same party. Democrats assumed this would always work in their favor in a blue state.

They never imagined their party would fracture so completely while Republicans united behind quality candidates offering real solutions to California’s mounting crises.

Newsom’s Cowardly Dodge

Perhaps most telling is Gov. Gavin Newsom’s refusal to wade into the mess. On Monday, the outgoing governor—who clearly has presidential ambitions—absurdly claimed he “hasn’t taken a look” at the race to succeed him.

“I honestly haven’t taken a look, nor do I think the public has,” Newsom told reporters while pushing his failing CARE court program for mentally ill criminals.

This is transparent political cowardice. Newsom knows his endorsement could be the kiss of death in a state where voters are rejecting everything he represents: skyrocketing housing costs, rampant homelessness, crushing regulations, failing schools, and exploding crime.

What a Republican Victory Would Mean

Hicks admits in his letter that losing the governorship would cripple Democrats nationally. “California’s leadership on the world stage is significantly harder if a Democrat is not elected as our next Governor,” he wrote.

He’s right to be terrified. A Republican governor in California would represent a seismic political realignment—proof that even the bluest states will reject progressive policies when they produce catastrophic results.

Hicks also warned that two Republicans on the November ballot would devastate Democratic turnout, potentially costing his party House seats and making it “harder for Democrats to recapture the House of Representatives.”

The March 6 Deadline Looms

With the March 6 filing deadline approaching, Hicks is begging candidates to “honestly assess” their odds and get out if they can’t win.

But here’s the problem: Politicians driven by ego rarely make honest assessments. They see the fragmented field and convince themselves they can thread the needle. They’d rather risk handing the state to Republicans than admit they’re not the chosen one.

The Democratic establishment created this monster by failing to coalesce around a strong candidate early. Now they’re reduced to public begging and barely veiled threats as the clock runs out.

A Wake-Up Call Democrats Won’t Answer

This California meltdown should serve as a warning to Democrats nationwide: Voters are done with incompetence, corruption, and failed ideology masquerading as compassion.

Steve Hilton and Chad Bianco represent something California hasn’t seen in years—leaders willing to challenge the progressive orthodoxy that’s destroyed the state’s quality of life. Hilton brings media savvy and policy depth. Bianco offers law enforcement credibility and no-nonsense leadership.

Meanwhile, Democrats offer the same tired faces peddling the same failed solutions that created California’s exodus of families and businesses.

The March 6 deadline will reveal whether Democrats can overcome their dysfunction. But the real deadline already passed—it was the moment California voters decided they’d had enough of progressive failure.

And no desperate letter from Rusty Hicks can change that political reality.