WASHINGTON- THE rivalry between California and Florida hit a record high in November 2023 when Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, faced off against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, on Fox News. on which state had a better model for the country.
Thirteen months later, DeSantis left the national stage after an abortive presidential campaign. But his state is winning the political war.
The nation led by President-elect Donald Trump will look a lot more like Trump’s adopted state of Florida after he defeated Vice President Kamala Harris painting it as a disconnected California liberal.
Trump is filling his cabinet with Floridians. And his plans to reverse California’s policies on the environment, crime, homelessness and education are meeting far less resistance than during his first term, thanks to the state’s waning influence in Congress and to a system of checks on Trump’s power that has eroded.
“These are all people born and raised in our state who are going to show America our type of leadership,” said Brian Ballard, a powerful Florida lobbyist and Republican fundraiser whose firm previously employed the new chief. of Trump’s cabinet, Susie Wiles, and still employs. his nominee for attorney general, Pam Bondi, former attorney general of Florida. (Ballard’s expanded presence now includes offices in Washington and West Los Angeles, opened two years ago, another sign of his state’s incursion.)
Other high-profile Floridians likely to be part of Trump’s inner circle include Sen. Marco Rubio, Trump’s pick for secretary of state, and Rep. Mike Waltz, his pick for national security adviser.
Two prominent figures in Trump’s orbit with ties to California, advisers Elon Musk and Stephen Miller, are sharply critical of the state’s trade and immigration policies, which they have pledged to help Trump reverse .
Their unified efforts are expected to spark a continuation of the fights that began eight years ago during Trump’s first term, when he sought to end California policies providing sanctuary to immigrants who arrived in the country illegally and roll back his authority in defining environmental policies such as automobile fuel. standards, change water policy to benefit farmers and suspend aid after forest fires.
He was thwarted in many of his efforts by regulators, advisers who found ways to change his mind, the courts and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the San Francisco Democrat who proved his most formidable adversary.
Democratic attorneys general filed a record 155 lawsuits against the first Trump administration, winning 83% of the cases, according to a tally by Paul Nolette, a political science professor at Marquette University. California has been involved in more than 100 such lawsuits.
But Trump has chosen staffers for his second term who are less likely to oppose his wishes. The Supreme Court has become more deferential to Trump, who nominated three of its nine members. And Pelosi no longer leads her party, as Republicans took control of the House and Senate in last month’s elections.
California Democrats’ best defense appears to be Republican dysfunction, as demonstrated by the party’s struggles last week to pass a bill in the Republican-controlled House that would avert a government shutdown.
Trump, meanwhile, has vowed to fight the state this time on a variety of fronts, including its anti-homeless policies, resistance to the border wall, electric car mandate and plans to begin mass deportations that would disproportionately affect California, a border state. with the largest Latino population in the country.
Newsom, who declined an interview request, vowed to continue the fight against Trump’s policies, but without what he calls “a brand of resistance” that defined his previous clashes. Other Democrats have approached Trump’s second term with more conciliatory rhetoric, as the party struggles to unite around a strategy.
Former Sen. Barbara Boxer, a Democrat who helped define the party’s liberal wing for decades, says Trump will invite his own backlash by going too far.
“Go ahead,” she said.
“People just decided they weren’t happy with certain things,” she added. “They didn’t vote on the issues that are now going to hit them in the face,” she said, citing a list of policies from Trump allies that could lead to a loss of overtime for workers and a loss of breathable air for residents.
But even if Trump’s policies help Democrats politically, they could have a profound impact on Californians.
Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, who began preparing possible lawsuits months before the election, said he expects to confront the new administration on immigration, climate, reproductive rights, gun safety fire, issues related to democracy and civil rights. He acknowledged the Supreme Court’s rightward shift, but emphasized that most decisions are made by trial and circuit court judges.
“We can and will win, and we won our case before the United States Supreme Court,” he said.
Bonta, who plans to run for governor in 2026, argued that voters were choosing Trump as the man — narrowly — rather than the model of single-state government.
“The Florida model? Do you mean Matt Gaetz or DeSantis or Pam Bondi? he said, referring to the former House member who stepped down as attorney general following allegations of sexual misconduct with minors, alongside the governor and current nominee for attorney general. Attorney General. “I don’t think they are a model for the future of our country. country. What is the Florida Model? “Don’t say gay” – just absolutely exclusive and discriminatory? A formal program sending immigrants across the country as political pawns?
But Bonta and other Democrats admit that the party just lost an election and that Trump, even though he lost California by 20 percentage points, gained about 10 percentage points from his 2016 and 2020 margins. in this state.
Much of that growth has come from the state’s Latino population, which makes up much of the traditional Democratic working-class base.
“It’s all about affordability. California is the least affordable state when you factor in housing costs,” said Mike Madrid, an anti-Trump Republican pollster who conducted surveys of Latino voters after the election and focused about how their opinions have evolved over decades. “The idea of Californian values is specific to cultural issues. This is essentially ignoring economic issues.
Madrid cited policies such as Newsom’s plan to phase out sales of new gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035 as an example of a policy that doesn’t speak to working-class voters.
Most Latinos in the state have to live farther from their jobs, due to high housing costs, and pay more for gas, but they can’t afford a new electric vehicle or qualify for a rebate. the Biden administration. The majority of their income goes towards housing costs, which have risen in part because of costly building regulations.
New census estimates released Thursday show that California gained 232,570 residents between 2023 and 2024 after the pandemic-era decline. But the state lost more residents (239,575) to other parts of the country than any other state, and saw an increase solely because of immigrants from other countries, according to the most recent estimates.
Florida saw one of the largest population increases, with 467,347 additional residents, including both immigrants and domestic migrants.
Long-embattled California Republicans are rejoicing, promising to work with Trump to dismantle Democratic-led projects and environmental regulations.
Rep. Vince Fong, a Bakersfield Republican who won election to succeed former Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy earlier this year, said he would introduce legislation to halt funding for California’s high-speed rail project and would work with Trump to build a border wall in the state. , blaming a porous border for allowing fentanyl smuggling from China.
In an interview, he effusively hailed Florida as a better model in business, regulation, environmental policy and housing costs and praised the state’s influence nationally.
“It’s ironic to me that Governor Newsom and Democrats in the state legislature are now concerned about affordability,” he said. “You hear them talk about it, but those are their policies.”
He accused Newsom of waging a war against Florida and the Trump administration for his own personal gain.
“He’s trying to rise for his own political purposes and at the expense of Californians,” he said.
Newsom’s office said the state remains the world’s fifth-largest economy and ranks first in private-sector business and job creation. Brandon Richards, a spokesman, said Newsom was traveling the state to increase economic opportunity.
But many of the nation’s biggest business titans are making their own pilgrimage — to visit Trump at his home in Florida.